Motivations behind selecting the name 'India' in 1947

[roadrunner]

---

---

We all name things for reasons. Even names have meaning. When the names of both India and Pakistan were submitted to Mountbatten at Partition by Nehru and Jinnah, what were the intentions of Nehru and colleagues for choosing the word "India". Surely they knew the history of the subcontinent well enough, the geography was obvious to them. The Indus River location was known to be outside of India, which is where India derives from. To give him the benefit of the doubt, I can only think that he chose the name because Hindus inhabited his country, Hindu of course taking its derivation from Indus also. To demonstrate this, let's say that a Spanish king invades France 200 years in the future, and calls them Germans (because he doesn't know any better). Then in 400 years time, political upheaval occurs, Germany changes its name to something else, and the French leader decides to rename his country Germany. Now all the history of Germany becomes French history. That's basically what has happened in the subcontinent. Pre-planned, or did the Indian leaders name it after the Hindus?

In the words of Winston Churchill, "India is no more a country than the Equator"

[bhangra12345]

Road runner,
I dont know what you are after. Probably I have heard/seen the word "bharat" from you more than the rest of the world combined.

I remember a movie by the name 'Sardar" on Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, which sums it all up. (all from my memory)During the discussions on partition between Mountbatten, Patel and Jinnah, Jinnah says "Mere khayal se jo do desh ban raha hain, wun ka naam hindustan aur pakistan rakhna chahiye" (ET: In my opinion the two countries which are being formed should be named hindustan and pakistan)to which Patel replies "yahaan do desh nahi ban rahe hain. Ek desh se ek hissa alag hoke jaa raha hain. Tumhare hisse ka jo naam rakhna chahe woh rakh sakhte hain, humare bare mein mat sochiye" (ET: Here two countries are not being formed. From an already existing country a part is seceeding away. You can keep whatever name you wish to keep, you need not worry about us).

It was not our country which removed all the stories of asoka, kanishka, gupta from our textbooks, but it was Pakistan who said we dont want to claim the heritage by removing
all their references from the children's textbooks and directly jump from indus valley to 712 sindh. Why are you even thinking of pinpointing us? It is "you yourselves" who is to blamed for letting go of such glorious heritage.
see the following links
Pakistan History, Pakistan Ancient History, Pakistan History Culture, Modern History Of Pakistan
Pakistan History,Army history insurrection pakistan war,India Pakistan History,Pakistan Cricket History,pakistan political history
Pakistan History Index

check out wikipedia, I could not check the official govt sites because they seem to be under maintanence, but I am sure that it will be the same.
All of them talk of ivc, then greek in bc and then jump to 712.

You talk about Alexander's conquest, we talk about Porus's stand against alexander and overthrow of greek rule by Chandragupta Maurya. As long as you appreciate alexander more than Porus/Purushottam, dont expect to see your claim on history seriously.

Because simple question? whom do you claim to be? of alexander or Puroshottam? Of some person coming from another country and attacking here or someone who might have lost but is native to the land. This is the question which Pakistan has to first answers before it starts reclaiming the history. Also realize answering this question will have profound implications on how you start seeing history from 712 AD and in essence your identity.

How do you start seeing Ranjit Singh and his escapades against british and mughal? when his capital is lahore? Dont forget that his principle enemy was a muslim mughal ruling from Delhi. Where do your sympathies lie?

[UnitedPak]

stealth, why do you flood every thread with off topic quotes?

The "India" the greeks were referring to wasnt called "India", and it was in Pakistan. Look up Alexanders invasion of "India", it didnt even touch modern India.

And this is about the naming of Modern India, you cant possibly use ancient quotes to justify anything here.

Churchill was spot on, but I suppose you only want to quote hinduonnet sources.

“India is merely a geographical expression. It is no more a single country than the Equator.” -Winston Churchill

[Flintlock]

stealth, why do you flood every thread with off topic quotes?

The "India" the greeks were referring to wasnt called "India", and it was in Pakistan. Look up Alexanders invasion of "India", it didnt even touch modern India.

And this is about the naming of Modern India, you cant possibly use ancient quotes to justify anything here.

Churchill was spot on, but I suppose you only want to quote hinduonnet sources.

“India is merely a geographical expression. It is no more a single country than the Equator.” -Winston Churchill

I am using ancient India because Roadrunner is saying that Ancient India was nothing but Pakistan. Hence my "flooding" with quotes.


UnitedPak, why would you ignore every Greek historian who described India, a Chinese historian, a Persian historian and Marco Polo and just consider Alexander?

