http://mariawirthblog.wordpress.com/2014/02/25/is-hindu-dharma-good-and-hindutva-bad/

Is Hindu Dharma good and Hindutva bad?

Maria Wirth

February 25, 2014 

 “When Germany is Christian, is India Hindu?”got amazingly good response with thousands of facebook likes. 

However, some readers felt I made a mistake by not distinguishing between good, tolerant Hinduism, which is a private belief, and bad, intolerant Hindutva, which stands for the ‘communal agenda of an extreme right Hindu party’ that wants to force uniform Hinduism on this vast country, an act which is completely un-Hindu and against the pluralism of India.

Is Hindutva really different from Hindu Dharma and dangerous? 

Or have those, which coined the term, an interest in making it look like that? 

No doubt, Hindutva has a bad name in the eyes of many, in spite of the ruling of the Supreme Court in 1995:

“Hindutva is indicative more of the way of life of the Indian people. …Considering Hindutva as hostile, inimical, or intolerant of other faiths, or as communal proceeds from an improper appreciation of its true meaning.”

I would like to explain from a personal angle,why I came to the conclusion that it is indeed ‘an improper appreciation of its true meaning’, when Hindutva is branded as communal and dangerous.

For many years I lived in ‘spiritual India’ without any idea how important the terms ‘’secular’ and ’communal’ were. 

The people I met were appreciative of India’s great heritage. They gave me tips which texts to read, which sants to meet, which mantras to learn, etc., and I wrote about it for German readers. I used to think that all Indians are genuinely proud of their ancestors, who had stunningly deep insights into what is true about us and the universe and who left a huge legacy of precious ancient texts unparalleled in the world.

However, when I settled in a ‘normal’ environment away from ashrams and pilgrimage places and connected with the English speaking middle class including some foreign wives, I was shocked that several of my new friends with Hindu names were ridiculing Hinduism without knowing much about it. 

They had not even read the Bhagavad-Gita, but pronounced severe judgment. They gave the impression as if Hinduism was the most depraved and violent of all religions and responsible for all the ills India is facing. 

The caste system and crude rules of Manusmiti were quoted as proof. 

Reading newspapers and watching TV, I also discovered an inexplicable, yet clear anti Hindu stand.

My new acquaintances had expected me to join them in denouncing ‘primitive’ Hinduism which I could not do as I knew too much, not only form reading extensively, but also from doing sadhana. 

They were not amused and declared that I had read the wrong books. They asked me to read the right books, which would give me the ‘correct’ understanding. They obviously did not doubt their own view to be the correct one. 

However, instead of coming around by reading Romila Thapar and co, I rather got the impression that there was an intention behind the negative portrayal of Hinduism:Christianity and Islam were meant to look good in comparison. 

My neighbour, a writer with communist leanings, henceforth introduced me to his friends as “the local RSS pracharak”. Many ‘secular’ Indians consider the RSS as Hindu fundamentalists, occasionally equating it even with Islamic terror groups. So no surprise that an elderly lady once retorted, “In this case I am not pleased to meet you.”

What was my ‘fault’? 

I dared to say that I love Hindu Dharma, as it (its off- springs Buddhism, Jainism and Sikhism included) is the only religion that is inclusive and not divisive, whereas Christianity and Islam divide humanity into those who have the ‘true faith’ and those who are wrong and will pay for it eternally in hell, if not already on earth. 

Standing up for Hindu Dharma (and not only following it in private) indicted me as belonging to the ‘Hindutva brigade’ that is shunned by mainstream media. 

Of course my stand is neither communal nor dangerous for India. Hindu Dharma is indeed inclusive, and needs to gain strength at the expense of Christianity and Islam, which are exclusive and therefore communal.

No doubt something is seriously wrong about the public discourse on ‘secular’ and ‘communal’ in India. 

I can’t believe that those media anchors and invited guests don’t know it. Indians are intelligent. So why would they get secular and communal wrong?

Secular means worldly in contrast to sacred or religious, and secularism is a western concept.  State and religion were intertwined since Christianity became state religion in the Roman Empire. The Church declared what is the truth, for example that that Jesus is the only way or that the earth is flat, and everyone had to agree. If scientists disagreed, they were in serious trouble. 

Not without reason those centuries of Church domination are called ‘dark ages’ and the liberation from her tight embrace is called the era of ‘Enlightenment’. 

For Christian Europe, it was a great and hard fought achievement to get ‘secular’ states, where the Church could not push anymore her agenda through state laws. 

Several centuries ago, even the Sunday mass was obligatory in German kingdoms. Nobody was allowed to leave Christianity. The blasphemy laws kept the flock in check. Heresy was punished severely. Jews suffered discrimination and persecution all through history being branded as the killers of Jesus.

After Martin Luther split the Church into Protestants and Catholics, fierce wars were fought over supremacy which destroyed much of central Europe. 

In 1648, after 30 years of fighting, a compromise was found: the subjects of a region had to follow the religion of their ruler. 

