Vajpayee and Advani were inherently Nehruvian, but Modi is different, says Jairam Ramesh

Since the time Congress lost power in Delhi in 2014, senior party leader Jairam Ramesh is on a writing spree. Like his fellow Congressman, Shashi Tharoor, Ramesh comes out with a new book almost every year. “This is my eighth book in the last seven years,” Ramesh says in a matter-of-factly tone. He, however, emphasises that he would never write a book on politics. “I feel that’s the most unexciting thing to do,” he says, adding that his next book will be on Jawaharlal Nehru, who has been under constant attack from his ideological opponents, the BJP and the RSS. “I think we have been trying to defend him. Unfortunately, the defenders of Nehru have frozen him in time.”

In an exclusive interview with Firstpost, Ramesh talks about his new book, The Light of Asia: The Poem that Defined the Buddha. He talks about why he chose to write a biography of a poem and its writer, Sir Edwin Arnold, and how he looks at the Modi dispensation at the Centre, among other things. Here are the edited excerpts:

Q: From PN Haksar to VK Krishna Menon to now Edwin Arnold, you seem to be charting unpredictable territories. What made you write The Light of Asia? 

A consistent feature in my books — this is my eighth book in the last seven years — has been the availability of archival materials. I always try to distance myself when I’m writing. I try to be as objective as I can. For instance, when I was writing the environmental biography of Indira Gandhi, I was conscious of the fact that I was a Congress MP. However, I put a distance between myself and her when I wrote that book. Similar was the case with Haksar and Menon books. For this book, however, I didn’t have to distance myself as Buddha has been a part of every Indian’s life. Buddhism may have disappeared from India, but Buddha is perhaps the most ubiquitous figure in India. Also, what prompted me was that my last three books were biographies of men, so I thought why not (do) a biography of a ‘book’! I had read this poem during my childhood; it had a tremendous effect on me. And here I am with this book.

Q: Being a different kind of memoir, this must have been difficult to write. Isn’t it? 

It is a two-in-one biography—it is a biography of a poem and embedded in it is a biography of a poet. So, I am not only writing about the poem which is on the life of Buddha; I am also writing about the poet who himself is quite a fascinating character. In the book, I have also written about how the poem becomes a milestone in Buddhist historiography. And also about a poet who lived in England popularising India’s literature legacy.

Q: Your book says that the poem ‘The Light of Asia’ redefined Buddha. Can you explain how? 

The original poem was published in July 1879 and was called The Light of Asia. It is about the life of Buddha. This book came when Buddha was going through a process of re-discovery. This poem came at the very opportune time when there was growing discontentment in regard to the church, there was religious dissent, growth of religious agnosticism and there was profound dissatisfaction with organised religion. At this time, science was questioned and there was rapid economic growth in Western countries. This time people were looking for spirituality and Buddha fulfilled that. Buddha never said that he was God but he encouraged people to be their own lamp. That’s what made this poem a sensation as it focused on the humanity of Buddha, not his divinity.

The poem The Light of Asia inspired people like Mahatma Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru, BR Ambedkar and Subhas Chandra Bose, Ravindranath Tagore, Rudyard Kipling, CV Raman, and DD Kosambi. What explains its popularity among such diverse sections of people?

They were all captivated by Buddha for different reasons. For Gandhi, Nehru and Tagore, Buddha represented morality, ethics and culture. But to Ambedkar and DD Kosambi, it was the social message of Buddha that fascinated them. Today we see Buddha in relation to spiritualism, meditation and love but we don’t see how he destabilised society by challenging society.

Q: Sir Edwin was a complicated personality and can’t be put in a box. He loved India and Indian culture, and yet he believed in Britain’s manifest destiny. How do you see this?

Yes, he was a great believer in British rule and was a soft imperialist. He always believed that Britishers one day would have to leave India, but he had no sympathy towards the political aspirations of Indians and never spoke for the self-rule of India. He was more into the cultural aspects of India as he translated various Indian texts and works of literature. He is an overall curious figure. He married a Japanese woman and then got very much involved in Japanese culture. He also spoke different languages. So overall he is a curious character, but undeniably he was a great populariser of Indian text and literature.

Q: The book is full of interesting anecdotes. One of them being that of Kisari Mohan Ganguli, who first translated the Mahabharata in its entirety into English, and Arnold helped him during his financial hardships. How do you see Viceroy Lord Curzon?

To Curzon, we owe a lot in terms of the preservation of our archaeological heritage. He also worked for the preservation of lions in Gir and for the preservation of wildlife. Curzon was a polarising figure. Let me tell you one more example. Tipu Sultan was hated by the British, but Curzon was very particular about the fact that Tipu was a very important figure.

