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Conclusion The study of 'Construction and Contestation of Nation in Indian English Fiction' was undertaken with the purpose of understanding the notion of nation underlying the texts and the alternative collectivity imagined therein. It has been carried out in this study by attending to three dimensions: the construction of collective identity, contestations of hegemonic construction of collective identity and visions of collective identities beyond the nation. Novels studied are all canonical texts and this selection was intended to enable a perspective into the 'mainstream' approaches to the issue of nations and nationalisms. The study does not present a detailed analysis of the novels in relation to the various content or form related aspects of the novel. For example, it does not enter into the exercise of exploring the psychological make up of characters, or the examination of the language used by the authors. Such and other investigations are employed in the study only in so far as they have a bearing on the issue under consideration. The idea behind restricting the scope is to keep the focus firmly on the issue being pursued. Three frameworks are adopted for the study. These frameworks are aimed at enabling a view of the notion of nation emerging at different historical junctures and in relation to various developments. However, the selection of novels for study under each framework is guided not by their year of publication or writing but by the period the stories relate to. As a result, while the novels discussed in each chapter have been published at various dates, they all concern themselves with roughly the same historical period. The first framework, 'Nation Formation', is the moment when the notion of nation as a new form of collectivity is emergent. Hence novels selected are from among those that deal with a historical period when in South Asia a transition was underway and people were re-imagining their collective identity. All the four novels studied here indicate the transition by locating the characters initially in traditional social situations such as traditional caste community or regional and cultural community. The narratives then go on to 330 trace the movement of the characters into a new form of collectivity, a larger community of distant togetherness. For example, in Chaman Nahal's Azadi the characters are firmly located in their Punjabi culture with reference to music, language, dress, food as well as other social practices. The narrative then traces the transition to 'nation' as the collective identity adopted by them after coming under the influence of nationalism. In undergoing this transition they alter their relation to the earlier collective identity, disaffiliating themselves from it in some respects. The ambivalence in Lala Kanshi Ram regarding his language - his choice of Hindi as his language for official record while in his daily life he used either Punjabi or Urdu - indicates this. It is significant, and part of the argument of this study, that they do not completely severe their ties with the regional identity, engaging in a complex negotiation of the claims of filiations and affiliations. Thus, this framework examines this negotiation underway at the time of the emergence of 'nation' as a new form of collectivity in the subcontinent. In addition to this, the novels studied here employ basically the social realist mode of novel writing. The second framework, 'Nation Building', situates the investigation in a period after the end of colonial rule when there is congruence between the nation and the state. The novels studied here narrate stories taking place, roughly, in the 1960s. This period is chosen because this allows for two kinds of enquiry: it is a couple of decades away from the anti-colonial nationalist fervour and the postcolonial nation-state had already established its hegemony by then. This would provide a perspective into the responses to the new collectivity, 'nation', that is now well-entrenched as a chief form of collective identity. Secondly, this is the period of emergence of literary modernism in Indian English literature. Of the three novels studied, two follow the modernist idiom, while one, Rama Mehta's Inside the Haveli, sticks to the social realist form. Even the other two, though modernist in tone and structure, weave in social realism in some ways. This framework enables a view of the relation between the metanarratives of nation building - national integration, progress, modernisation, etc. - and the responses to homogenised national identity. Here, 331 the processes of both conformation and confrontation with the 'national identity' become the focus of investigation. The grounds on which these twin processes are undertaken reveal the ideas informing the collective identity. For example, in Sahashi Deshpande's novel, That Long Silence, we find the unequal impact of the nation's modernisation and industrialisation projects on male and female characters. Jaya, the protagonist, is excessively burdened by her husband's enthusiastic participation in these projects and in his ambition for upward social mobility. This burden disallows her own self to develop a sense of worthiness. The gendered projects of national progress reveal in this novel the subjugation of women in the name of the 'nation'. This results in Jaya confronting the construction of national identity. Yet, caught in her class/caste determined social situation, she conforms to the hegemonic construction of that identity. Thus, we notice 'nation building' as a juncture fraught with the tension between the metanarratives of nation building and the diverse claims of identity by different social groups. The third framework, 'Nation and beyond', refers to the rapidly changing historical juncture, when critiques of nationalism are emerging. The 1980s and after is a period when under the emergence of globalisation processes, the ideas of nationalisms are subjected to severe scrutiny. The role of the state is eroded in certain spheres with the disembodied powers of globality coming to regulate the flow of money and service undermining the authority of the state. Therefore, this framework enables an investigation of not only the critiques of nationalism but also the alternative imaginings of collectivity. In this framework the three novels selected for analysis narrativise different temporal junctions. The crisscrossing of the temporal and spatial planes is constitutive of the ambitions of these novels. Nevertheless, the choice of the novels is consistent with the purpose of this framework, of examining criticism of nation as a collectivity and visions beyond the nation. For example, Amitav Ghosh's The Shadow Lines is a novel that presents a criticism of the ideas of discrete identities that drive nationalist claims of homogenous collectivity. On the other hand, the notion of free individuals circulating in an 332 unbounded terrain of global space offers no hope. Therefore, in this novel, a sort of rooted internationalism is implied as the ahemative to the inherent violence of nationalism. Thus, this framework makes possible an engagement with the contestations of the homogenising impulse of nation imaginary and with the alternative visions offered in these novels. The study of construction and contestation of nation is carried out in this thesis with a specific understanding of the concepts of 'nation' and 'nationalism'. The first chapter, 'Nations and Nationalisms' has elaborated this via a review of the literature on these concepts and by working out a theoretical framework. Nation, I have argued, is a discursive field where diverse identity claims are invested. The diversity is caused by the condition of being of this category of collective identity. Nation is a modem identitarian form of collectivity though it has no novel and independent form in itself It forms itself through other existing forms of identity even as it dissociates from any one of those. The impact of modernity renders prevalent forms of identity inadequate to address the expansion in sociality though these are not completely abandoned either. The coming together of the different identity categories is a result of the coming together of people from different social, economic, cultural, linguistic and religious affiliations under the impact of modernisation - expanding the territorial base of a large population due to migration and the shrinking of distance through advancements in modes of communication. This diverse population has to adjust to the demands of new modes of exchange, interaction and co-habitation, in short, new forms of sociality. Coupled with this is the requirement of the capitalist system for large and bounded territorial units capable of regulating labour, governance and finance, which engenders the modem state. The congmence of nation and state conditions the form of collectivity called nation. I argue that nation is not merely imagined, which is an idea that focuses on the formation of familiarity across unfamiliar people. This view stresses the psychological aspect of identity formation. 1 consider that the coming together under nation as the collective identity is facilitated by concrete practices. The community formation is not entirely based on the 333 psychological desire and need to form a collectivity but also based on the material needs and circumstances. This means that the formation would be full of discontinuities and that there is not enough consonance as no one person can ever materially form association with all the rest. While this is true, we must not ignore the fact that the practices being referred to here are in diverse areas. The lack of continuity and consensus in fact is an important point because it indicates that nations are not homogenous within. Nation is a category of identity which is forever plural due to the diverse membership. Therefore, it is a form of identity that is never singular, always conflictual, and driven by contradictory perceptions of togetherness. Nation, hence it is understood here, is a contract across contradiction, a conflictual consensuality.

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