AsCon Briefs

By Udayan Das

 Abstract

 

 

Apart from security and trade, states are increasingly strategizing cultural policies aimed at ocean spaces. The brief studies these emerging state policies through the case of China’s Maritime Silk Route and India’s Project Mausam. It looks at four questions: first, why did these states decide to curate cultural oceanic policies; secondly, what do these policies entail; thirdly, how have they been executed, and finally, what are the similarities and differences between the two. The brief concludes with two generalizations. First, states curate cultural maritime policies for three objectives – associated material interests, international prestige and regime legitimation. Secondly, the execution of these policies depends on state requirements, capabilities and resources and finally, acceptance by other stakeholders.

Introduction

States engage with oceans in myriad ways. These engagements predominantly revolve around state uses of the oceans for security and trade. A third understanding, related to how states conceive of oceans as cultural spaces, receives comparatively lesser attention. This is primarily because culture is widely conceived in terrestrial terms and ocean spaces are held as a cultural and empty in the modern state system. However, in the recent past, statist cultural imaginations of the oceans have taken forms of cultural diplomacy, transnational heritage conservation and soft power that have demanded scrutiny.

 

Cultural maritime policies are based on three objectives. First, it provides an anchor to the state policies both bilaterally and multilaterally to advance other goals more convincingly. Cultural constructions of mutual history allow enhanced mutual exchanges between the states, develop trust and open avenues of material interests of security and trade. For instance, the revival of the Maritime Silk Route (MSR) involves analogous routes like the ‘Health Silk Route’ where China sought to provide medical aid at the height of the pandemic to states already brought under the Belt and Road Initiative umbrella.[i] The risk is that such constructions of mutual history end up being hierarchical. The MSR involves a plurality of states but is still centred around a Sino-centric worldview and interests.[ii]

 

Second, states aim to brand their civilization internationally to advance prestige and status. Civilization has lately been a buzzword in International Relations and an increasingly studied state power metric.[iii] Non-Western states have alluded to the idea of civilizational power as the foundation of their state’s authority and strength, to fashion as a world leader and attempted to revamp a Western-dominated world order. This curation of the past involves engaging other states and multilateral institutions, like UNESCO. Oceans as theatres of culture allow states to further civilizational histories without outrightly making disputed claims on another state’s territory and yet being expansive. Unlike national histories, oceanic histories are more fluid and can be conceived in mutual and transnational terms.

 

Finally, states map and appropriate cultural histories of oceans to advance national pride and regime legitimation. Claiming cultural pasts that stretch beyond the political borders allows states to reflect on past glories and swell national pride.[iv] Unlike the earlier point where civilizational history is aimed at other states and the international audience, this is aimed particularly at the domestic audience. When the regime reconstructs and retraces these footprints in the form of trails or museums, it speaks to its people in colloquial scripts of folklore, customs and rituals. It acts as the inheritor and protector of a civilization presently alive as a state. This provides a foundation for the regime as a cultural guardian more than a referee of law and order. Civilizational states reinstate that their civilizational borders are much wider than their political borders. They had to curtail and reconcile their political borders owing to principles of sovereignty. For the civilizational state, there is a strong nostalgia and superiority about spaces which they culturally own even if they cannot be legally claimed. In this pursuit, states project a more linear and convenient history that glosses over nuances.

This brief looks at three aspects. First, it analyses the three objectives presented above in light of China and India’s cultural maritime policies. Second, it looks into India’s execution of cultural policies in the form of Project Mausam. Third, it points out observations on these policies through a comparative framework and possible implications.

 

The first section looks at useful concepts in the literature that allow us to understand why states attempt at cultural spatialisation of ocean spaces. This underscores the three objectives stated above – tangible interests, international prestige and regime legitimation. The second section looks at these tropes in light of the Chinese MSR and India’s contemporary maritime policies in the Indian Ocean Region. The third section looks at a case study of Project Mausam. The fourth section looks at the similarities and differences between China’s MSR and India’s Project Mausam with concluding observations.

