I was just walking through some documents I had saved over the years, when it struck me that there has been very little new research work or relook into the history of the hill states. One particular format has been the examination of oral ballads, very few of which seem to be available in popular culture today. However, that was certainly not the case in the British era, when much field work seems to have been done by scholars of Europe on the subject, as they panned across the state of the Lahore kingdom and their adjunct territories. Sirmour was a Small Princely state along the Yamuna river's course While their purpose may have been malevolent in nature, many interesting insights got captured over the course of their work, and replication or improvement on the same seems to be rather scarce, especially in the context of what the European scholars used to call the "Punjab Hill States". One such case was on Sirmour, where very little information can be found in the publi...
Commemorative Stamp of Zorawar Singh History is a nebulous creature, or perhaps more like a Medusa, which when one stares directly in the face, results in petrification. To that extent, it is interesting to note how the Communist Chinese narrative of one and a half wars that were won against India that was first thrown up by the murderous demagogue Mao Tse Tung to justify a sense of superiority over India. The problem with all shades of Marxists and Maoists is that the cherry picking of history is a habit that fails even basic scrutiny. The power of narrative holds only so long as gatekeepers to information are able to secure it. Once the horses bolt the stables, it is beyond redemption, however hard they try. If there was one and a half war for China, there were two and a half wars won by India that could be invoked to provide a cure for selective amnesia and cherry picking of history that would petrify a large section of the China apologia. History offers lessons to those w...