back in 2007 I plan to write an article
for a major English daily of Pakistan
dawn the reason was that it was 2007 one
hundred and fiftieth year of the first
war of independence and of course I was
reading and people were writing about it
I headed to Punjab archives department
there I did my bit of research and the
question that I was finding an answer to
was whether we fought a war of
independence in 1857 or whether it was a
mutiny as was dubbed by the erstwhile
colonizers now based on that research I
wrote the article and I argued that it
in fact was a war of independence and
not just a mutiny the article got
published in the month of May 2007 with
the title the mutiny at Lahore well it
was symptomatic of something larger it
was symptomatic of our deeply embedded
colonial conceptions and of course it is
this conception which makes us gullible
most of the times because it is a
narrative which tells us convinces us at
a subconscious level that we have
nothing to celebrate in our past that in
our past we were never creative we were
never innovative we did not have any
progressive attitudes that we never
liked democratic dispensation
it is conception of this kind for
example
which would make us readily accept and
believe the narrative that was
propagated a few years ago on a major
Pakistani television channel the
narrative went like this that while we
are our rulers were busy building the
Taj Mahal rulers from other parts of the
world were busy building Oxford and
Cambridge Universities now of course
this is ridiculously anachronistic
because the Taj Mahal was built in 17th
century Oxford and Cambridge
universities who are built in 11th and
13th centuries such a conception of our
past which a Latin American writer calls
mutilated memory such a conception would
stop us from accessing the fact that the
ruler of this that the Builder of this
magnificent edifice the designer who
built this amazing structure designed it
which continues to enthrall and enchant
tourists from all over the world even
after 300 years of its construction was
from this very town who start a mad
lorry such a conception would not take
us to a point where we may where we are
able to think about the skill the craft
the engineering the innovation the
creation and the magnificent team effort
that would have gone into the creation
of the Taj Mahal
now of course such a conception would
also not allow us to access our past and
know about universities of Nalanda and
universities of an University of Texas
and in the words of inimitable Shashi
Tharoor these universities
listed in our part of the world long
before Oxford and Cambridge were not
even gleams in the eyes of their
founders well I’ve been teaching for
over 17 years now and when I interact
with my students initially in their
first year they come with this
subconscious understanding of their past
and of course it’s reflected in their
body language when I interact with them
and I ask them where do you think you’ve
come from and where do you think you are
headed because they don’t remember where
they have come from an overwhelming
majority almost 99% of them would say
they don’t know where they are heading
they don’t know what they want to do
with their lives
now this crucial component of history
which of course interacts with us
converses with us at a subconscious
level it is telling us that our past has
nothing to offer that we must not go
there into our past that if we have to
be scientific creative progressive
democratic we have to look elsewhere and
there is nothing in our own context that
we can of course look up to this
conception would of course not tell them
that they live in a part of a world in a
part of the world where something which
is called the greatest of human
inventions a zero was invented and by
the way the oldest manuscript in the
whole world which employs the zero was
found in a Pakistani village called buck
Shelly of course the manuscript it does
exist such a conception would not tell
them that in 17th century
Hazara water-powered looms the first in
the world were operating and by using
those water powered looms
cotton and silk and brocade zuv the
highest quality were made and exported
to the rest of the world such a
mutilated memory of course would not
tell them that it was cashmere of 17th
century we’re horticulturist were
experimenting with creation of new
fruits through grafting and of course
since this is TEDx Lahore we are
standing here such a conception would
not tell them that for over a hundred
years the best and the most accurate
astrolabes which were also called
celestial globes which were utilized for
astronomical observations and for
navigation in high seas all ships made
in India had one fitted in them that the
best and accurate most accurate Astra
lives were made by a family of Lahore
and to date we have those extant
astrolabes which have signatures of
members of the same family and of course
another astrolabe which is found which
is there on display in a university in
Varanasi has inscriptions of Sanskrit
inscriptions in Sanskrit and Arabic
written side-by-side on it such a
beautiful display of peaceful encounter
of cultures and by the way that
precisely was the reason why such
innovation and creativity was possible
because how can I not mention the fact
that in 1600 ad when dude Anna Bruno was
being burnt alive in Europe for
proposing the heliocentric model of the
universe at the behest of religious
clergy there in our part of the world in
1600 ad we had just finished instituting
a law allowing religious freedom and