 

Conceptualising Cultural Spatialisation

 

Tim Winter in his work provides the useful concept of “geocultural power” as a framework to understand China’s attempt at the revival of the Silk Routes.[v] It delves into the question: why is China reviving the Silk Route and why now? Three significant points emerge. First, China uses a cultural backdrop to pave the way for its interests in trade, energy security, and foreign relations with the Eurasian states in the region. In a way, more material interests are couched behind its cultural imagination. Unlike geopolitics and geoeconomics which might lead to competition, geoculture speaks a softer language of mutual connections, peace and harmony. These are more acceptable to other states and bode well for international norms of state behaviour too. This enables China to foster connections and build confidence. Cultural diplomacy advances when there are conceptions of shared history, practices and norms that lay the foundations of material trade and security pacts.

 

Second, it allows China to gain the upper hand in structuring a Sino-centric rewriting of the history of regions. Even if underlined security and trade gains are kept aside, cultural diplomacy results in an economy centred around it independently. China can develop suitable knowledge systems and a China-driven geocultural economy where it presides over the aid of cultural conservation and digitisation. Finally, it brands China’s international image diverting from just a vertical state to a rich tapestry of the past that is nurtured in collaborative ventures. Winter illustrates how China uses the politics of conservation and heritage to advance plural interests at once.

Apart from interests and international prestige, culture policies allow domestic interests too. For states, linking to the past and practising the past as present serves as the benefit of regime legitimisation for the state.[vi] Prasenjit Duara introduces the term ‘regimes of authenticity’ to explain how states tend to draw their authenticity by forming a linear history with the past.[vii] Building on the works of Eric Hobsbawm[viii], Duara portrays how states often vouch for a linear understanding of history. This sense of continuity gives the states a timelessness, and they do not seem like imposed modern authorities. Instead, they absorb past cultural practices and perform them in societies. This connects them to societies and legitimises the state as authentic. Once the state can carry out these practices of the past in the present, states validate their authority by being custodians of the authenticity of the past.

States can also ‘invent traditions’ to help them ideate and establish a continuity with the past. Invented traditions, according to Hobsbawm ‘is taken to mean a set of practices, normally governed by overtly or tacitly accepted rules and of a ritual or symbolic nature, which seek to inculcate certain values and norms of behaviour by repetition, which automatically implies continuity with the past’[ix]. When these traditions are performed repeatedly in a space, the meaning of that culture is spatialised. This is how the meaning and performance of the tradition are attached to that of the space. As a result, when the state claims to own a culture, it is, by default, claiming ownership over the space in which it is performed. This is because that culture has no value if detached from that space.

Interests, Prestige and Legitimacy: China and India’s Maritime Cultural Policies

The politics of connecting to the past has several immediate and tangible interests to serve. One can ask the question: Why is this cultural history popularised now? In most cases, the cultural history is floated deliberately as part of its larger policy conception. People understand culture, words, symbols, gestures, and acts. Therefore, the performance of cultural attributes serves as a precursor or an interlude to other policies of the state. These policies can be economic as well as strategic. Tansen Sen provides an example of how the Chinese understanding of MSR was within the larger backdrop of its economic modernisation and famous branding as a benign, harmonious and connected non-Western power of the world[x]. China’s MSR was mainly popularised by the writings of Qing intellectual Ling Qichao in the early 20th century. Qichao picked up the heft of the Chinese migrant diaspora and Zheng He’s voyages as the lynchpin of his portrayal of the MSR.

When China opened up for economic modernisation, the idea of a peaceful and outwardly China was the perfect cultural backdrop. Effectively, since the 1980s, before the formal announcement of a policy, the discourse of the Chinese-led Silk Route became routed through the Chinese state and academia. This was channelised through popular culture. The MSR narrative provided a convenient framework for this new approach. China could justify increased foreign investment and trade partnerships by emphasising historical trade connections. Additionally, the MSR became a branding tool, attracting international attention and fostering tourism on routes associated with the historical Silk Road. When UNESCO started nominating and listing heritage sites, the “heritagization of the Silk Route” became a new agenda for China.[xi]

Apart from interests, states like China and India also strategize cultural policies to strengthen prestige and regime legitimacy. In his work, Tansen Sen uses both concepts to study China’s ideation and propagation of the MSR.[xii] China strategically draws upon a selective historical narrative, emphasising peaceful and harmonious periods, to bolster national pride and legitimise its contemporary economic aspirations. It has also been likened to that of a geopolitical chronotope, which has facilitated its strategic claims, especially in the South China Sea. While historical trade routes existed, emphasising a unified China-centric “Maritime Silk Road” is a recent invention. China cherry-picks peaceful and prosperous periods in its maritime history, downplaying conflict and instability. This is particularly illustrative of how the reconstruction of Zheng He’s voyages has been shown as peaceful whereas evidence of military ventures exists. This selective narrative fosters a sense of national exceptionalism, portraying China as a historical leader in global trade and fostering a sense of national destiny to reclaim its rightful position. It also makes the Chinese state, in this case, particularly the PLA Navy the custodian of the earlier Chinese expanses sprawling into maritime space.