Only in 1847, a Prussian king introduced a law for ‘negative religious freedom’, which meant, his subjects had the right to leave the Catholic or Protestant Church. 

Ever since, the Churches are losing sheep from their flock. It points to the fact that Christianity did not grow because its dogmas were convincing. It gained strength because those born in the faith could not leave it. The blasphemy laws propped up Christianity.

India has a completely different story. 

Sanatana Dharma was never based on unreasonable dogmas and did not need state oppression to keep believers in check. It was not in opposition to science. It was helpful to society as a whole by giving guidelines for an ideal life that acknowledges the invisible, conscious essence in the visible universe. It did not straight jacket people into an unbelievable belief system. 

It allowed freedom of thought and many parallel streams with different ways to connect to this essence emerged. 

“Hinduism is a way of life”, is often said. Following Hindu Dharma is actually an ideal way of life.

Since I grew up in the Catholic Church and know the narrow mindedness that is indoctrinated into children, I wonder why on earth Indians would prefer dogmatic religions to their ancient, benign Dharma. 

Don’t they see the real communal danger? 

Those ‘secular’ friends, who fiercely defend the right of the religious minorities to assert their exclusive identity, don’t seem to realise that both, Christianity and Islam cannot live with others peacefully. Both religions need to dominate. And both are very powerful worldwide, politically and financially. 

As long as they have not yet the numbers in India, they may downplay the central tenet of exclusiveness in their ideologies. But exist it does.

Secularism has dented the influence of Christianity in the west. But the Church did not give up its goal to make the whole mankind believe in Christ, and focusses now on the huge mass of Hindus. 

In Islam, the clergy still has a hold on the faithful and in several Muslim countries leaving Islam is punishable by death. As the Quran itself forbids the followers to leave the faith, it is difficult to forego the blasphemy laws.

The Indian secularists seem to fight for the right of Christianity and Islam to be communal and for their followers not to integrate into the Indian society, but to stress their separate identity. 

And what is this separate identity? 

It is merely an unverifiable belief that gravely impacts the mind-set. This mind-set not only creates outsiders, but it creates outsiders that are looked down upon. 

How can educated Indians be blind to the danger and risk having in future more partitions on the basis of unsubstantiated religious beliefs, including the risk of more terrible bloodshed?

Strangely, the dogmatic, exclusive religions are not accused of being divisive, but Hinduism is. 

Why? 

Hindus are required to see Brahman, the one Godhead, in everyone, never mind how he connects to his creator. 

In contrast, the followers of dogmatic religions are not required to respect those who reject their respective ‘true religion’. They are even allowed to hate them.

The ease, with which Christians and Muslims killed unbelievers, is frightening. 

Only 70 years ago six million Jews were murdered in cold blood in gas chambers in Germany. 

Only a little over 40 years ago, hundred thousands, if not millions, of Hindus were butchered in Bangladesh. There are many more examples. 

Humanity needs to win over such madness. 

How? 

Hindu Dharma has the key: acknowledge that we are all members of one family – coming from the same source with the same blood as it were…

50 Points about todays India ---- The Colonial Native Vs The Hindu - Vamadev Shastri 

A Fantastic and must-read article on today's India to be read by every educated Indian , written by David Frawley (aka Vamadeva Shastri). This article is a light and quick read - 50 points in 10 minutes.

The Colonial Native Vs The Hindu  -
Vamadev Shastri
http://www.hinduhumanrights.info/the-colonial-native-vs-the-hind

1. A defeatist tendency exists in the psyche of modern Indians perhaps unparalleled in any other country today. An inner conflict bordering on a civil war rages in the minds of the country’s elite.
2. The main effort of its cultural leaders appears to be to pull the country down or remake it in a foreign image, as if little Indian and certainly nothing Hindu was worthy of preserving or even reforming.
3. The elite of India suffers from a fundamental alienation from the traditions and culture of the land , that would not be less poignant, had they been born and raised in a hostile country. 

4. The ruling elite appears to be little more than a native incarnation of the old colonial rulers who haughtily lived in their separate cantonments, neither mingling with the people nor seeking to understand their customs. This new English-speaking aristocracy prides itself in being disconnected from the very soil and people that gave it birth.
5. There is probably no other country in the world where it has become a national pastime among its educated class to denigrate its own culture and history, however great that has been over the many millennia of its existence.
6. When great archaeological discoveries of India’s past are found, for example, they are not a subject for national pride but are ridiculed as an exaggeration, if not an invention, as if they represent only the imagination of backward chauvinistic elements within the culture.
7. There is probably no other country where the majority religion, however enlightened, mystical or spiritual, is ridiculed, while minority religions, however fundamentalist or even militant, are doted upon. The majority religion and its institutions are taxed and regulated while minority religions receive tax benefits and have no regulation or even monitoring.
8. While the majority religion is carefully monitored and limited as to what it can teach, minority religions can teach what they want, even if anti-national or backward in nature. Books are banned that offend minority religious sentiments but praised if they cast insults on majority beliefs.
9. There is probably no other country where regional, caste and family loyalties are more important than the national interest, even among those who claim to be democratic, socialist or caste reformers. 

