It's about the soul of a nation still trapped in mental servitude. It didn’t require Modi to identify this black hole in India’s self-esteem. He was just the first political leader wielding power who tried to restore India’s mojo.
When a Prime Minister singles out a facet of India’s past for scrutiny in two major addresses in less than a fortnight, it naturally implies there is an important message he wants to convey.
There were two aspects to that invocation of the colonial legacy. First, while a very accomplished scholar whose stature as a historian is still considered significant, Macaulay chose to conceal his ignorance of Indic intellectual traditions with a facile comment that also defined the Raj’s approach to the education of natives. His infamous aside on the worthlessness of Oriental knowledge and the innate superiority of western civilisation was sufficiently brutal to still rankle in the Indian imagination.
There were two aspects to that invocation of the colonial legacy. First, while a very accomplished scholar whose stature as a historian is still considered significant, Macaulay chose to conceal his ignorance of Indic intellectual traditions with a facile comment that also defined the Raj’s approach to the education of natives. His infamous aside on the worthlessness of Oriental knowledge and the innate superiority of western civilisation was sufficiently brutal to still rankle in the Indian imagination.