What kind of reader are you? Do you read books on your preferences? Do you reject the books that you do not prefer? How do you decide which one to read and which one to skip? Jokes aside, we all have preferences in various walks of life. We will not eat in any restaurant that we see on the roadside. We don’t travel by any available vehicle. We don’t marry anyone just like that. However, these choices are based on merits. In terms of books, nevertheless, there is a new, increasingly worrying, practice that’s emerging. People have started to prefer books based on ideologies. If my economic model doesn’t suit the thesis laid down by some ABC economist, I will not read that person’s book. If my philosophy doesn’t align with someone from the XYZ group, I will ignore anything having tremendous merit by that person. How far is this logical? What problems might occur in future if things continue like this?
Books by authors like J Sai Deepak and Vikram Sampath, Vivek Agnihotri or François Gautier, Koenraad Elst or P N Oak… a number of authors from one side of the spectrum are outrightly rejected and ridiculed in spite of the facts and figures they present. P N Oak is the most-suffered one. Nevertheless, authors from another side of the spectrum, whatever they write, are always ‘worshipped’. Modern researchers and historians have categorically rejected the imaginary Aryan invasion theory multiple times but there are authors who are not ready to yield and accept that they have erred. And therefore, people with a different point of view are coming up with their version, liked by people who want to see the alternate version that was suppressed or ignored.
At the same time, people on one side always ridicule or blame the other side. It is true for both sides of the ideology. Ideology can be interpreted in many ways and you should not limit it to certain definitions. Is it good? In this way, will we ever reach the concept of perfect non-fiction? Will there be any author who can be accepted by a diverse population in totality? Perhaps not!
So, the search for perfect fiction might not be approachable unless we approach this subject with an open mind and without any prejudices in our hearts. If we are prejudiced about the author before we even read the book, it shows our fear of facts, ideas and thesis that we cannot digest. Does it make someone look good? No! It only limits the horizon of knowledge and information of a person. We should be diverse in our readings, look for facts from various angles and then decide whether a claim is rightly made or just fabricated as the Aryan Invasion theory to suit the agenda and roll the propaganda of a certain section of people who wished to rule our country forever!
