IN her article Pakistan abroad (May 18), columnist Rafia Zakaria pointed out that “… school boards in the United States are facing moves to alter American history textbooks so that ‘South Asia’ is replaced by ‘India.’”

This is disconcerting for two reasons. First, that the Indians are feeling no need to find out whether the other six (or seven, if Afghanistan is included) nations of the region would agree for their area to be called India, rather than South Asia. Second, it implicitly promotes the Hindutva supporters’ agenda of the ‘Greater India’ of yore.

This is an unreasonable demand that could set a bad precedent. Serbia, for instance, might want itself and the neighbouring states to be referred to as ‘Yugoslavia’, which they were all part of until the 1990s. If the communists somehow come to power again in Russia, they could ask for all of the Russian and Central Asian states to be depicted in global maps as the USSR. Likewise, there may be a call for Alaska to be shown in Russia, rather than in the US, which bought it from Moscow. Not far behind could also be Mexico, seeking California to be mapped as its portion, instead of the United States.

If this Indian move isn’t checked, the Indian diaspora may then desire that lessons on Indian culture must state that the Indians had mastered transplant surgery thousands of years ago by fixing an elephant’s head on to a human body. Additionally, they could also claim to have undertaken space travel at the time. These claims were made by their Prime Minister Modi over a year ago.

Q. Iqbal
Karachi

Published in Dawn, May 27th, 2016