The Aryan Invasion and Indian Nationalism

There is one remote period of history, or prehistory, which, in spite of its remoteness, has come to acquire a major propaganda-value for Leftists and their ilk – the period of the so-called ‘Aryan Invasion of India’. A race of people, called the ‘Aryans’, is supposed to have invaded India somewhere around 2000-1500 BC from the north-west. These Aryans, after centuries of warfare and bloodshed, are supposed to have destroyed, or driven south-wards, or subjugated and absorbed (as lower castes) most of the natives in the north of the ‘subcontinent’, and then themselves occupied the northern areas. Originally formulated by European scholars, mainly for imperialistic reasons, this theory has been perfected by Indian Leftists into a powerful weapon to be used against Indian nationalism. The theory has been accepted on such a scale that any textbook or scholarly book the world over, which deals with, or refers to, India’s early history, mentions the Aryan Invasion of India in the second millennium BC, as if it were a natural and indisputable part of proven history. To the Leftist propagandists, however, the theory means much more. It means that just as the British and the Muslim invaders came from outside, so also the Aryan invaders came from outside. Hence, Christianity, Islam and Hinduism are all equally foreign to India; or, conversely, all three are equally Indian.