An interesting example in India’s case is the portrayal of a linear history for the Indian Navy. The pre-colonial history is relied upon to frame the maritime heritage of India and show the Indian Navy as a custodian of a long-drawn maritime heritage.[xiii] It is also shown as a modern force in its execution but ancient in terms of its roots, whereby emphasis is given to India’s ancient coastal communities and their shipbuilding cultures, valours of the navies of Cholas and the empire of Shivaji.[xiv] This also discards the cultural notion that Indians are not a seafaring community.[xv] The Indian state has changed the symbolic ensigns of the British to turn them into signs inspired by the Maratha empire. In 2014, Tamil Nadu Governor K Rosaiah flagged a ship commemorating the 1000th year of Rajendra Chola’s coronation on account of his sailing and conquering lands in Southeast Asia, including present-day Java, Sumatra and the Malay Peninsula. Amar Mahadevan, who was the Naval Offer-In-Charge for Tamil Nadu and Puducherry stated, "It is to be noted that INS Sudarshini is now on its voyage around the world or circumnavigation and is on its way back to Kochi. It is only fitting that a circumnavigating ship is being involved in the celebrations of a king, whose navy has gone beyond boundaries even in those ancient times."[xvi]

 

It is imperative to ask what kind of cultural spatialisation the Indian state seeks in the Bay of Bengal region. Project Mausam stands out as India’s exclusive cultural policy for the maritime space of the Bay of Bengal and the Indian Ocean.[xvii] It is also a seemingly similar strategy to what China did with its MSR. Two questions are essential to assess Project Mausam’s contribution to the Bay of Bengal cultural spatialisation. First, what are India’s strategies leading to? This need not be confused with an evaluation of the project’s performance but to understand why this project was put forward by India and, importantly, why now. Secondly, what cultural space does it seek to construct in the Bay of Bengal region? While the Indian government denies it as a counter to China’s maritime silk route strategy, there are invariable parallels that cannot be denied. Similarly, India’s divergences with China’s understanding of the cultural maritime space must be pointed out. While China’s cultural spatialisation uses a China-centric understanding that is much more authoritative, India tries to allude to a more confluence view of maritime cultural preservation. China’s claims are much more contested than India's.

 

Project Mausam: India’s Cultural Maritime Policies

 

In 2014, at the 38th Session of the World Heritage Committee meeting held in Doha, the Indian Government announced an initiative called ‘Project Mausam’.[xviii] It is an initiative of the Ministry of Culture to be implemented by the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) as the central nodal agency. The research support is supposed to be provided by the Indira Gandhi National Centre for Arts (IGNCA) with the National Museums as the associates. Project Mausam is a transnational initiative to portray three aspects of India’s maritime positioning. First, it seeks to trace the cultural connections that span across East Africa to Southeast Asia. This is done through collating historical and archaeological research around the region. Second, it intends to portray the diversity of cultural, commercial and religious interactions in the Indian Ocean.

Finally, its objective is to promote research on themes of maritime significance and historical trials through multidisciplinary seminars and conferences. India’s Minister of State of the Ministry of Culture, Mahesh Sharma, in response to a question in the Rajya Sabha about the aims and objectives of Project Mausam, summed it up as ‘it aims to encourage the production specialised works, as well as publications for the general public with an attempt at promoting a broader understanding of the concept of a common heritage and multiple identities.’[xix] A question discussed in the Parliament was whether Project Mausam aimed to counter the increasing Chinese influences in the Indian Ocean. The Minister denied this claim concern and argued that the project's purposes differed entirely.[xx]

