Blog Posts

Resurrection

Romit Chakraborty
March 3-7, 2025

In the languid hour of midday, in my half-wakeful sleep, I dreamt that while crossing some dark river, unnamed and uncharted, the outer cover of my being slipped off and fell into the rushing stream. It took away with it my name, the memories of my shame, and the records of my glory signatured by sweet fleeting moments. Wave after wave carried them away, beyond my reach. As I argued with myself in this emptiness: Of all that was lost, which was it that caused me the deepest pain?

It was not my past – with which in joy and sorrow my days and nights had been spent. It was my future – in whose underground soil waits in silent nights an unrealised immensity.

- Tagore's English Translation of Poem 22 from `On the Sick-bed' for The Statesman. Dec 6th, 1940. He would die within the next year.

Despite growing up in a suburban middle-class household in Calcutta, my upbringing nurtured in me an undeniable sense of nobility—a nobility rooted not in wealth, but in lineage, history, and intellectual tradition. Descended from the Kulin Brahmin heritage, whose identity and significance have been etched into countless generations, I carry within me the implicit knowledge that this nobility is a birthright, a legacy, a silent but potent source of inner fortitude. This birthright comes with the moral and religious duty to uphold nine self-evident virtues: `acahro, vinayo, vidya, pratishtha, tirtha, darshanam, britti, tapo, danam, navadha kula-lakshanam' that loosely translate to {practice, modesty, scholarship, success, pilgrimage, dedication, ethical profession, meditation, and charity}. I may only accept my heritage to the extent that I uphold these virtues. 

The historiography of the `Kulin', which translates literally to the people derived from `kula' or lineage that has been ascribed an elite status: kulagranthas/geneologies, kulapanjikas or kulajis/chronicles, constitute a shrinking sphere of cultural memorabilia of a Brahmanical liturgy imported into Bengal through a stream of migrations between 770-1080 AD. We are Kanyakubja Brahmins, where Kanyakubja refers to our ancestral homeland of Kanauj, a small city that marks the confluence of the sacred Ganges, and the Yamuna in northern India. Markers of this legacy bear five names that end in `Upadhyay' or scholar. Chattopadhyay (Chatterjee), Gangopadhyay (Ganguly), Mukhopadhyay (Mukherjee), Bandyopadhyay (Banerjee), Bhattacharyya (Bhattacharjee). I happen to be a Chatterjee, and my last name is a title or honorific conferred as a 'Raj' 'Chakraborty' or emperor in a formal appellation inscribed in copperplate circa 1079 AD. Chatterjee's have historically been experts at Vedic rituals and embody the lineage of Kashyapa, the sage who lends his name to Kashmir, `Kashyapa-Mir', an early seat of residence for Kanyakubja Brahmins.  

An Argument for the Protectorate of the Elite in Marginalised Cultures

Carrying such self-assurance as a person of colour in the Western world is a complex endeavour. Whilst a postdoc at Berkeley, a German colleague, now a Professor at Bremen, joked at my expense one time, comparing me to a 'Gypsy King'. They were not aware of the above heritage; they were basing this simply on the manner in which I conducted myself. And the implied humour was derived, of course, from their perceived absurdity of an elite in a subjugated and marginalised people. This warrants a closer inspection from the point of view of modern European perceptions of the said people and the relevant historical backdrop.  

Europeans will often speak of Indians and Gypsies in the same light, perhaps because we are. The term Gypsy, is a racial slur that compares the Roma/Romani and the Sinti people to Egyptians owing to their olive-tinged complexion. The Romani or the Sinti are north Indian migrants into Europe, an ethnic minority that has been gravely persecuted due to their lack of a protectorate among other reasons. Josef Mengele, the infamous angel of death from Auschwitz famously recruited Dina Babbitt to paint Roma inmates since he felt that camera film did not capture their complexion. Scapegoating of Jews and Gypies (an umbrella term used to describe the Romani, and the Sinti), relatively newer migrants into Europe, worked hand in hand with scientific racism in Nazi Germany to inflict human suffering on an unprecedented scale. Operation Barbarossa, for instance, was inspired by the notion of creating living space (Lebensraum) for Germans in Eastern Europe at the expense of its civilian population. 

