A comparison of the Oxford School Atlas revised
31st Edition, 2006 and
the 28th Revised
Edition, 1993 vis-à-vis India.
The so-called revised 31st Edition, 2006 makes cosmetic changes
and has absolutely made no improvement when compared to the earlier editions,
and has in fact undermined what little beneficiary value was
available in the 28th Revised
Edition, 1993. The 1: 4000,000 scale map titled “North Western India and
Pakistan” at pages 16 and 17 therein ( which excludes Baluchistan in western
Pakistan and N.W.F.P. in Pakistan and the whole of Kashmir 36.20 N. 78.45 E. in northern India ) has been clandestinely and stealthily removed
and instead, a number of utterly useless junk Political maps have been
added to create a false superfluous façade that there are a lot of
improvements in the new edition, when there were already 1:4000000 scale maps of the whole of India published by Bartholomew, Edinburgh available except the Himalayan
States, the Andaman and Nicobar islands, Lakshadweep and north eastern India,
when what ought to have been done is to provide 1:4000000 scale maps of
the rest of India viz. the Himalayan States, the Andaman and Nicobar Islands , Lakshadweep and north
eastern India also.
It is incredible and amazing that even after so many years and after so many newer editions, instead of providing maps of the whole of India in the scale of 1:4000000, the publishers are beating around the bush and taking recourse to such pernicious deceitful tactics, when by now, the whole of even the Sub-continent of India comprising of Pakistan, Afghanistan, India, Nepal, Bhutan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, and Maldives ought to have been provided in the scale of 1:4000000. In the earlier editions the whole of India in the scale of 1:4000000 excluding the Himalayan states, northeastern India, the Andaman and Nicobar islands and Lakshadweep were some how provided, albeit in bits and pieces as inset maps. For example, the whole of the state of Orissa is shown in three pieces in three different maps between them, and extraordinary effort had been taken to include all the areas in India excluding the Himalayan states, northeastern India, the Andaman and Nicobar Islands and the Lakshadweep archipelago extending to the Diego Garcia and the Chagos. But the same sustained effort had not been taken to depict inter alia northeastern India and the Himalayan States in India particularly Kashmir 36.20 N. 78.45 E. as though to cause aspersion on the fact that these areas are an integral and inalienable part of India. Only with the ulterior intention of not depicting the whole of Sikkim, Bhutan, and eastern Arunachal Pradesh and the adjoining parts of Tibet, has an inset map of part of Assam been shown in the map titled “Northern India” at pages 18 and 19 and the inset map of Kolkata has been shown only to deliberately avoid showing a part of Nepal, since if the publishers purportedly really wanted to depict Assam, the rest of the northeastern India in the scale of 1:4000000 could have been depicted in a separate plate and not as an inset. Similarly, the inset map titled Punjab Irrigation has been shown only to abstain from showing the areas in Afghanistan in the scale of 1:4000000 which otherwise would have been shown in the normal course.
Plate titled China, Mongolia, and Japan:
The very most important and crucial map in the Atlas notwithstanding the smaller scale viz. the map Plate titled China, Mongolia, and Japan of the scale 1:15000000 inter alia depicting south western Tibet and “Sinkiang” as independent, and more importantly depicting the Hindutash Peak in Kashmir as allegedly part of “Sinkiang” has been stealthily removed. The relevance of the map which was profound and significant as a geographical geopolitical strategic map pertaining to the aspect of political geography was summarily stealthily and surreptitiously removed. The publishers obviously have
woken up now due to obvious reasons i.e. after they became aware that one Hindutashravi had created and published an article on the Hindutash Pass in Kashmir in a web page called Wikipedia and the article had become famous and realized that inadvertently, Hindutash in north eastern Kashmir was being shown all along all these years albeit as alleged a part of “Sinkiang” , as though there was a law which prohibited the depiction of the Hindutash pass in northern Kashmir in a physical map of the Sub-continent of India, and hence, they woke up from their deep slumber and “rectified the error” to the satisfaction of those who had demanded that the Hindutash Pass in Kashmir not be portrayed in the Oxford School Atlas by meticulously altogether removing the Plate titled “China, Mongolia, and Japan” of the scale 1:15000000, thus rendering the whole Oxford School Atlas utterly useless!
Why was the Plate titled China, Mongolia, and Japan removed?
The pertinent question is at whose behest the Oxford University Press removed that particular map? Was it the British Government? Or was it the United States Government? Or was it the Chinese Government? Or was it due to pressure from the subservient and servile Government of India? Similarly, the map titled “Burma and Thailand” depicting inter alia the Narcondam Island in India at pages 30 and 28 of the 28th Revised Edition, 1993 has been surreptitiously removed due to obvious reasons! It was the only map of Narcondam island in the entire atlas in the scale of 1:8000000. The political map in colour at page 15 titled “India, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Myanmar, Nepal, Pakistan, and , Sri Lanka: Political” ought to have included Afghanistan and excluded (Burma) Myanmar which is in South East Asia and has nothing whatsoever to do with India or the Sub-continent of India. The legends Plateau of Iran and Table land of Iran have been depicted wrongly extending into Afghanistan and Baluchistan in pages 14 and 24, where as the legend Sub-continent of India is not shown any where extending into Afghanistan and Pakistan, and the legend Plateau of Tibet is not shown any where extending into the Tsaidam and Ching Hai or Koko Nor area of the sovereign state of Tibet.
Though the atlas carries the legend that “ all the maps in this atlas: Based upon Survey of India map with the permission of the Surveyor General of India” and that “The external boundaries and coastlines of India on the maps agree with the Record/Master Copy certified by the Survey of India , Dehradun vide their letter No. TB-3592/62-A-3/29 dated 11.11.2005” , the claim is a blatant lie and the Publishers of the Oxford School Atlas have made a fraudulent misrepresentation and the boundaries in many of the maps are not in conformity with even the obnoxious, bogus and spurious Nehru Line published by the Survey of India in 1954 and the maps of India particularly in the world maps from page 78 to 88 do not even depict the areas in India adjoining the Vakhan area in Badakhshan ( including the border of India with the so called Gorno Badakhshan) in Afghanistan as part of India and the area is clandestinely depicted as purportedly a part of "China" and the aforesaid maps do not depict the border of India with Afghanistan and even when the border of India with Afghanistan is purportedly depicted as in page 78 and 88, the Vakhan area in Badakhshan in Afghanistan is twisted downward to create a façade that the borders of India have been depicted in consonance with the spurious 1954 line illegally published by the Survey of India and to circumvent the fact that the borders of India have been wrongly depicted and the geographical details in the maps in particular the Sindhu and the Satlej rivers have no bearing whatsoever with the political borders depicted in the map of India and the borders of India do not extend to the northern most parts of India which are all clandestinely depicted as part of “China”. The Oxford University Press cannot be permitted to get away with such deceitful and shameless lies and punitive action has to be taken against them by the Government of India.
So there!
