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Why David Cameron apologising for Raj won’t mean much to India

pardon me for a quick question

who will apologise for Muslim Raj? as Cameron did for British Raj

Another very pertinent and fair question. Probably the difference between a few score thousand Anglo Indians and 170 million Muslims. Either way, the British would still be seen as the primary guilty party there.
 
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pardon me for a quick question

who will apologise for Muslim Raj? as Cameron did for British Raj


and on a flipside the British Raj has also given nice infrastructure and above all education to India specially in TN .

what you say ?


If I did not think that you were being playful and teasing the Hindutva types, this could be a provocative remark.

First, I doubt that there is either relevance or value to these 'apologies'. These exchanges seem to have started in the poisonous relations of the Chinese and the Japanese, and have some relevance in their esoteric world views. These thoughts have been picked up by partisans of native people victimized by western colonisers (not by eastern colonisers, as their gentle efforts are somehow not as atrocious as those committed by Caucasians). How much relevance they have today is moot.

Second, what did the Muslim Raj ever do to warrant an apology? There was no Muslim Raj, for starters; what individual Muslim rulers and dynasties of mainly Muslim rulers did was to act as autocrats have done throughout human history. If it is the religious element of their governance, there are religious overtones to the governance of autocrats which wildly exceed the worst excesses that we have on record.

pardon me for a quick question

who will apologise for Muslim Raj? as Cameron did for British Raj


and on a flipside the British Raj has also given nice infrastructure and above all education to India specially in TN .

what you say ?

On the flip side, I am saddened by this renewed display of unquestioning acceptance of whatever the British claimed for themselves and their rule. Are you sure that there was no education in India, specially in Tamil Nadu? Would you consider the issue for a moment, putting aside any thoughts injected by the usual culprits, and ask yourself if this is a tenable proposition?
 
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Indians need to stop getting so emotional. All I said was Britain kept India happy for centuries which is why Indians didn't revolt. If Indians didn't like it, you would have revolted much earlier. India liked what Britain was giving you.
That's all I said.

Please, don't make yourself look a fool when you clearly haven't looked into colonial rule in the subcontinent. Would it be sensitive of me to convey an opinion like the Western powers 'civilized' you people by raping your forces and citizens in the first/second opium wars? No, it would be outright despicable and stupid on my part.

While the British and other European powers looted our lands, they put in place a system of roads, rail and administration that had the sole purpose of controlling the movement/legal ownership of those resources, quashing rebellious or independent sentiments as 'treason' and imposing an alien system of values that caused rifts within society, some of which we still have not fully overcome. They played the sinister role of devil, supporting one region or ruler over another, interfering in the judiciary to selectively punish or favour according to their interests, and capitalizing on the greed and lack of vision amongst many kings, all the while watching and sneering at the rivers of blood their cowardly games had shed.

Yet for you, it is 'civilization'. Funny that. To us, the atrocities they committed, as part of a rule that saw India's share in the world's GDP go from 17-22% at the beginning, down to less than half of 1 percent by the time they were kicked out, are nothing to be 'thankful' for. What you people felt in Nanjing, we felt every time they caused artificial famines wiping out millions, relentlessly shooting down rows of people in peaceful protests and trying to play our masses against each other to the point of violent hatred.

As for the rebellion aspect of your opinion, their monarchy only officially took over colonial interests in the 1850s from the East India company. There was never a time in the subcontinent that they didn't face opposition or calls for them to bugger off back. To even gain a foothold was no smooth campaign for them, they waged several unsuccessful wars especially in the south, and even after winning on the third, fourth attempt they had restless militias or other independent kingdoms to worry over all throughout. Since our first war of independce in 1857, what they call the mutiny, there were countless movements that gained momentum before and during the non-violent struggle, all of which played a part in gaining freedom. So in short, the British were never accepted here and always seen as foreign aliens by the people, irrespective of region, caste or religion.

But I sense you enjoy degrading or believing that India was never worth its weight in history, so you try to say the lack of a European-style nation state (invented a few hundred years ago) or Chinese-type prolonged authoritarian rule is proof of weakness or lack of civilization. Well, our culture has always been different to the Chinese, for good or for bad. The Vedic heritage of our subcontinent was one of open-minded, pluralistic, fiery debates in an environment of constant change. Individualism and non-material considerations were important to our people. The Chinese have through their history mostly been ruled by one or few very iron-handed authoritarian monarchies or aristocracies that would not tolerate dissent, so the people grew to form a masochistic admiration of their rulers as being 'Gods' and what not. Even when Confucian philosophy is one of sacrificing individual interests in the interests of the 'greater', this was ironically used by various kings to justify unrestricted control over people for centuries at a time as 'superior, divine' guardians sent by the heavens.

