80 "Presenting" the Past
educated and the illiterate, Philip Lutgendorf quotes Kapila Vatsyayan's
observation that "a seeming illiterate will know the story and the words
better and with a greater understanding of its value than one who reads
it only as an intellectual exercise." Explaining in exhaustive detail how
the Ramayana makes the Hindus a "people of the book," Lutgendorf lists
series of vignettes that reflect the popularity of the story, such as group
recitals in commuter trains, audiocassettes, video of the popular serializa-
tion in Indian TV, rendering Ram's name in notebooks, and so forth.^18
Like teachers and traditional storytellers, the role of politicians in influ-
encing the masses' concepts of identity and history through their public
speeches is rather important. The state-politician-public-policy trio plays
the school-teacher-textbook mix with almost the same functional roles.
Gyanendra Pandey points out the fact that the Congress leaders turned
to the task of education in the 1930s and 1940s "for more effective politi-
cal representation." The "enlightened leadership" had this obligation to
educate, as they were "the makers of history." Nehru wrote, "Through
nation-wide action ... (Gandhi) sought to mould the millions, and largely
succeeded in doing so, and changing them from a demoralized, timid, and
hopeless mass, bullied and crushed by every dominant interest, and inca-
pable of resistance into a people with self-respect and self-reliance, resist-
ing tyranny, and capable of united action and sacrifice for a larger cause.
The nation for them is born out of the far-sighted initiatives of an enlightened
leadership. They are the makers of history" (italics mine).^19
The Congress leaders like Nehru adopted the same old colonial idea of
representation of and responsibility for the "dumb millions." In the semi-
feudal culture of colonial (as of postcolonial) India, the masses were, as
Nehru put it, with "loving and hopeful eyes," "overflowing gratitude,"
and "faith in us." This elitist line had been adopted in some areas as long
ago as 1921, when the peasants were asked to give up "meetings" and
"disturbances" and to leave it to Gandhi to win swaraj (self-rule). So it
was only natural for the "makers of history" to tell the masses who they
were and what they should do. For instance, Nehru said, when he heard
people shout "Bharat Mata ki Jai" (Victory to Mother India) in gatherings,
he would ask them what they meant by that cry, and who was this Mother
India whose victory they wanted.
My question would amuse them and surprise them, and then, not knowing exactly
what to answer, they would look at each other and at me. I persisted in my ques-
tioning. At last a vigorous Jat, wedded to the soil from immemorial generations,
would say that it was the dharti, the good earth of India, that they meant. What
earth? Their particular village patch, or all the patches in the district or province,
or in the whole of India? And so question and answer went on, till they would ask
me impatiently to tell them all about it. I would endeavour to do so and explain
that India was all this that they had thought, but it was much more. The moun-