India’s civilisational cohesion

Lately, Shri Mohan Bhagwat, RSS chief, has been speaking with renewed urgency about the unity of India. His concerns are not new. In truth, questions about the cohesion of the subcontinent have echoed since the passing of Akbar. During his nearly half-century rule, Akbar ensured that the people of northern India - and indeed their very souls — breathed in a common rhythm. The south, though geographically distant, shared a civilisational bond that had endured for centuries. Yet since the end of the 12th century, this bond was never fully spontaneous. Every ruler who ascended the throne of Delhi, including the remarkable Razia Sultan, was quietly scrutinised with a single question: is this monarch a sovereign first and a Muslim second — or the other way round?

Akbar was exceptional precisely because he answered this question with unusual clarity. For him, kingship was not a secondary identity — it was the first and the last. His life offered little room for confusion. At just thirteen, he found himself in the storm of the Second Battle of Panipat.

Over the next five years, as he consolidated his power, he thought deeply about the nature of his rule. He realised that he was destined to govern an empire in which nearly 97 per cent of his subjects were Hindu. His long-term success required not merely their obedience but their goodwill. This did not mean antagonising Muslims, but it certainly meant displeasing an orthodox clergy that envisioned the empire under the Nizam-e-Mustafa, where political authority followed religious guidance. Akbar chose a different path — one that placed the stability of the realm above sectarian demands.

Most rulers of the Delhi Sultanate and later the Mughal Empire, however, presided over a realm that resembled what Tipu Sultan would later proudly call a “religious state.” The consequence was a deep and often painful divide: rulers and their beneficiaries stood on one side, while the vast Hindu populace remained on the other.

Hindus were routinely called kafir — a term denoting a non-believer, but one that soon came to be understood as an insult in daily life. They were tolerated as taxpayers, artisans and the economic backbone of the empire. For military service, they were summoned when necessary, but rarely trusted with command. A sense of distance persisted, even when peace prevailed.

In medieval India, ideas such as “the souls of all citizens breathing together” to define nationality had not yet been articulated; such expressions would arise much later in Europe.

Yet India had its own notion of unity - dosti ki ekta, the harmony of friendship and coexistence. This unity was not spoken of daily, but it revealed itself in moments of crisis: in the long turmoil of Kashmir, or even in the occasional tensions in Tamil Nadu that could reverberate across the subcontinent. Indians instinctively sensed that unity was not a poetic abstraction but a lived necessity.

The trauma of 1947 was the most severe test of this idea of unity. One-third of the country broke away to follow Mr Jinnah’s vision. Yet within twenty-four years, in 1971, more than half of Pakistan rejected that very vision, abandoning the dream of a “New Medina.”

The episode demonstrated that religious identity alone cannot hold a country together. What many in the subcontinent failed to grasp — then or now — is that Hinduism, with its inductive, voluntary and internally diverse nature, forms a deeper and more enduring basis for unity than a rigid, prescriptive ideology.

The Hindu ethos, often described simply as “culture”, has historically fostered an implicit unity across India’s immense diversity. One example is the idea of karma.

A Hindu is taught to believe that one’s circumstances are shaped by one’s own past actions. Whether or not one remembers the details of past lives, the underlying philosophy encourages introspection rather than blame. A Hindu tends to hold oneself responsible for adversity, instead of attributing calamity to others or to the state. This worldview, for centuries, prevented large-scale politicisation of suffering. Had the population of western Pakistan embraced such a view, its violent break from its eastern wing might have unfolded very differently.

The greatest virtue of Hinduism is that it is rarely against anyone. Precisely for this reason, Swami Vivekananda, during his visit to the United States, chose to use the terms “Vedanta” and “Vedantism.” He wanted to make it clear that Hinduism was not a negation of other faiths but a vast philosophical tradition.

Significantly, India has never witnessed a Hindu-Christian riot, even in regions like Nagercoil where conversions have been widespread. Scuffles may have occurred, but not large-scale communal violence. The more frequent historical clashes were between Hindus and Muslims, often triggered by anxieties nurtured by sections of the clergy. From time to time, religious leaders warned their communities that a relaxed attitude might allow Hindus to grow complacent — or even to grow in number. Partition, however, dramatically reduced the political potency of this rhetoric.

Across these centuries, one truth has quietly endured: the unity of India does not rest on uniformity of religion, language or ethnicity. It rests on a civilisational ethos — rooted in Hindu thought yet open to all — that absorbs difference without erasing it. Akbar sensed this. Modern India, too, must remember it.

The writer is a well-known columnist, author, and former member of the Rajya Sabha; views are personal; views are personal