All ancient writers describe India accurately as the area India+Pakistan


Then the British came and named the entire place India.

Is that good enough for you?


Pakistan is simply a portion of the original India, as described by almost every early and late historian, that broke away in 1947.

The above is not my viewpoint, its the viewpoint of the ancient as well as the modern world.

[bhangra12345]

Now this is directly from the pakistan's government website.

http://www.heritage.gov.pk

and then click on History through Centuries, you will go to http://www.heritage.gov.pk/html_Page...f_pakistan.htm i.e. here the whole of Pakistan's history is provided in a nutshell by the govt.

Something like 15 paragraphs for history in bc, mostly about greeks and ivc -mentions about kanishka and asoka. Then 2 small paras from bc to you know which year, yes 712. So all the 700 years of history has been jumped and then the mughal empire is discussed, but wait a minute there is even the sikh empire right, sorry no mention of it.

Basically, you dont claim it, you wont get it and you dont claim Pakistan's history.

[UnitedPak]

Now this is directly from the pakistan's government website.

http://www.heritage.gov.pk

and then click on History through Centuries, you will go to http://www.heritage.gov.pk/html_Page...f_pakistan.htm i.e. here the whole of Pakistan's history is provided in a nutshell by the govt.

Something like 15 paragraphs for history in bc, mostly about greeks and ivc -mentions about kanishka and asoka. Then 2 small paras from bc to you know which year, yes 712. So all the 700 years of history has been jumped and then the mughal empire is discussed, but wait a minute there is even the sikh empire right, sorry no mention of it.

Basically, you dont claim it, you wont get it and you dont claim Pakistan's history.

Sorry, but what do you think the whole point was of me and roadrunner bringing this topic up??
It was BECAUSE Pakistan history wasnt credited to Pakistan.
That has to be the weakest argument I have ever come across.

Just because Pakistani Gov doesnt claim it, doesnt mean its up for grabs, and India can claim to be people they are not.

When Pakistanis like me try to claim it, you have other completely besides the point arguments. There is no way of debating this with you.

And just for the record, Greek "India" was mainly Pakistan, if not all of it. When they invaded "India", they never set a foot in modern India. You need to stop claiming Pakistan is part of India. It belongs to Pakistanis (whatever they called themselves throughout history), Indians dont come into the equations whatsoever.

I dont know why you think Indians own Pakistanis. Everyone of your arguments is based on that assumption.

[Flintlock]

And just for the record, Greek "India" was mainly Pakistan, if not all of it. When they invaded "India", they never set a foot in modern India. You need to stop claiming Pakistan is part of India. It belongs to Pakistanis (whatever they called themselves throughout history), Indians dont come into the equations whatsoever.

The Greeks never invaded the whole of India dear!!

They simply reached the extreme end of Ancient India....and weren't able to progress further because of the powerful Maghada Kingdom!!

I dont know why you think Indians own Pakistanis. Everyone of your arguments is based on that assumption.

Ah...chillax.....we don't own Pakistanis.


The point is that a major chunk of Pakistani history is too intertwined with Indian history to be called exclusively it own!

[bhangra12345]

The point is that a major chunk of Pakistani history is too intertwined with Indian history to be called exclusively it own!

I would change that to Pakistani geographical history instead of plain vanilla pakistani history.

[Flintlock]

I would change that to Pakistani geographical history instead of plain vanilla pakistani history.

Yeah, well, history of the area currently occupied by Pakistan.....so Pakistani history...

Of course the whole of Pakistan was part of Ancient India....but that is another story.

[roadrunner]

Road runner,
I dont know what you are after. Probably I have heard/seen the word "bharat" from you more than the rest of the world combined.

I remember a movie by the name 'Sardar" on Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, which sums it all up. (all from my memory)During the discussions on partition between Mountbatten, Patel and Jinnah, Jinnah says "Mere khayal se jo do desh ban raha hain, wun ka naam hindustan aur pakistan rakhna chahiye" (ET: In my opinion the two countries which are being formed should be named hindustan and pakistan)to which Patel replies "yahaan do desh nahi ban rahe hain. Ek desh se ek hissa alag hoke jaa raha hain. Tumhare hisse ka jo naam rakhna chahe woh rakh sakhte hain, humare bare mein mat sochiye" (ET: Here two countries are not being formed. From an already existing country a part is seceeding away. You can keep whatever name you wish to keep, you need not worry about us).

