Sir

May I suggest that the reason this may be offensive to a lot of Indians is the indication, unsaid of course, that India is somehow a “creation” of the British. The implication being that, India is a foreign creation and what that means for the sustainability of the country as a unit.

This is categorically untrue. Suffice to say, the Indian Constitution would have borrowed from the British Constitution had there been such a thing. The Republic of India, from the word go, is a creation of the Indian people and their Indian leaders. British India was a hodgepodge of some territories over which Britain has direct control and a very large area which were under native princely administration. The majority of them acceded to either India or Pakistan through a native exercise in persuasion.

If Indians did not like the idea, broadly, of a union, then the time for making this clear has passed a very long time ago. Many, including Indians, did not initially expect the Union to last, citing the various differences you mention. There was a split at the beginning itself - the Muslims decided to separate into a new sovereign state. Thank God. As for the other differences, there wasn’t the level of animosity that would necessitate the creation of separate countries out of the various states. It is the largest such exercise in the history of man, and it has lasted the course of a very turbulent century, so there must be something to it.

Even though a modern nation-state called India did not exist until 1947, the concept of a nation-state itself is of the 18th century, coming into being at the conclusion of the Thirty Year’s War. The concept of a cultural unit made of indigenous parts - Bharat Khand - existed way before Europeans came on the scene. May I refer you to an English translation of the Njanappana, a Malayalam devotional recital to Lord Krishna. Reference is made there to Bharat Khand - as the land where, in typical Hindu flourish, even blades of grass from other lands wish to be born to attain liberation. This is in the 1400s, and the compiler was a simpleton.

Many nation-states have been created in the 20th century. Not many of them lasted. East Germany, West Germany, Nationalist China, Pakistan (United), South Vietnam, South Yemen, North Yemen, Soviet Union, Yugoslavia, Czechoslovakia, Sudan, too many African states, are all examples of nation-states which have been consigned to history books. They faced the same pressures as did India. The Indian state machinery is too weak to fully control the Indian population, for it to keep a lid on secessionist aspirations in every major place within, were such a scenario ever to occur. What I meant is, a lot of the unity of the state flows from the will of the people which, except for certain exceptions, is in unequivocal support of the idea of common international representation and a pooling of certain government functions. What I mean is that, for vast majority of the Indian populace, and certainly for those who are culturally Indian, India as is today is a apt representation of their political aspirations. Politics on boundaries is really no longer an issue. Economics, certainly.

Sir

Again, no would be the answer to an assertion that Britain assumes prime responsibility for the creation of the Republic of India. British rule officially ended in 1947; the Republic came into being in 1950. Which is why the Republic Day is celebrated separately from the Independence Day which celebrates, oddly enough, the withdrawal of the British on their own accord. India, or the former British ruled bits of it, was a Dominion on the lines of Canada or Australia for two years and a bit when the Constitution, an Indian document, was promulgated. The day the British left in 1947, India looked very different from what it is today. Remember that all native states were officially “free” as well and went back to status quo ante before acceding to the Union.

You know, you can theorize all day but we have what we have. Has the Marathas been left unperturbed, maybe there would have been an Indian Empire anyway with a Marathi king. What I am saying is, had then been no impulse among the people of India to forge together a country, no give, no amount of British input would’ve made that happen and India would have collapsed. Fact is, it did; Partition was that. And the stark truth is, the bits of the Indian subcontinent that bore the brunt of the violence were mostly British controlled territories. Not a feather in Britain’s nation-building cap. The remnant India too, would’ve collapsed had it not been an Indian creation first and foremost. History is witness that imperial creations forced into Union don’t last very long; the USSR, successor to the Russian Empire is certainly proof of that. Were the Republic of India an imperial creation as you suggest, it wouldn’t have lasted this long either, and you’re talking about a lot more people than Russia. Corollary being, if the Republic of India does collapse one day, you can let me know about how it was, after all, a British imperial creation.

I am just saying that, as a genuinely free people, the various peoples of India have little need to bring international borders closer to their state, maintain armies and diplomatic corps, and most crucially, bear negligible animosity towards one another on ethnic or linguistic grounds. What could’ve broken India before was religious tension, but that has already been addressed with Pakistan and no one wants to go back to that. India makes sense to the Indian people, in a way the Central African Republic cannot makes sense to the people there.