10. Political parties exist not to promote a national agenda but to sustain one region or group of people in the country at the expense of the whole. Each group wants as big a piece of the national pie as it can get, not realizing that the advantages it gains mean deprivation for other groups. Yet when those who were previously deprived gain power, they too seek the same unequal advantages that causes further inequality and discontent.
11. India’s affirmative action code is by far the most extreme in the world, trying to raise up certain segments of the population regardless of merit, and prevent others from gaining positions however qualified they may be.
12. In the guise of removing caste, a new castism has arisen where one’s caste is more important than one’s qualifications either in gaining entrance into a school or in finding a job when one graduates. Anti-Brahminism has often become the most virulent form of castist thinking.
13. People view the government not as their own creation but as a welfare state from they should take the maximum personal benefit, regardless of the consequences for the country as a whole.
14. Outside people need not pull Indians down. Indians are already quite busy keeping any of their people and the country as a whole from rising up. They would rather see their neighbors or the nation fail if they are not given the top position. 

15. It is only outside of India that Indians succeed, often remarkably well, because their native talents are not stifled by the dominant cultural self-negativity and rabid divisiveness that exists in the country today.
16. Political parties in India see gaining power as a means of amassing personal wealth and robbing the nation. Political leaders include gangsters, charlatans and buffoons who would stop short at nothing to gain power for themselves and their coteries.
17. Even so-called modern or liberal parties resemble more the courts of kings, where personal loyalty is more important than any democratic participation. Once they gain power politicians routinely do little but cheat the people for their own advantage.
18. Even honest politicians find that they cannot function without some deference to the more numerous corrupt leaders who often have a stranglehold on the bureaucracy.
19. Politicians divide the country into warring vote banks and place one community against another. They offer favors to communities like bribes to make sure that they are elected or stay in power. They campaign on slogans that appeal to community fears and suspicions rather than create any national consensus or harmony. 

20. They hold power based upon blame and hatred rather than on any positive programs for social change. They inflame the uneducated masses with propaganda rather than work to make people aware of real social problems like overpopulation, poor infrastructure or lack of education.
21. Should a decent government come to power, the opposition pursues pulling it down as its main goal, so that they can gain power for themselves. The idea of a constructive or supportive opposition is hard to find. The goal is to gain power for oneself and to not allow anyone else to succeed.
22. To further their ambitions Indian politicians will manipulate the foreign press to denigrate their opponents, even if it means spreading lies and rumors and making the country an anathema in the eyes of the outside world.
23. Petty conflicts in India are blown out of proportion in the foreign media, not by foreign journalists but by Indians seeking to use the media to score points against their own opponents in the country.
24. The Indians who are responsible for the news of India in the foreign press spread venom and distortion about their own country, perhaps better than any foreigner who dislikes the culture ever could.
25. The killing of one Christian missionary becomes a national media event of anti-Christian attacks while the murder of hundreds of Hindus is taken casually as without any real importance, as if only the deaths of white-skinned people mattered, not the slaughter of the natives. 