This is where I differ from my friend and fellow Congressman Shashi Tharoor. I don’t see history in black and white. In my worldview, there’s enough space for grey. But for Shashi, it’s either black or white. For him, the British rule was all dark

Q: Although Arnold had not discredited Christ in any way, the missionaries thought that “the Englishman had a diabolical design to bring disrepute to Christianity”. Was this the reason why he wrote ‘The Light of World’?

Since his works were centred on Oriental themes, he was consistently under attack from Christian missionaries, particularly in America. The American Church establishment was more critical to Arnold than the British Church establishment. The Light of Asia got very popular at that time and the church was worried that the Buddha would influence the Americans—so they mounted a systematic attack on Arnold and his book. It is to counter this sentiment that Arnold wrote The Light of the World, a poem on Christ, but it bombed. Nobody remembers him for The Light of the World!

Q: You write about a 1958 exchange between then Education Minister Abul Kalam Azad, Prime Minister Nehru and Vice-President S Radhakrishnan on the translation of Ashvaghosha’s Buddhacarita and the Rig Veda. Can you tell us about this episode?

This episode is quite amazing where the Education Minister, Prime Minister and Vice President were engaging in a discussion that was prompted by Hindi poet Mahadevi Verma seeking financial assistance for the publication of her translation of Ashvaghosha’s Buddhacarita and the Rig Veda. Nehru wrote (to) Azad on 6 August 1956: “I agree with the Minister of Education about publishing religious books. Normally we should not take them up, but books like the Buddhacarita and the Rig Veda are classics of ancient India and hardly be considered religious books." That exchange was very important, especially in the context where Nehru is projected as Hindu phobic, etc.

Q: You mention Arnold’s role in Buddhists getting back the temple of Bodh Gaya from Hindu priests. How did it happen? 

I must tell you an interesting episode: A couple of weeks after the book appeared, a BJP senior leader from Bihar called me and said, “I have been going to Bodh Gaya for 40 years, but I never knew the history of Mahabodhi and after reading the book I came to know about that place.” Arnold went to Bodh Gaya in 1886 and wrote about the state of the Mahabodhi temple. It was only after his visit that a movement started in a big way to bring the temple management back with Buddhists, which was then controlled by Hindu priests.

Q: One of the highlights of the book has been your painstaking research that included tracking down Arnold’s great-grandchildren. Please tell us more.

When I was doing some research on Arnold, I discovered that his son was working with the Nawabs in Bhopal. I then tried to locate his family. I found where Arnold’s great-grandchildren were living. What also fascinated me were their interesting names: Mohammed Michael Arnold, his brother Feroz Arnold, sisters Nahid Arnold, Farzana Arnold Siddiqui and Fauzia Arnold Raza. I could speak to Michael Arnold. They are deeply conscious about the fact that Edwin Arnold is their great-grandfather.

Q: Congress stalwarts like you and Shashi Tharoor are writing books on Hinduism. Why aren’t you writing on politics? 

Two things I’ll never do: One, I’ll never write my memoirs; and two, I’ll never write on politics. I feel that’s the most unexciting thing to do.

Q: What’s next after this book? 

I’m planning to write a book on Nehru, who is under constant attack these days. People who have not read about Nehru discredit and defame him. I have collected a lot of material on him. I will revisit Nehru with his relationship with Gandhi, Patel, Ambedkar and others, and would respond to some of the mischievous myths that have been spread against him.

Q: Of late, we see that Nehru is completely left undefended. Is it because of the failure of the Congress party? 

No, I think we have been trying to defend him. Unfortunately, the defenders of Nehru have frozen him in time. They haven’t understood Nehru. Nehru and Gandhi were self-critical people—you don’t need to read anything else, you only need to look at what they have written about themselves. So I won’t say we haven’t defended him well, but that conspiracies and propagandas against him have been well planned and organised.

Q: Is the attack on Nehru also happening because the Nehruvian era is truly over now, especially with the arrival of Prime Minister Narendra Modi? 

I will agree with you. Narendra Modi is the first Prime Minister who is not a product of Nehruvian era and order. Everyone before him, including Atal Bihari Vajpayee, LK Advani, Murli Manohar Joshi, Jaswant Singh and Bhairon Singh Shekhawat were all products of the Nehruvian order. They were inherently Nehruvian. Decency and dialogue mattered then. Today, there’s a complete lack of dialogue. It’s a ‘my way or highway’ kind of situation.