The Great Hindu Civilisation : Achievement, Neglect, Bias And The Way Forward

by Pavan K. Varma

Gurcharan Das, a product of Harvard University, who took early retirement as CEO of Procter & Gamble to become a full-time writer, has an interesting anecdote to tell about the reaction at a typical upper-crust dinner in Delhi when he decided to research Hindu epics and philosophy. His aggressive interlocutor was a ‘self-proclaimed leftist and secularist, who had once been a favourite of former prime minister Indira Gandhi, [and] had the gruff, domineering accent of an English aristocrat, not surprising in a former civil servant of the old school. I admitted reluctantly that I had been thinking of reading the Mahabharata, the Manusmriti, the Kathopanishad perhaps and … “Good Lord, man,” he exclaimed. “You haven’t turned saffron have you?”’1

argument

Arguments that promote ignoring or breaking away from india's past