द इण्डियन स्ट्रगल / भारतीय स्वाधीनता संग्राम (नेताजी सुभाष चन्द्र बोस - ऐतिहासिक विश्लेषण)

14 THE INDIAN STRUGGLE
history, when there was a uniform and all-round progress in
every department of life.¹
After some time decay set in and there was an interval of
chaos—religious, cultural and political. Largely because of
its exaggerated asceticism, Buddhism lost its hold on the
Indian people and there was a revival of Brahmanical Hin-
duism. On the philosophical side, the Vedanta philosophy
which was first propounded in the Upanishads, was restored
to its pride of place. Socially, there was a revival of the
caste-system and a new breath of realism took the place of
the morbid asceticism of the latter-day Buddhists. Political
anarchy was ended through the rise of the Gupta Empire
which flourished in the fourth and fifth centuries A.D. The
greatest of the Gupta emperors was Samudragupta who
ascended the throne in A.D. 330. During the Gupta period,
the country was not only unified politically but art, literature
and science flourished and once again reached the high-water
mark of excellence.² This renaissance took place under the
influence of Brahmanical Hinduism and this period is there-
fore regarded by orthodox Hindus as a more glorious age
than the preceding Buddhistic period. As under the Maurya
emperors, India once again had active contact, both cultural
and commercial, with Asia and also with some countries in
Europe, like Rome. After the fifth century the political
power of the Gupta emperors came to an end but the cultural
renaissance continued unabated till once again it reached its
peak in A.D. 640, when under King Harsha the country was
once again unified politically.
This did not last very long and after some time, once again
signs of decline appeared. Then there appeared a new
element in Indian history—the Mohammedan invaders.
Their raids into the heart of India began as early as the tenth
century A.D., but it took them some time to conquer the
country.³ Mohammed Bin Tughlak succeeded for the first
¹ An impartial observer like the Greek Megasthenes bears testimony to
the above facts.
² Impartial testimony is borne this time by the Chinese pilgrim and
traveller Fa-hien.
³ Sindh was conquered in the eighth century but this remained as an
isolated phenomenon.