It was not our country which removed all the stories of asoka, kanishka, gupta from our textbooks, but it was Pakistan who said we dont want to claim the heritage by removing
all their references from the children's textbooks and directly jump from indus valley to 712 sindh. Why are you even thinking of pinpointing us? It is "you yourselves" who is to blamed for letting go of such glorious heritage.
see the following links
Pakistan History, Pakistan Ancient History, Pakistan History Culture, Modern History Of Pakistan
Pakistan History,Army history insurrection pakistan war,India Pakistan History,Pakistan Cricket History,pakistan political history
Pakistan History Index

check out wikipedia, I could not check the official govt sites because they seem to be under maintanence, but I am sure that it will be the same.
All of them talk of ivc, then greek in bc and then jump to 712.

You talk about Alexander's conquest, we talk about Porus's stand against alexander and overthrow of greek rule by Chandragupta Maurya. As long as you appreciate alexander more than Porus/Purushottam, dont expect to see your claim on history seriously.

Because simple question? whom do you claim to be? of alexander or Puroshottam? Of some person coming from another country and attacking here or someone who might have lost but is native to the land. This is the question which Pakistan has to first answers before it starts reclaiming the history. Also realize answering this question will have profound implications on how you start seeing history from 712 AD and in essence your identity.

How do you start seeing Ranjit Singh and his escapades against british and mughal? when his capital is lahore? Dont forget that his principle enemy was a muslim mughal ruling from Delhi. Where do your sympathies lie?

People talk about Alexander for one reason. I talk about him because he is a part of Pakistan's history. He left a big enough mark on it by all the stupas built, and of course some tribes claim, descent from him. Therefore i talk about him. Porus I believe to have been an ancient Pakistani of course. He was defeated anyway. If he'd have won, he'd have been the only one to have defeated Alexander..He nearly did, so it was a good achievement. The only arrow that got Alexander was given to him in Pakistan I believe. So, it's not "hero worship" of Alexander (or Porus), it's he's a part of Pakistan's history.

Why should my sympathies lie with Ranjit Singh? He was an idiot that conquested several areas of Pakistan and he was one of the reasons the British were able to get some of the regions under control. For me he's a traitor. I didn't even like the Mughals much, but i definitely didn't like Ranjit Singh or Hari Singh. For me, they were all colonialists.

[roadrunner]

Quote by Megasthenes (300 BC)

"India then being four-sided in plan, the side which looks to the Orient and that to the South, the Great Sea compasseth; that towards the Arctic is divided by the mountain chain of Hēmōdus from Scythia, inhabited by that tribe of Scythians who are called Sakai; and on the fourth side, turned towards the West, the Indus marks the boundary, the biggest or nearly so of all rivers after the Nile."

How does this refer to India? India today if anything is three-sided in plan. More triangular. Pakistan on the other hand is four-sided with all these features. Also, your quotes are from Wikipedia, which could easily be wrong. What is the link for your "Arrian" quote?

I believe the above quotes from Greek, Chinese and Marco Polo himself should establish the boundaries of India, as known to the ancient world, being approximately those of modern India and Pakistan.

You seem to think you've hit upon something amazing here. All your quotes that include geographical modern India as "India" are from around the 1st century AD onwards. Do you know that "Ind" and the Indus were given to the name of ancient Pakistan since 2000 BC? So for 4,000 years people have been referring to Pakistan as India, whilst only 2000 years has India been included with the Ganges. And this being only what foreigners have been saying. Pakistan, or the ancient Pakistani people never agreed to accept you guys as part of the original India or Sindhu.

Why on earth name your country after someone elses river? It's like naming your country "Rhineland" even though the Rhine flows through Germany.
Why on earth name your country on what foreigners (who werent very good at geography) called your country?

[Flintlock]

How does this refer to India? India today if anything is three-sided in plan. More triangular. Pakistan on the other hand is four-sided with all these features.

If you cross reference the archaic names mentioned, it is crystal clear.

[roadrunner]

If you cross reference the archaic names mentioned, it is crystal clear.

You make even less sense than the irrelevant arguments you come out with usually.

[Flintlock]

