The writer was a contemporary of the noble and charismatic world figure Jawaharlal Nehru, the first prime minister of India, but that is where any common ground - other than time spent by Crocker in India - ends.
Nehru was more than charismatic and beloved leader, noble of spirit and prince of soul, someone who had a not only very acute mind but a seeking intellectual thirst that went on regardless of humongous work, age and strife, someone who took trouble to be nice and courteous in trying circumstances, was brought up in comparative wealth but gave it all up for independence fight and then for India. That is a small and incomplete summary of what Crocker goes on to describe about Nehru, and it is all too true and more.
But the writing of Crocker in this work, not in style but in substance and level of perception, is so skewed between two poles of admiration of the man on one side and complete disdain or worse for the nation, the culture, the whole background, that one can only surmise either that the writer is unaware just how thoroughly, how firmly he is rooted in his colonial, racist, and religious background, to the extent of automatically assuming all other alternatives are beneath consideration, not worthy of attempting to understand, certainly not of respect and never as good as those he was familiar with - or, that this book, contrary to asserted claim, is not a work of the one writer mentioned, but has whole chapters of insertions of material that is derogatory and more, often enough to the point of vicious accusations or callous lies, assaulting India in general, Hindus and Hinduism more pointedly, and Nehru to the extent he is involved or did not please the erstwhile colonial masters.
Lest it seem far fetched, Crocker was indeed a part of British colonial forces stationed in India and disliked it intensely, and was thereby likely prejudiced as were most of those of his background, more sympathetic to muslims and church communities as the British ruling most often were, which is not hidden in this book except by omission of any mention of horrendous massacres perpetrated against Hindus by muslims or against the indigenous by rulers in Goa.
Such prejudice is exhibited here as often with explicit condemnation of one side as with either lack of mentioning of the other, as it is with even complete lies on side of his prejudice - for example he mentions the differences between what is termed South India and what is normally understood as North, which is generally understood as north or south of the ancient mountain range across middle, Vindhya; what he specifically, repeatedly mentions as the difference is "Hindu revivalism", which makes one wonder if he intends to force the reader to accept his unspecified assertion that Hinduism is dead and better off so.
In reality, which he either intends to cover up with this trick or refuses to see, or is blind to, is that it is only someone in a state of unconsciousness, coma or at the very least in a state understood opposite of well being, that needs to be revived, not someone conscious and relatively well.
With over a millennium of deadly onslaughts of islamic invaders marauding, looting, ruling and generally destroying the indigenous culture of India in general and Hinduism in particular, and that too quite intentionally, deliberately, zealously so, the regions more under the islamic rules were those where any need of reviving and reasserting were felt; and Hinduism and Indian culture that were dormant, beleaguered but far from wiped out (unlike anywhere other than in India, indigenous culture in India was not wiped out completely as it was elsewhere under islamic onslaught), were given a fresh breath of respite when islamic rule gave way to British (or French) colonial rule. (In Goa the story was different, and Portuguese rule competed well with the worst of islamic in attempted annihilation of Indian culture, and of Hinduism.)
There are many pointers to the truth of this, from relative freedom of women in society to changed rituals of traditional weddings and more, to see that this divide across north and south is related to the relative extent and force of islamic rule of the regions. And similar pattern can be seen in other parts, west and east and northeast and what was northwest before partition.
Another example, his assertion that Goa was a part of Portugal (rather than a colony, as is obvious), and had no problem and was people with catholics while a few Indians had migrated (did he think Goa was brought like a ship from Portugal and fixed to rest of India? one wonders) - completely ignoring the massacres perpetrated by Portugal against Hindus, complete outlawing of Hindu traditions and even weddings so much so the people of Goa hurried through every religious ceremony (and still do, from centuries of habit of fear ingrained) lest the Portugese soldiers come and wreak havoc, and other atrocities he simply denies ever took place.
A similar insistence on his part goes on against India in other matters such as relations with neighbours, giving equal benefit of doubt at best and questioning if India would stay a democracy post Nehru. Perhaps an example of his racism that is not clear as racism to him, though, is about Nagaland. Crocker points out that NEFA (now named Arunachal Pradesh, a state at northeast boundary of India), rightfully does not belong to India because not only China questions it but the people are of "mongoloid" features. He says the same of Nagas, and it is not clear if he knows the two are separate regions. But clearly, it is racist to insist that races cannot be divided across national boundaries, and that invaders' and migrants' rights supersede those of indigenous? He takes care of those by complete neglect of relevant history (such as Naga are part of Mahabhaarataa, hence not strangers to India and not connected to India only due to British as he seems to claim) and more - just as British did it by the invention of Aryan migration theory, discrediting and disfranchising all of Hindus of India except those of south India.
In reality, Aryans were never supposed to be a race as such but a culture of civilised code of conduct, the code intricate and taught in society painstakingly in families, homes and live-in schools. The very word Aarya relates to Light, not colour of skin or other physical features but to a standard of behaviour related to an enlightened mind and a soul awakened.
That this was misunderstood by Europe, or was deliberately twisted to suit European prejudices, or worse, due to Macaulay doctrine of separating everything good of India from India and deliberately breaking the spirit of India, is swept under the rug as is the deliberate use of Swastika, which the very word means "well being", for purposes far from well being and in fact for evil.
Crocker comes across as, at best, struggling with his more than evident admiration and adoration of a prince of soul that was Jawaharlal Nehru, and compensating by his treatment of all that is India, people and history and culture of India, Hindus, and so on; at worst, as someone who allowed insertion of whole chapters of matter to that effect for that purpose that was at most rewritten by him so the writing style as such at a superficial level is not too discordant with his adoration of Nehru.
But what is indubitably true is that the great soul that was Nehru comes alive in reading this work, and that is in spite of really very little detail about him of a personal nature as such. For anyone even slightly familiar with the era or the halo of the figure, reading this is a deja vu.