26. Missionary aggression is extolled as social upliftment, while Hindu efforts at self-defense against the conversion onslaught are portrayed as rabid fundamentalism. One Indian journalist even lamented that western armies would not come to India to chastise the political groups he was opposed to, as if he was still looking for the colonial powers to save him!
27. Let us look at the type of leaders that India has had with its Laloo Prasad Yadav ( ex CM Bihar), Mulayam Singh Yadav( ex CM UP) or Jayalalita to mention but a few. Such individuals are little more than warlords who surround themselves with sycophants.
28. Modern Indian politicians appear more like colonial rulers looting their own country, following a divide and rule policy, to keep the people so weak that their power cannot be challenged.
29. Corruption exists almost everywhere and bribery is the main way to do business in nearly all fields. India has an entrenched bureaucracy that resists change and stifles development, just out of sheer obstinacy and not wanting to give up any control.
30. The Congress Party, the oldest in this predominantly Hindu nation, has given its leadership to an Italian Catholic woman simply because as the widow of the last Gandhi prime minister, she carries the family torch, as if family loyalty were still the main basis of political credibility in the country. And such a leader and a party are deemed progressive!
31. The strange thing is that India is not a banana republic of recent vintage but one of the oldest and most venerable civilizations in the world. Its culture is not trumpeting a militant and fundamentalist religion trying to conquer the world for the one true faith but represents a vaster and more cosmic vision.
32. India has given birth to the main religions that have dominated East Asia historically, the Hindu, Buddhist, Jain and Sikh, which are noted for tolerance and spirituality.
33. It has produced Sanskrit, perhaps the world’s greatest language. It has given us the incredible spiritual systems of Yoga and its great traditions of meditation and Self-realization.
34. As the world looks forward to a more universal model of spirituality and a world view defined by consciousness rather than by religious dogma these traditions are perhaps the most important legacy to draw upon for creating a future enlightened civilization.
35. Yet the irony is that rather than embracing its own great traditions, the modern Indian psyche prefers to slavishly imitate worn out trends in western intellectual thought like Marxism or even to write apologetics for Christian and Islamic missionary aggression.
36. Though living in India, in proximity to temples, yogis and great festivals, most modern Indian intellectuals are oblivious to the soul of the land. They might as well be living in England or China for all they know of their own country. They are isolated in their own alien ideas as if in a tower of iron.
37. If they choose to rediscover India it is more likely to occur by reading the books of western travelers visiting the country, than by their own direct experience of the people around them.
38. The dominant Indian intelligentsia cannot appreciate even the writings of the many great modern Indian sages, like Vivekananda or Aurobindo, who wrote in good English and understood the national psyche and how to revive. It is as if they were so successfully brainwashed against their own culture that they cannot even look at it, even if presented to them clearly in a modern light!
39. Given such a twisted and self-negative national psyche, can there be any hope for the country? At the surface the situation looks quite dismal.
40. India appears like a nation without nationalism or at least without any national pride or any real connection to its own history. Self-negativity and even a cultural self-hatred abound.
41. The elite that dominates the universities, the media, the government and the business arenas is the illegitimate child of foreign interests and is often still controlled by foreign ideas and foreign resources. It cannot resist a bribe and there is much money from overseas to draw upon. Indian politicians do not hesitate to sell their country down the river and it does not require a high price.
42. Fortunately signs of a new awakening can be found. There is a new interest in the older traditions of the country and many people now visit temples and tirthas.
43. Many young people now want to follow the older heritage of the land and revive it in the modern age. The computer revolution and the new science are reconnecting with the great intelligence of the Indian psyche that produced the unfathomable mantras of the Vedas.
44. Slowly but surely a new intelligentsia is arising and now several important journalists are writing and exposing the hypocrisy of the anti-Hindu Indian elite.
45. Yet only if this trend grows rapidly can there be a real counter to the defeatist trend of the country. But it requires great effort, initiative and creativity, not simply lamenting over the past but envisioning a new future in harmony with the deeper aspirations of the region.
46. One must also not forget that the English-educated elite represents only about three percent of the country, however much power they wield. The remaining population is much more likely to preserve the older traditions of the land. Even illiterate villagers often know more of real Indian culture than do major Indian journalists and writers.
47. Meanwhile overseas Hindus have become successful, well educated and affluent, not by abandoning their culture but by holding to it. They see Hindu culture not as a weakness but as a strength.
48. Free of the Indian nation and its fragmented psyche, they can draw upon their cultural resources in a way that people born in India seldom can. Perhaps they can return to the country and become its new leaders.
49. However, first this strange alienated elite has to be removed and they will not do so without a fight. The sad thing is that they would probably rather destroy their own country than have it function apart from their control.
50. The future of India looks like a new Kurukshetra and it requires a similar miracle for victory. Such a war will be fought not on some outer battlefield but in the hearts and minds of people, in where they choose to draw their inspiration and find their connection with life.
51. Yet regardless of outer appearances, the inner soul of the land cannot be put down so easily. It has been nourished by many centuries of tapas by great yogis and sages. This soul of Bharat Mata will rise up again through Kali (destruction) to Durga (strength). The question is how long and difficult the process must be.

Obsessed with ‘Hindu terror’, NIA flounders

Obsessed with ‘Hindu terror’, NIA flounders

Sandhya Jain

25 February 2014

[Six persons accused in the 2009 Margao bomb blast, allegedly the handiwork of a Hindu group,were recently released by a Special NIA Court for complete lack of evidence, or even a credible motive]

‘Hindu terrorism’ may be the UPA’s grand denouement.

The Congress’s most maligned monster got a clean chit in the violence of 2002; his Minister of State for Home was not named in the CBI charge-sheet in the Ishrat Jehan encounter case; and nemesis is now hunting their former prosecutrix. 

Now, Army intelligence officer Lieutenant Colonel Prasad Purohit, arrested in a ‘Hindu conspiracy’, has urged Union Minister for Home Affairs SK Shinde not to discriminate between Muslims and others while providing relief in false cases. His wife recently met President Pranab Mukherjee to complain about lack of movement in the case despite his five years in jail, and the refusal of bail.

Others languishing without bail in cases of alleged Hindu terror include the cancer-stricken Sadhvi Pragya, Swami Aseemanand, and the Sharadapeeth Sankaracharya. 

However, the principal accused in the Israeli diplomat car bombing case was given bail by a Bench presided over by the then Chief Justice of India.

The National Investigation Agency that was set up after the November 2008 assault on Mumbai to investigate terror-related crimes and given several high-profile cases, has failed to distinguish itself. 

In a case largely ignored by the mainstream media, six persons accused in the Margao bomb blast of October 16, 2009, in which two persons died, were released by the Special NIA Court for Goa on December 31, 2013, for complete lack of evidence — or even a credible motive. 

The NIA sleuths claimed that the blasts were the handiwork of members of a social organisation, Sanatan Sanstha, based at Ponda, Goa, who disliked a local cultural event based on Narakasur, an asura killed by Krishna the day before Diwali!

