As ‘Bharat’ on Modi’s table turns heads, a magazine for G20 guests explains name

The "Bharat" country tag at Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi's table during his opening remarks at the G20 Summit grabbed attention on Saturday morning. Modi's unequivocal endorsement of the country's name came days after Indian President Droupadi Murmu sent an invite for a dinner as part of the multilateral event in the name of the "President of Bharat".

Interestingly, "Bharat: The Mother of Democracy", a glossy 24-page magazine that's disappearing fast from bookracks at the international media centre of the G20 Summit venue, Bharat Mandapam at Pragati Maidan, explains its title on the second page: "Bharat is the official name of the country. It is mentioned in the Constitution as also in the discussions of 1946-48," which preceded the adoption of the charter.

The use of Bharat as "the official name of the country" in a magazine distributed among G20 foreign delegates and journalists from both the country and abroad is the latest, and clear, indication that the name, currently used interchangeably with India, albeit largely in a domestic context, will now be the name the country wants to be known by in the international context.

India may have been the name under which it ascended to the G20 presidency, but Bharat was the name under which it announced, at 3.30pm on Saturday, 9 September, that the Delhi Declaration had been adopted.

Published by the Union government, the magazine has been produced specially for the summit to be distributed free among delegates and journalists. Under the header on Page 2, titled "Democratic Ethos in Bharat Over Thousands of Years", the glossy identifies the beginning of the Indian civilisation as the "Sindhu-Saraswati civilisation: 6000 BCE -2000 BCE" , what history books, both in India and abroad, refer to as the "Indus Valley Civilisation".

The introduction further identifies "Ramayana: Beyond 2000 BCE" and the Mahabharata : "Beyond 1100 BCE", indicating that these were, in fact, real eras, and not mythological events embellished over a thousand years of oral and written traditions in Indian folk and religious narratives.

It also refers to the Chinese monk, Fa Hsien, who travelled to India in 5th century CE. The magazine identifies several other eras in India's history: Mahajanapada and Gantantra (7th and 8th century BCE), Buddhism (since 500 BCE), Jainism (since 650 BCE) besides mentioning Megasthenes (the Greek explorer) followed by Kautiliya and his political treatise, Arthashastra.

After the mention of the Vijayanagar Empire (14th to 16th century) in southern India comes the only mention of a Muslim king under the headline "The Understanding Monarch". "Good administration should embrace everyone's welfare, regardless of religion. That was the kind of democracy the 3rd Mughal Padishah Akbar practised," the magazine describes him, adding: "Akbar's democratic thinking was unusual and way ahead of its time".

The magazine ends with the mention of the years between 1952-2023 where all prime ministers of the country and the "peaceful transfers of power" are mentioned.