Anshuman Sahoo

“ आ नो भद्राः क्रतवो यन्तु विश्वतः ” – Rig Veda (Let noble thoughts come to me from all directions.) (In honour of the 5000-year old culture that taught me to de-contextualise and de-personalise every piece of wisdom.) The India that we get to see today came into being only in 1947, and later. Prior to that, the whole landmass that we refer to as India was never a part of a single empire, never had a uniform governance, evidently had a high-degree of socio-cultural as well as geographical diversity, and seemingly had no single feature which can be found to be common across the subcontinent. And yet, not only the outer world recognised this whole landmass as one, but the people inside somewhere had this feeling that they’re one – they belong to one! Interesting, but how? The whole subcontinent, throughout its history, no matter how diverse it was in its socio-cultural and political affairs, has always had a common essence – a common signature trait that was rar