Speaking at a lecture series on Mahatma Gandhi, he said it was important to discuss the concept of Indian nationalism as people these days were being told about a “totally false nationalism.”
New Delhi: “Indian nation was born from the freedom struggle and not from the Rig Veda like the RSS wants us to believe,” said Prof. Irfan Habib on Monday. Prof. Habib, India’s renowned marxist historian and Professor at Aligarh Muslim University, delivered a lecture on Mahatma Gandhi and the idea of a nation on October 1, at a lecture series organized on Mahatma Gandhi by Safdar Hashmi Memorial Trust (SAHMAT) at Constitution Club of India.
He is an international expert due to his study and research on Mahatma Gandhi’s contribution to nation building.
Speaking on ‘Gandhiji and the National Question’, Habib said it was important to discuss the concept of Indian nationalism as people these days were being told about a “totally false nationalism”. Describing Gandhi’s evolving ideas through the years, he said, “Isn’t it time to celebrate Gandhi?”
“A country becomes a nation only when there is a serious effort within the country to constitute it as a political entity,” he said. “This concept of a nation goes back to relatively recent times, particularly the French Revolution of 1789. The concept of Indian nation has really originated from the freedom movement, it does not come from the Rig Veda like the RSS seeks to tell us.”
He also said that the Modi Government had turned Mahatma Gandhi into a mere sanitary inspector. “This is a fascist government and we can fight it only when we remember the fasting observed by Mahatma Gandhi on January 30, 1948, for friendship between India and Pakistan and for the protection of minorities. It is very important to draw inspiration from this. Gandhi was shot only because he wanted peace and amity between both the countries. Gandhi ji was a symbol of the friendship between India and Pakistan and he sacrificed his life for that,” he said.
The historian said that Gandhi “was religious but not sectarian”, in that he “wanted education to be conducted by mullahs, parsi priests and brahmins”. But he also felt that “Hindus must give concessions to Muslims”.
“Gandhi’s religious position was totally different from Tilak’s. To him, Islam was as important in political matters as Hinduism,” said Habib. He also said Gandhi valued “truth over consistency.”
Watch his lecture here: