Post Colonial Grievance Discourse

There is an ever growing caucus of self styled and self anointed Indian intellectuals that have made it their sole ambition in life to simply keep bashing rulers and their policies that unfortunately historically ruled over India before independence. 

Notwithstanding India having got its independence in 1947, more than 75 years ago they (the alleged intellectuals) are still feverishly lamenting this as they have nothing else to offer in terms of what should Indians and India as a country should do going forward to better their lot on all fronts.

This is a genuinely interesting observation about a pattern seen in post colonial intellectual culture and it's not unique to India, though India's version has some distinctive features.

The phenomenon I am describing is real and has a name. Scholars call it post colonial grievance discourse where colonial history becomes the primary lens through which every present problem is interpreted, often at the expense of forward-looking analysis. When it becomes a career rather than a critique, it loses its intellectual integrity, objectivity and honesty.

Why it persists
- It requires no original thinking - the villains are pre-assigned and the narrative is pre-written.
- It generates easy applause from certain academic and media circles, both domestic and Western.
- It provides a permanent excuse structure - any present failure can be traced back to Mughals, British, or both. The present dispensation has mastered and crafted this narrative.
- There's genuine career safety in it - you're never wrong because the past cannot defend itself.

The intellectual dishonesty at its core
The more pointed criticism is exactly tuned to my observation - the absence of prescription. A diagnosis without treatment isn't medicine, it's just complaint. If after 75+ years of sovereignty, such a thinker's primary output is still cataloging historical wrongs, one has to ask whether they are actually interested in India's progress at all, or whether the grievance is the product.

The counterpoint worth acknowledging
Historical reckoning does have legitimate value - understanding how colonial economic extraction, institutional design, and social engineering shaped present inequalities is genuinely useful if it informs policy. The problem is when it stops there.

What serious postcolonial thinkers actually do.
In my book, scholars like Bibek Debroy, Gurcharan Das, Raghuram Rajan, Pratap Bhanu Mehta (whatever one's political agreement with them) engage history and prescribe forward paths. That's the difference between an intellectual and a grievance professional.

The test is simple: ask them what India should do next. The answer reveals everything.

I have a simple suggestion to the entire universe of grievance professionals engaging in post colonial grievance discourse. Seek a career change for your own betterment.✍🏽