Story of Hindutva

Augustine Kanjamala | Friday, 26 December 2008 Why Hindu extremists target Christians A militant school of Hindu thought which despises Islam and Christianity as alien creeds is growing in strength in India. Many Westerners believe that Hinduism is exemplified by Gandhi, the saintly man who led India to independence through toleration and ahimsa, or non-violence. But there is another strain of Hinduism which is far from tolerant and dreams of reviving the martial traditions of Aryan forebears. One leading Hindu monk, the Sankaracharya of Karvipith, criticised Gandhi in 1922: “Ahimsa undermines Hindu self-respect; passive and non-resisting sufferance is a Christian and not an Aryan principle.” Organized anti-Christian animosity and violence in India goes back to the Hindu reformist movement, Arya Samaj, and its founder Dayananda Sarasvati (1824-1883). When an American Presbyterian mission in Punjab began to attack Hinduism and denounce its superstitions, Dayananda was infuriated. His Hindu social reform movement bore some resemblance to Luther’s slogans. His mottoes included, “back to Vedas” (like “back to the Scriptures”). He introduced the Sudhi rite for reconversion to counter Christian proselytism among the Chura community of outcasts. In 1923, a political extremist from the state of Maharashtra, V.D. Savarkar, after imprisonment for 12 years for terrorism, published his book Hindutva: Who is a Hindu? He argued that only those who are bound by the Hindu culture and uphold India as their pitrubhumi (fatherland) and punyabhumi, (holy land) should enjoy full rights. Muslims and Christians, whose holy lands are far off in Arabia and Palestine, are not children of the soil of the sub-continent. He popularized the slogan: “Hinduise all politics and militarize Hinduism”. The exclusivist Hindutva policy was radically opposed to the inclusive and secular policies of the founders of independent India. more