We are not used to that in the subcontinent as princes and kings here, of various religions, have in many cases left their wealth or kingdoms to pursue an ascetic, non-violent life devoted to the supreme being, with their teachers, pirs or gurus often being from the very lowest rungs of the socio-economic ladder. However, the land was so rich and contested, that the ones who did have ambitions needed not to think of going abroad and could rarely gain complete control for long periods as they vied for it amongst themselves, but kings outside of India never kept this land's wealth outside of their ambitious gaze. The lack of unity amongst indigenous kings is what led to the constant sacking and establishing of different kingdoms south of the Himalayas, which you find as a good enough reason to fling mud at present-day Indians for. And if this is your only criteria, go tell the Greeks that due to the various Hellenic city states being at war with each other for much of their ancient history, they cannot be characterized as a nation during the peak of their civilization, because at the time they didn't adopt the Chinese model or European state model which came 2,000 years later. New heights of ridiculous.
 
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pardon me for a quick question

who will apologise for Muslim Raj? as Cameron did for British Raj


and on a flipside the British Raj has also given nice infrastructure and above all education to India specially in TN .

what you say ?

What made you think that there was no education in Tamil Nadu?? Have you ever tried to check the literatures of Tamilians?? Heard about Chola Kingdom??
 
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pardon me for a quick question

who will apologise for Muslim Raj? as Cameron did for British Raj


and on a flipside the British Raj has also given nice infrastructure and above all education to India specially in TN .

what you say ?

There are many countries like Thailand or Japan who adopted western education without being ruled by them. By the way, what's with Pakistanis obsession with Tamil people. :cheesy:
 
.
If I did not think that you were being playful and teasing the Hindutva types, this could be a provocative remark.

First, I doubt that there is either relevance or value to these 'apologies'. These exchanges seem to have started in the poisonous relations of the Chinese and the Japanese, and have some relevance in their esoteric world views. These thoughts have been picked up by partisans of native people victimized by western colonisers (not by eastern colonisers, as their gentle efforts are somehow not as atrocious as those committed by Caucasians). How much relevance they have today is moot.

Second, what did the Muslim Raj ever do to warrant an apology? There was no Muslim Raj, for starters; what individual Muslim rulers and dynasties of mainly Muslim rulers did was to act as autocrats have done throughout human history. If it is the religious element of their governance, there are religious overtones to the governance of autocrats which wildly exceed the worst excesses that we have on record.



On the flip side, I am saddened by this renewed display of unquestioning acceptance of whatever the British claimed for themselves and their rule. Are you sure that there was no education in India, specially in Tamil Nadu? Would you consider the issue for a moment, putting aside any thoughts injected by the usual culprits, and ask yourself if this is a tenable proposition?

What made you think that there was no education in Tamil Nadu?? Have you ever tried to check the literatures of Tamilians?? Heard about Chola Kingdom??

@sir Joe

I was NOT at all teasing hindutva goons. It was just a thought passed by that if at all one has to aplogise for Muslim rule or whatever you may call it individual or whatever then who will be bound to do that?


2. And you guys ignored the infrastructure part and by education i did not mean that TN was not having one at all.

Its also a reality the modern education progressed in India under Brit raj

There are many countries like Thailand or Japan who adopted western education without being ruled by them. By the way, what's with Pakistanis obsession with Tamil people. :cheesy:

Tollywood starlets :P :P :P
 
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Please, don't make yourself look a fool when you clearly haven't looked into colonial rule in the subcontinent. Would it be sensitive of me to convey an opinion like the Western powers 'civilized' you people by raping your forces and citizens in the first/second opium wars? No, it would be outright despicable and stupid on my part.

While the British and other European powers looted our lands, they put in place a system of roads, rail and administration that had the sole purpose of controlling the movement/legal ownership of those resources, quashing rebellious or independent sentiments as 'treason' and imposing an alien system of values that caused rifts within society, some of which we still have not fully overcome. They played the sinister role of devil, supporting one region or ruler over another, interfering in the judiciary to selectively punish or favour according to their interests, and capitalizing on the greed and lack of vision amongst many kings, all the while watching and sneering at the rivers of blood their cowardly games had shed.

Yet for you, it is 'civilization'. Funny that. To us, the atrocities they committed, as part of a rule that saw India's share in the world's GDP go from 17-22% at the beginning, down to less than half of 1 percent by the time they were kicked out, are nothing to be 'thankful' for. What you people felt in Nanjing, we felt every time they caused artificial famines wiping out millions, relentlessly shooting down rows of people in peaceful protests and trying to play our masses against each other to the point of violent hatred.

