S Gurumurthy
In a world fractured by power-hungry nationalism, often conjures images of military marches, border skirmishes, and ideological superiority, Indian idea of nationalism offers something radically different; a quiet, profound alternative rooted not in might but in meaning. It is not a nationalism that thunders from podiums; it is one that whispers from the soul. To truly understand India is to move beyond the tired paradigms of statehood and territory and to encounter a living, breathing civilisational rhythm; a spiritual consciousness that predates borders, flags, and constitutions.
While Europe’s idea of nationalism was born through the ambitions of kings, forged in the crucible of wars, territorial conquests, royal marriages, and political unions which anchored in bloodshed and violence, gave nationalism itself a bad name, an order that civilised societies eventually began to distrust. It was nationalism by force.
Whereas India’s nationalism is fundamentally different. It is not manufactured by power but nurtured by spirit. It is not imposed from above but arises from below, from saints, seers, philosophers, and common people who lived and preached peace, harmony, and unity across vast diversity. It is not territorial or military nationalism; it is civilisational nationalism.
Hawaii University’s Professor Rammal R.J. conducted a study tracing 2,500 years of global violence, estimating that human beings have slaughtered between 680 million and 1.2 billion of their own kind. His maps and data revealed that the only geography untouched by large-scale violence until the 13th century was Bharat (India).
While empires rose and fell in blood across continents, what preserved peace in India? It wasn’t statecraft or the sword. It was the silent, persistent work of sages and saints who cultivated a culture of coexistence, despite caste, creed, region, or religion.
This is the only land where 33 crore Gods could exist in a single civilisation, where multiple ways of worship never fractured the social fabric. In contrast, the belief in one God elsewhere often created more divisions and violence than unity; wars were fought, lands were colonised, and people were exterminated in the name of “my god vs. your god.”
This ethos, this capacity to live with contradiction and diversity, is the core of Indian nationalism. As one Swiss professor observed, India uniquely teaches how to live with differences of gods, languages, customs, and philosophies. This acceptance is the core of Indian nationalism.
Ashoka’s war, the only major violent conflict considered “adharmic” in Indian history, was not celebrated but condemned. Indian consciousness was never at ease with conquest.
It is this spiritual depth that Swami Vivekananda called the foundation of India’s unity. He proclaimed that India was a “union of hearts” beating to a shared spiritual rhythm, not a mechanical union imposed by administration or army.
Maharishi Aurobindo, in his 1909 Uttarpara Speech, went further: “Sanatana Dharma is nationalism… With it, the Hindu nation was born. With it, it grows. If Sanatana Dharma declines, the nation declines. If it perishes, the nation perishes.”
Even Mahatma Gandhi, often secularised in public memory, grounded his freedom struggle in this deeper idea of India. In his 1909 dialogue, Hind Swaraj captures his deep faith in India’s pre-colonial unity. When asked whether British railways, posts, and courts made India one nation, he responded:
“We were one nation before they came… One thought inspired us; our mode of life was the same… What do you think our ancestors intended when they established Rameshwaram in the south, Jagannath in the east, and Haridwar in the north as places of pilgrimage?”
This network of pilgrimages was India’s grassroots federation, uniting diverse peoples in a sacred geography: Punya Bhoomi, Karma Bhoomi, and Moksha Bhoomi.
Unknown to most, Gandhi also invited Naga Sadhus to the 1920 Nagpur Congress session. The British were alarmed. Secret colonial documents noted that if saints and farmers united, the British Raj would collapse. That is why Gandhi dressed like a fakir because Indian nationalism was not bureaucratic but spiritual.
Where European nations had to be artificially forged, with national languages and bureaucratic unity imposed after unification, India never needed that. It was always a living civilisation, not broken statues or forgotten scripts, but a lived experience. As Vivekananda famously said, unlike Greek or Roman ruins, Indian civilisation breathes even today in the lives of its people.
This continuity was not preserved by emperors or parliaments but by the spiritual consciousness sustained by saints, temple traditions, and village dharma. That is why even someone arriving without preparation at the Kumbh Mela finds food, shelter, and welcome. India still lives that spirit without contracts, without government.
In contrast, look at modern America. In 2020, five former U.S. Army Chiefs and six Defence Secretaries warned of a deep national fracture where Democrats and Republicans were unwilling to marry or even speak to each other. There was no shared sacredness.
A Pew study revealed the stark truth: America has no sacred mountain, no sacred river, and no common sacred person. Only government institutions hold it together.
In Italy, there are 30,000 canonised saints. In the U.S., just three.
India, on the other hand, is a land where everything is sacred: the Ganga, the Himalayas, cows, trees, temples, sages, songs. The very soil is imbued with spiritual meaning.
Even Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru also acknowledged this reality. In Glimpses of World History (1935), he wrote: “Vivekananda’s nationalism was Hindu nationalism. It had its roots in Hindu religion and culture. This was not in any way anti-Muslim or anti-anyone else.”
He added, “It is not easy to draw a line between Hindu nationalism and Indian nationalism, for the two overlap.”
This is not about majority vs. minority. It is about a shared civilisational memory. A memory that connects temples, tirthas, festivals, and philosophies across thousands of years and millions of hearts.
In conclusion, Indian nationalism cannot be understood through Western lenses of political theory or colonial historiography. It is not “nation-state nationalism” but “civilisational dharma,” the living, breathing spiritual ethos of people who could house a thousand gods and a billion humans without losing their soul. It is time to reclaim this idea of India, not as an abstract legal union but as a sacred civilisation, held not by law or force but by the dharma.
(Edited excerpts from S Gurumurthy’s talk on How Nationalism Is Continuity of India’s Rich Past at Nationalist Collective Conclave, hosted by Republic TV on May 17, 2025)
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