Akhand Bharat: What's in a map?

Akhand Bharat refers to the concept of an undivided India whose geographical expanse in the ancient past is said to have reached up to Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Bangladesh. Photo: Collected

It is not unusual for the parliament building of a country to be decorated with historic symbols of the nation's greatness. But when India decided to mark the launch of the new Sansad Bhaban in New Delhi by unveiling a mural, its neighbours were in uproar. 

That was because instead of showcasing a map of India, as one would have expected, the mural included the sovereign lands of Afghanistan, Pakistan and Bangladesh - a representation of  'Akhand Bharat' - a conceptual landmass that India's ruling Bharatiya Janata Party draws a historical connection with.

In no time, the map drew angry responses from the political establishment in Bangladesh, Nepal and Pakistan.

Pakistan expressed "grave concerns over the idea of Akhand Bharat being increasingly peddled by the ruling party in India" while the issue caused a political stir in Nepal, with opposition parties pressuring Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal to raise it with Indian officials and get the mural removed during his visit to India. 

In Bangladesh, while the ruling Awami League has so far stayed quiet, opposition parties, including the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), have called the move "shameful".    

The Bangladesh government, meanwhile, has been careful in its response, with the State Minister for Foreign Affairs Shahriar Alam seeing "nothing misleading or political" in the mural. He told journalists on Monday a spokesman for the Indian Ministry of External Affairs had confirmed that it was a map from the time of the Ashokan empire of 322 BC.

"It's not a map of 2023. So, there's nothing to be confused about it or be political," he said, adding that Bangladesh has asked its mission in New Delhi to speak to the Indian Ministry of External Affairs to find out what their official interpretation is.

But the reaction of some ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leaders suggest that the map, at least for some of them, means more than a mere historical representation of Indian culture.

"The resolve is clear – Akand Bharat," Prahlad Joshi, the Union Minister of Parliamentary Affairs, tweeted. Manoj Kotak, Lok Sabha member from Mumbai North-East, said in a tweet, "Akhand Bharat in New Parliament. It represents our powerful & self-reliant India." 

What is Akhand Bharat?

Akhand Bharat refers to the concept of an undivided India whose geographical expanse in the ancient past is said to have reached up to Afghanistan, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Myanmar and Thailand.

Pitched by Hindu Mahasabha leader and Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) ideologue Vinayak Damodar Savarkar at the Mahasabha's 19th Annual Session in 1937, the concept has come to be a mainstay of the Hindutva ideology and 'Hindu Rashtra' that the RSS and BJP stand for.

On 17 August, 1965, the BJP (known as Bhartiya Jansangh at the time) passed a resolution at its meeting in Delhi, which stated, "India's tradition and nationality has not been against any religion. Modern Islam should also not be an obstacle in the way of unity of the Indian nation. Real obstacle is separatist politics. Muslims will integrate themselves with the national life and Akhand Bharat will be a reality, unifying India and Pakistan once we are able to remove this obstacle [separatist politics]."

As of late, however, the RSS has maintained that the Akhand Bharat concept should be seen in the cultural context and not politically, given the partition of India along religious lines.

Historians, however, have generally cast doubt over the historical existence of Akhand Bharat. Many of them contend that the term Akhand Bharat is essentially a misnomer, as India was never a fully unified entity before the arrival of the British. According to them, India was a conglomeration of warring princely states.

Why does it matter?

Clearly, there is no real threat to any of India's neighbours of Akhand Bharat becoming a political reality anytime soon, nor has India ever expressed such desire. But ideological concepts and constructs sometimes can have a life of their own, and have a way of manifesting in dangerous forms in the future.

Take what's happening in Ukraine, for instance. While the Soviet Union may have ended in 1991, it still survives as a concept among Russian nationalists and ordinary citizens, which is why it is difficult for Russians to accept the sovereign ambitions of Ukranians, even though the latter has been an independent country now for more than three decades. 

You see the same dynamics at play when it comes to Tibet and Taiwan vis-a-vis China, Northern Ireland (and to some extent Scotland) vis-a-vis the United Kingdom, and countless other places in the world where one people's conception of nationhood and its geographical boundaries clash with those of another group of people. It does not necessarily lead to confrontation all the time, but lays the seed for future contention.   

Even India was at the receiving end of such map controversy, when in 2012 China decided to include Arunachal Pradesh and the Himalayan region of Aksai Chin as part of China in the map printed on new Chinese passports. 

Their reaction then mirrored their neighbours reaction today in 2023.