In this last of the series of articles on this movie made for patriotic Indians, I share with the readers the third and last important strand of my thoughts as I watched Surjyo Sen fight the might of British empire with his band of 65 mostly teenagers.
In the last decade or so, after the BJP came to power, India has started believing that the West led by USA is a potential if not already an actual ally of India. The shared values are indeed very important and visible. We too want an India where every individual free is and flourishes to the best of his potential. We admire nations like UK and USA who have taken in people from all countries including the ones oppressed by colonialism and afforded them freedom, dignity and opportunity. Indeed, it is not unfair to say that the western nations have been more friendly to Indians than perhaps any other group of countries.
India has received some recognition from these countries now, for it's consistent democracy and human rights record, for it's other freedoms and the commitment of all it's politicians of all shades to modernity and secularism. From the perspective of these countries, India alone amongst backward nations has achieved modernity with a free and constitutional framework and therefore worthy of respect.
I have to say that I had become ready to put behind all the animosity of British rule in India and started believing that we should deepen the friendship with the West to a point where there is real alliance with the West to spread modernity and democracy.
The movie forced me to question that belief and desire.
As I watched British ruthlessness and racism in the movie, their brutality and readiness to reduce Indians to a subhuman level, I found myself asking how deep is the West's commitment to equality of all humans and did they ever really abandon their racism. If perchance they indeed believe, without expressing it openly for political reasons, that they are a genetically superior lot, can they ever be true partners of India on equal terms.
We cannot brush aside these questions. We have to objectively evaluate the West's behavior, in colonial period led by Britain and in post – colonial period led by the USA, in order to form a correct attitude and policy towards the West. We should not go by pronouncements and expressions of support. We should look at their actions and the end results sought by them. Then alone we will be understand what really goes on in their mind.
As I tried to go over the key incidents with respect to India – West relationship, the picture is not pretty and indeed, this movie forced me to shift my stance on how we should relate to the USA. If we look at how the Western nations behave, it is clear that their commitment to liberty, freedom and human rights is more or less restricted to their own citizens. They never have and perhaps never will truly believe in the equality of all men. I can give no better example of this than their eulogistic references to Chruchill. Here is a man who routinely proclaimed superiority of his race and made abusive comments about “lesser” peoples. He also maintained that whites must rule over colored peoples. His ideas of liberty and freedom did not extend to peoples like Indians. Yet, if you hear a typical Western man (a white man actually) talk about Churchill, you will get the impression that Churchill was the inventor of the concept of Universal Human Rights.
There are many other pointers, impossible to ignore, that say that in their heart of hearts, white people still want to maintain superiority over others, using foul means if needed. One notices many times in Western media, lists of “biggest” terror strikes on free nations. I lost count of how many times they never mention any terror strike in India. At least one such instance was noticed AFTER 26 /11. The list of the most “horrific terror attacks ever”, posted on frontpagemag site, included Beslan terror attack (justifiably), included the shoe bomber and not the horrific 26 / 11 attack. As if someone making a crude attempt at killing white people and failing is a bigger incident than butchery of 180 + Indians !
They are racists, let us not keep ignoring the elephant in the room.
Nowadays Americans give the argument that since a black man was elected to US presidency, they have washed the sins of their past racism. It is not really a valid argument. I suspect it works the other way round. In a racially polarized society, blacks feel so humiliated that they can't think of voting for a white man if there is a black man in the race. Hence a solid block of minority votes combined with a percentage of white “liberal” votes ensured the victory. This is exactly what happens in one of the most casteist state of India – UP. The Dalits have been oppressed so much, even in modern times, that they cannot dream of voting for parties traditionally identified with upper castes.
I, therefore felt, as I watched the movie, that we must operate with a presumption, a very safe one based on our centuries of interaction with them, that we should never expect a real meeting of hearts with any Western nation. We have to learn a lot of skills from them and hence I would not advocate shutting all doors on them. But we must always be cautious and certainly in strategic matters, we should assume that they will be neutral even in the face of utmost viciousness against us, if not on the side of our enemies.
This means India will not have any significant allies in global politics. This is as it should be. India has a distinct sense of values, different from Islamic world, from China and from the West. Our interactions with all the nations must be transactional and we should not seek a starry eyed (but woolly headed) “partnership” or “natural alliance”. Let us face it. We have no natural allies. The similarities with the West are superficial, the differences profound. With others, there is no superficial overlap either.
The movie really gave a perspective of India's experience with the West. We do forget in the goody goody atmosphere of a summit meeting with US how vicious the British were and, examine closely and you find the same in the US. Let us be cautious of them. May our eyes always be dry in dealing with them.
I would like to wish all of our readers a very Happy New Year. I pray to the good Lord Bholenath that Indians get rewarded for their hard work in the face of lost opportunity, optimism in the face of despair, perseverance in face of fear and faith in face of demagoguery.