Briefly, the NIA case, argued by the prosecution,was that Malgonda Patil and Yogesh Naik conspired with nine others to hatch a criminal conspiracy to strike terror in the minds of the organisers, participants and spectators of the Narakasur Vadh Competition in October 2009. 

The Sanatan Sanstha promotes the proper performance of Hindu rites; it objected to the glorification of the asuraand smaller size of the Krishna effigies. 

As the competition was held at several places in Goa, the Sanstha planned to cause explosions at these places. 

During the trial, a witness said the Sanstha’s main opposition to the event was due to children drinking alcohol, extracting money from people, and eve-teasing, and many local persons opposed it for the same reasons.

According to the NIA, Malgonda Patil and Yogesh Naik (who died) conspired with Vinay Talekar, Vinayak Patil, Dhananjay Asthekar, Dilip Mangaonkar, Prashant Asthekar and Prashant Juvekar (who were released) and Jay Prakash Anna, Rudra Patil and Sarang Akolkar (declared absconding) to wage war against the nation and terrorism. 

They purchased materials necessary for making a bomb and assembled Improvised Explosive Devices at the residence of Yogesh Naik’s brother Laxmikant Naik, at Talaulim, Ponda-Goa, and conducted test blasts on the hillock behind the house.

Their alleged plan was to blast IEDs at five places in Goa on October 16, 2009. 

Accordingly, Malgonda Patil and Yogesh Naik went to plant the IEDs at Margao behind Grace Church, near the venue of the function, where a large crowd, the Chief Minister, local MLA and other VIPs were present. 

But when the accused parked their Eterno scooter (No GA-05-A-7800) near the Reliance Trade Centre, the IEDs in the dickey exploded; they later died in hospital. 

Vinay Talekar and Vinayak Patil allegedly planted IEDs in a lorry (No GA-08-U-0029) ferrying Narakasur effigies at a temple in Sancoale; these were noticed by an alert driver who tossed the packet out of the vehicle; it was later defused by experts.

But the Solid Party Trust which organises the competition told the court that the blast site was 300m away from the route taken by the effigy processions, on an isolated road. 

The blast was heard at the function and the Chief Minister received a telephone call and left, but the competition continued. 

The organisers continued to hold the function at the same venue in subsequent years; the police never suggested there was any threat to peace. 

Moreover, they testified that the Sanstha members had never complained directly to them, but to the Collector. They would come with placards prior to the competition, but never created any problems for the event. 

The organisers did not recognise any of the accused in court.

Police witnesses confirmed that a letter produced by the prosecution contained no threat of any kind. 

The letter, addressed to  Ponda Police Station, said that Krishna slew Narakasur on Ashwin Vadya Chaturdashiand granted a boon that whoever took a holy bath at dawn would never suffer in hell. 

In Goa, a custom developed of burning effigies of Narakasur to commemorate Krishna’s victory. 

But recently the practice has become distorted with people participating the whole night and unable to wake up for the holy bath, which is an important spiritual aspect of this festival; they end up forgetting Sri Krishna.

The Special Judge observed that persons peacefully opposing an activity on moral and ritual grounds will not take such extreme steps; he concluded that the prosecution failed to establish motive. 

This means that Malgonda Patil and Yogesh Naik were victims, not conspirators.

Three of the accused (Vinay Talekar, Vinayak Patil and Dhananjay Asthekar) were allegedly identified by persons who sold electronic items to them. 

But an engineering college student testified that Dhananjay Asthekar was the main coordinator of a national level competition in electronics, and preparing circuits was part of the academic curriculum. 

The Special Judge observed that there was no evidence to show that the accused had purchased the detonators used for the blasts, which is the key to the crime.

Nor was there any evidence to suggest that the Sanstha or its members intended to overcome the armed or other personnel deployed by the Government and attain a commanding position from which they could dictate terms to the Government. 

This negates the charge that the accused were waging war against the State Government (Section 121-A IPC).

As the trial unfolded, the Special Judge doubted the veracity of the First Information Report and held that the facts seemed to be manipulated with the intention of roping in the Sanatan Sanstha. 

Neither the evidence nor the witnesses supported the prosecution case. 

The case simply collapsed; the ‘Hindu terrorists’ were freed and the NIA’s reputation tarnished. 

The new Government must seriously address the training and professional standards in this premier institution.

http://centreright.in/2014/02/wendy-doniger-academia-racism-and-hinduphobia/#.UwDAcM4ZTyS

Wendy Doniger: Academia, Racism and Hinduphobia

Abhinav Prakash Singh February 16, 2014

The theatric over Penguin’s decision to pulp Wendy Doniger’s “The Hindus: An Alternative History” is amusing as an astonishing number of her Indian supporters (Doniger refers to them as native informants) and other gullible liberals continue to marshal around the flag post of free speech. In the comical fury and thunder, the real issues have been sidelined in the best traditions of Indian public discourse.

