PERSPECTIVES ON ANCIENT INDIA 5 conceal it from the public e} e. The scrupulous care with which they collected the data will elicit praise even from the most severe critic of their approach to the history of India. Indian scholars who entered the field in the early dec ades of the present century were mostly trained and inspired by their European preceptors, whose work they carried forward in many ways. They followed the same methods and techniques but most of them were consciously or unconsciously affected by the spirit of nationalism. History had become the food of nationalism at that stage. In opposition to the persistent British efforts to deny nationhood to India in the present as well as the past, Indian historians had often been trying to use history in the service of nationalism by glorifying kings, events, institutions, periods, movements and regions. They picked up and whitewashed those areas which had been tarnished by prejudice. This provided a means of legitimate correction and improvement as it brought about re-assessment of events and personalities, filled up certain gaps in our knowledge, (especially about regional dynasties and republican tribes) and clarified the nature of artistic, religious and social development. Nationalistic bias was also responsible for exaggeration and distortion when elements of British parliamentary democracy, socialism, and welfare state were discovered in ancient records. On looking back there is nothing surprising in this because imperialism and nationalism are first cousins who speak the same language of prejudice. Theie is more of basic continuity in spite of superficial conflict between the imperialist and nationalist historians of the pre-indepen-dence era inasmuch as the latter did not introduce any fundamental shift in perspective. Nationalist Bias Nationalist historians modified the framework a little but it was not abandoned altogether. Extreme Hindu chauvinist attitude was exhibited by K P Jayaswal in Hindu Polity, and reflected even in publications like The Cultural Heritage of India. A number of scholars from Bengal, Madras and Bombay carried on this tradition. As long as they cared more for propaganda than academic discipline, these were not able to provide fresh insight into the historical process. However, there was another group of writers like A S Altekar, R K Mukherji and R G Majumdar who produced works richer in facts and more precise in details though they often fell short of international standards at the level of interpretation and explanation. In this period several nationalist historians idealized Indian rulers and characterized invaders as barbarians. They multiplied the number of heroes and dug up the history of more and more empires—those of the Chalukyas, Rashtrakutas, and Cholas in the south, the Palas and Senas in the east, and the Pratiharas and Chandelas in the north. More and more details about more and more kingdoms were added on to the main body of the narrative. However, it must be admitted that neither the sober