during the same years a Muslim ruler got
translated an ancient sacred text of
Hindus bhagavad-gita translated into
persian a beautiful illustrated version
still exists it was the same Muslim
ruler who got translated an 11th century
treatise on mathematics called
leelavathi in persian language such was
the understanding of the value which
other cultures and other religions and
other denominations had and it goes a
long way
the story of interdependence even a
person as maligned maligned in history
texts as Aurangzeb Alamgir who is
otherwise known for his religiosity he
was the one according to Professor Audra
Trischka
I strongly recommend her book Aurangzeb
Alamgir the man and the myth in which he
writes that it was orange a volunteer
who employed the most number of Hindu
doctors and scholars in his service and
he of course gave stipends to construct
Hindu temples and of course he supported
other religions like Brahmins as well
you can read the text she’s a very
rigorous scholar and historian and of
course as I said this history of
pluralism understanding difference it is
really very long even in 20th century
when of course a large part of the world
in a large part of the world people were
at each other’s throats and when of
course in a large civilized continent
people had just our governments I should
probably be more accurate had just
finished killing off three hundred and
eighty million people at the end of the
First World War a scholar from our part
of the world
had roamed the streets and alleys of
this town who bear the law Cindy he
proposed the idea of Cathedral coming
and in a detailed political document he
proposed that why is it important for us
to accept mono national conceptions of a
country why can’t we accept a plura
national conception of a country of
course he was advanced by decades as the
first country which called itself which
proudly called calls itself the pleura
national state of Bolivia acquired this
name I think just a decade ago so when I
talk about past
I mean remembrance I interact with my
students and I tell them that they need
to realize that they too are part of a
beautiful human rainbow that the colors
of this beautiful human rainbow are
probably faded and they by their act of
remembrance need to refurbish it back in
2008 I wrote on the need to decolonize
our knowledge and on the need to
indigenous it eight years later in 2016
along with six of my intellectually
minded colleagues I set up a forum a
think-tank if you may at the University
where I work now Punjab University
it’s called indigenized knowledge forum
of course we’ve got a long way to go we
need to decolonize
not just our minds not just individuals
but also our institutions and I think my
students are going to lead me in this
effort thank you very much [Applause]
for a major English daily of Pakistan
dawn the reason was that it was 2007 one
hundred and fiftieth year of the first
war of independence and of course I was
reading and people were writing about it
I headed to Punjab archives department
there I did my bit of research and the
question that I was finding an answer to
was whether we fought a war of
independence in 1857 or whether it was a
mutiny as was dubbed by the erstwhile
colonizers now based on that research I
wrote the article and I argued that it
in fact was a war of independence and
not just a mutiny the article got
published in the month of May 2007 with
the title the mutiny at Lahore well it
was symptomatic of something larger it
was symptomatic of our deeply embedded
colonial conceptions and of course it is
this conception which makes us gullible
most of the times because it is a
narrative which tells us convinces us at
a subconscious level that we have
nothing to celebrate in our past that in
our past we were never creative we were
never innovative we did not have any
progressive attitudes that we never
liked democratic dispensation
it is conception of this kind for
example
which would make us readily accept and
believe the narrative that was
propagated a few years ago on a major
Pakistani television channel the
narrative went like this that while we
are our rulers were busy building the
Taj Mahal rulers from other parts of the
world were busy building Oxford and
Cambridge Universities now of course
this is ridiculously anachronistic
because the Taj Mahal was built in 17th
century Oxford and Cambridge
universities who are built in 11th and
13th centuries such a conception of our
past which a Latin American writer calls
mutilated memory such a conception would
stop us from accessing the fact that the
ruler of this that the Builder of this
magnificent edifice the designer who
built this amazing structure designed it
which continues to enthrall and enchant
tourists from all over the world even
after 300 years of its construction was
from this very town who start a mad
lorry such a conception would not take
us to a point where we may where we are
able to think about the skill the craft
the engineering the innovation the
creation and the magnificent team effort
that would have gone into the creation
of the Taj Mahal
now of course such a conception would
also not allow us to access our past and
know about universities of Nalanda and
universities of an University of Texas
and in the words of inimitable Shashi
Tharoor these universities
listed in our part of the world long
before Oxford and Cambridge were not
even gleams in the eyes of their
founders well I’ve been teaching for
over 17 years now and when I interact
with my students initially in their
first year they come with this
