A t the time of Independence, I am quite sure the British packed their trunks into their old boats with more than tea and silverware. They probably carried a quiet chuckle with them. ‘How on earth,’ they must have thought, ‘would this land of multiple languages, hundreds of dialects, countless cuisines, competing customs and more gods than a mythology textbook manage to survive as one nation?’
From their tidy island perspective, we must have looked like a chaotic clearance sale.
And yet we managed like guests at a wedding buffet where everyone insists on being heard and served twice.
But it worked.
My cousin Villiers Stephen captured this better than any political analyst ever could. Let me leave his words untouched:
‘Sometimes I feel saddened by how divided India seems today. I often think of my mother, who loved stitching patchwork quilts. With patience and care, she would cut small squares of cloth in different colours and patterns, and then, using her hand-operated Singer sewing machine, skilfully stitch them together into a beautiful quilt.
To me, that quilt is like our nation – made up of diverse cultures, religions, languages, communities, urban and rural lives, tribals, farmers, and so many others. Each piece is different, yet each is essential to the whole. After Independence, the Fathers of our Nation brought these varied pieces together, overcoming immense challenges to unite India into a vibrant and enduring democracy – the largest in the world.
Today, however, it feels as though this carefully stitched fabric is under threat, pulled apart by divisive forces driven by narrow and selfish interests.’
Beautiful, isn’t it?
I remember those quilts. They were never one neat colour. There was always a rebellious square that did not quite match the rest. A bright red next to a stubborn blue. A floral piece arguing silently with a checkered one. But stitched together, they became something magnificent. And most importantly, they kept you warm on cold nights.
Imagine if my aunt had decided that only one colour deserved to exist.
A fully saffron quilt perhaps.
Or fully green.
Or fully white.
It would have been tidy, yes. It would also have been terribly boring. Worse, it would have lost its strength. Patchwork is strong because it shares the strain. Pull one piece too hard and the others hold it in place.
India was stitched that way. With debate, compromise, sacrifice and vision. Not by ironing out differences but by sewing them together.
Today we are told uniformity is strength. My aunt would disagree. Uniformity is easy. Unity through diversity is hard work. It requires patience, a steady hand, and the willingness to sit at a noisy old Singer machine while different pieces resist being aligned.
But today that machine’s been replaced by bulldozers.
And those old boats that left our shores laugh out loud and say, “We knew it wouldn’t last...!”
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