Pliny: Position, Boundaries, and Physical Characteristics of India

BOOK VI. c. 17 (21). But where the chain of Hemodus rises the communities are settled, and the nations of India, which begin there, adjoin not only the eastern sea but also the southern, which we have already mentioned under the name of the Indian Ocean. That part which faces the east runs in a straight line to the bend where the Indian Ocean begins, and measures 1875 miles. Then from this bend to the south up to the river Indus, which forms the western boundary of India, the distance, as given by Eratosthenes, is 2475 miles. But many authors have represented the total length of its coast as being a sail of forty days and forty nights, and its length from north to south as being 2850 miles. Agrippa has estimated its length at 3300 miles, and its breadth at 2300. Poseidonios has measured it from north-east to south-east, placing it opposite to Gaul, which he was measuring from north-west to south-west, making the whole of India lie to west of Gaul. Hence he has shown by undoubted proofs that India being opposite to Gaul must be refreshed by the blowing of the west wind, and have in consequence a salubrious climate. Here the appearance of the heavens is entirely changed, and the stars rise differently; there are two summers in the year, and two harvests having winter between them, while the Etesian winds are prevalent; and during our winter the breezes there are light and the seas navigable. In this country the nations and cities are numberless should one attempt to reckon them all up. It was opened up to our knowledge not only by the arms of Alexander the Great and of the kings who succeeded him, Seleucus and Antiochus, as well as by their admiral Patrokles who sailed round even into the Hyrcanian and Caspian seas, but also by certain Greek authors, who resided with Indian kings, such as Megasthenes, and Dionysius who was sent by Philadelphus, and have thus informed us of the power and resources of the Indian nations. However, there is no room for a careful examination of their statements, they are so diverse and incredible. The companions of Alexander the Great have written that in that tract of India, which he subdued, there were 5000 towns, none less than Cos--that its nations were nine in number--that India was the third part of all the world, and that the multitude of its inhabitants was past reckoning. For this there was probably a good reason, since the Indians almost alone among the nations have never emigrated from their own borders. Their kings from Father Bacchus down to Alexander the Great are reckoned at 153 over a space of 6451 years and three months. The vast size of their rivers fills the mind with wonder. It is recorded that Alexander on no day had sailed on the Indus less than 600 stadia, and was unable to reach its mouth in less than five months and a few days, and yet it appears that it is smaller than the Ganges. Seneca, who was our fellow-citizen and composed a treatise on India, has given the number of its rivers at 60, and that of its nations at 118. It would be as great a difficulty should we attempt to enumerate its mountains. The chains of Imavos, Hemodus, Paropanisus, and Caucasus are mutually connected, and from their base the whole country sinks down into a plain of immense extent and bears a great resemblance to Egypt. But that our account of the geography of these regions may be better understood, we shall tread in the steps of Alexander the Great, whose marches were measured by Diognetes and Baeton.

BooK II. c. 73 (75). In the same way they inform us that in the town of Syene, which is 5000 stadia south of Alexandria, no shadow is cast at noon on the day of the solstice, and that a well dug for the purpose of the experiment was completely illuminated, from which it appears that the sun is vertical at that place, and Onesicritus writes that in India this is the case at that time at the river Hypasis. . . . In the country of the Oretes, a people of India, is the mountain Maleus, near which shadows in the summer are cast to the south and in winter to the north. The stars of the Great Bear are visible there for fifteen days only. In India also, at Patala, a celebrated port, the sun rises on the right hand and the shadows fall to the south. It was observed, while Alexander was staying there the seven stars of the Bear were seen only at the early part of the evening. Onesicritus, one of his generals, states that in those parts of India where there are no shadows the Bear is not seen; these places, he says, are called 'ascia,' and time there is not reckoned by hours.

C. 108 (112). One part of the earth . . . stretches out to the greatest extent from east to west, that is, from India to the Pillars of Hercules at Gades, being a distance of 8578 miles according to Artemidorus, but according to Isidorus 9818 miles.

Book VI. c. 16 (18). This nation (the Bactrian) lies at the back of Mount Paropanisus over against the sources of the river Indus.

From: McCrindle, J. W. Ancient India as Described in Classical Literature. Westminster: Archibald Constable, 1901, 107-110.

[Flintlock]

---

---

You seem to think you've hit upon something amazing here. All your quotes that include geographical modern India as "India" are from around the 1st century AD onwards. Do you know that "Ind" and the Indus were given to the name of ancient Pakistan since 2000 BC? So for 4,000 years people have been referring to Pakistan as India, whilst only 2000 years has India been included with the Ganges. And this being only what foreigners have been saying. Pakistan, or the ancient Pakistani people never agreed to accept you guys as part of the original India or Sindhu.

Er....your "analysis" is highly suspect. Please provide quotes by ancient historians or writers clearly stating that India is comprised of merely the banks of the Indus.

I suspect that you will not find many.

Why on earth name your country after someone elses river? It's like naming your country "Rhineland" even though the Rhine flows through Germany.
Why on earth name your country on what foreigners (who werent very good at geography) called your country?

Er....silly argument.

Ancient India was the land "east of the Indus", as envisioned by most of the explorers of that time, my quotes justify this.

Now that Pakistan decided to separate....too bad. We still retain the name.