At the heart of India’s vision behind this project is the idea that India’s civilisational expanse is not limited to the borders of the Indian state. This is a consistent expression by the Indian government and its ambassadors. In a recent visit to Cambodia, India’s External Affairs Minister, S Jaishankar spoke about India’s initiative in preserving and reconstructing the Angkor Wat Temple. He pointed out, “There are temples not only in India, the Indian subcontinent, but in many regions beyond. I had gone with the Vice President to see the biggest temple in the world — the Angkor Wat temple complex. Today, we are restoring and renovating the temples in Angkor Wat. These are contributions which we are making outside because the civilization of India has gone beyond India.”[xxi] He further stated, “So, today, when we are restoring, rebuilding, and re-energizing Indian civilization, our task is not only in India. Our task is all over the world. But it is not only where our civilization went, but it is also where our travellers went, but our traders also went, our people of faith went”.[xxii] Angkor Wat's case is directly relevant to the sea because these cultural confluences happened because of the Bay of Bengal. It might seem that temple construction is high on the government’s agenda list because of the Hindutva leanings. However, Angkor Wat reconstruction has been a priority for India since the 1980s.[xxiii] This shows India’s consistent cultural leanings in this space. The intensity of investment has changed owing to India’s growing heft.

The idea behind India’s cultural claims in the Bay of Bengal and Southeast Asia is further established on similar lines through other government documents in the public domain. A recurrent theme is the usage of similar tropes associated with the earlier mentioned concepts like ‘regimes of authenticity’ and ‘invented traditions’ utilised for regime legitimisation. Simultaneously, the process of cultural spatialisation also accrues definite and immediate benefits. These include branding and financial gains that India seeks to derive from tourism. A detailed Working Group Report by NITI Aayog on Heritage Management, released in 2023, deals with several issues related to India’s policies of preserving maritime cultural heritage.[xxiv] Concerning Project Mausam, the report states, "India is a civilisational country with close historical links with East Asia, the Indian Ocean Rim and West Asia. The spice trade and the spread of Buddhism and Hinduism were central to these interrelations. While China has highlighted the “Silk Route”, there is a need to focus on researching and propagating these relations through an overarching project like Mausam as intended by India. The status of Project Mausam, started in 2014, has not progressed even though UNESCO and other countries are looking at India for some actions on this count.”[xxv]

A constant thread in the report is how tangible elements of India’s culture are beyond India’s territory and should be the state's policy to preserve and advertise it. There is a sense of ownership as these tangible cultural markers branch from the Indian civilization. It is a matter of responsibility and pride for the state to protect them. It further states, "India has one of the largest geo-political expanses and one of the greatest volume and diversity in heritage. This vast heritage repository of India is recognized globally as a significant part of its unique cultural identity. Even beyond India, a number of countries across the world, house some of the best specimens of our country’s heritage in their museums, often narrating the glory of Indian culture along with the tales of colonial legacy; while others in Southeast Asia have extraordinary monuments standing as testimony to the spread of Indian culture.”[xxvi]

 

For postcolonial states, the ideas of cultural exceptionalism and national pride have been part of the state’s playbook in mobilizing nationalist sentiments. This partly works because of the colonial subjugation and India’s deprivations of being denied and forgotten of its heritage in the modern world order. With its rising heft, India’s aspirational power has been growing. Cultural acts that link with past civilizational greatness give citizens a sense of identity and security. Similarly, it lends a divine power to the government as the protector and guardian of preserving India’s national glories of the past and present. A good illustration of this civilizational exceptionalism is the term ‘Vishwaguru’, which translates to ‘World Teacher’ and has been an essential part of the contemporary lexicon of India’s international engagements.[xxvii] It revolves around this self-fashioned world teacher who intends to undo social hierarchies through its civilisational pedagogy. In turn, it also looks to leverage a combination of domestic consolidation and international prestige.

India’s cultural imagination picked up when its dependency on the sea lanes of communication began. To answer the question: why now? The cultural imaginations serve as a backdrop as India increasingly tries to undo its sea blindness. For years, the land borders kept India occupied as flashpoints of conflict. Simultaneously, it was an inward-looking economy that had little dependency and requirement of the sea. When both of these slowly turned around during the 1990s, the Indian state and academia started paying more attention to appropriating the sea. Its cultural roots were discovered from the times of the Cholas to argue that India’s landmass flourished the most when it was connected to the sea. It also served well that these connections created during the pre-colonial times were severed during the colonial period and after that. As and when India is increasingly turning to the sea, the cultural imagination forms the precursor of India’s pivot.

