Peace and harmony in India are essential for Asian future, said Prof. Sugata Bose of the Harvard University. Delivering the inaugural Mushirul Hasan Memorial Lecture of Jamia Milia Islamia on Thursday, the academic remarked that Asian universalism’s future in the 21st century will be determined by the rivalry between India and China which is intensifying.
“Mahatma Gandhi understood that peace and unity of India was the precondition for contributing to the universalism of Asia,” said Prof. Sugata Bose delivering the lecture on “Asian Universalism in the Age of Nationalism” which was held virtually. The scholar and academic pointed out that the Asian universalism came up on the common anti-colonial agenda. The agenda, he noted, gave a chance to nationalist China and India as well as Japan and several countries to unite in the early 20th century.
The scholar said Mahatma Gandhi, Rabindranath Tagore and Sun Yat-sen were the leading proponents of the Asian universalism that began to fall apart after Japan joined the western trend of aggressive nationalism and pursued imperial policies. Mahatma Gandhi, he noted, was disturbed by the Japanese imperialism. Prof. Bose, Gardiner Professor of History in the Harvard University, remarked the Asian universalism was destroyed by the violence between China and Japan during the early 20th century.
In the backdrop of the crisis of nationalism driven state system in Europe of the early 20th century, the Asian universalism was a hope that came up as an alternative to the European “integration”. He said interconnected and inter-referential Asia was to contribute to the global development. “Societies can become each other’s point of reference,” he said arguing in favour of generous universalism against narrow and hubris-driven nationalism.
He also pointed out through documented records that the Indian Muslims too participated in this process.
Indian Muslims were unanimous in prioritising the nation state over Islamic universalism that was influenced by the developments in the Arabian peninsula after the arrival of the Ibn Saud in the mid-1920s. He said the relation of the Indian Muslim with the West Asian region was strengthened during the Khilafat movement but the leadership participated in the international movement while maintaining its priority in the regional developments.
Prof. Bose said Japan’s imperial attitude in the 1920s and 1930s disappointed Rabindranath Tagore. The idea of Asia appealed to Tagore, said the scholar pointing at the deep interconnections that existed between India, Japan, western Asia and the Southeast Asia.
He urged for better understanding between the contemporary Asian powers to ensure a future free from narrow nationalism which, he noted, is currently being played out in the relationship among various countries of Asia. At the virtual event, various scholars recollected the academic contribution of Prof. Mushirul Hasan who had served as the Vice-Chancellor of the Jamia Milia Islamia during 2004-2009. Prof. Hasan passed away on December 10, 2018.