TRUE TO HIS CULTURED NATURE, P.V. Kane never fails to acknowledge the good work and generosity offered by well-wishers and devotees of knowledge notwithstanding their social status.
Sir Ratan Tata financed for several years the work of excavation at Pataliputra. Recently the Trustees of the Sir Dorabji Tata Trust have made an offer to the Deccan College Research Institute at Poona to bear the entire cost of the 4th prehistoric expedition in Gujarat under Prof. Sankalia and have donated Rs. 19,400 for the purpose… This noble example of the enlightened house of Tatas will, it is earnestly hoped, be imitated by other merchant princes of India.
Almost at every step in P.V. Kane’s address, we unmistakably observe the sheer extent of our national downfall and cultural evisceration. The same Sir Dorabji Tata Trust that had sponsored such nationalistic endeavours also started the Sir Dorabji Tata Graduate School of Social Work in 1936. It was later renamed as the Tata Institute of Social Sciences, which was eventually hijacked by the Far Left and is now notorious for its acronym, TISS. TISS, the gigantic conveyor belt spitting out breaking India forces and Woke psychos.
Next, Kane tackles another realm that is indispensable for a proper understanding and reconstruction of Indian history, culture and society: Epigraphy or the study of inscriptions. Way back in 1946, we notice Kane’s anxiety when he says that
It is estimated that about 30 thousand inscriptions have been brought to light during the last hundred and fifty years. Only a very small percentage of these have been read and published… But the pace at which inscriptions are published in the Epigraphia Indica or elsewhere is so slow and fitful that one is filled with despondency and anxiety by the thought that even the next one hundred years might not be enough to deal with all the Archaeological material collected…
In the Introduction to my book Stories from Inscriptions, I have narrated the grim saga of the calculated ruin of Inscriptional studies in some detail. I’ve also been told by some learned scholars that after about one and half generations, there won’t be a single Indian scholar equipped with even the basic knowledge to decipher Indian inscriptions. It’s quite eerie how P.V. Kane’s prediction might come true in a macabre fashion in my own lifetime. He had stopped merely at saying that a century would not be sufficient to “deal with all the Archeological material collected.” One wonders what he would feel if he had seen the criminal neglect of the field now.
PERHAPS THE MOST INSPIRING portion of his entire address is the robust guidance he gives to individual scholars pursuing studies in Indology.
"There are numerous problems which individual scholars can tackle by their single-handed efforts or with the co-operation of another scholar or two… There are many matters, which though discussed for decades, cannot yet be regarded as finally settled by the consensus of opinion among scholars. I shall mention a few topics on which Indian scholars can profitably work for several years to come.
Though…others have written Histories of Sanskrit Literature, yet there is room for Indian scholars to write an extensive History of Sanskrit Literature from an Indian point of view…
Deep, comparative study of the Vedas and the ancient Iranian Literature has not yet been carried far enough…
…the proper decipherment of the symbols and signs at Harappa and Mohenjo-daro yet awaits a genius.
…there is ample field for work on several other dynasties and oligarchic tribes, such as the Alupas, Banas, Bhanjas, Calukyas in all their branches, Cahamanas, Candellas, Gahadvalas, Gangas, Guhilas, Gurjaras, Haihayas, Hoysalas, Kakatiyas, Kalacuries, Licchavis, Malavas, Maitrakas, Palas, Paramaras, Pratiharas, Rattas, Sailodbhavas, Senas, Sendrakas, Silaharas, Sindas, Traikutakas, Vaghclas, Yadavas, and Yaudheyas.
The names of countries and cities, with their boundaries, social life and economic structure as collected from the Vedic Literature, the Epics, the Puranas, the Brhatsamhita and its commen- tary, classical Sanskrit, Pali, Prakrit and Apabhramsa Literature, Kosas, inscriptions will be a very interesting study."
I have extracted a small sample from the spellbinding range of research topics that Kane mentions in his lecture. This portion alone takes up two full pages. It is clearly a daunting endeavour and Kane is not blind to its numerous challenges, foremost of which is funding. He issues an appeal that is both heartfelt and earnest.
In his Presidential address at the Hyderabad Session of the Conference, Dr. G. Yazdani laid great emphasis on two matters, viz., that the conference should have a permanent office with a small but competent staff and the necessity of building up a Permanent Fund. We must strenuously pursue this matter of a permanent fund. The Conference should appoint an influential committee of persons occupying a high place in the public life of the country and of scholars from different provinces to induce… the Heads of Indian States and on merchant princes to… make generous contributions to the permanent fund.
Recent history shows that enormous public and private funding was diverted for promoting “scholarship” aimed at further deracinating the Indian people with the long-term goal of de-Hinduising and thereby destroying Bharatavarsha itself. In the last 15 years or so, things that had been non-negotiable for decades were transformed into topics for debate under the pretext of individual freedom. These include but are not limited to respect for the national flag, anthem, emblems and the sanctity of our cultural heritage. Even the military has not been spared.
And we now arrive at the grand climax of P.V. Kane’s lecture. It is worth memorising in full:
"Our country is now on the threshold of epoch-making political changes. Although the Conference is not a political body, it cannot fail to be affected by the political and other ferments that are leavening the whole country. The hearts of all, young or old, educated or uneducated, are throbbing with the excitement of great aspirations and expectations.
In ages past, India was frequently confronted with religious, social and political upheavals. In spite of them all, India has exhibited great vitality in survival, did not give up her agelong quest of truth and always attached the highest importance to the things of the spirit. She developed centuries ago traditions for tolerance of varying views in religion and philosophy and showed great capacity for absorption of races and ideas and for adaptation.
India is now in the midst of a whirlpool of ideas. The present is full of fear, of religious scepticism, conflicts and eagerness to destroy the old and construct anew after some patterns quite alien to our traditions and ways of thought and not yet sufficiently tested.
On us of this Conference rests a manifold responsibility. We have studied the Literature and monuments of the past and therefore it is our duty to disseminate among all our brethren, correct knowledge of the past and the present and to discover the manifold gains and glories of the past, to see that the great ideals of our literature and culture do not perish but continue to work on the social life all round and to make adjustments in the superstructure of the many-sided life of the country while retaining the solid foundations that have withstood the storms, the burdens and the wear and tear of ages. It is up to us not to allow, as long as there is life in us, the great ideals and achievements of the past to be swept off altogether by the onrushing avalanche of conflicting and ill-digested ideas.
We are all humble devotees of Literature, of the Muses, of Bharati; and in serving Bharati we try to serve our motherland which also bears the name Bharati. Let us hope that by the united efforts of the sons and daughters of India, this ancient land will not only secure for her own children freedom, peace, prosperity and a high level of intellectual and moral life, but will also be able to proclaim to the world a message of hope, of freedom, of co-operation and the practical synthesis of several cultures."
प्रकटितबहुविधाशिल्पा विविधागमशास्त्रविस्तरप्रसवा |
आसन्नत्वातन्ञया जयतु सदा भारती जगती ||
It is hard not to shed tears after reading Kane’s lecture in full. What our political class did with independence was a flagrant betrayal of all such savants from all walks of life.
Series Concluded
The Dharma Dispatch is now available on Telegram! For original and insightful narratives on Indian Culture and History, subscribe to us on Telegram.