India Research Foundation Cordially Invites You To A Presentation

It is widely recognized that the almost 600 years of domination by Islamic Sultans and Padshahs followed by two hundred years of colonial rule had a profound impact on the Indian population and has altered the political map of the Indian subcontinent. What is less well appreciated is the equally profound impact this had on the mind of the people of Indian Subcontinent. The colonial overlord changed the way the Indic looked at himself. He rewrote the history of India, refashioned the legal system, reinvented the social hierarchy, institutionalized a vastly expanded Caste system, and divorced the Indic from the language of its ancestors, all this in the space of less than 200 years. This presentation is a narrative of some of these efforts both during the colonial period as well as the years after independence. It is a singularly fascinating story, albeit not as well publicized, of how the shaping of the Indic mind and the Indic society has gone on for the last two centuries to the point where it touches the lives of most Indic today.