What John Oliver, Raveena Tandon and other assorted nationalists don’t get about the Kohinoor

Aakash Joshi writes: Asking for return of the Kohinoor is a bit like promising lakhs in bank accounts from black money stashed abroad. A good slogan, but no one takes it seriously

The most recent advocate of this national pride has been Raveena Tandon, who retweeted a clip – some five years old – of Last Week Tonight host John Oliver describing the demand for the diamond's return to India and saying “the British museum should be an active crime scene". (Source: Royal Collection Trust)

Written by: Aakash Joshi

4 min readSep 15, 2022 08:26 PM IST First published on: Sep 15, 2022 at 08:26 PM IST

Since the death of Elizabeth of the House of Windsor earlier this month, desi social media has had two sorts of “trending” topics. The first, in line with much of the English-speaking world, consists of posts riddled with nostalgia, gossip and clips from episodes of The Crown. The second sort is filled with righteous indignation at the crimes of colonialism, of the “wealth” and treasure that was looted from India during the Raj. For social media nationalists in India, the “return the Kohinoor” chant seems to be the most popular. The world’s most famous diamond was stolen from Indian royalty by the colonial state and its royalty, goes the refrain, and it must be brought back as a part of reparations.

The most recent advocate of this national pride has been Raveena Tandon, who retweeted a clip – some five years old – of Last Week Tonight host John Oliver describing the demand for the diamond’s return to India and saying “the British museum should be an active crime scene”. Oliver, of course, isn’t wrong. Colonialism was a great crime, and its cultural thefts and appropriations stand tall as symbols of empire and national pride throughout the capitals of Europe.

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But imperialism and its depredations require more than just a casual cry for a symbolic piece of hardened carbon. And perhaps more importantly, the demand for the Kohinoor disguises the more pressing problems of our political-economy. In fact, even as symbols of exploitation go, there are enough corrections to be made at home.

The British empire was a systemic exploitation. Reparations must be a systemically planned and sought, to mitigate even a fraction of its consequences. National pride, given how much water has flowed under the bridge — the celebration of the Indian diaspora, the new multiculturalism in the UK (little has been made of Rishi Sunak’s prime ministerial bid compared to, say, the attacks on Sonia Gandhi for her Italian origins) – is just a convenient way to make some noise and get some likes. A more reasonable demand – and more difficult one to articulate and fight for – would be to ask the British to fund public education (a la comprehensive, common schools) and health (an Indian NHS) as payback. After all, Britain’s wealth has been funded historically and in large part, by India.

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Then there’s the question of the symbols of exploitation. Even now, erstwhile “royals” in India continue to harp on the abolition of privy purses – the ultimate “handout” for the rich and historically privileged. Did they earn their palaces – many of them now hotels – or were they built by nameless multitudes who see no reparations? And to the Kohinoor itself – it was a piece of rock mined long before our borders became what they are. It went from the South India, to West Asia, to what is now Pakistan and eventually to Queen Victoria. What makes it “ours” now? Should it not go to all the countries that can lay claim to it?

English imperialism was evil. But it was also complicated. Many of the ideologues and leaders of parochial nationalism today did little to combat it. That history cannot be erased by a cosmetic demand. Asking for the Kohinoor is a bit like promising lakhs in bank accounts from black money stashed abroad. A good slogan, but no one takes it seriously. And like any good slogan, it tries to distract from larger issues and failures.

aakash.joshi@expressindia.com

Aakash Joshi

Aakash Joshi is Deputy Associate Editor at The Indian Express. He ... Read More

# Kohinoor diamond