Modern Indian Myths

There are some famous modern (post 1900) Indian myths (Indian here refers to the original India) which have been floating around for some time now. What is interesting is that nobody seems to know how these myths have originated, but they exist all the same and are also being confused with facts. So here is my humble venture to set a few records straight:

Myth No. 1 – General Dyer (of the Jallianwala Bagh massacre notoriety) was killed by a Punjabi freedom fighter in England

The person who got killed (he deserved it, too) in England was Michael Francis O'Dwyer, the Lieutenant Governor of Punjab at the time of the Jallianwala Bagh massacre. General Reginald Dyer who ordered the firing at Jallianwala Bagh died of natural causes in 1927.

Myth No. 2 – In 1965 the Indian Army under General J N Chaudhuri had surrounded Lahore when Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri declared peace with Pakistan

The Indian Army was nowhere near Lahore when hostilities came to an end in 1965. Towards the end of the war, Lal Bahadur Shastri had asked General Chaudhuri about whether India could win a significant victory if the war continued. The General had replied that most of India’s ammunition had been used up. Actually only 14% of India’s frontline ammunition had been fired and India had almost twice the number of tanks available to Pakistan (which was near total exhaustion). An interesting case of the civilian prime minister willing to be aggressive and the General being unwilling to continue the war.

Reference – read the official history of the 1965 war released by the Indian Ministry of Defence. You can download the pdf version from the Bharat-Rakshak website at http://www.bharat-rakshak.com/

Myth No. 3 – The Indian Army was about to boot out the Chinese in 1962 when Nehru stopped the war

The fact is that in 1962 the Chinese could have pretty well wiped us out if they had wanted to. Since nobody knows why exactly they started the war, possibly it is logical that no one knows why they ended it.

Reference – read “The Guilty Men of 1962” by D R Mankekar or “The Untold Story” by General B M Kaul. For that matter read any book on the 1962 war.


Myth No. 4 – The Nazi Swastika was the reverse of the Hindu Swastik (swastik should be the correct spelling, but bloody foreigners insist on misspelling it) thus becoming a swastika of death or something like that. Fact is that both the swastiks face the same direction. The only real difference (colour or background really don’t matter) is that the Nazi swastika was crooked while the Hindu swastik is straight.

Reference – do a google image search and figure it out for yourself.

Know of any more? If so, please add them here (but do provide references or links)