‘No, I have not forgotten any of this,’ I reply as calmly as I can. ‘Nor have I forgotten what Indians have done to each other. I can show some of their handiwork in Delhi. Ever seen the Quwwat-ul-Islam next to the Qutub Minar? Twenty-seven Jain and Hindu temples demolished to build one large mosque! Faces and limbs of gods and goddessses hacked off. Tell me of one place of worship, Hindu, Muslim or Sikh which the English destroyed? Remember Babar raising pyramids of Rajput skulls, the general massacres of citizens ordered by Taimur, Nadir Shah and Abdali! No one was spared, neither the aged nor the new born, nor their mothers. Tell me of a single instance of a massacre ordered by the English. Not even after the massacre of their women and children in Delhi, Lucknow and Cawnpore after your so-called First War of Independence did they touch your women or children. They hanged a few people, levelled some bazaars to the ground. That was all.’

‘That was not all,’ they yell back at me. ‘They treated us like dogs—worse than dogs because they are dog-worshippers, they called us niggers, had their “Europeans only” clubs, “For Europeans and Anglo-Indians only” compartments in railway trains. There was one law for the white man, another for the black.’

I shout back at them: ‘There was no justice in India till the British came. There will be no justice in India after their impact has worn off. They gave you freedom to do your buk buk against them and only took action when you preached violence. Can you think of another race besides the British who would have put up with your Gandhis and Nehrus preaching sedition against them? If they had ben Germans, French, Russians, Italians, Chinese or Japanese, they would have strung up your Congresswallas on the branches of the nearest trees.’

‘If they had tried that their lease would have ben shorter. Our freedom fighters would have booted them out during one or the other of the world wars when they were neck deep in trouble in Europe.’

‘Freedom fighters my foot!’ I shout back. ‘Hired yellers of slogans who spent more comfortable times in jails than in their own hovels. And now want to be compensated with life pensions. Don’t talk to me about freedom fighters. They make me sick.’

‘You have been brainwashed,’ they tell me. They tell me of the great progress India has made since the British were thrown out—’More advance in ten years of independence than in a hundred years of British rule. We produce all the food we need because of the dams and canals we have built. We produce the best textiles in the world; we produce our own cars, aeroplanes, tanks and guns; we can make nuclear bombs, send satellites into space, pick up nodules from the ocean bed; the Indian tri-colour flies in the wastes of Antarctica. Don’t you feel a sense of pride in your country’s achievements?’