Do we need Nationalism today

Nationalism is the new brand people love to wear on their sleeves to display their patriotism and pride in their country. The ruling party has pitch forked Nationalism onto the centre stage and has made it synonymous with patriotism. In an era dominated by globalization, multiculturalism and pluralism that accommodates different ethnic, religious and cultural groups as central to the survival of mankind, the sudden reversal to nationalism makes one wonder whether we are in the past forward mode. Nationalism is today like a hat stand on which any hat can be hung. So there are a number of adjectives tagged on to Nationalism such as ethnic nationalism, romantic nationalism, racial nationalism and in recent times we have   Cultural nationalism (propounded by the current  ‘margadarshak’ of the BJP, Shri Advani), and the last two , as advanced by a senior Professor of a leading university are Dharmic nationalism and Namo nationalism.

Nationalism does not stop with inculcating patriotic fervor in people, it promotes the doctrine of superiority of one’s culture and interests over all others and thereby it is antithetical to multiculturalism that accommodates and accepts all cultures on equal footing. While it is partially true that Nationalism has once again come to the centre of discourse in the country( and also globally),  the consequences have been far from agreeable. Nationalism is good to a certain extent like getting freedom for the majority of men and women who belong to a country. But once freedom is accomplished, the country becomes a part of the globe and a part of humanity. “Nationalism”, says Frantz Fanon “ is that magnificent song that made the people rise against their oppressors, stops short, falters and dies away on the day that independence is proclaimed”.

Beginning with the second half of the 20th C,- post World War II-, mankind came together to fight as one unit to stave off inhuman forces under the likes of Hitler who were cutting the very root of humanity in the name of Nationalism. Nationalism has the potential to change into mob hysteria and become authoritarian and isolationist refusing to tolerate values, culture and traditions of the rest of the world.  Nationalism in this respect becomes dictatorial and as Francis Fukuyama says, “ is often the enemy of democracy; nationalism has also been democracy's handmaiden, from the time of the French Revolution”. In India today we are also witnessing this catastrophic change  in myriad ways- the latest is the Cauvery violence(and before that and still festering is the Kashmir violence) where nationalism has descended to parochialism, jingoism and brutal destruction of lives and property. The term  Kashmiriyat, though it rhymes well with insaniyat and jamhooriyat, has made the Kashmiris(in particular the majority Muslims) pitch for Kashmiri nationalism. Kashmiriyat has now mutated in ways that its meaning is not clear. Who will it include and exclude, and on what terms? The Nationalism debate has fragmented the country and not united it.

The senior Professor who had added the two adjectives –‘dharmic’ and ‘namo’ to nationalism has quoted Aurobindo Ghose who had spoken about rise of dharma in India. But Ghose does not limit it to our selfish interests. Ghose like Tagore was not constrained by nationalism and looked for the restoration of values for humanity. Tagore denounced nationalism, deeming it among humanity's greatest problems. "A nation," he wrote, "... is that aspect which a whole population assumes when organized for a mechanical purpose", a purpose often associated with a "selfishness" that "can be a grandly magnified form" of personal selfishness”.

There is a lot of confusion in the professor’s attempt at spelling out dharmic nationalism to "include non-dualism in the realm of metaphysics, swaraj or non-aggressive autonomy in the realm of politics, and non-exclusionism in the realm of culture".  But  non exclusionism is inclusionism which negates the concept of  ‘I,me,my nation’; similarly non duality means  ‘one undivided without a second’ which in the context of humanity holds all together and not just one nation or one community.

Finally he heaps praise on the PM as the sole harbinger of Nationalism and thereby does disservice to the PM as Nationalism is not a concept for humanity. It is too narrow and chauvinistic and to make PM the centre of Nationalism damages his reputation,especially when he  wants to be acknowledged as  better than Pt.Nehru as the Statesman of the World.

Lastly, let us not forget the diabolical nature of IS that operates under the garb of one religion, one Caliphate.  It is time for the world and in particular for India to unite to put down such shrill cries of outdated monolithic concept of nationalism.

What we need is a fusion of being singular as a nation and being plural as one among humanity.