A collaborative effort of the Wehrmacht and the Einstatzgruppen of the Schutzstaffel (SS) ear-marked more than three thousand highly erudite German and Austrian servicemen, most of whom had had PhD degrees, for the systematic genocide of Jews in Eastern Europe. Included among their victims were large numbers of Roma and Sinti civilians and this barbaric tradition involved indiscriminate shooting of civilian populations all over Eastern Europe by cornering them in quarries, ravines (Babi Yaar close to Kiev), and in forests, and in the indiscriminate torching of Soviet villages. The bodies of the victims were incinerated with gasoline, a precious fuel the Germans were later to ill afford during their retreat in 1943-1945. 

Practically every German deployed on the Eastern front was either a participant in the massacre, or was involved in direction and filming of the horrors. The tapes were sent back to their homes to be developed voiding pleads of ignorance from at least a section of the civilian population. By 1942, reports reached Himmler that the cold-blooded murder of unarmed civilians at this unprecedented scale was proving to be psychologically debilitating for his men. With trademark German professionalism, a plan was orchestrated at Wannsee that was to take this up with industrial scale and precision at Auschwitz, and other extermination camps all across Eastern Europe. This is where Dina Babbitt made her paintings of ethnic Indians. By Indians, I mean South Asians, and specifically ethnic north Indians, based on the linguistic and genetic profile of the Romani peoples. 

Did you know that only a handful of these perpetrators (about twenty) faced the death penalty? Have you come across a reputable South Asian Journal covering the issue? The person, the German Professor referenced above, changed their name from upon marriage due to their grandfather being having such dubious affiliations during a war, a phenomenon that is not uncommon in modern day Germany. You may even hear Germans of my generation claim that the civilian population was unaware of the said atrocities. The ability to be able to do so is far more convenient that it ought to have been given the purported target of about 11 million Jews for men and women of their grandfather's ilk. At the time of this writing AfD, an alternative ultra-nationalist party in Germany got 20% of the popular vote. Bjorn Höcke their leader in Thuringia openly professes the concept of Lebensraum, the very idea that led to this mass massacre of Jewish, Roma, Polish, Ukrainian, Russian, and other civilians. And Italy has premier who has a video recording of them as an adult openly praising Mussolini. This is not to make a claim for generational guilt but to acknowledge the persistent threat of dangerious ideologies that pit man against man for the benefit of a few efficient politickers.  

The Cycle that determines Scapegoating of the Non-White Elite in Western Society

Expectations of humility and submission from individuals of my background are subtly reinforced and often implicitly demanded by the status quo. Signatures of nobility; Marks of self-reliance—confidence, intellect, fortitude, resilience, are easily mistaken for arrogance or insolence—creating a cognitive dissonance that frequently leads to professional scapegoating. This dynamic often unfolds within the context of cultural expectations and power dynamics, where deviation from the norm is viewed sceptically. On occasions, natural demeanour, eccentricity, a highly aspirant attribute for any individual (one that's almost impossible to feign), can mark one as an outsider. This highlights the fragility and complexity inherent in cross-cultural interactions within professional settings which may be understood from the point of view of Girardian scapegoat theory. 

