Indian humanity experienced the birth-pangs of a new society in the sixteenth century. The Jand of five rivers gave birth to a new society which in due course was destined to mature into anation. This nation did not come out from vacuum, It came from the parent stock—un- questionably Hindu. Lest the political academicians be perturbed over the usage we should do well to allay his anxiety and surprise by dwelling over the concept of nation. Remember that concepts which represent living feeling or some sentimental consciousness cannot be adequately caged in words. No definition will be found completely satisfactory, acceptable to all and covering every possible concrete case. Such is the case with such abstract concepts as democracy, state etc. It is idle to resort to musty old text books in search of a definition. Some would clutch at the most convenient, of regarding a people as nation which expresses its unity through a state. In other words, nation is a nation because it has a state. But what about the homeless Jews? No body seriously denies them nationhood. What about the dependent races of mankind? In fact there is no essential relation between statehood and nationhood. From the history of political struggles all the world over, we can conclude that as soon as a nation achieves full consciousness of its separate nationhood, it automatically strives to attain the maximum of freedom for the free expression of its national life and demands a state. Whether it succeeds in actually obtaining one is different. Latvia and Estonia have never been independent states in the modern sense of the word; yet the Lett and Estonian nations are a reality.
To some thinkers of the Hindu way of thought the sum total of citizens who happen to be under one state constitute a nation, Hence it is that they conclude that Indian peoples having the unity of common subjection in the past under the Mauryian Empire and at present under the British rule are a nation. One wonders how a Hindu, a worshipper of plurality has suddenly developed his love for political monism. The reason is not far to seek. It gives him the excuse for the transfer of political power to him over millions whom he has ‘treated with callous unconcern or deliberate hostility. But he should nor, however, forget, that in a conflict between a nation and the ‘State it is the former that always survives. By this is not meane to deny that a state does not at all possess the nation-building power. There have been such instances. But the normal course is nation calling for a state and not state building a nation. If you have any doubts first recollect the instructive behavior of how the Germans in the Volga regions of the U.S. S. R. became a hot-bed for fifth-columnist activities on the approach of Hitler’s armies. The Russian Government saw no other solution but the wholesale deportation of six lacs of Volga Germans to Siberia far from the front. It is not common subjection that produces nationhood or else prison houses could be used as nurseries for the production of nations. No definition, as I said before, will be acceptable to all. Perhaps that given by Renan enjoys the greatest popularity and is the nearest approach to truth. He says, “A nation is a living soul, a spiritual principle. Few things constitute this soul; one is in the past, the other in the present. One is the common possession of a rich heritage of memories; the other is the actual consent, the desire to live | together, the will to preserve worthily the undivided inheritance. To have common glories in the past, a common will in the present; to have done great things together, to will to do the like again—such are the essential conditions for the making of a people. To have suffered and rejoiced and hoped together in the ‘past are the strongest limbs that bind a people together.” Comrade Stalin remarked, A nation is a historically evolved stable community of language, territory, economic life and psychological make-up manifested in a community of culture.” In other. words some of the obvious ponds through which unity of a people find: expression are common language, religion, race, land and culture. It does not matter how many of these limbs are present in the case of a particular nation, but what matters is how strong those limbs are which bind a particular group and separate it from the rest. In shortest possible words, it is the consciousness of being separate from others and of belonging to a particular group of humanity. It is the consciousness that expresses through the state of feeling a home amidst those a person regards as his own and feeling a stranger amdist people regarded not their own.
No single bond is to be given undue or exclusive importance. Language for instance may make union possible but does not compel. it. The English and Americans speak the same language but belong to different nations. Sikhs and Punjabi Muslims speak the same language but there i is no love lost between them. So with race. To found nationality on basis of ethnology is to court sure disaster. Race has lost all that sentiment about it. No ethnologist has so far succeeded in discovering a pure race, Attachment to race is increasingly on the wane. Ethnological limbs are not strong enough to give birth to a nation. Mahatma Gandhi’s position is extremely vulnerable when he wishes to label all the people of the country as one Indian nation on the ground that they belong to the common racial parent stock. Common territory is another limb. Rivers and mountains do not create a nation. Maps are drawn by men not men made by maps, Land affords only a place to live on, substratum to work on. Material nature does not determine the soul of a people.
The definition given by Louis de Brouchere is considered perhaps the most comprehensive.
