Colonial Discourse and History of India | Dr. Kundan Singh |

James Mill produced his three-volume 'History of British India' in 1817, which is a momentous year in the relationship of Britain with India.The Marathas lost their third and final war to the British the same year and a large part of the Indian subcontinent came under the British dominion. Ronald Inden in 'Imagining India' says that Mill’s 'History' is a hegemonic text. And indeed, it is because Mill used the text to describe Indians, in particular the Hindus, as savage and barbarian from as many vantage points as possible. His twisted and distorted narrative, set in motion 200 years ago, is the primary paradigm in which the history, culture, politics, governance, and sociology of Hindus are described in academia even today. This talk gives a brief biography of James Mill and an overview of the ways in which his hate-filled enunciation have become an integral part of the mainstream discourse on Hindus in academia and media.

About the speaker:
Dr. Kundan Singh is the Vice President of the Cultural Integration Fellowship in San Francisco and Senior Fellow at Hindupedia, Cupertino, California where he is diligently involved with changing the representation of Hinduism and India in grade-school textbooks across the US. Author of the 'Evolution of Integral Yoga: Sri Aurobindo, Sri Ramakrishna, and Swami Vivekananda' and joint author of 'Making Children Hinduphobic: A Critical Review of McGraw Hill’s World History Textbooks' with Krishna Maheshwari, he has lectured extensively in San Francisco and has many academic presentations at international and national conferences. Some of his chapters in edited books are “Beyond Mind: The Future of Psychology as Science,” “Beyond Postmodernism: Towards a Future Psychology,” “Relativism, Self-Referentiality, and Beyond Mind,” “Relativism and its Relevance for Psychology” and “Sri Aurobindo’s Invalidation of the Aryan Invasion Theory and the Contemporary Western Archeological Evidence.”
Some of his articles written for popular press can be found at indiafacts.org (http://indiafacts.org/author/kundan-s.... His talks can be accessed at https://sangamtalks.org/dr-kundan-sin... at https://www.mixcloud.com/sriarvinda/

Subtopics:

0:10 James Mill: Introduction, education, and career
4:30 His book on British India in 1818
5:35 His substantial influence on India through the East India Company
6:45 His text as required reading for British officers posted in India
9:27 Mill twisting and turning Manu's Dharmashastra laws, while setting the narrative on Hindus as hierarchical and oppressive
12:10 Relevance of his discourse in present times
13:15 His ideas travelling to Marx: Hindu society primarily oppressive
16:21 James Mill’s 1821-1824 articles in the 'Supplement to Encyclopedia Britannica'
19:20 1850 onwards, universities emerging in India with the History of British India in curriculum
20:25 Nehru’s 'Discovery of India' replicates the narrative
22:30 Children of Indian ancestry taught the same discourse, resulting in inferiority complex and shame
24:00 Hindu hatred content always related to James Mill
25:25 Need for systematic study to refute this narrative appropriated by both Liberal-Left and Right.

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