expertise as ways of achieving ‘modern’ social and economic goals – even
by the Gandhians, who tried to redefine the ‘modern’ in such a way as to
justify a decentralised, village-based and labour-intensive socio-economic
order as more in keeping with ‘modern’ trends. To achieve these goals,
a good deal of ‘national discipline’ was required, and the ‘masses’ were to
have to make some sacrifices in the short term, or in the ‘transitional
period’. And lastly, all solutions to social, economic or political problems
had to conform to ‘indigenous’ values: borrowings from ‘foreign’ systems
were to be treated with suspicion. This was a particularly useful tactical
argument used against socialists and communists by Gandhians and by
the right (often strategically merging with the Gandhians); but it was
also used by socialists to argue that communists were ‘foreign’ elements
controlled from Moscow. The appeal of the ‘indigenist’ strand of argument
in a colonised country was rhetorically powerful, and could often put
people who counted themselves in the ‘progressive’ camp on the defensive.
These views could all be contained within a general view of ‘development’
as ‘progress’, and of India as a ‘modern’ country with a rich ‘tradition’.
And yet, to call them ‘formulae’ is not to suggest that they were
meaningless. As ideas that formed the basis of the accepted political
rhetoric of public arenas, they defined the boundaries of public standards
to which people were expected to conform. This created the basis for
public debate and the standards for acceptable action. Claims to political
legitimacy had to be made in terms of a rhetorical appeal to the norms
enshrined in the formulae. Deviations from such norms needed to be
hidden, or justified as only apparent deviations, ultimately assimilable
within the bounds of the norms. Those who disagreed strongly with the
norms had to hold their peace or to find other ways of getting what they
wanted in practical terms, while purporting to uphold the norms. So it
was a set of constraining and framing boundaries for arguments and ideas;
all arguments that hoped to claim any legitimacy had to place themselves
within those boundaries; there was limited room for manoeuvre.
IN THE END IS THE BEGINNING: THE INDIAN
NATIONAL CONGRESS AND THE STATE
The institutional framework within which Nehru had to work was in a
state of flux, as the Congress searched for a role and a rationale to keep itself
together. In the years running up to independence, the Congress had
INTERLUDE – ENVISIONING THE NEW INDIA 141