The plan of action for Project Mausam is not bereft of branding and economic gains. The report states a detailed plan of action charting several points on how the state should proceed with cultural preservation. First, Project Mausam has to be used for transnational nominations of heritage sites. There is a mention of Mahabalipuram being shown as a part of the project. Mahabalipuram will be a centre for India-China cultural exchanges through sea voyages. This was also a venue for the meeting of India-China heads of the states in 2019. The report cites this instance with suggestions that the MEA and ASI should initiate establishing a cultural centre at this place.[xxviii] While India’s proposal to establish the UNESCO Cultural Centre has been pending for several years, aiming for accreditation is seen as a positive step.[xxix] Second, a clear roadmap for Project Mausam is needed that can be shared with other states. The report suggests a thematic paper that can be circulated with the other states. It also suggests that the project's conceptualisation should be in tandem with feasible transnational nominations to be taken up with other countries.[xxx]

Third, it prepares the vision for several plans that can be executed as subsets of Project Mausam. This primarily includes the creation of thematic heritage circuits. A coastal route under Project Mausam linking the neighbouring Southeast Asian countries has been envisioned to increase tourism, research, and cultural exchanges and revive the older spice route.[xxxi] An envisioned trail proposes to look at the old routes and passages that depict the spread of Buddhism in Southeast Asia through India. Another immediate proposal is to link the historical imprint of the Chola and the Srivijaya Empire that spanned the 10-15th Century CE and linked present-day countries from India to Indonesia along the Indian Ocean.[xxxii]

 

Maritime Silk Route and Project Mausam: Similarities and Differences

 

There are inherent similarities between India’s Project Mausam and the Chinese strategy of institutionalising the Chinese MSR. First, these exercises allude to a specific idea of civilisational exceptionalism and linear historical continuity. The attempt is to build a past centring on the state. Therefore, it is an active exercise of selective remembering and forgetting, glorification and sidelining optics that suit the interests of the states. Second, they both fall back on using the past in regime legitimisation. They both appeal to the domestic audience by underscoring civilizational and national pride. The regime is the guardian in reviving the lost and forgotten history. Third, the cultural backdrop interludes to broader economic and political gains. There are tangible benefits attached to these cultural policies. Often, cultural diplomacy opens up other areas of trade and security policy-making. Finally, there is also the use of international institutions and platforms, like UNESCO, to brand itself and refashion it as a civilisational power of considerable prestige at the international level. This is furthermore important given the surge of civilizational arguments by the non-western states. Such voices have ramifications on what shape the liberal international world order will take in the present and future.

 

However, there are several deviations that the Indian route also ends up with compared to that of the Chinese. First, while there are allusions to Greater India and the spread of Indian civilisation as culturally superior, India consciously avoids the pitfalls of China’s unilateral approach to defining culture across the maritime space. Admittedly, to India’s advantage, its cultural past in the region is less controversial than China's. In a way, India can make civilisational arguments in the region because that is feasible. However, the civilisational arguments are more likely to invoke a sense of cultural hegemony and associated fears of the neighbouring states if overdone. As a result of which, India may deliberately eschew its cultural claims. It has made use of cultural arguments in the past and in some cases smacked of cultural arrogance. Despite a considerably higher display of cultural claims by the present government, it remains aware that sour regional ties may turn down perks of domestic legitimation.

 

A second issue is the lack of coherence in strategizing cultural claims. Given China’s vertical domestic structure, it becomes much more feasible to manufacture and project a certain kind of cultural heritage through the state and its machinery. This showcases how the Chinese build on the narrative of MSR through cultural programmes, academic publications, societal practices and iconography. In India, however, such coherence is lacking. There are severe logistical limitations to India’s cultural stratification. Cultural strategization has to deal with many departments and ministries, each with bureaucratic processes and delays. Apart from that, the capability of scale in projecting such cultural power is also limited. This refers to material and financial capability to produce, deliver and project cultural diplomacy at a higher scale.

