Search

The arguments of this book have so far stressed the importance of ideologies and languages of politics in generating ideas about nation and community. These languages of politics suggest that it is difficult to talk of a single Congress ‘party’, working and behaving according to a single coherent set of principles. If the ‘secular’ Congress was able to accommodate the Arya Samaj so easily, it is more appropriate to study the Congress in terms of its multifarious membership. Any study of Hindu nationalism and its relationship to ‘communalism’ must also discuss the role and ideas of these individual politicians. There has been ambivalence in historical writing about the relative importance of leaders, communal or otherwise, and their manipulation of religious rhetoric. The gears of communal conflict, it has been argued, were lubricated by competition over social and political resources, rather than the deliberate manipulation of religious symbols, or institutional alliances such as those that existed between the Congress and Arya Samaj. It has been seen that the cloth boycotts and untouchable uplift movement of civil disobedience bore a relationship to Hindu–Muslim conflict in Agra, Banaras, Allahabad, Kanpur, Lucknow and a host of smaller towns. In these situations, both competition for space and resources and political ideologies played their part. Untouchable uplift, for example, raised questions of political representation and power, as well as the symbolic and emotional significance of a rejuvenated and unified ‘Hindu community’. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In attempting to investigate the nature and operation of symbolic communication in north India, it is useful to locate a historical point at which local and national politics intersected. In Uttar Pradesh, one such moment of intersection was the urban and rural protests of 1930–4. The civil disobedience movement of this period is regarded as the second period of mass nationalist protest in India, following the non-cooperation of 1920–2. It was built upon long and careful preparation throughout 1929. Civil disobedience aimed to create mass enthusiasm for the nation and the propagation of the main political issue of ‘purna swaraj’ (perfect freedom) was achieved in practice by the transformation of local protests on the basis of an India-wide nationalist symbolism. This symbolism and nationalist imagery were an answer to the political divergence of differentiated local and provincial interest groups. The salt tax issue was the first and most famous example, but throughout 1930–4 other symbolic themes arose as part of a planned campaign which linked the activities of district Congress workers with negotiations at the centre. Localised disputes and grievances were harnessed, facilitated by the effects of economic depression. Congress workers in UP visited pockets of rural and urban discontent, where specific complaints were varied – ranging from disputes over landownership or rents to licences for markets or processions. The tactics used to harness local grievances very often aimed to restrain and check as much as to develop militancy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

the rallying of all communities under the banner of independence will automatically remove all obstacles in the way of a satisfactory solution of all communal questions The religious rhetoric, language and organisation highlighted in chapter 2 showed how a number of UP Congressmen made a subtle but decisive connection between the Indian nation and the experience of being a ‘Hindu’. For some Congressmen, this was simply an unspoken assumption. For others, Hinduism contained a natural toleration and inclusiveness that facilitated national unification and cultural and religious absorption. A sense of ‘Hindu unity’ was part of a foundation myth – based upon less concrete, but broad principles of assimilation. There was a qualitative difference between this broad array of positions within the UP Congress and the ‘hard’ ideology of the 1930s' Hindu Mahasabha of Savarkar which explicitly set out the connection between ‘Hindutva’ (Hindu-ness) and the nation. However, it is apparent that UP Muslims noticed associations between sections of the UP Congress and the Hindu Mahasabha. There were key points of contact, particularly in notions of the ‘secular’ nation as a solution for India's societal diversity. Indeed, as the words of Nehru above suggest, for many the future state as imagined by the Congress, perhaps through the engine of ‘Hindu’ civilisational toleration, would put a final end to all communalism. The interplay and relationships between ideological positions and political languages concerning the ‘Hindu’ were subtle, as the last chapter set out. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Maritime trade in Asia antedates early modern history. During the fifteenth century, intrepid Chinese mariners and ships sailed into the Indian Ocean. Chinese produce was sold in Indian ports and shipped into the Red Sea, Persian Gulf or along the east African coast. By the end of the fifteenth century, Ming China's official interest in these commercial and political links with India and the Indian Ocean had collapsed. Maritime trade between China and India was sustained by junk traders sailing, principally, to Malacca and other ports in the South China Sea. At Malacca, the Chinese encountered and traded with other Asian merchants who frequented that port. The Asian, Chinese, Indian, Arabian, Malay and non-Malay indigenous merchants who traded at Malacca met on the periphery of one geographical region in which the Chinese perceived themselves dominant. Those Chinese merchants did not concern themselves over the commercial and religious penetration by Islamic traders and missionaries throughout the Indonesian archipelago. Neither were they particularly preoccupied with the competitive commercial activities of the Malay and non-Malay indigenous merchants. Sinocentric attitudes led the Chinese merchants to ignore the maritime and commercial acumen of the many merchants of the Indian Ocean who were present at Malacca. The Indian Ocean and the South China Sea are terms recently created by geographers to delineate the physical boundaries between three regions, the Indian sub-continent, Southeast Asia and China. Asian and European merchants of the early modern period would not recognise the Indian Ocean and the South China Sea as those terms are currently used. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]