Going on 60, still together.. what unites India?

karthik_mitta

The profusion of caste, class, culture and religion offers Indians enough reasons to stand divided. But we dont.

60 years ago, when we were set free, the great Winston Churchill, known for his grasp on history, said: "India will fall back quite rapidly through the centuries into the barbarism and privations of the Middle Ages". Well, he was horribly wrong.

So, what keeps India united?

- Shared sense of identity
- Extreme form of democracy
- Secular tradition with religious freedom
- The Indian ruling elite
- Or just the sheer differences

The list may go on.. but its such a wonder. We continue to be united, have a common currency, a central supreme court, a consitituion...

As we celebrate India's 60 years of freedom, I wonder what keeps us together. What do you think?

Happy Independence day!

**This post is a reflection of the question and essays in India Today (Aug 20th, 2007). I have used extracts from the book and wanted to know how IM community would react to it...

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KM

In the process of gaining our rightful place, we must not be guilty of wrongful deeds - Martin Luther King Jr.

shashank.aggarwal

I guess it the combination of every factor...with most important being - Secular tradition with religious freedom.

This is the factor that doesn't let the hatred and differences crop up...

I know that as this thread progresses there will be many members who will criticize and argue, but end of the we are still together..

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blackbird

I thought India only remained united to annoy Pakistan!

For me it is the shared sense of identity.... if there wasn't this sense of being Indian which predominates in the vast majority of states, surely it would have split into separate nations long ago, as Yugoslavia did not long after Tito's death.

I wish that over here, we could have a similar sense of being European.... I guess some European nations do, but here it seems like we can't be English and European at the same time, like you can be (for example) Tamil and Indian. Yet when I visited the USA I realised for the first time how European I was, how we have many things in common with our neighbours that we don't share with the Americans.

rangers

batistuta

If there was an Option, None of the above, I would have chosen that. I don't know what actually keeps this country together.

iloveindia1234

What keeps India together..this question is very difficult question to answer....There is a lot of difference in culture, religion etc in different states of India. North is different from south and east is different from west. Be it North or south, there are differences as you move across states..
but i guess when it comes to the country all all united...
When there is a match with pakistan , all want them beaten. This is just one of the few examples i am givin to say that the opinion is same when it comes to the country.

karthik_mitta

Not really....

Very well said, BB.. I am inclined to believe it is the shared sense of identity too... very well put.


Oh, I am sure you dont.. thats the quest.

For a minute when I was posting, I even thought I will add Cricket as an option However, it did not seem to fit the scheme of things... But, I agree.. Cricket is one common thread, irrespective of where in India you are!!

Let's see what other IMers have to say... surprised that not many have an opinion.

Nick-H

It's said that the greatest uniting force is a common enemy.

Imagine how bad the Brits must have been that India remains united sixty years later!

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T.I.P

I do not think India is united!!

If united is something to talk about in terms of physical boundaries, then yes.. congrats.. india is united.

But the differences as mentioned :

The profusion of caste, class, culture and religion offers Indians enough reasons to stand divided.

We are indeed divided!!

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karthik_mitta

T.I.P you are missing the whole point.. actually you are not even seeing it.

The point is we are divided.. and yet united. "Unity in diversity" demonstrated at its best ...
read: we still have one country, one currency, one consitution et el.. and the question is "what is the common thread..?"

maybe too complicated, oh well.. I guess I am allowed to get complicated once in a while

Nick-H

I think T.I.P's point is that the unity of India is an illusion: he is not seeing it because it is not there.

Another thing: how many of India's states have some sort of separatist movement?

karthik_mitta

The beer mug is half-full or half-empty.. every story has two sides.. depends on which side you want to see and what you want to do with your beliefs.. yeah.. I guess T.I.P does not see the illusion..

And the answer to your question is : 0. Not a single state that wants to seperate from the country, they may be asking for seperated state.. not seperated country including J&K. And I may pose the same question 10 years later, even with the number of states being doubled (assuming all seperatists suceeded) what keeps us together... cricket???

capt_mahajan

'Some sort' is difficult. Khalistan is not dead for all, as an example.

I would say serious seperatist movements today would include Kashmir and Assam, both fuelled by radical Islamic entities from Pakistan and Bangladesh... and, in the case of Pakistan, also fuelled by State policy.

Other contenders are Mizoram and Nagaland, Arunachal and Manipur... but these, IMHO, are confusing, because for eg Manipur, is a major drug entry point into India from Myanmar, and I for one can't figure out if the seperatist movement is not really a business proposition in disguise, just one which does not want Indian policing. They have clear links with Burmese druglords.

But the bigger threat, in my mind, is the so called 'Red Corridor' in Eastern/Central India, discussed elsewhere on indiamike. Not seperatist, really, but they are a law onto themselves, and the Administration in too many districts is out of Indian Central/State Government control.

The North East is generally a troubled area, also because for successive Central Governments, the importance of a State has been inversely proportional to it's distance from Delhi. And political meddling in many border states was Indira Gandhi's forte', with disastrous results often.

capt_mahajan

Having said all that, I would still have to comment that I would consider TIP's statements interesting but incorrect.

India has had deep divisons of the sort TIP mentions for centuries. It has survived well as an independent nation for 60 years.

Many Western countries worldwide are experiencing these divisions in their societies for the first time. I have a humble feeling they can learn something about managing these tensions from India.

I also have a feeling that time will underline this thought.

IVAN

Having some experience about partition motives, I would suggest another unifying one that doesn't seem to have been taken into consideration:

Interest

The ex-Yugoslavia did not partition because of some irrational motives, but because of reasons of diverging interests (economic and national).

If India stays together, it is perhaps primarily because it is still percieved as the best interest of the majority of the various population groups that constitute it. (Interests in the positive sense, but also in the anti-negative one.)

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