Prasenjit K. Basu’s India Reborn: The Epic Story of a Civilisation’s Rebound from Two Centuries of Decline is an important book with a clear purpose. It refuses to treat India’s rise as a recent miracle, or as a story that begins in 1947, or even in 1991. Basu is asking the primal question: how did a civilisation with long-standing economic weight and intellectual influence suffer such a steep relative decline, and what does rebirth look like when it is measured in institutions and agency rather than in mood? The range is wide, yet the spine is firm. He moves from India’s historical economic scale into the mechanics of colonial conquest and extraction, into the layered struggle for freedom where he gives real weight to currents often distorted by historians or softened in public memory, and then into the Republic’s long policy drift before the reform turn and the current effort to rebuild delivery and opportunity at scale. The tone is confident and unsentimental, which is part of its appeal. Basu does not write to comfort and challenges us to rethink long-held assumptions of who we are as a civilisational state claimant, how we got lost in between, and how we may be finally getting there. That long arc matters because the book is really intervening with its arguments and ideas in a contemporary contest: what kind of political entity is India? Read narrowly, India is a nation-state, a modern constitutional polity, a republic, bounded by territory and defined by citizenship. Read more accurately, India is also a civilisational state, a perpetual thread of civilisational memory, Hindu religious and cultural grammar, intellectual, spiritual and syncretic traditions, and social and commercial life that long predates and extends way beyond the modern map and repeatedly survived political rupture. Basu is interested in what happens when that continuity and endurance begins to express itself again as modern capability. And that is one of the key strengths of this compelling book. The civilisational state idea has unfortunately been ideologically contentious. It is easily caricatured, and it can be mishandled by opposing sides, one denying any exceptionalism, greatness and glory of Indian civilisation and culture, and the other asserting it to the exclusion of other influences and pluralities embraced by it over the ages. Used mindfully, it is an explanatory frame, inspirational and exhortatory, to reclaim India’s greatness of virasat in all its plenitude, its profundity and myriad dimensions. It tells you why continuity, antiquity, and shared civilisational memory is not mere memory but, when reignited, more recently in the last 11 years under PM Modi’s aastha—faith and indefatigable effort—vikas gets conjoined with and draws the self-confidence ballast of virasat. This virasat is of capability and genius, as cultural and philosophical as it is economic, technological and scientific, one that had often been suppressed by colonial and post-colonial narratives. This can shape legitimacy more deeply than a single founding moment, and explains why a society’s instincts about unity in diversity, authority and responsibility often cannot be understood on a short timeline. It also forces a distinction that is often blurred in public debate: legacy as inheritance versus legacy as power. Basu puts it sharply in one line, contrasting communities that retain distant cultural residues with those that still control a living civilisational state: “these tenuous successors do not durably control civilisational states that can carry the rich legacy of their ancestors forward”. That is the standard implied by the reborn. Civilisations can survive as nostalgia. Civilisational states survive as operating systems. They carry forward inherited depth into institutions, norms, and strategic choices, and they retain the capacity to renew without cultural amnesia. The concept is reinforced if it also organically allows its diversity to become its strength. Civilisations that endure for millennia do so through absorption, argument, accommodation, and synthesis. Any civilisational state argument that flattens plurality is historically illiterate and politically brittle and unwise. At the same time, Bharat’s mainstream Hindu civilisational core values, belief systems, philosophies and institutions have to be honoured and resuscitated and taken forward, not lost in submission to overlays of colonising cultures and values. India qualifies as a civilisational state on three grounds that go beyond its subcontinental size, its largest population in the world, and its oldest, biggest and most vibrant democracy that is pluralistic in several senses. Antiquity is the simplest. Continuity is the deeper proof. India has lived through repeated ruptures, invasions, partitions, and political reinvention, yet it retained recognisable threads across languages and literatures, sacred geographies, philosophical schools, and habits of debate, while other civilisations shrunk into museum lore, as in Egypt. Continuity here is not stasis. It is persistence and resilience through change. Consequence and influence in the region and globally is where the modern map becomes plainly inadequate. India’s civilisational reach historically travelled less by conquest and more by diffusion, through merchants and monks, scholars and sailors, craftsmen and courtly exchange. Southeast Asia is one visible layer, where epics, Sanskritic vocabularies, temple forms, and political ideas left durable residues that still surface in language, ritual, aesthetics, and architecture. Yet the sphere expands far wider. Across the Indian Ocean world, trade routes linked the subcontinent to the Gulf and the Red Sea, and onward to East Africa, carrying communities, words, tastes, and commercial cultures. Northwards and eastwards, Buddhism carried Indian philosophical concepts, monastic institutions, translation traditions, and artistic forms through Central Asia into China and beyond, creating civilisational bridges sustained by pilgrimage and learning rather than by armies. Ideas in mathematics, astronomy, medicine, and logic also travelled across languages and regimes. This is civilisational influence in its most durable form: a web of transmission that outlives borders. Read in this frame, from Virasat to Vikas becomes more than a slogan. Heritage is not decorative. It matters only when it is translated into capability, skill, talent, intellectual gravitas and cognitive genius in everything we do as a polity, economy, society, R&D, and in forging ahead in the Tech 4.0 revolution. Competence is visible in the Read More

On Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose’s birth anniversary, the nation pays tribute to his courage, sacrifice, and unyielding passion for freedom. From a young age, Netaji displayed rare moral intensity — renouncing personal comfort, worldly ambition and even a prestigious career in the Indian Civil Service to dedicate himself to India’s liberation. For him, freedom was a sacred duty. A profound insight into Netaji’s personality comes from a remarkable tribute by Gurudev Rabindranath Tagore in 1939. He hailed Subhas Chandra Bose as deshnayak — the leader of the nation. Gurudev observed that in troubled times, a country needs the strong hand of an inspired and valiant leader. In Netaji, he saw a rare fusion of courage, vision and moral force. When conventional paths appeared inadequate to achieve Independence, Netaji charted his own course, transforming the freedom struggle into an international movement through the Indian National Army. He asserted, “There is no power on earth that can deprive us of our birthright of liberty any longer.” This belief found expression in the INA. Netaji’s clarion call —“Give me blood, and I will give you freedom”— resonated deeply across regions and communities of India, especially the people of the southern regions, the Tamils in particular. The deep emotional and ideological bond between Netaji and the Tamil people became one of the strongest pillars of support for the INA and the freedom movement. Netaji’s popularity also resonated powerfully with Tamil communities in Malaya, Burma and Singapore. From the early 1920s, Netaji recognised the political importance of the Madras Presidency in the Indian national movement. As a Congress organiser and national leader, he engaged closely with political workers in the region. Netaji’s visits to Madras (now Chennai) and other centres of the presidency were marked by large public meetings and enthusiastic receptions, particularly by students and the politically conscious youth. On September 3, 1939, Netaji arrived at Madras Central Station, where he was received by supporters, including lawyer and freedom fighter S Srinivasa Iyengar and Pasumpon U Muthuramalinga Thevar. Taken in an open jeep to “The Peak”, the residence of civil engineer S P Ayyaswamy Mudaliar, he was followed by a sea of supporters. That evening, he addressed a massive public meeting at Marina Beach. During this visit, Pasumpon U Muthuramalinga Thevar, a close associate of Netaji, emerged as a key leader of the Forward Bloc in Tamil Nadu. Often remembered as the “Bose of the South”, he played a significant role in mobilising Tamil support for the INA. He also founded a Tamil weekly magazine, Netaji. Among the notable recruits was Ramu Thevar, originally from Ramnad in the Madras Presidency. Inspired by Netaji at an early age, he joined the INA and was later entrusted with intelligence duties in Penang. Arrested while attempting to reach India, he was imprisoned in Alipore Jail in Calcutta (now Kolkata). His letters to his mother speak of the immense hardship he had to undergo as well as his unwavering patriotism. Unaware of his execution in Madras Jail in 1944, his mother continued writing to him until 1948. Thevar was only 18 when he made the supreme sacrifice for the nation. The Tamil recruits for the INA also came from outside the country. Among them was Lieutenant R Madhavan Pillai. It was heartening to see Prime Minister Narendra Modi felicitate him at the Parakram Diwas celebrations in 2024. In a stirring address at the Padang in Singapore in 1943, Netaji urged women to join the struggle, declaring that this must be a truly revolutionary army. His words deeply moved Tamil Indian women in Malaya, many of whom had endured hardship on rubber plantations. Despite having never seen India, nearly a thousand of them volunteered for the Rani of Jhansi Regiment. While the bravery of Lakshmi Swaminathan (Captain Lakshmi Sahgal) is widely recognised, the contributions of Janaky Thevar, Anjalai Ponnusamy and Rasammah Bhupalan are equally inspiring. Janaky Thevar, only 14 when she first heard Netaji speak, donated her diamond earring to the INA and later rose to a senior leadership position in the Rani of Jhansi Regiment. Saraswathi Rajamani, often regarded as one of India’s youngest women intelligence operatives, joined the INA at 16 and served with distinction. In keeping with Netaji’s egalitarian vision, women trained and served alongside men, and caste divisions were rejected. Alongside these leaders stood countless unnamed Tamil soldiers and labourers from Ramanathapuram, Tirunelveli, Madurai, Sivaganga, Tiruchirappalli and Cuddalore, who answered Netaji’s call from Malaya, Burma and Singapore. Deeply moved by this overwhelming support, Netaji is believed to have remarked that if he were to be born again, he would wish to be born a Tamilian. Netaji believed that political independence was only the beginning; the greater task was to build a strong, united and self-reliant India that ensured dignity and justice for all. His special bond with the Tamil people stands as a powerful reminder that India’s freedom was forged through the shared sacrifice of regions, communities and countless unsung heroes. Prime Minister Narendra Modi has consistently emphasised the need to shed the colonial mindset, honour India’s values and freedom fighters, and advance towards true freedom of the mind and spirit. This vision is reflected in the government’s observance of Netaji’s birth anniversary as Parakram Diwas, the renaming of historic islands in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands in his honour, and the installation of his statue at Kartavya Path. As Netaji once observed, “One individual may die for an idea, but that idea will, after his death, incarnate itself in a thousand lives.” His ideals continue to guide Bharat as the nation moves forward with a collective resolve to translate parakram into progress. (Courtesy: The Indian Express)

