The Discovery of India

This book, first published in 1946, was written by Jawaharlal Nehru while he was in Ahmadnagar Fort Prison Camp for five months from April to September 1944 for his participation in the Quit India Movement against British rule. The book has been dedicated to his “colleagues and co-prisoners”. In the preface of the book, he makes special reference to four of his companions in Ahmadnagar Fort: Maulana Abul Kalam Azad, Govind Ballabh Pant, Narendra Deva, and M. Asaf Ali.

“The Discovery delves deep into the sources of India's national personality,” Indira Gandhi writes in the foreword. Nehru discusses the history of India in the book – spanning from the Indus Valley Civilization to the then present-day British Raj. The 581-page document is divided into 10 chapters: Ahmadnagar Fort (Chapter 1); Badenweiler, Lausanne (Chapter 2); The Quest (Chapter 3); The Discovery Of India (Chapter 4); Through The Ages (Chapter 5); New Problems (Chapter 6); The Last Phase (1): Consolidation Of British Rule And Rise Of Nationalist Movement (Chapter 7); The Last Phase (2): Nationalism Versus Imperialism (Chapter 8); The Last Phase (3): World War Ii (Chapter 9); Ahmadnagar Fort Again (Chapter 10).

Nehru reflects on India's recent and past history in an unhurried tone. He also speaks of the future of democracy in the country. He recalls his life after being sentenced to prison in Almora in the year 1935, his wife Kamala’s illness and death as well as his travels to and from Switzerland across the 6 sections of Chapter Two titled “Badenweiller, Lausanne”.

Chapter Four “The Discovery Of India” has significant themes like ‘What is Hinduism?’. “The word 'Hindu' does not occur at all in our ancient literature. The first reference to it in an Indian book is, I am told, in a Tantrik work of the eighth century A.C., where 'Hindu' means a people and not the followers of a particular religion,” writes Nehru. On religion, he adds, “Before the Buddha, seven hundred years before Christ, a great Indian, the sage and lawgiver Yagnavalkya, is reported to have said: 'It is not our religion, still less the colour of our skin, that produces virtue; virtue must be practised. Therefore, let no one do to others what he would not have done to himself.'”

Chapters 5-9 speak of topics like Progress versus Security, Indian Languages and Art, Mughals in India, British in India, and About Indian National Congress. At the end of the book, Nehru concentrates on India's democratic future as he anticipated the country's independence, shortly after providing a summary of the Indian freedom struggle from its inception to when it gained momentum in its final years. Nehru notes that if India is to thrive, it must learn about technology and scientific innovation from the West while simultaneously shedding the historical baggage that has hindered its progress.

Nehru ends the book with a postscript where he writes, “We are on the eve of General Elections in India and these elections absorb attention. But the elections will be over soon–and then? The coming year is likely to be one of storm and trouble, of conflict and turmoil. There is going to be no peace in India or elsewhere except on the basis of freedom.”

Focus by Fatima Kapasi.