In the all the discussions, the people like Rajiv Malhotra, who were the original mover of the issue in USA, are not being invited. Instead, we have people who most likely never heard about the book before the news of its pulping broke. And they have been repeating the standard lines of Hindutva, freedom of speech, fascism and so on.

It is therefore proper to put the main issues at the centre of public discourse. But before that, we want to make our position on banning of the books clear - we are opposed to banning or to taking them to courts.

The main issues in Doniger controversy are – academic integrity, racism and Hinduphobia.

The work of Wendy and other such “experts” use Freud’s psychosexual analysis to analyse the Hindu Dharma, its sacred lore and people.

Freud’s psychoanalysis is not considered as a scientific method by modern psychologists. It is often called as the most successful pseudoscience in history. At best, it possibly gives some indications to the personality of an “individual” if not being a wild speculation. It was never meant for analysing societies or communities much less for analysing history or religions.

Only some of the insights are still used in psychotherapy in neo-Freudian school. But even there it is rejected as a tool to explore the unconscious and emphasis is on interpersonal relation between researcher/therapist and the subject to get the desired modifications in the behaviour. And even its validity and efficacy is contested.

As we will see Doniger failed on this aspect of interaction between researcher and subject as well.

It is therefore bizarre but not surprising that such discredited theories continue to be used in Hinduism studies. 'The Aryan Invasion Theory' is another case in the point. And it is also not surprising that usual suspects are always involved in peddling such theories.

Not only her methodology is flawed but even her academic skills are under question.

She is an “expert” in giving false references, quoting non-existent sources, fraudulent translations and imagined dates and geography.

She is adept in presenting distorted versions of the stories as original without clearly specifying the source to prevent any cross-checking.

Her skills in mis-quoting were in full display in her statement on the decision of Penguin to pulp her book.

She said “they were defeated by the true villain of the piece-the Indian law that makes it criminal rather than civil offense to publish a book that offends any Hindu”.

A criminal offense to offend any Hindu!

What law is that?

The whole book is almost a racist profiling of a people apart from being demeaning in language and content.

It is what Mahatma Gandhi called Katherine Mayo’s “Mother India”- a drain-inspector report.

In fact, it resembles Mayo’s work with its obsession to prove the “natives” as sexual perverts.

Doniger tells us that use of colour in Holi is a substitute of blood used in earlier times and “proves” inherent barbarity of Hindus. (Christians eating wafers or appams and wine as substitute for their Lawd Gawd or Jesusu’ flesh and drinking his blood as done straight from the Cross in their recent past, and presently from their Abbey’s Distilleries and abbattoirs? <vijayan>)

Indian mothers don’t bond with their children as western mothers do. (Western mothers bond by nursing their babies from other orifices? <vijayan>)

She tells us that Ganesha is a eunuch whose love for sweets reflects his desire for oral sex and that the love between him and his mother Parvati is actually sexual as unable to satisfy himself otherwise he turns to his mother.

She then uses these “conclusions” to explain what is the problem with Hindu society.

She implies that Hindus are akin to rats and monkeys whose “chaotic” culture was in contrast with that of “serene” culture of various  invaders. (Like her Great Scientists H.Ellis & Co. proved – though much, much later accepted by her O & Later Doctorised, allah-troped and atrophied  Testaments? <vijazyan>)

Those who disagree with Doniger are being labelled as intolerant and fascist. We are being lectured to debate in a civilized manner rather than acting like “Hindu fundamentalists” and fanatics.

And this comes from the people who one day preach that there is no such thing as Hindus and Hinduism and on second day blame Hindus and Hinduism for all the evil that exist!

Fanatics?

Who is acting like fanatics if not Doniger’s supporters themselves?

The litigants simply went to the court to exercise their legal rights in a democratic, civilized manner. In fact, hardly anybody knew about the case till the Penguin decided to recall it, hardly a Taliban action.

One can still understand if the debate is about the said law which was instituted by British in 1897 to penalise Hindus for ever questioning Islam.

Both sides can surely discuss the law and the wider question of the free speech but for that at least a modicum of tolerance is required from both sides.

When those who disagree with Doniger are automatically branded as fascists, extremists, Taliban, totalitarian, casteist Brahmins or Brahminised, uneducated, intolerant then how exactly any debate or even discussion take place?

This behaviour of self-proclaimed liberals bears striking similarity to how Doniger responded to any request for “civilized” discussion about her work. She too branded her critiques as fascists, Hindu-nationalists, un-educated people who don’t read, RSS supporters who fund rioters in India to kill Muslims, racist and anti-women.

She insulted them as being just a “native informants” (who can’t talk to her as equals) or mouse-turd or being jackals who want to hang around in the company of lions.

According to her those who defend Hinduism suffer from a “psychological disorder which has roots in penies”.

Her response to any challenge was personal attacks, racist berating of challengers and demonization of Hindu diaspora. Do her defenders in India realise that it’s her who needs a lecture on “civilized” debate?

The criticism of her work is not about “hurt religious” sentiments. It’s about her lack of academic integrity, racism and pushing the imperialist agenda of Hinduphobia.

