Relevance of Sri Aurobindo’s vision of Rashtra

Abstract

The paper is a modest attempt to critically examine the relevance of Sri Aurobindo’s vision of Rashtra as represented in his writings in the contemporary contexts of the so-called Euro-Americo-centric discourses of the post nation, the post-human and the post-truth. The essay aims at critically analysing how Sri Aurobindo’s “dharma-centric”, “purushartha-oriented” vision of “ rashtra” cannot be equated or compared with the Eurocentric notions of “nation” or even “the post-nation” - which are primarily grounded in the positivist, rationalist, materialist, historicism or new historicist discourses. 

Sri Aurobindo’s discourse of “rashtra“ is grounded in the philosophical matrix of Sanatan Dharma - ( dharma in Indian tradition cannot to be translated as “ religion), and Bharatiya Jnana Parampara - that  is, free from the kind of religious, ethnic, political, economic, cultural, linguistic, regional, or ideological dogmatism etc that characterise the discursive trajectories of “ the nation/ post-nation” in the west. 

It is interesting to discuss how and why Sri Aurobindo emphasises that “sanatan dharma” is the only politics as well as nationalism (rashtra- vimarsha) that Bharat / India admits of. The essay, this, deals with the analysis of the spiritual-moral connect between “rashtra” and “dharma “that leads to “Swaraj” - the welfare of all. 

The paper is also an endeavour to illustrate how the already heavily colonised field of research methodology in contemporary times in Indian institutions of higher education can be decolonised- in consonance with the objectives of the NEP-2020