jan 13th, 2009
i have seen michael wood's previous 'the empire of the spirit' series, and that was outstanding -- the first documentary i have seen that didn't sneer at india. he has also written a book 'the smile of murugan' which i haven't read. i have seen 'the story of india' in fragments on bbc and some of it was really good.
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Soniya
Hi Rajeev,
Your blog audience may be interested in this.
PBS is running a 6-part series on India by BBC correspondent Michael
Wood. I watched the first four parts, and they were not terribly
bigoted. In fact I learned many good things about our past which our
history books conveniently fail to mention. He does carry on about the
Aryan Invasion Myth though, which is to be expected from an
Englishman.
I look forward to part 5 which is about "the wonderful story of Indian
Islam". I am sure it will be about the peaceful rise of Islam in
India, how it was a blessing to India, and how the Mughal empire was
the best in the world.
http://www.pbs.org/thestoryofindia/
-Soniya
5 comments:
Rajeev,
hmm this series is well meant but factually incorrect...
he goes on and on about AIT and at one point of time seems to condense Rig Veda into digging for truth about the 'soma drink' and horses..
He certainly does not come across as bigoted and Hindu hating westerner.. and the style is quite entertaining..
But i am afraid, a series on Indian history that does not even question AIT is not really worth it..
wudnt u agree?
The documentary is available on google videos and you tube.
HAF is right in objecting to it.
The documentary is in line with the reporting one sees in BBC and NDTV.
The only good thing about it is that the visuals are eye-catching.
But that is not saying much when one considers the content and its implications.
Someone has put Empire of the Spirit on Youtube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WTFsleGIa4A
One cannot expect others to question established "truths" when Indians themselves don't do it, i haven't watched the doc yet but was told while it had the usual crap about aryans (which was changed to migration rather than invasion according to my source who watched it), it was far better than the usual garbage, especially the garbage made by Indians themselves (remember that tv serial on doordarshan about Tipu Sultan in the 90s which showed him as a patriot and secular), so many people including me were misled by that crap, especially because i was young and impressionable. The documentary may not be the best in the world but at least its a start.
By the way, one of the best doc's i saw is:
http://video.google.ca/videoplay?docid=-5096103596865842301&ei=5HduSaT0ConS-AG39qW3BQ&q=tamil+king
or this link:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SnANjdReAlY
It has the usual stereotypes about lingam = phallus and some other mistakes but overall it is a great documentary, much better than the whitewashing Indians do, watch it all the way through and you will see it explicitly mentioned several times how the Muslim rulers were impelled by their religious zeal to destroy temples and wanted to wipe out Dharma, and how priests had to hide vigraha's because of this. I don't know of any indian made documentary that even comes close to that kind of honesty about Islamic fanaticism and what it did to Hindu kovil's.
So, I watched part 5 and part 6 and was not disappointed. It was all about the peaceful rise of Islam under a garden variety of Islamic invaders. Islam did not spread by the sword in India, but through the peaceful teachings of Sufi saints. Akbar was the best thing to happen to India. Also, no mention of the Maratha empire which at one time ruled majority of India, and gave a tough fight to the Mughals and British. No mention of the great warkari tradition and bhakti poet-saints of Maharashtra. Oops, they were not peaceful Sufis, but were safffron communalists, right!
No mention of Tilak, Sawarkar, Bose and several leaders who were instrumental in the freedom movement. Singing high praises of the Muslim league. Yes, that is the story of India.
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