 

Would India have gone the Chinese way in strategizing cultural claims if it was logistically superior? That takes us to the third deviation, where India’s regime legitimation[xxxiii] is not entirely drawn from strength but also from recognition.[xxxiv] A part of India’s civilisational exceptionalism also indicates its peaceful and harmonising face in the world order. As a state, it falls back on recognition of status and prestige on abiding norms of the international order. This often leads to a dissonance between the conception of India’s civilisational thought, which precariously balances virtues of cultural exceptionalism and accommodation, strength, and purity, yet is peaceful and diverse.

 

Conclusion

The overarching theme of this brief is to draw attention towards the study of maritime cultural policies of the states. It unpacks how, apart from material interests, states use prestige and legitimacy as pursuits of power in the contemporary international order. With the rise of civilizational states, these cultural policies are becoming prominent. They also in turn shape and mould oceanic zones as cultural spaces. This further draws our attention to how actors socially construct ocean spaces.[xxxv] Deviating from traditional international relations which are dominantly terrestrial, the study of these cultural oceanic policies points out that oceans are not open and empty spaces in international relations. They are politicised beyond the traditional requirements of defence and trade.

The second submission is that while the objectives of the states are fairly clear, the execution of maritime cultural policies varies from state-to-state owing to different sets of factors. The state’s requirements are the first factor for strategizing culture. For instance, China would emphasise interests and international prestige over regime legitimation. Given China’s vertical state structure, regime legitimation is not a major concern. For India, cultural policies allow the mobilization of public sentiments and encashing a political mandate. This further converges with a regime like the one led by the Bharatiya Janata Party which has cultural foundations to their political authority. This manifests in rewriting history and upholding a culture that in turn appeals to their electoral demography.

Second, strategies are dependent on resources and capabilities. This is the key variable to transform latent cultural diplomacy or transnational ideas into coherent policies. The study points out how this is a differentiating variable between China and India. The earlier sections point out how differently China and India have strategized their cultural maritime policies owing to the nature of their financial resources and organizational capabilities. Such differences are not always signals of inefficiency but of design.

 

Finally, such claims are not unilaterally tenable but also dependent on the acceptance of other involved actors and stakeholders. No transnational project is possible if there are fallouts from other stakeholders. Therein lies a contradiction: the state ideally prefers a cultural claim centred on its own but the more centred it becomes, the less acceptable it is beyond its borders. It helps if such self-centred claims are buttressed through financial incentives for other states. However, the risk remains that at some point the other stakeholders will have pressures from their societies to defend their culture and civilizational attributes and not be submerged in the powerful state’s imagery. The rise of civilizational states would produce cultural policies beyond their borders. Oceans in this pursuit become an active zone of contested mapping.

    

Udayan Das is Assistant Professor, Department of Political Science, St. Xavier’s College (Autonomous), Kolkata.

 

Disclaimer: The views expressed above and the information available including graphics and images are those of the author/s and can therefore in no way be taken to reflect the position of Asian Confluence.

Citations

[1] Kirk Lancaster, Michael Rubin and Mira Rapp-Hooper, “Mapping China’s Health Silk Road”, Council on Foreign Relations, April 10, 2020, https://www.cfr.org/blog/mapping-chinas-health-silk-road

[2] Tim Winter, “Geocultural Diplomacy”, International Journal of Cultural Policy, 28, no.4 (2021), accessed September 8, 2024, https://doi.org/10.1080/10286632.2021.1967943

[3] Emma Mawdsley, “India as a ‘civilizational state’’, International Affairs, 99, no. 2, (2019) accessed September 9, 2024, https://doi.org/10.1093/ia/iiad053; TV Paul, The Unfinished Quest: India’s search for major power from Nehru to Modi, (New York: Oxford University Press, 2024)

[4] Udayan Das, “India’s civilizational imagination of Southeast Asia”, E-IR, March 12, 2024 accessed September 12, 2024, https://www.e-ir.info/2024/03/12/indias-civilizational-imagination-of-southeast-asia/

[5] Tim Winter, Geocultural Power: China’s Quest to Revive the Silk Roads for the Twenty-First Century, (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2019); Tim Winter, “Geocultural Power: China’s Belt and Road Initiative”, Geopolitics, 26, no. 5, (2021), accessed September 11, 2024, https://doi.org/10.1080/14650045.2020.1718656

[6] For various interpretations of nation and traditions, see Anthony D. Smith, “The Nation: Invented, Imagined, Reconstructed?”, Millennium: Journal of International Studies 20, no. 3 (March 23, 1991): 353–68, https://doi.org/10.1177/03058298910200031001.

