KOCHI: “An Era of Darkness” is a book that was waiting to be written. History is widely perceived to be a story of the winner. In a refreshing contrast, Shashi Tharoor makes an attempt to rewrite it from the perspective of the victim and the vanquished.
Withhis formidable debating skills and penetrating mind, Tharoor is emerging as the quintessential argumentative Indian of our time.
“An Era of Darkness” is a compelling work. IN signature Tharoor style, the book abounds in delightful witticisms.
A few samples:
“If the sun never sets on the British Empire, it is because even God cannot trust the English in the dark”
“Only the British could have made revolutionaries of Americans”
The thrust of the book is that India had a flourishing economy before British arrived here and the country captured its glorious past only after Britain left India in 1947. It is the independent India, in spite of many deficiencies that steadily rose to become an economic powerhouse in the 21st century.
Yet, there were apologists from both Britain and India with many NRIs running down India on every conceivable occasion.
Tharoor describes them as “Non Responsible Indians”. Tharoor says that the worst form of colonialism is the colonialism of mind. 70 years after Britain left India, the class division continues. India’s corporate community and IAS lobby inheriting the club culture, golf and the aura of western education.
The book’s title itself is a subtle snub to V.S. Naipaul for his merciless and vituperative attack on India in the “Area of Darkness” published in the sixties.
The book met with wide resentment in India and was subsequently banned in the country. It is ironical that it took more than 60 years for a sober, mature and measured response to emerge to Naipaul’s misinformed portrait of India.
Yet the book ignores the reality of current Indo-British relations. Ties between the two countries have now come to a full circle. The two nations treat each other with maturity and self confidence.
Some of Britain’s richest citizens are of Indian origin. Tata Motors are producing the
British brands like Jaguar and Land Rover. Nasser Hussain born in Chennai has captained the English cricket team and Dr. I.G. Patel has been a Director of the prestigious London School of Economics.
Four Indians have won the Britain’s prestigious Literary Award - The Man Booker Prize. It is the measure of that self confidence that Tharoor could present his stirring address against the British Empire right at the heart of British intellectual aristocracy, the Oxford Union and win wide admiration. India and Britain have undoubtedly moved on.
One of the most illuminating parts of the book relates to Tharoor’s plea to introduce teaching of colonial history in schools perhaps both in Britain and India.
The idea has found wide support from Britain’s liberal intellectuals. British newspaper The Guardian endorsed it with a quote from George Santayana “those who do not learn lessons of history are condemned to repeat them”.
The Guardian adds “the British Empire was a huge force for change but it was not always a force for good”. That was a gracious admission.