Akhand Bharat


Akhand Bharat or Greater India are irredentist terms literally meaning "Undivided India".

History

The Indian subcontinent has been territorially consolidated under various empires. These include the Maurya Empire at its zenith under Ashoka, the Mughal Empire by 1700 CE, the Maratha empire and the British Indian Empire throughout the 19th century CE, all of which greatly influenced the development of South Asia.
At the time of the Indian Independence Movement, Kanaiyalal Maneklal Munshi advocated for Akhand Hindustan, a proposition that Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, agreed with, believing that "as Britain wanted to retain her empire by pursuing a policy of divide and rule, Hindu-Muslim unity could not be achieved as long as the British were there." In addition, Mazhar Ali Khan wrote that "the Khan brothers determined to fight for Akhand Hindustan, and challenged the League to fight the issue out before the electorate of the Province." On 7–8 October 1944, in Delhi, Radha Kumud Mukherjee presided over the Akhand Hindustan Leaders' Conference.
The Indian activist and Hindu Mahasabah leader Vinayak Damodar Savarkar, in response to Islamic and European nationalism, propounded the notion of an akhand bharat as well as a Hindu Rashtra , emphasizing the potential cultural, religious and political unity of Hindus, Buddhists, Sikhs and Jains throughout the Indian subcontinent 'from Kashmir to Rameshwaram and Sindh to Assam', and the alienation of Indian Muslims and Christians due to their 'spiritual homelands' in the Middle East instead of the Indian subcontinent.

Contemporary usage

The call for creation of the Akhand Bharat or Akhand Hindusthan has on occasions been raised by Hindu nationalist organisations such as the Hindu Mahasabha, Kakbhusundi Revolutionary Forum, Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, Vishwa Hindu Parishad, Shiv Sena, Hindu Sena, Hindu Janajagruti Samiti and Bharatiya Janata Party. One organization sharing this goal, the Akhand Hindustan Morcha, bears the term in its name. Other major Indian political parties such as the left-wing Indian National Congress do not subscribe to a call for Akhand Bharat, although India formally claims the entire region of Kashmir as an integral part of India through official maps.
Pre-1947 maps of India, showing the modern states of Pakistan and Bangladesh as part of British-occupied India, illustrate the borders of a proto-Akhand Bharat. The creation of an Akhand Bharat is also ideologically linked with the concept of Hindutva and the ideas of sangathan and shuddhi that seek to focus modern Indian politics on a continuous civilizational legacy and heritage of the Indian subcontinent.
A 1993 diary of the trade union wing of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh included a map depicting Pakistan, Nepal, Bhutan, Bangladesh, Myanmar, Sri Lanka, Thailand and Cambodia as territories that were part of "Akhand Bharat".
While the leadership of the right-wing BJP wavers on the issue, the RSS has always been a strong proponent of the idea. RSS leader H. V. Seshadri's book The Tragic Story of Partition stresses the importance of the concept of Akhand Bharat. The RSS affiliated magazine Organiser often publishes editorials by leaders such as the present Sarsanghachalak, Mohan Bhagwat, espousing the philosophy that only Akhand Bharat and sampoorna samaj can bring "real" freedom to the people of India. The call for Indian reunification has been supported by Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, and BJP National General Secretary Ram Madhav.
In December 2015, following Narendra Modi's diplomatic visit to Lahore, Pakistan, the BJP National Secretary Ram Madhav described that "The RSS still believes that one day , which have for historical reasons separated only 60 years ago, will again, through popular goodwill, come together and Akhand Bharat will be created." In March 2019, RSS leader Indresh Kumar claimed that Pakistan would reunite with India by 2025, that Indians would settle in and migrate to Lahore and Lake Mansarovar in Tibet, that an Indian-allied government had been ensured in Dhaka, and that a European Union-style Akhand Bharat would form.
Former Indian Supreme Court Judge Markandey Katju advocated in Pakistani newspaper The Nation that the only solution to the ongoing dispute between India and Pakistan is the reunification of India, Pakistan and Bangladesh under a strong, secular, modern-minded government. He expanded on the reasons for his support for an reunified India in an article for Newslaundry; Katju advocated that such a state would be administered by a secular government. Katju serves as the chairman of the Indian Reunification Association, which seeks to campaign for this cause. The former Indian Deputy Prime Minister Lal Krishna Advani, in April 2004, similarly endorsed a confederation of the sovereign nations of India and Pakistan as a powerful geopolitical entity rivaling the European Union, United States of America, Russian Federation and People's Republic of China.
Hindu nationalist political groups such as Shiv Sena, a former ally of BJP, have sought the reclamation of Pakistan-administered Kashmir under the pretence of akhand bharat, especially after the abrogation of Article 370 and 35A of the Indian constitution in August 2019. Following the abrogation of Jammu and Kashmir's special status, some posters in Islamabad displayed a map of an "Akhand bharat".