The Personality of India: Pre- and Proto-historic Foundation of India and Pakistan c10.67

c10.67

Let us try to trace the origin of this regionalism. We have already described the main foci of the various physical and cultural regions in India. It may be noted that each of these regions started with a well endowed focus, around which the neighbouring areas merged. Hence it is no accident that these physical regions correspond to the linguistic and cultural divisions of the country. "The State", said E. W. Gilbert, "is an artificial contrivance by which several or perhaps many geographic regions, some natural, some man-made, are welded into one working unit......regions can be regarded as separate limbs of the body-politic: regional diversity need not be a danger and it can strengthen the unity of the State".² Thus as already described, each of these areas in the Indo-Pakistan sub-continent were natural geographic regions with their frontiers marked by natural barriers. Owing to diverse historical reasons, each of these regions asserted their independent personality with the growth of population, rise of local dialects and vernacular languages. As Sunitkumar Chatterji pointed out, "....the economic milieu, and the special training which the mind receives in an organised community or corporate body of men, create a framework of civilization or ordered life which commonly finds expression in the language of that body of men: and hence we are more justified in speaking of language cultures than of racial cultures".³