For Dissent
Against Hindu Extremism
by Angana Chatterji
The Rashtriya Swayamsevak
Sangh (RSS), Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP), the Bajrang Dal, and other
Hindu extremist organisations, collectively known as the Sangh Parivar
(Hindu fundamentalist family of organisations), are utilising religion
to foment communal violence toward organising ultra right, non secular
and undemocratic nationalism in India. Once again, this year has borne
heartbreaking testimony to this. As the Sangh Parivar goosesteps to
a future predicated on injustice and bigotry, we, as ordinary citizens,
must not be lulled into complacent comfort that denies our own complicity.
Minorities in contemporary India are becoming the evil 'other' that
must be annihilated or assimilated. For those of us not explicitly under
attack, it is time to examine our privilege and use it to empower the
conscience of a democratic and secular India, where necessary religious
and social reforms are enacted.
Hindu fundamentalism is well
funded by Indians abroad. These organisations receive substantial contributions
from Hindus in the United States and elsewhere. Outlook Magazine in
its July 22, 2002, issue published an article by A. K. Sen, titled,
'Deflections to the Right' highlighting a component of the chain of
funding that sustains Hindu extremism. The article states that the India
Development and Relief Fund (IDRF) is one of the more conspicuous charity
organisations that fundraises in the United States to support RSS battalions
in India. IDRF lists Sewa International as its counterpart in India.
Sewa International and the various organisations that it oversees receive
over two-thirds of IDRF funding. Sewa International, in its mission
to transform India, states on its website in a section on 'Experiments
and Results' with 'Social Harmony' that social consolidation can be
achieved through social cohesion. Among other things, their website
quotes Manya H. V. Sehadarji, Sarkaryawah of the RSS,"The ultimate
object of all these endeavours is Hindu Sangathan -- consolidation and
strengthening of the Hindu society". Hindu extremism, like other
xenophobic movements, functions through carefully fashioning exclusionary
principles whereby all non Hindus, and dissenting Hindus, identified
as Hindu traitors, become second class citizens. In addition, justification
of caste inequities, subordination of Dalits ('lower' caste communities),
women, adivasis (tribal) and other minorities, and the consolidation
of a cohesive middle class base are critical to its momentum.
In the United States, where
substantial funding is raised for Hindu extremist agendas, the government
must act to ensure that organisations that broker terror should not
continue to enjoy their non profit status within the country. It is
interesting that in 1999, the VHP failed to gain recognition at the
United Nations as 'a cultural organisation' because of its philosophical
underpinnings. However the VHP of America is an independent charity
registered in the United States in the 1970s, where it has received
funds from a variety of individuals and organisations.
Non resident Indians and
Americans of Indian descent must examine the politics of hate encouraged
by extremist Hindu organisations in the name of charity and social work.
Indians, one of the most financially successful groups in the United
States, must take seriously their moral obligation to ensure that their
dollars are not funding malice and scrutinise the organisations that
are on the receiving end in India. The issue is not whether these organisations
are undertaking charitable work, but if they are doing so to promote
separatist and non secular ideals. Param Vaibhav Ke Path Par (On The
Road To Great Glory) written by Sadanand Damodar Sapre, and published
in 1997 by Suruchi Prakashan, Jhandewalan, New Delhi, the central publication
house of the RSS, lists the 40+ organisations maintained by the RSS
in India for its multivariate programs.
In addition, VHP and other
Parivar outfits target the communalisation of education through the
'Vanavasi Kalyan Ashram' and 'Ekal Vidyalas' (schools). One strategy
is to Hinduise adivasi communities, exploit divisions among the marginalised,
and indoctrinate the youth, in order to both turn them against one another
and use them as foot soldiers in the larger cause of religious nationalism.
Such inculcation has had serious repercussions in Gujarat this year
where tribals were manipulated into attacking Muslims during the carnage
in February and March. While Hindu fundamentalists do not have a monopoly
on religious intolerance in India, their actions are holding the country
hostage. Well organised, wide spread and acting in the name of the majority
religion in India, Hindu extremism is positioned to silence diversity
through force and terror, the rhetoric of Hindu supremacy, and the positioning
of minority groups as depraved enemies who must be punished.
Indians at home and abroad
must oppose the deep infiltration of the Hindutva brigade into the press,
as well as the political, military, bureaucratic, civic, business, educational,
law and order institutions of India. Such infiltration is creating a
nation where the constitution is violated by religious fundamentalists,
with such violation tolerated by the state. While the current government
at the centre holds open and close links to organisations within the
Sangh Parivar, citizens are assured that secularism and democracy are
sacred and secure. In reality, the government's handling of communal
violations and sanctioning of communalism jeopardises our capacity to
function as a nation.
The VHP, in its meeting with
Muslim leaders in New Delhi on July 15, 2002, stated that if Muslims
agree to resettle Hindus in Jammu and Kashmir, Muslims in Gujarat would
be rehabilitated. Hindus must understand that issues connected to the
democratisation of Pakistan, ethical resolutions to Kashmir, or gender
reforms within Islam are separate from India's commitment to upholding
the rights of minorities or to reforms within Hinduism. Hindu extremism
against Muslims and other minorities in India collapses distinctions
that must be made to honour human rights in India. Also, Hindutva's
discourse of history posits Hindus and Hinduism as under siege and preposterously
asserts the idea of India as a Hindu nation. Such revisionist history
strategically and hideously poses that a vengeful justice can be found
for the crimes of history committed under non Hindu rulers. Retribution
is sought by attacking contemporary Indian Muslims, Christians, Sikhs
and others.
Hinduism is critical to the
fabric of India, as are all the other cultures and religions that inhabit
this land and frame the imagination of this nation. It will require
considerable effort on our part to conceive a secular nation where religion
is indeed separate from the integrity of the state, where pluralism
guarantees rights and respect to the religious and non-religious alike.
Every Hindu and every citizen must denounce that to be Indian is to
be Hindu, challenge assertions that a secular constitution is anti-Hindu,
and refute the call for a Hindu nation in India as anti-national. Patriotism
and nationalism demand that all social, political and religious groups
work for an India free of disenfranchisement, institutionalised violence,
corruption and rampant inequities. We cannot permit India's secular
and democratic fabric to be irreparably compromised. The politics of
segregation and hate cannot determine the century before us.
(Angana Chatterji is a professor of Social and Cultural Anthropology
at the California Institute of Integral Studies in San Francisco.)