Chapter 1
1. Amartya Sen discusses the universality of democracy and its intrinsic and instrumental values in the Journal of Democracy 10.3 (1997) 3–17. http://muse.jhu.edu/demo/jod/10.3sen.html. Accessed 6 August 2007.
2. Though not discussed openly, this has been the predominant progressive view at private exchanges between scholars of the region. David Ludden discusses some of its intricacies and implications. http://www.sas.upenn.edu/~dludden/areast1.htm. Accessed 1 August 2007.
3. Brahma Chellaney, a professor of strategic studies at the privately funded Centre for Policy Research in New Delhi argues that channelling Tibetan waters northward can have grave implications for South Asia as China aims for a bigger share of South Asia’s water lifeline. His reasoning appears to be based on looming water crisis in mainland China and its brimming foreign currency reserve that can precipitate diversion of Brahmaputra flow northwards. Japan Times Online, Tuesday, 26 June 2007. http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/eo20070626bc.html. Accessed 5 July 2007.
4. I have discussed contestations over the name in Adluri Subramany Raju (ed.) Imagining South Asia in a Unipolar World, Gyan Publishing House, New Delhi, 2007.
5. Himal Southasian hosted a roundtable on 18–19 November 2001, just prior to the 11th SAARC summit in Kathmandu. A summary of the proceedings was published in the January 2002 issue of the magazine. It was discussed again a year after in ‘The necessary manufacture of South Asia’. http://www.himalmag.com/2003/january/asia_special_2.htm
6. The Delhi High Court used this belief to dismiss a Public Interest Litigation—evidently aimed at Sonia Gandhi and Congress (I) headed by her—seeking to debar persons of foreign origin from holding any constitutional post and de-recognize any political party having a foreign-born person as its president. One of the presiding judges said: ‘If one has to follow the liberal and humane concept of ancient Indian philosophy, then what our scriptures have taught us is “Vasudhaiv Kutumbkam”, i.e., the whole planet is a family.’ Hindustan Times, New Delhi, 26 November 2006.
7. Amartya Sen dates it back to the imperial edicts of Ashoka in the third century BC and argues convincingly that it was the position of the great Mughal ruler Akbar too in his popular tract The Argumentative Indian, Penguin Books, 2005.
8. Referring to A. M. Leslie, ‘Pretense and Representation: The Origins of “Theory of Mind”’, Psychological Review, 94 (1987), pp. 412–426, Simon Baron-Cohen has discussed differences succinctly in The Biology of Imagination <http://www.entelechyjournal.com/simonbaroncohen.htm> accessed 4 June 2007.
9. R. D. Dikshit (1997). Geographical Thought: A Contextual History of Ideas. New Delhi: Prentice-Hall.
10. John K Wright coined this term by joining ge meaning earth and sophia meaning knowledge. But he also gave a tongue-in-cheek warning: geosophy shouldn’t be confused with geosophistry or geopedantry! John K. Wright (1947). Terrae Incognitae: The Place of Imagination in Geography in Annals of the Association of American Geographers 37: 1-15. Available on the net at http://www.cplorado.edu/geography/giw/wright-jk/1947-ti/1947_ti.html. Accessed 29 July 2007
11. Recent researches suggest that sediments brought down by the Indus River System from Karakoram Hindu Kush and western Tibet have helped form a 10-kilometer-thick Indus Fan extending up to 1000 to 1500 kilometres into the Arabic Sea. This should be reason enough to call it Indus rather than the Arabic Sea. http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2007%5C07%5C02%5Cstory_2-7-2007_pg12_8. Accessed 2 July 2007.
12. Khushwant shows humility when he says: ‘I am not happy with my translation and will be grateful to readers for suggestions on how to improve it.’ http://www.tribuneindia.com/2005/20050702/saturday/above.htm The challenge should prompt readers to attempt it though the act of translation helps in the understanding and internalization of the zeal of the poet.
13. The term ‘Macaulay’s Children’ is often used for people of Indian ancestry who adopt a Western attitude, culture and lifestyle and begin thinking like westerners. This mindset is a tribute to the success of Lord Thomas Babington Macaulay (1800–1859) who had observed in his famous minute on education in 1835: ‘We must at present do our best to form a class who may be interpreters between us and the millions whom we govern; a class of persons, Indians in blood and colour, but English in taste, in opinions, in morals, and in intellect.’ I have discussed the enduring influence of this group in ‘Macaulay’s Orphans: The Rotten Core in the Middle’ in Himal Southasian, November 2003. http://www.himalmag.com/2003/november/southasianphere.htm (accessed 24 September 2007) and also ‘In the Shadow of Fear’ in Himal Southasian. September, 2005. http://www.himalmag.com/2005/september/southasiasphere.html. Accessed 24 September 2007.
14. This was an unusually strong statement from Gandhi in view of his conciliatory gestures towards the British earlier. According to Mark Tully’s review (available on the web at: http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/books/history/article2361518.ece; accessed 1 September 2007) of Last Thousand Days of Empire, historian Peter Clarke casts Gandhi in the role of a villain. But there is little doubt that Gandhi was a politician and may have erred in estimating the staying power of post-war British in India. A concise description of evolution of the Indian National Congress can be seen in ‘The Congress and The Freedom Movement’ available at. http://www.aicc.org.in/the_congress_and_the_freedom_movement.htm#quit. Accessed 24 September 2007.
15. Engineer observes that the attempt of an union between Egypt, Syria and Libya to create United Arab Republic by Nasser in the 1970s failed even though all of them shared the same language and religion. He argues ‘When the Saudi King objected to Nasser’s use of the term “Arab Nationalism”, and suggested instead “Islamic Umma”, Nasser rightly pointed out that what was common between an Arab Muslim and an Indonesian Muslim except their religion.’ There is a short but fervent plea against religious nationalism by Asghar Ali Engineer on the web, ‘Nation, State, Religion and Identity’. http://ecumene.org/IIS/csss33.htm. Accessed 24 September 2007.