India Will Survive

Am looking forward to reading Ramachandra Guha’s magisterial work on the history of the world’s largest democracy, India After Gandhi. Excerpts from the book appeared in Outlook’s latest issue. I particularly liked the conclusion of the essay -

So long as the Constitution is not amended beyond recognition, so long as elections are held regularly and fairly and the ethos of secularism broadly prevails, so long as citizens can speak and write in the language of their choosing, so long as there is an integrated market and a moderately efficient civil service and army, and- lest I forget- so long as Hindi films are watched and their songs sung, India will survive.