AUSTRALIA   AS IT IS

Dr. Arpita Banerjee

This landmass reminds us of  the  land of convicts who landed in Botany Bay, transported by the colonisers in 1788  either for stealing bread or for  any instance of dishonesty. It was then considered to be 'Terra Nullius'   later owned by the colonisers but discovered with the passage of time  that  there were original inhabitants of the land  the Indigenous people ,with their oral story telling techniques,  their heritage , culture and even epics. Through colonisation, invasions, contradictions,  re-locations and sub-alterned state of being the existence began and continued till the current stage of a burgeoning bilateral relationship with India , factored on quantifiable bilateral economic exchanges 

Since  the 18th century Calcutta  has been used as the get-way port to Australia and there are links which focus an extended relationship in the history of both the nations .  At the same time some of the significant  places  of Calcutta were transferred  to Australia. A suburb in  Hobart  Tasmania  is called Howrah, a block of residential  flats  in Wollongong is called Barrackpore and a street overlooking the sea in Melbourne is named Esplanade, a busport in Perth  Western Australia  near the Matilda Bay bears the similar name Esplanade Busport  and even the  first ever shipment of food supplies from India in the Australian vessel 'Sydney Cove' steamed off from the port of Calcutta as far back as 1791. This establishes a close tie between India and Australia. Together with this the cultural exchange and identity encompassed the aspects of life in India and Australia. Thus, to write from a holistic perspective, this relation exists till this day.

My visit to  the five leading  Universities of Australia: University of Western Australia;(Perth), University of South Australia (Adelaide), Australia National University (Canberra), University of New South Wales,( Sydney), and last but not the least, the University of Monash (Melbourne) assisted me to be introduced to researchers, scholars, and the Indigenous faculty of the Universities . I was  awe-struck at the  extent  of the Universities and the  continent and my focus of research in the Universities : “Indigenous studies” opened up the findings that their narratives   have a similar and strong story- telling tradition like that of India, with multiple narrators, universally accessible, mystical as well as intellectual experience that makes the whole cloth of many narrative threads. I emphasize on the story -telling aspect as their  novels have a healing power that has been lost in the modern world.

With an understanding  and on the  basic assumptions about the universe that the Proto-Australians belonged  to a part of undivided India in the Tertiary Age ( prior to  the Continental-Drift Theory) , the North-eastern part of Gondwana land, now Purulia, Northern Orissa, Jharkhand and Northern Chattisgarh which  is still now believed by some of  the   Indigenous Australians to be  an extended  part of the original inhabitants of this country . To recall from human geography, the 'Sabars'  Pastoral nomads of ancient India, a tribal community, about whom  many narratives have been constructed  by Bengali writers like Mahashweta Debi, Pranabesh Chakraborty, Debesh Ray, Nalini Bera, Narayan Sanyal,    in innumerable novels ,  the stories  have cultural  links with the Indigenous community of Australia. With the passage of time, transformation and appropriation, have been made to suite the present need. On the other hand in the works of Judith Wright, Patrick White, Mudrooroo, Kim Scott  the  Australian  novelists , we read the deliberate constructs towards modernization with myth and history. Though they have been re-located, the emerging Australian identity finds the authenticity of landscape. Though Identity is in a state of flux for the Indigenous Australians, their struggle of survival still exists .

The Sans Sounci theatre where our St. Xaviers College stands since 1860, has links with the Russian theatre in Australia (Sans Sounci theatre).The  then plays enacted  aimed at the British Raj and the upper class Hindus with protest  and criticisms. This perceptive and ground-breaking analysis cannot remain undisputed with the contention that there are important differences between Australian and Indian cultures that should never be overlooked or homogenised. Despite its obvious divergence, and fragmentation, particularly in the 21st century, there are also  links with the original inhabitants in Melbourne like the Bunnurong and Woiworung and the Kulins of Central Victoria .  The State Library of Victoria which opened in 1856 with Augustus Tulk preserves an anthology   which tells us about Calcutta and the water supply for Calcutta in the proposed vol. XXXIV (p291).

The survey is unending, thus to conclude with some inferences from James Wolfensohn's speech that India and China will experience a 22 times growth between 2008 and 2050,  when  United States will grow may be two and a half times during the same span of time ,  to quote: “ This is not just a modest statistical change; this is a change in terms of quantum and in terms of importance ,”   we can look forward for a better tomorrow if we can sustain  the relation which the upcoming power of Australia for the combined  energy produced in  the massive amalgamation  would pertain to Asian countries only with India in focus . Though often India has been considered as the “ Other”, the future of India still looks bright  in this context .