Last week Hon. MP Medha Kulkarni submitted a list of demands to the Railway minister, one of which was renaming the Pune Railway Station after Peshwa Balaji Bajirao. Within hours, social media timelines filled with calls to bury the idea. Criticism to the idea came in a variety of forms:
- Some shared views I personally subscribe to, like: “We should let go of this compulsive need to deify historical figures and choose a neutral name - just call it Pune Station.”
- Others floated predictable alternatives - “Name it after Phule or Ambedkar.” Given my ideological leaning I disagree with this, but I still do see this as a valid part of democratic discourse.
- A huge percentage of criticism could be summed up in the usual wave of social media toxicity: personal attacks, name-calling, slurs. It's unacceptable, but unfortunately an inescapable reality of today’s digital landscape.
- Worse, however, was the real-life hostility shown by sections of the political opposition. This wasn't just ideological dissent, it was hatred, expressed in crude, caste-charged language. It reflects the two kinds of politics currently distorting our public life: party politics(any demand including this one coming from a BJP MPs would naturally be countered by opposition) and caste politics (Kulkarni and Bajirao are both Brahmins and the politics of caste centers around the narrative of the Brahmin as the archetypal oppressor).
Here, I'd like to state a couple of points for why, beyond the form, one should have problems with the substance of their arguments too:
Bajirao I became Peshwa at the age of twenty in 1720, amid growing instability in the Deccan. He cemented his legacy with a decisive victory at the Battle of Palkhed (1728), where he forced the powerful Nizam to accept peace. A decade later, he orchestrated a daring raid on Delhi, humiliating the Mughal court and asserting Maratha dominance in northern India.
Over the next two decades, he led more than 40 military campaigns, never losing a single one. His strategic brilliance extended Maratha influence from the Godavari to the Yamuna. Governors in Delhi deferred to him. Rajput kings paid tribute. Mughal emperors plotted how to placate—not defeat—this cavalry commander from Pune.
When he died of illness in 1740, he left behind a Maratha state poised to become the first indigenous Indian power since the Mauryas to dominate much of the subcontinent. In realpolitik terms, Bajirao was India’s premier head of state in the generation before the British East India Company took control.
Given all this, one wonders why would anyone not just dismiss Bajirao’s legacy but go so far as to actively celebrate his downfall? How could we call ourselves decolonialists if we are to estrange Bajirao, and with him the Maratha empire - the pre-colonial power that aligned most to our interests.
I see only one reason for this: the poison that comes in the form of present day's anti-caste politics. Because in today’s political climate, anything even remotely associated with Brahmins is seen as ethically suspect, regardless of historical fact. Bajirao was a Brahmin, and for some, that alone disqualifies him from public commemoration.
But this is a deeply flawed and intellectually dishonest approach to history. The idea that all Brahmins are historical oppressors is not only historically inaccurate, but also ignores regional and temporal complexities in caste dynamics. And even if we accept caste as a dimension of history, Bajirao’s record of leadership stands on its own. Bajirao should not be seen merely as a Brahmin; he was a strategist, warrior, and empire-builder whose caste was incidental to his achievements.
Additionally, critics invoke the Manusmriti as the most remarkable taint of the "Brahmanical" Peshwa rule, as though eighteenth‑century Maharashtra ran on its verses like code. In reality, caste practice varied drastically across regions and eras; with many scriptural prescriptions being casually overlooked in practical life. Bajirao’s own correspondence shows concern for soldier pay, grain prices and river crossings, not ritual law. Latching onto Manusmriti because it's an easy target and reducing a flesh‑and‑blood strategist to a footnote in an ancient legal text is pure intellectual laziness.
The kind of logic we now see in India would be laughable elsewhere if it weren’t becoming so mainstream. Imagine Britons rejecting Queen Victoria because some 19th-century theologians justified slavery using the Bible. Or Germans erasing Otto von Bismarck because certain Protestant scholars once defended feudal hierarchy. Neither figure is free of moral baggage. Bismarck’s “Blood and Iron” speech glorified militarism. Victorian Britain profited from opium, indentured labor, and ruthless colonization. And yet, their legacies are studied, debated, critiqued—not erased. Because to amputate your past is to forfeit the ability to learn from it.
India’s social fabric is already frayed by identity politics. Scrubbing Bajirao from public memory will not relieve Dalit poverty or end caste insult; it will simply amputate a chapter in which an Indian power, led by an Indian commander, bent both Mughal and Afghan forces to its will. In an era when we lament colonial amnesia, it is perverse to torch an indigenous success story.
