Tipu Sultan a complex figure, politics of the day cherry-picks facts: S Jaishankar

External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar described Tipu Sultan as a “complex figure” in Indian history as he picked apart the selective portrayal of his legacy, saying facts have often been “tailored for regime convenience.”

“History in all society is complicated, and the politics of the day often indulges in cherry-picking facts. To a considerable extent, that has happened in the case of Tipu Sultan,” Jaishankar said during the launch of historian Vikram Sampath’s book Tipu Sultan: The Saga of Mysore Interregnum 1761-1799 on Saturday.

Known for his resistance against British colonial expansion, the former ruler of Mysore has been a subject of debate for generations. While he is celebrated for his anti-colonial efforts, Jaishankar noted that Tipu Sultan also evokes “strong adverse sentiments” in many regions.

“On one hand, he has a reputation as a key figure who resisted the imposition of British colonial control over India,” Jaishankar said, calling Tipu’s death a turning point for peninsular India. At the same time, his actions towards his people and neighbouring kingdoms raise uncomfortable questions, he stated.

“The Tipu-English binary has been highlighted to the exclusion of a more complicated reality,” Jaishankar said. The Minister argued that modern narratives have largely examined Tipu Sultan’s opposition to the British while “underplaying, if not neglecting” other aspects of his reign, including his foreign alliances and faith-based outreach to rulers in Turkey, Afghanistan, and Persia.

“Perhaps the truth is that the sense of nationhood, as we understand it now, was simply not there then,” he observed. “Force-fitting those identities into a contemporary construct seems more than a little challengeable.”

In a light-hearted callback to his Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) days, Jaishankar said that as a “product myself of an institution” that was at the centre of these “politically driven endeavours”, he could appreciate the need to present an “actual representation” of history.

“…How much of our past has been airbrushed, how awkward issues have been glossed over, how facts are tailored for regime convenience. These are basic questions which confront us all today,” he stated. The foreign minister lauded the current political environment for fostering alternative historical perspectives, crediting Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government for encouraging balanced accounts of India’s past.

“In the last decade, the changes in our political dispensation have encouraged the emergence of alternative perspectives and balanced accounts,” Jaishankar said. “We are no longer prisoners of a vote bank, nor is it politically incorrect to bring out inconvenient truths.”