The Indian Mosaic

Abstract

The view of India and Indians that persists abroad is narrow and stereotypical. It is derived from an amalgam of the writings of Rudyard Kipling, the mimicry of Peter Sellers and the heart-tugging advertisements of such charitable organisations as World Vision and Oxfam. Personal contacts with the proprietor and family of the neighbourhood dairy store may be leavened with the romanticism of films and television productions like Heat and Dust, The Far Pavilions, The Jewel in the Crown and Gandhi. The resulting picture that most Westerners have of India is an odd and contradictory mix of falsehoods, half-truths and fantasies:

• India is a poor country with few resources;

• India has little manufacturing and industrial capacity;

• India’s overpopulation causes starvation and hunger on a large scale;

• India is a land of handsome, charming and rich princes and maharajas;

• Indians are heirs to an ancient civilisation that emphasises self-sacrificing asceticism, spiritualism and a stable family life;

• India is full of beggars, child-brides, bride-burners, corrupt officials and self-serving politicians;

• India is chaotic and disordered;

• India’s nationhood is fatally flawed by divisions of religion, caste and ethnicity;

• India’s defence forces are large in manpower but neither modernised nor well-equipped;

• India is a nuclear power;

• India is a regional bully;

• India has little real influence in world affairs.