Monumental neurosis: Taj is India's heritage

Controversial Uttar Pradesh BJP legislator Sangeet Som unwittingly shot himself in the foot when he said that the man who built the Taj Mahal had imprisoned his father, and such a man can’t be accepted. Mr Som was wrongly referring to Aurangzeb, who had imprisoned his father Shah Jahan in the course of the war of succession, as the builder of the Taj. Predictably, Mr Som’s history is not just inaccurate but a little gobbled as well. Politicians in general believe in saying the provocative thing, and let the facts be damned. But his remarks have predictably become the proverbial red rag to those vehemently opposed to the BJP’s Hindutva ideology. So AIMIM leader Asaduddin Owaisi stepped into the pit and asked sarcastically whether Prime Minister Narendra Modi would continue to unfurl the tricolour from Delhi’s Red Fort, another iconic Mughal monument. It may be better to let Mr Som and Mr Owaisi fight for their 15 minutes of fame, which is all that television allows.

The man who wantonly walked into the slush was BJP spokesman G.V.L. Narasimha Rao, who didn’t confine himself to making the political statement that Mr Som’s views didn’t reflect that of the party, which is what the seasoned politician and Congress migrant to the BJP, a member of Yogi Adityanath’s government, did. Besides resorting to the now-familiar rant about the Leftist distortion of Indian history, forgetting that Leftist history is neither dominant nor fashionable, Mr Rao almost endorsed Mr Som by saying: “There have been attempts to distort Indian history. It’s a symbol of barbarism and it’s a monument.” Unless he is being misquoted, Mr Rao is saying the Taj Mahal is a symbol of barbarism. It’s possible he may have wanted to say distortion of Indian history is barbaric and that it’s monumental. But it doesn’t appear that Mr Rao’s statement can be sanitised and rationalised as his next line is: “I will say what I have to say”. And it’s only after this defiant stance that he remembers his obligation to be a sober and responsible party spokesman: “As far as Som is concerned, he has freedom of speech. That is his personal view, there needn’t be a party line on every statement.” Of course, no senior BJP leader will rap Mr Som on the knuckles. They feel it is electorally useful to keep the Hindutva kettle boiling.

There is of course the more serious problem of the attitude of right-wing Hindus, many of them beyond the Sangh Parivar. It is a rejection of the dominance, influence and impact of Turks, Afghans and Iranians from the end of the 12th century Common Era (CE) to the end of the 18th century on India. There is sneaking admiration as well as resentment for Turko-Afghan-Iranian achievements, specially architectural monuments, besides governmental structures and systems, food and fashion, music, poetry and manners. But these achievements were possible only in the Indian ambience as the Turks, Afghans and Iranians have not achieved the subtle balance in worldview in their homelands that they were able to evolve in India. The Taj Mahal is a sublime Indian expression of the Turko-Afghan-Iranian genius. The Taj was built in Agra, not in Kabul, Isfahan or Tashkent. But it must also be remembered that the Turks, Iranians and Afghans achieved their peaks of glory after they converted to Islam. Islam fired up the imagination of these people, and one of its legacies can be seen in the shaping of medieval India. Hindus in medieval India didn’t feel this sense of inferiority that today’s Hindu right-wingers feel so acutely in relation to Islam and to Turkish-Iranian-Afghan Muslim rulers and elites of India.

It would be useful if the right-wing Hindus looked at the “Hindu” achievements in Angkor Wat in Cambodia, the gentle Hindu culture in Bali, and the indirect impact of India’s Buddhism in Sri Lanka, Myanmar, Thailand, Korea and Japan. Cambodians did not reject Angkor War out of cultural pique that it was an expression of Hindu symbolism. But they realised that Angkor Wat belongs to Cambodia and not to India. There is nothing comparable to Angkor Wat in India, and it can even be said it could not have ever happened in India. Angkor Wat is an expression of Cambodian genius. And the Hindu right-wingers should never make the mistake of claiming cultural suzerainty over Southeast Asia that they are in the habit of doing. The Ramayanas of Thailand and Indonesia are their own and don’t belong to India. Contemporary Turks, Iranians and Afghans don’t make any cultural claims to the imposing mosques, mausoleums and townships of medieval India.

Hindu right-wingers in the Sangh Parivar and outside need to overcome their inferiority complex, that compels them to resent the Turkish-Iranian-Afghan past of India. It is a form of cultural neurosis to turn away from 800 years of your own history. Even if Hindu right-wingers find it difficult to accept Islam as part of the Indian ethos because of their own inner demons, they must realise it is dangerous to disown a part of your own collective self. It would be a folly to disown democracy, the Constitution, science and technology as in their present form they are cultural imports, but have all grown Indian roots. It needs maturity, both cultural and political, on the part of Hindu right-wingers to accept Islam, Muslims, and the Turkish-Iranian-Afghan elites, peoples and their ways as an inalienable part of Indian civilisation and culture. Hindu right-wingers need not be liberal secularists, and they should not be. But from their prejudiced perch, they should take in the whole panorama of India, which includes the Islamic heritage. It just needs a little bit of intellectual and moral courage on the part of the Hindutva brigade to feel proud of the Taj Mahal as a part of India’s heritage.