Her works fits well with the western stereotypes and provide ample ammunitions to the faithful agents of western imperialism i.e multinational corporate evangelical missionary organisations. The intense demonization of Hindus and division of Hinduism as “bad Sanskritic Vedic traditions” and “good folk tradition” and that later must break free of the former which was “imposed” on it has a long history.

Mercifully, Doniger has dropped the use of discredited Aryan-Dravidian polemics but has attempted to replace it by a new construct with similar narrative.

But the Hinduphobia goes even deeper.

When seen in historical context (according to Doniger her critics have no understanding of context and history), it is the continuation of crusades of Abrahamists against what they see as the last pagan stronghold. Hindus are demonised not because there are problems in their society like all others, but because they are not “people of The Book”.

Hence, they are lawless barbarians in thrall of Satan and who need to saved by destroying their spiritual systems and replacing their weird deities by the worship of “One True God”, exclusivist and jealous.

[ Please read : " A Hindu View of Islam and Christianity " By : Ram Swarup

http://www.scribd.com/doc/19106059/Ram-Swarup-Hindu-View-of-Christianity-Islam]

The technique of demonization before physical eradication is a time tested technique used against all other pagan civilizations be it Greece, Rome, Eastern Europe, Arabia, Egypt, Africa, Americas etc.

The very pluralism and religious tolerance of these societies is used by Abrahamic imperialists to subvert them by the denying the very legitimacy of these ancient civilizations and fueling war and hatred between different sections of the pluralistsociety before moving in for a final kill.

Only in India, China and Japan they could not achieve their dream of Kingdom of God. And exactly same is being attempted in India with a renewed vigour as India is the softest target among the last surviving Dharmic civilizations.

Western academia with its “experts” on Hinduism and evangelists are the vanguard of this neo-colonial project. The subversion and demonization is prelude to actual physical decimation which has already began in the region. It not only justifies and makes it acceptable that Hindus have suffered the biggest genocide in the last century.

For the first time in history, Hindus no more exist in the western sub-continent something which didn’t happened in the bleakest days of Islamic invasions. But that is not only never discussed but Hindus are held responsible for their own genocide. Why were they so evil and wicked? Isn’t the world better off without them? This is the undertone of all explanations so far be it from left, West or Islamists.

[Ram Swarup, Hinduism, and Monotheistic Religions – David Frawley]

[http://bharatabharati.wordpress.com/2010/02/19/ram-swarup-hinduism-and-monotheistic-religions-david-frawley/]

The ethnic cleansing of Hindus in Kashmir is openly justified by Islamists and left, ongoing ethnic cleansing in Bangladesh is nobody’s concern. This is the reason why ethnic cleansing of Bodo tribals is tolerated and justified by blaming tribals as the ones who didn’t wanted to live peacefully with the Bangladeshi settlers.

This is why Muzaffarnagar riots are blamed on Hindus and rising Islamo-fascism is completely ignored.

This is why religious oppression of Dalit Hindus by Christians in South and Muslims in North is ignored.

Why are they Hindus anyways?

Whatever the occasion Hindus stand accused because as the long line of “scholars” to which Doniger belongs tell us that there is something not “quite right” with them.

Then we have our leftists and liberals who have never ever challenged or critiqued likes of Wendy.

Left is otherwise trigger happy over any perceived falsification and in India boosts of a strong academic tradition to its credit.

Why have they never called bluff on such racist and Hinduphobic work? Instead we see them providing legitimacy to such works. Even now we see them portraying Wendy as a martyr who is a brilliant and innovative scholar proving “fuller” description of Hinduism.

Only last year an interesting event happened in left-dominated JNU. Evangelists and certain self-proclaimed representatives of SC/ST/OBCs organised Mahishasura Day during Durga Puja to denounce the worship of “Aryan prostitute” Durga. It happened right next to the history department but not a single JNU professor called bluff on this pseudo-history and neo-Nazi rant calling for “annihilation” of Hindus. Instead, many professors patronised it in the name of subaltern discourse, alternative history.

A forum named India First came out with an elaborate “academic, civilized” response to it by point by point refuting the whole construct of Mahishasura Day. It involved a painstaking task of making 30-40 huge collages involving some three chart papers each. (Facebook page and photos of India First can be accessed here).

And the only response it got from the organisers and all the left parties and even left ruled JNUSU (which is supposed to speak for all students) was a bunch of abuses.

Some gems of the response included-”you bloody, barbarian Hindus”, “why are you afraid of re-interpretation of history?”, “India First is fascist, casteist, communal, patriarchal”,” “it’s a Modi funded little fascist organisation”, “we will not cede our hard won democratic space to these Hindu-fascists”, “India First is run by perverts who are naturally unfit for any discussion or debate”, “it is impossible to expect any discourse from them”, “they are anti-people, anti-Dalit, anti-women”, “they are totalitarians who want to impose fascist agenda”. And then these are the people who are today lecturing others to debate rather than taking books to the court!

This from the same left which never tiers itself out shouting down any critical analysis of Islam-the second majority religion in India.

Then we are told that it’s not about free speech but about the ruling class agenda and imperialist propaganda and they mush protest against Islamophobia!

This is the same left which justified cancellation of Subramanian Swamy’s summer school course in Harvard because he wrote an article in India.

We were then told in so many words that “he has right to his opinion but not the right to publish”.

It is the same left and self-certified liberals who arm twisted Wharton into cancelling a video conference of Narendra Modi.

It is the same left which shouted down Tarek Fatah as an agent of Western hegemony and Islamophobe, refused any legitimacy to his works. We never saw anyone even making a fuss when the publisher of “Chasing the Mirage: The Tragic Illusion of an Islamic state” dropped it after the first print owing to fears of communal tensions.

It looks like that only courts can provide a platform which can neutralise the asymmetry of power in the public discourse. We have seen that how in the Ayodhya case, many of the “eminent historians” disowned their works when they were cross-examined by court. But if that is the situation who exactly is responsible for it?

The whole fury and thunder over Doniger is an elaborate fraud and more so because of people making it.

Arundhati Roy is more furious over the use of the word “Bharat” by Penguin. She claims to speak for “masses” but seems to be unaware that in every language of the masses, the word is Bharat. How many of her beloved “masses” call it India?

Others are more worried about “the deteriorating political situation” in India (due to probable victory of Modi led BJP!) while others are, as always, listening to sound of fascist boots.

What matters is that the issue of Hinduphobia in academia has finally become a topic of discussion. The opportunity must be grabbed to expose and defeat on of the most entrenched racism and stereotypes and the nexus that thrives on it.

Abhinav Prakash Singh is a Doctoral Scholar in Economics, JNU. He has done his Masters in Economics from JNU and Economics (Honours ) from Hindu College, University of Delhi. He is interested in politics, history, economics, religion and hopes to grasp the reasons behind rise and fall of civilizations.

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Oh, But You Do Get It Wrong! Aditi Banerjee October 28, 2009

Wendy Doniger (1) falsely and unfairly brands all of her critics as right-wing Hindutva fundamentalists, and (2) grossly mischaracterizes (and misquotes) the text of the Valmiki Ramayana

http://www.outlookindia.com/article.aspx?262511

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Wendy Doniger's Imagined History Of The Hindus Jan. 10, 2010 Oct 28, 2009

' - - - .  But we revisit her work now not just because Doniger provokes the Hindu American community much in the same way that her attack on Sarah Palin's femininity viscerally offended conservatives.  Doniger represents what many believe to be a fundamental flaw in the academic study of Hinduism: that Hindu studies is too often the last refuge of biased non-Hindu academics presenting themselves as "experts" on a faith that they study without the insight, recognition or reverence that a practicing Hindu or non-Hindu striving to study Hinduism from the insider's perspective would offer. 

 Hinduism is tenuously positioned in the academy: in contrast to Christianity, Judaism, Islam and even Buddhism which are dominated by recognized scholars that actually practice the faith, Hinduism is more often taught by scholars viewing the religion with the clinical dispassion of one studying ancient Sumeria--neither passionate about the theology of Hinduism nor concerned about the beliefs and sentiments of the faithful. Indeed part of the "blame" for underrepresentation in the Academy lies with the Hindu community which has long focused its academic pursuits in the sciences and engineering; this, albeit slowly, is changing.  But until we see a real shift in the imbalance, we as Hindus, especially in the West, continue to grapple with misguided portrayals of Hinduism which do not reach far beyond caste, cows, curry and in this case, the Kamasutras, because the bully pulpit of the ivory tower is owned by the likes of Doniger to permeate the media, school textbooks and the public square.

'The Hindus: An Alternative History' does not represent nor provide insight to the contemporary practices and interpretations of Hinduism and its scripture.  It is as if Doniger and contemporary Hindus are reading completely different texts, given the differences in their presuppositions and inherent biases.  Comparatively, though the Hebrew Bible and the Old Testament are the same text, containing the same collection of words, the meaning to Jews and Christians is very different.  In the end, rather than offering the reader a depiction of a family of vibrant religious traditions practiced by a billion Hindus globally, Doniger offers a deconstruction of some of the most important epics and episodes in Hindu thought and belief that shocks and offends at best, and offers grist to Hindu hate groups at worst.  Indeed, pornographic depictions of Hindu Gods and Goddesses captured from Doniger's writings grace the websites of some banefully anti-Hindu hate sites with their own varied agendas.  

 Doniger's work demonstrates a lifelong fascination for Hinduism.  But her proclivity for sexualizing Hindu deities and expressing caustic intolerance of critics from outside academia is legend.  With a broad sweep, she has delighted in tarring many of her opponents as Hindu extremists; a tactic that only decimates the public space for debate.

Academic freedom should not be infringed upon and is sacrosanct.  But academic legitimacy in the eyes of the public, outside of what is oft viewed as the incestuous academy, sets a much higher bar. 

The above blog was sent to HAF's American Academy of Religion database.