[7] Prasenjit Duara, “The Regime of Authenticity: Timelessness, Gender, and National History InModern China,” History and Theory 37, no. 3 (October 17, 1998): 287–308, accessed September 1, 2024, https://doi.org/10.1111/0018-2656.00055.

[8] E Hobsbawm and Terence Ranger, The Invention of Tradition, ed. Eric Hobsbawm and Terence Ranger (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press: 2012), https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781107295636.

[9] Eric Hobsbawm, “Introduction: Inventing Traditions,” in The Invention of Tradition (Cambridge University Press, 2012), 1–14, accessed September 12, 2024, https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781107295636.001.

[10] Sen, “Inventing the ‘Maritime Silk Road.’”

[11] Ibid.

[12] Tansen Sen, “Inventing the ‘Maritime Silk Road,’” Modern Asian Studies 57, no. 4 (July 22, 2023): 1059–1104, accessed September 11, 2024, https://doi.org/10.1017/S0026749X22000348.

[13] Early History, Indian Navy, https://www.indiannavy.nic.in/node/1402

[14] KK Nayyar, Maritime India (New Delhi: Rupa, 2005); GM Hiranandani, Transition to Eminence: The Indian Navy, 1976-1990 (New Delhi: Integrated Headquarters, Ministry of Defence (Navy), Naval Headquarters, in association with Lancer Publishers, 2005); Satyindra Singh, Under Two Ensigns: The Indian Navy - 1945-1950 (New Delhi: Oxford and IBH Publications, 1986).

[15] TE Narasimhan, “The King Who Looked East 1,000 Years Ago,” Business Standard, November 22, 2014.

[16] PTI, “Navy to Commemorate Tamil King Rajendra Chola’s 1000th-Year of Coronation,” The Economic Times, September 13, 2014.

[17] STARRED QUESTION NO.*201, August 1, 2016, Lok Sabha, Ministry of Culture, Government of India, https://sansad.in/getFile/loksabhaquestions/annex/9/AS201.pdf?source=pqals

[18] Project Mausam, Ministry of Culture, Government of India, https://indiaculture.gov.in/project-mausam

[19] Unstarred Question 1313, Rajya Sabha, Parliament of India, https://rsdebate.nic.in/bitstream/123456789/657495/1/IQ_238_09032016_U1313_p122_p122.pdf

[20] Ibid.

[21] PTI, “India Restoring Angkor Wat Temple in Cambodia: Jaishankar.”

[22] Ibid.

[23] Prashant Panjiar, “Indians Back at Angkor Wat in Kampuchea as Restorers to Bring It to Its Original Majesty,” India Today, April 15, 1988.

[24] Working group report on Improving Heritage Management by NITI Ayog, Government of India, March 2023, https://www.niti.gov.in/sites/default/files/2023-03/ImprovingHeritageManagement-in-India.pdf

[25] Ibid, 182

[26] Ibid, 8

[27] Kate Sullivan de Estrada, “What Is a Vishwaguru? Indian Civilizational Pedagogy as a Transformative Global Imperative,” International Affairs 99, no. 2 (March 6, 2023): 433–55, accessed September 3, 2024, https://doi.org/10.1093/ia/iiac318.

[28] Working group report on Improving Heritage Management by NITI Ayog, Government of India, March 2023, https://www.niti.gov.in/sites/default/files/2023-03/ImprovingHeritageManagement-in-India.pdf, 181

[29] Ibid, 181

[30] Ibid, 182

[31] Ibid, 214

[32] Ibid, 183

[33] For diverse interpretations of regime legitimation, see Marcus Tannenberg et al., “Claiming the Right to Rule: Regime Legitimation Strategies from 1900 to 2019,” European Political Science Review 13, no. 1 (February 4, 2021): 77–94, https://doi.org/10.1017/S1755773920000363.

[34] David Brewster, A Contest of Status and Legitimacy in the Indian Ocean, vol. 1 (Oxford University Press, 2018), https://doi.org/10.1093/oso/9780199479337.003.0002.

[35] Philip Steinberg, The Social Construction of the Ocean (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001)

 

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