What will be the consequences of US President Donald Trump’s reckless actions on the US Indo-Pacific strategy? Though future developments in the international politics of the region depend as much on the behaviour of others as on the US, understanding the broad outlines of power relations in the region can tell us something about likely behaviour of various players and its consequences for the region. Simply put, Trump’s policies are likely to reduce US role in the region and force others to contemplate some unpalatable strategic choices. First, the US. It is difficult to categorize Trump’s behaviour as being defined by anything as disciplined as suggested by the term “strategy”. Strategy normally encompasses a problem and means and methods by which one resolves the problem. Trump has some vague objectives—make America great again— but these are loose notions, seemingly a wish to turn the clock back to the 1950s, both domestically and internationally. He also has some equally vague notions about tariffs, exploitative allies, the efficacy of military force (short, quick ones at least), unilateral behaviours and great power politics. He has junked almost all aspects of traditional American foreign policy, including any defence of liberal values. He also has a strange fascination with the wealthy, whom he seems to see as kindred partners, and with dictators, whom he appears to fear, admire and want to emulate. Unlike his first term, when he was hemmed in by advisors from the traditional Republican political class, he is now surrounded by enablers and grifters who do little to control his asinine impulses. Thus, the first year of Trump’s second term saw wild gyrations in foreign policy but we can also see some underlying elements. Four appear to be key: all US foreign relations are decided by Trump’s personal relations, though even these are short-term and transactional; he will not recognize traditional US foreign policy’s notions of America’s friends and foes; he will mainly attack the weak, even if they are allies; and he will not commit to any significantly complicated or potentially expensive military operation. Second, his geopolitical focus is on the Western Hemisphere. Again, this harms back to an earlier period of American dominance, which had over time become less important as the US took on global responsibilities. Trump now wants to switch from being a global power with global responsibilities to being a regional power though, as usual, this is neither consistent nor underwritten by any strategy as such. If Trump actually achieves his objectives, this will represent a voluntary and unilateral diminishing of great power role rarely seen in the annals of interstate behaviour. States, especially great powers, often try to over-expand and this could lead to downfall. It’s unheard of for a great power to withdraw in the manner Trump is attempting in the absence of significant domestic economic problems or military defeat. The only possible parallel is Ming China’s retreat from maritime power and Japan’s closing under the Tokugawa Shogunate, neither of which ended well for them. Third, whatever the illogic of Trump’s policies, the end result is that the Indo-Pacific has and will continue to lose strategic importance, at least for the duration of Trump’s tremendous in the White House. The consequences for the region will be dire. If the US withdraws from the region in a strategic sense—in other words, even if it is engaged economically and in other ways but takes no part in managing the military balance—China becomes the most powerful actor in the region, by far. In wealth, its Gross Domestic Product (GDP, in current US $) of US $ 19 trillion dwarfs even the combined GDP of the four noteworthy Asian powers, Japan, India, Australia and South Korea, who make up only about two-thirds of this. In military power, the story is much the same: from being a relative light-weight force that was large but poorly equipped and trained, the Chinese military forces have become leaner and a lot meaner. It now has three large aircraft carriers, with even larger nuclear-powered ones on the way. By comparison, only India has a true aircraft carrier in the rest of Asia, but it only has two, relatively light ones, in service. Japan has only two helicopter carriers, but they are even lighter though at least one can carry jump-jets such as the F-35B’s. In the air, China now either deploys or is developing several fifth generation combat jets and is even reported to be developing sixth generation fighters. China is also massively expanding its nuclear arsenal, which could potentially deter any US involvement in the region even if the US wants to continue its presence. In short, China is set to become Asia’s dominant power, if not its hegemon in the fullest sense of the word. Moreover, this is not likely to be a temporary situation but a long-lasting one because no other Asian power can hope to come anywhere close to matching China’s wealth for the next several decades. The choice for others in the region is very limited in such a circumstance. None can match China by themselves. Indeed, the gap in wealth and military power between China and the rest of Asia is only likely to grow more in the coming decades. A recourse to nuclear deterrence may ensure basic national survival but not much else. Other than India, Japan, Australia, and South Korea could potentially build their nuclear arsenals, though time may be running out for them to make the jump. China will very likely do what the US has done, using indirect and direct threats to dissuade others in the region from going nuclear. Combining their power in a military alliance will not help if the US is not part of such an alliance. The others are simply not rich enough or strong enough to do much even together against China. In addition, There are the usual problems of any such partnerships, especially the question of burden sharing. Which of the potential partners can help India in Read More