The West expected India to be a failed state within a decade of independance. There were 584 princely states and hundreds of linguistic, religious and cultural minorities to integrate within one country.
Compare India to Yugoslavia which broke up violently along ethnic lines or to Sri Lanka which had a bloody civil war that lasted 25 years. Or the division of Pakistan into Bangladesh along racial and linguistic lines even though they shared the same religion.
What I fear is that young Indians take nation for granted and don't understand that India's secular democracy is fragile and that it can within a generation 'be broken up into fragments by narrow domestic walls'.
Compare India to Yugoslavia which broke up violently along ethnic lines or to Sri Lanka which had a bloody civil war that lasted 25 years. Or the division of Pakistan into Bangladesh along racial and linguistic lines even though they shared the same religion.
What I fear is that young Indians take nation for granted and don't understand that India's secular democracy is fragile and that it can within a generation 'be broken up into fragments by narrow domestic walls'.