| Pandit
Nehru almost never used the phrase composite culture. His
was a more organic view of culture and civilization. He believed in,
and spoke of, cultural synthesis which, if all, could take place
only within the old civilizational framework since Islam did not
finally triumph. Pandit Nehru also wrote and spoke of the spirit of
India asserting itself again and again. Surely, that spirit could
not be a composite affair. In the Maulana Azad memorial lecture
(mentioned earlier) he also spoke of different cultures being
products of different environments and he specifically contrasted
tropical India with the deserts of Arabia. He even said that a
Hindu-Muslim cultural synthesis had not been completed when other
factors intervened. Apparently he was referring to the British Raj.
This should help dispel the
impression that the Nehru era was a continuation of alien rule
intended to frustrate the process of Indianization of India. This
charge is not limited to his detractors. It is made by his admirers
as well, though, of course, indirectly and unknowingly. They pit
secularism against Hinduism which is plainly absurd. Hindus do not
need the imported concept of secularism in order to be able to show
respect towards other faiths. That comes naturally to them. For
theirs is an inclusive faith which provides for every form of
religious ex- perience and belief; there can be no heresy or kufr in
Hinduism.
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