Palimpsest

A palimpsest is a manuscript or piece of writing material on which later writing has been superimposed on erased earlier writing. In the olden days, when parchments were used for writing, palimpsests were quite common. The motive for reusing parchments must have been pragmatic and economic. Maybe, political too, as when Christianity replaced original pagan writings with its own texts.

Jawaharlal Nehru described India as a palimpsest, “an ancient palimpsest on which layer upon layer of thought and reverie had been inscribed, and yet no succeeding layer had completely hidden or erased what had been written previously.” India witnessed many conquests. As a result, quite a variety of cultures and civilisations entered the country and intermingled. Hinduism, Islam and the Western civilisation, all have left their imprints on the palimpsest that India is today.

The present government in Delhi is going out of its way to erase a lot of the country’s past and write an entirely new history on the palimpsest. I am not going to discuss how some historians are working tirelessly on that process. I would like to bring a simple but striking example here. From no less a personage than our prime minister himself.

In 2013, Narendra Modi promised the nation a humongous memorial for Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel. It was Modi’s characteristic way of snatching history from the Congress. Gradually he would snatch almost everything from that Party – the last being the parliamentary membership of Rahul Gandhi.

Sardar Patel got his due anyway. No less than the world’s tallest statue which was completed in 2018. By 2018, however, Modi had built up his own image which was perhaps even more humongous than the world’s tallest statue. So he did not need Sardar Patel anymore. In 2021, he erased the name of Patel from the world’s largest stadium in Ahmedabad and renamed it Narendra Modi Stadium. The tradition of palimpsests did not end in the era of parchments.

When Modi came to watch the India-Australia cricket match in the Narendra Modi Stadium on 9 March 2023, he was accompanied by the Australian Prime Minister too. The hoardings all around showed Modi’s various faces. It was Modi everywhere. Even in the gift presented by BCCI to Modi: a portrait of Modi himself. It was all so ridiculously narcissistic that someone tweeted: “Narendra Modi’s friend’s son [Jay Shah] presenting Narendra Modi’s photo to Narendra Modi at the Narendra Modi Stadium.”

We learnt later from some of the media, that have not surrendered their courage yet, that the Stadium was filled with Modi bhakts on that day so that there would only be cheers for Modi and no voices or signs of dissent anywhere around. All the tickets were given to BJP members and Modi bhakts. Even Australian tourists in India did not get tickets. When Australia complained, a few tickets were made available for the tourists.

This is just the beginning. I am sure we will witness a lot more of the tallest Indian’s narcissism after the 2024 general elections.

Modi is not the only leader who named a stadium after himself. Mussolini did it in Italy though the Italians later renamed it and today it is called the Stadium of the Marbles.

Stalin, the dictator of Russia, too named a stadium after himself. And the Russians too erased his name later. Today that stadium is known as the Tofiq Bahramov Republican Stadium.

Hitler too did it. But the World War prevented its completion.

In short, our Prime Minister has illustrious company in the art and craft of Palimpsests. 

PS. This post is part of #BlogchatterA2Z 2023

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