BBC Discovers Women Existed in India, 77 Years Later
The BBC applauds itself for unearthing 'forgotten photos' of women who powered India's freedom struggle. It's a heartwarming tale, if you ignore the historical amnesia required to 'forget' women like Captain Lakshmi Sehgal of the Azad Hind Fauj, or the countless female salt satyagrahis, and countless others who faced British brutality. The empire (and its media descendants) wasn't just
'forgetting'; it was actively sanitizing history, reducing resistance to a few palatable figures while erasing the multifaceted, gender-inclusive struggle against colonial oppression. One might wonder if the BBC will next 'discover' that the British Empire engaged in resource extraction or that colonizers weren't universally adored. This 'discovery' isn't history being found, but propaganda slowly
unraveling as the architects of that propaganda grudgingly acknowledge inconvenient truths, often decades after the fact, and framed as novel revelations.