subconscious understanding of their past
and of course it’s reflected in their
body language when I interact with them
and I ask them where do you think you’ve
come from and where do you think you are
headed because they don’t remember where
they have come from an overwhelming
majority almost 99% of them would say
they don’t know where they are heading
they don’t know what they want to do
with their lives
now this crucial component of history
which of course interacts with us
converses with us at a subconscious
level it is telling us that our past has
nothing to offer that we must not go
there into our past that if we have to
be scientific creative progressive
democratic we have to look elsewhere and
there is nothing in our own context that
we can of course look up to this
conception would of course not tell them
that they live in a part of a world in a
part of the world where something which
is called the greatest of human
inventions a zero was invented and by
the way the oldest manuscript in the
whole world which employs the zero was
found in a Pakistani village called buck
Shelly of course the manuscript it does
exist such a conception would not tell
them that in 17th century
Hazara water-powered looms the first in
the world were operating and by using
those water powered looms
cotton and silk and brocade zuv the
highest quality were made and exported
to the rest of the world such a
mutilated memory of course would not
tell them that it was cashmere of 17th
century we’re horticulturist were
experimenting with creation of new
fruits through grafting and of course
since this is TEDx Lahore we are
standing here such a conception would
not tell them that for over a hundred
years the best and the most accurate
astrolabes which were also called
celestial globes which were utilized for
astronomical observations and for
navigation in high seas all ships made
in India had one fitted in them that the
best and accurate most accurate Astra
lives were made by a family of Lahore
and to date we have those extant
astrolabes which have signatures of
members of the same family and of course
another astrolabe which is found which
is there on display in a university in
Varanasi has inscriptions of Sanskrit
inscriptions in Sanskrit and Arabic
written side-by-side on it such a
beautiful display of peaceful encounter
of cultures and by the way that
precisely was the reason why such
innovation and creativity was possible
because how can I not mention the fact
that in 1600 ad when dude Anna Bruno was
being burnt alive in Europe for
proposing the heliocentric model of the
universe at the behest of religious
clergy there in our part of the world in
1600 ad we had just finished instituting
a law allowing religious freedom and
during the same years a Muslim ruler got
translated an ancient sacred text of
Hindus bhagavad-gita translated into
persian a beautiful illustrated version
still exists it was the same Muslim
ruler who got translated an 11th century
treatise on mathematics called
leelavathi in persian language such was
the understanding of the value which
other cultures and other religions and
other denominations had and it goes a
long way
the story of interdependence even a
person as maligned maligned in history
texts as Aurangzeb Alamgir who is
otherwise known for his religiosity he
was the one according to Professor Audra
Trischka
I strongly recommend her book Aurangzeb
Alamgir the man and the myth in which he
writes that it was orange a volunteer
who employed the most number of Hindu
doctors and scholars in his service and
he of course gave stipends to construct
Hindu temples and of course he supported
other religions like Brahmins as well
you can read the text she’s a very
rigorous scholar and historian and of
course as I said this history of
pluralism understanding difference it is
really very long even in 20th century
when of course a large part of the world
in a large part of the world people were
at each other’s throats and when of
course in a large civilized continent
people had just our governments I should
probably be more accurate had just
finished killing off three hundred and
eighty million people at the end of the
First World War a scholar from our part
of the world
had roamed the streets and alleys of
this town who bear the law Cindy he
proposed the idea of Cathedral coming
and in a detailed political document he
proposed that why is it important for us
to accept mono national conceptions of a
country why can’t we accept a plura
national conception of a country of
course he was advanced by decades as the
first country which called itself which
proudly called calls itself the pleura
national state of Bolivia acquired this
name I think just a decade ago so when I
talk about past
I mean remembrance I interact with my
students and I tell them that they need
to realize that they too are part of a
beautiful human rainbow that the colors
of this beautiful human rainbow are
probably faded and they by their act of
remembrance need to refurbish it back in
2008 I wrote on the need to decolonize
our knowledge and on the need to
indigenous it eight years later in 2016
along with six of my intellectually
minded colleagues I set up a forum a
think-tank if you may at the University
where I work now Punjab University
it’s called indigenized knowledge forum
of course we’ve got a long way to go we
need to decolonize
not just our minds not just individuals
but also our institutions and I think my
students are going to lead me in this
effort thank you very much [Applause]
Please follow and like us: