INDIA BEFORE CAPITALIST IMPERIALISM AND INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION India has been the luckiest land on earth so far as availability of natural resources is concerned. Abundance of solar energy, the great Himalayas and the triveni of bay of Bengal, Indian Ocean and Arabian sea has provided India with gigantic river systems and vast, immensely fertile valleys and flood plains which grew gold for India all over the ages, dense natural vegetation and other resources giving enormous potential for the growth of animal breeding, intensive agriculture and horticulture combined together – the basic activities of the Indian cultivator who reaped the fruits of nature through all the three available modes of food production making him enviably prosperous. Man in India by interaction intelligently with nature and using his wisdom laid the foundations of the greatest and the richest civilization in the world with highly developed and advanced socio-economic specialization resulting into the growth of thriving industry, arts, literature, greatest empires in the world and a surplus economy importing gold in return for her exports and earnings worldwide and earning respect for the contribution to the world in the field of culture. Indian life represented growth of mankind in perfect harmony with nature and itself. Intensive agriculture practiced in the Indus valley civilization with extremely good yields spared a large section of population for other activities and the adaptive adjustments resulted into the growth of a number of commercial and social activities leading to the growth of the most prosperous and advanced civilization in the world and growth of a highly specialized and flourishing industry. All the members of the society were fruitfully and productively engaged by the society in different activities other than agriculture. The civilization shows remarkable scientific and technological achievements made by India of those times, the pure and the most powerful brains in the society being made the bearers of the torch of wisdom. Such an environment of abundance and affluence was very conductive to the growth of knowledge – man’s tool to learn more about nature and to enjoy her benefits and fruits in a cooperative manner conforming to the natural laws and treating nature as mother of all creatures. Fine arts and literature developed almost to the level of perfection to cater to the finer subtleties of mind and soul in leisure time and the culture percolated down to the grass root level is evident from the findings made by the historians. So the development of science, technology, fine arts, folk arts, trade and commerce etc. in India in its totality represented a process of growth of a culture in harmony with nature by intelligently adapting to the environment. This is called evolution. This was the progress of mankind in a particular part of the world which resulted into the evolution of a prefect socio-economic system to ensure a happy and peaceful co-existence of man with nature over a span of several thousand years. The system helped man to exist with nature for thousands of years until it was finally destroyed by British imperialism. A balanced use of thought memory and wisdom resulted into the growth of a healthy and prosperous society with people of India having enough leisure and resources to perfect their knowledge and technology thanks to her fertile flood plains producing a lot of surplus and the trade bringing in gold from all over the world establishing her mental, spiritual and material supremacy over the world. The three most important factors responsible for India’s great achievement may be short listed as follows :1. Abundance of natural resources. 2. Successfully tapping the resources through science and technology.3. An optimum division of labor leading to a balanced growth of society meeting the basic requirements of the individual as well as the society in harmony with nature. India’s material superiority which made her establish her cultural supremacy over the world was thus the natural outcome of the evolution of a balanced socio-economic system by successfully using the available resources, satisfactorily performing its functions of catering to the needs of the society as well as the individual – the basic unit of society – giving equal importance to individual liberty and prosperity and social stability. This represented a remarkable growth of society and the individual in a balanced way so as not to allow the one to infringe upon the rights of another. By ensuring socio-economic and physiological security and satisfaction of both the individual and the society and the subsistence of the individual in a non-competitive way through the caste system, India laid the foundation of her great civilization excelling in thought and action. This was the material superiority of the country with due regards to human dignity and liberty within an stipulated social framework of checks and balances imposing reasonable social-economic restrictions which was responsible for our strides in all fields of human endeavor. The entire social order represented a perfect adaptation of man to nature with both contributing to the safety and well being of other. Indian socio-economic super structure based on caste system despite all its so called weaknesses and shortcomings acted as an effective means of redistribution of India’s material and cultural wealth to all the people paving way for a harmonious social order giving India, the top place in the world for the thousands of years of civilized history. In economic terms the caste system as a means to country’s socio-economic ends guarded the individual as well as the society against each other with a particular profession being reserved for every member of the society as a birth right ensuring progress of both. Unemployment and resulting social turmoil were unheard of in India of those days. This was the basic reason behind India’s material and cultural supremacy. A judicious use of available natural resources with optimum use of national manpower, castes represented different organs of the society performing their assigned function, the thread of economic cooperation linking all of them together. The underlying cultural unity of the Indian society reflects this economic integration of the society in a non competitive manner. We achieved excellence without competition by adequately satisfying the fundamental physical and spiritual needs of the individual in the society. Every member of the society was assured of complete socio-economic security through caste system. The evolution of India’s economic system based on cooperation ensured a natural balance between industry, agriculture and the service-sector, preserving the natural right of every human being on the gifts of nature giving an unmatched richness of thought and wealth and a stable social order ensuring harmonious progress of mankind.
Posted on: Fri, 20 Sep 2013 17:23:22 +0000
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