As for the rebellion aspect of your opinion, their monarchy only officially took over colonial interests in the 1850s from the East India company. There was never a time in the subcontinent that they didn't face opposition or calls for them to bugger off back. To even gain a foothold was no smooth campaign for them, they waged several unsuccessful wars especially in the south, and even after winning on the third, fourth attempt they had restless militias or other independent kingdoms to worry over all throughout. Since our first war of independce in 1857, what they call the mutiny, there were countless movements that gained momentum before and during the non-violent struggle, all of which played a part in gaining freedom. So in short, the British were never accepted here and always seen as foreign aliens by the people, irrespective of region, caste or religion.

But I sense you enjoy degrading or believing that India was never worth its weight in history, so you try to say the lack of a European-style nation state (invented a few hundred years ago) or Chinese-type prolonged authoritarian rule is proof of weakness or lack of civilization. Well, our culture has always been different to the Chinese, for good or for bad. The Vedic heritage of our subcontinent was one of open-minded, pluralistic, fiery debates in an environment of constant change. Individualism and non-material considerations were important to our people. The Chinese have through their history mostly been ruled by one or few very iron-handed authoritarian monarchies or aristocracies that would not tolerate dissent, so the people grew to form a masochistic admiration of their rulers as being 'Gods' and what not. Even when Confucian philosophy is one of sacrificing individual interests in the interests of the 'greater', this was ironically used by various kings to justify unrestricted control over people for centuries at a time as 'superior, divine' guardians sent by the heavens.

We are not used to that in the subcontinent as princes and kings here, of various religions, have in many cases left their wealth or kingdoms to pursue an ascetic, non-violent life devoted to the supreme being, with their teachers, pirs or gurus often being from the very lowest rungs of the socio-economic ladder. However, the land was so rich and contested, that the ones who did have ambitions needed not to think of going abroad and could rarely gain complete control for long periods as they vied for it amongst themselves, but kings outside of India never kept this land's wealth outside of their ambitious gaze. The lack of unity amongst indigenous kings is what led to the constant sacking and establishing of different kingdoms south of the Himalayas, which you find as a good enough reason to fling mud at present-day Indians for. And if this is your only criteria, go tell the Greeks that due to the various Hellenic city states being at war with each other for much of their ancient history, they cannot be characterized as a nation during the peak of their civilization, because at the time they didn't adopt the Chinese model or European state model which came 2,000 years later. New heights of ridiculous.

Thank you for a brilliant summary. It was delightful to read.
 
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There are many countries like Thailand or Japan who adopted western education without being ruled by them. By the way, what's with Pakistanis obsession with Tamil people. :cheesy:

to your knowledge the Japanese education is not western.

a simple look at the basic educational system, you will find the Japanese and Chinese system are as follows,

primary school 6 years/
junior high 3 years
high school 3 years

illust_edu2.gif
 
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Jaaa yaar maaf kiya. Aaab Khush. Kaam ki baar kar. What do you have to offer and what you want from us??? Lets talk business. :coffee:
 
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@sir Joe

I was NOT at all teasing hindutva goons. It was just a thought passed by that if at all one has to aplogise for Muslim rule or whatever you may call it individual or whatever then who will be bound to do that?


2. And you guys ignored the infrastructure part and by education i did not mean that TN was not having one at all.

Its also a reality the modern education progressed in India under Brit raj



Tollywood starlets :P :P :P

Oh, well, in that case...

No, indeed, I think it is not useful to think of an apology from the Muslim Raj, first, because there was no such Raj, and second, there was nothing to apologize for. Nobody alive today has to take responsibility for what was done hundreds of years ago. We, among ourselves, should stop apologizing for the acts of those gone, though there is a case for mutual apologies for a number of things that occurred in recent times, during the past two generations.

Certainly not further back, this itself suggested very tentatively.
 
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to your knowledge the Japanese education is not western.

a simple look at the basic educational system, you will find the Japanese and Chinese system are as follows,

primary school 6 years/
junior high 3 years
high school 3 years

illust_edu2.gif

And you misinterpreted my point. :cheesy:
 
. .
Oh, well, in that case...

No, indeed, I think it is not useful to think of an apology from the Muslim Raj, first, because there was no such Raj, and second, there was nothing to apologize for. Nobody alive today has to take responsibility for what was done hundreds of years ago. We, among ourselves, should stop apologizing for the acts of those gone, though there is a case for mutual apologies for a number of things that occurred in recent times, during the past two generations. Certainly not further back, this itself suggested very tentatively.

And what are these cases?
 
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And what are these cases?

Maybe the surviving 80+ great-grandfathers and great-grandmothers from your side should start by apologizing to our 80+ great-grandfathers and great-grandmothers. And we can then move on from there.
 
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