Raghuramaraju A. - Modern Frames and Premodern Themes in Indian Philosophy: Border, Self, and the Other

Part I
Self and other

Part II
Border

Two tasks of the present study are to lay bare the nature of debate and to understand, through the concept of debate, modern Indian thinkers and social reality. Border and the other, in addition to the self, constitute three structural aspects of a debate. In a debate, the participant knows what his or her position is, knows the position of the other who is the opponent and, more importantly, knows how to relate his or her position to the position of the other. The last task requires the cognitive competence of both translation and critical comparison. At times, one wins a debate not only because ones position is stronger, but also because one knows about the position of the other better than the upholder. Logic and argumentation are aspects of a debate. Debate is a more structured form of inquiry than dialogue.

Structured forms of debates in Indian philosophy can be traced to the post-Buddha period. The Vedas are aphoristic in nature; the Upanishads are devoted more to the search for truth. Sometimes, the seeker of truth did speak, but it was more in the form of self-expression like the joy of realising the truth rather than communication. Though the rishis were heard by the disciples who followed them, some of that was meant to be communicated while some were in a debating mode. The main purpose of their activity was seeking after truth rather than communication or debate. Difference, which is the necessary requirement for debate, was less during the pre-Buddhist time, particularly in the Vedas and the Upanishads, as their preoccupation was more with the search for truth. This, however, takes a different turn with the advent of the Buddha who rejected the Vedas and Upanishads in a radical way. This sowed the seed for the rise of a new mode of philosophising in India, namely, debates. There were instances like Badarayana compiling Upanishads under one place in his Vedanta Sutra. The compiler discusses other philosophical schools. Buddha radically rejected the earlier forms of philosophy, particularly those of the Vedas and Upanishads, except some form of Kapilas Samkhya, or what is known as classical Samkhya. This subsequently gave rise to debate as a form of philosophising.

A systematic attempt is made by Samkara, who, in his commentary on Badarayanas Brahma Sutras or Vedanta Sutras, consolidates his critique of Buddhism. Debates as a philosophical genre began to develop during this period and grew substantially in the subsequent times, giving rise to debates between or amongst various schools of philosophy.

In recent times, however, this way of dealing with the other has almost disappeared. Largely, the relation is seen as an oppressor, within postcolonial discourse. There are two ways of depicting the role of the other. One is followed by scholars like Romila Thapar and the other by Ramchandra Gandhi. She presents a critique of those developments, which was the parent to the present-day Syndicated Hinduism which is being pushed forward as the sole claimant to the inheritance of indigenous Indian religion (1985: 21). In this context, she argued that the

origin of the word Hindu is geographical and related to those living in the Indian subcontinent. The Sindhu (Indus) river was referred to as Hindu by the Achaemenid Persians and as the Indos by the Greeks.

(1985: 17)

She finds this problematic and argues that the call to unite under Hinduism as a political identity is anachronistic (1985: 22). This anachronism highlights the extent of the self that is called Hindu, dependent on the other, the outsider, for its name. Ramchandra Gandhi has a different take on this. He refers to the worried feeling many Hindus have that the other gave them the name, and how they sometimes feel that they ought not to even call themselves Hindus because it is a term coined by outsiders. He moves away from the domain of