According to Girard, communities often relieve internal tensions by projecting hostility onto a scapegoat, an individual or a body of individuals that often lack a protectorate, that embodies perceived threat and offer easy targets. This also posits a model for the emergence of interpersonal dynamics, especially in diverse and hierarchical professional environments. The very human need for a narrative is given a neat scaffold by the scapegoat, and the process of their construction not too different from any other form of engineered propaganda or myth-making where ethics and humanism are thrown out of the window. We perpetuate many such myths on a regular basis: the perception of a ghostly figure in the dark, the Christmas grinch, The Classic American Jock, and the paradoxical and twin reflective ideals of `no-one likes a know-it-all'. We subconsciously migrate to these characterisations in the absence of self-reflection. If one meditates on this for a while, one may realise that this irrationality is a collective phenomenon, a peculiar `madness of crowds', and with some doubt, this subconscious pull may be ascribed to the collective unconscious. This may well describe the deep historical and anthropological roots of the Girardian Scapegoat theory.

The Solution

This Girardian hypothesis also offers a pathway toward resilience and personal growth—an emergence not merely as a survivor, but as someone who transcends challenges by embracing and reframing their role in society. This path, for someone navigating modern Western landscapes with a heritage like mine, demands some reflection—both professional and intellectual. True resilience is found not in submission or feigned conformity, nor in retreating entirely to familiar environments, but in the assertion of authentic selfhood. It calls for building one's own intellectual and professional domain, unbound by external expectations or pressures. It involves pursuing endeavours genuinely aligned with the spirit, skills, and heritage, of a true nobleman thereby transforming challenging experiences into profound opportunities for personal renewal. 

As a dose of realism the writer notes that the nature of the above ambition contrasts sharply with the traditional advise for career progression: Align your interests with the man or woman above you. And runs directly contra to the finite nature of our being. It is a call into the wilderness for spiritual fulfilment over material protections that could hazard a clear and present danger of oppression.  

Thus, while professional and cultural challenges are ancient and persistent, one's response can be timeless and defiant. To live authentically is to reclaim one's own narrative, reject externally imposed limitations, and cultivate an independent intellectual and professional identity. However, translating this ideal into action is profoundly challenging. Part of the necessary action involves legislative initiatives aimed at undoing nearly a millennium of tacit reinforcement—an orchestrated marginalization designed for power-brokering that has diminished certain historical narratives. Another essential dimension lies in acts of cultural self-preservation, including safeguarding the rapidly diminishing historiography of a vanquished elite, historically positioned as frontiers against imperial expansion. These legislative and preservative actions are interdependent and mutually reinforcing; each provides legitimacy and context for the other. Ultimately, though, perhaps the most profound act is the existential one—embodying virtue authentically, in the Heideggerian sense of fully 'being' one's values rather than merely acknowledging their aesthetic or symbolic importance. 

As Allama Iqbal eloquently reminds us: "If one learns to appreciate what's truly beautiful they stop being a slave." This may come across as a pithy quote charged with Iqbal's incendiary idealism. But note that it points to a realisation or discovery that fundamentally alters one's state of being and recasts aesthetic virtue as a transformative ideal that percolates into one's material actions. In the act of acknowledging beauty as fleeting material experience one is offered a door past which they can transform their selfhood permanently. Matter and spirit coexist in this regard with both having transient and static qualities. Freedom from tyranny demands exertion of an authentic selfhood.

In exerting it, one preserves their dignity and heritage and reshapes their story into one of resilience, strength, and self-determination of their perceived nobility within a new cultural context. Yet, authenticity demands more than aspiration; it requires reflection on the complexities inherent in reclaiming one's narrative. Navigating the delicate path of asserting individuality amidst entrenched expectations, advocating for legislative recognition when the stakes are not widely recognised, safeguarding the fading historiography, meeting the demands of success and its sacrificial elements in a hyper-competitive marketplace—each carries its own challenges. Perhaps the key is to recognise that success is perceptible, beauty is a transient joy, and that all manner of of virtue is ultimately, always self-evident.

Only in pursuit of authenticity can one discover the truth about oneself, and the truth about our universe in an eternal, emergent, natural, and, active phenomenon. 

Editorial log:
1. April 5th, 2025: minor text edits
2. April 21st, 2025: added Tagore quote