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Defaming of Hinduism-II

V SUNDARAM

        In his brilliant and perceptive preface to the recently published book - INVADING THE SACRED, An Analysis of Hinduism Studies in America, edited by Krishnan Ramaswamy, Antonio de Nicolas and Aditi Banerjee, Arvind Sharma of McGill University in Canada has observed that the study of religion in a historical perspective can be best developed by utilizing the distinction regularly drawn in the history of religion between the INSIDER and the OUTSIDER. From the point of view of this distinction, the study of religion, in the intellectual history of humanity, seems to exhibit a fourfold typology in terms of the modalities of transmission involved, in the context of the various religious traditions over the past few centuries : 

        1. Insider to Insider 

        2. Outsider to Outsider

        3. Outsider to Insider

        4. Insider to Outsider

Rajiv Malhotra
The main force
behind the book
       As a general observation, one can say that till the beginnings of the renaissance in Europe in the late 15th and early 16th centuries, the main channel of the intellectual communication of a religious tradition was from Insider to Insider. This began to change with the rise of the West and the onset of the modern era. In this phase, as the West became familiar with the religions of the Americas, Africa and Asia, the main mode of transmission about these religions became that from Outsider to Outsider. During this phase Western scholars, Outsider to these different religious traditions, began sharing their knowledge about such traditions with other Westerners, who were as much of an Outsider to the religious traditions they were receiving information about, as those who were providing it. As the Western domination of the world became institutionalised in the form of imperialism and colonialism, the West began to control the intellectual discourse in its colonies, and the Insiders to these traditions came to be profoundly affected, even in their self understanding of their own religious traditions by Western accounts. Thus another dimension was added to the channeling of religious communication —— from the Outsider to the Insider. I would explain this process in this phase by quoting from the writings of Thomas Babington Macaulay (1800-1859), who was responsible for the introduction of English language-based education in India in the 19th century. This is what he wrote in his famous Minute on Education in India on 2 February, 1835: 'It is impossible for us, with our limited means, to attempt to educate the body of the people. We must at present do our best to form a CLASS who may be interpreters between us and the millions whom we govern; a CLASS of persons, Indian in blood and colour, but English in taste, in opinions, in morals and in intellect.' Most of the secular and pseudo-secular Indians in India and abroad who are proud of their Himalayan ignorance about the great Hindu heritage of India in diverse fields belong to this category.

        When the age of European imperialism was gradually beached by the tide of history after the end of the II World War in 1945 and when many erstwhile colonies of European countries in Africa and Asia became independent, the direction of the intellectual and cultural discourse took another turn. The people from these various non-Western religious traditions began to openly challenge the colonial descriptions, done by their earlier colonial masters for more than 200 years, in the post-colonial world. Now these Insiders themselves began to claim the right to tell the Outsiders about their faith and culture, thus reversing the earlier established trend of flow of information from Outsider to Insider for more than a century. I fully endorse the verdict of Arvind Sharma 'It could be argued that the new book INVADING THE SACRED, An Analysis of Hinduism Studies in America reflects the state of discourse about Hinduism at this cusp of Insider to Outsider.'

        In this book it has been forcefully argued and claimed in essence that the academics in America are either biased or in gross error when dealing with several aspects of Hinduism. Anyone can see from the essays in this book that the Hindu community in America wonders whether the academic community there can ever evoke Hinduism without condescension. Likewise it is also clear that the American academic community wonders if the Hindu community can evoke Hinduism without sentimentality.

        In my view this book serves a very important and necessary purpose, more particularly in today's context of totally ill-informed, lopsided, arbitrary, unscientific and even barbarous attacks on Hinduism, Hindus and Hindu culture being made in the West (specially in America). This book can be hailed as a harbinger of an important attempt to start a new kind of dialogue in India-related cultural and post-colonial studies. This book effectively challenges the Western portrayals of India, her religions and problems. Most of these Western portrayals view Indian culture as a panorama of abuses and social evils, such as caste, Sati, dowry, murders, violence, religious conflicts, immorality, grotesque deities and so on. They do not view problems of India as being historical or economic in origin, but as essences of the traditions, cultures and civilizations of India, making it a 'chaotic and even desperate country.' The problems of India are being viewed by Americans as inseparable from the problems of Hinduism. According to American academics discussed in this book, India's problems are in its DNA (Deoxyribonucleic Acid). These prejudiced and biased American scholars and some Indian scholars as well (who have sold their Hindu souls for a mess of 'American' pottage) seem to be in a state of bumptious delusion by imagining that for Western religions and societies DNA means (not Deoxyribonucleic Acid) but Divine Noble Authority. Sadly for India and her people, attempts by nervous secular Indians in the west to distance themselves from Hinduism have also led to an academic vacuum about Indian traditions which has been filled by external voices from the West which have their own agendas.

        Unlike in India, where only the academic study of Islam and Christianity is surreptitiously promoted by the State as a handle of 'Minority Vote-bank Politics,' in America the academic study of religion is a major discipline (which today has become a large scale anti-Hindu industry thanks to the University of Chicago and its powerful academician Wendy Doniger) involving over 8.000 university professors most of whom are members of the American Academy of Religion (AAR). AAR is the primary organisation for academic scholars or Religious Studies in the United States. RISA (Religions in South Asia) is the unit within the AAR for scholars who study and teach about religions in the Indian sub-continent. Within this organised hierarchy, the study of Hinduism is an important and influential discipline. This book under review argues that the discipline has been shaped by the use of preconceived Euro-centric categories that are assumed to be universal by Western syndicated research. Most criticism or 'peer review' comes from a coterie of scholars who are linked and interlinked (financially and organisationally!) in different ways and they take particular care to largely exclude practitioners of Hinduism. The mass producers and distributors of this specialised knowledge (mainly of the Hate-India and Hate-Hindu Religion variety) comprise a sort of closed, culturally insular cartel, which has disastrous consequences for original thinking about India and Hinduism. The heated controversies described in detail in this book have emerged out of the Indian diasporas' debates with RISA scholars.
 Keeping in view the fact that much of this scholarship always attempts to portray Hindu culture and therefore Indian culture as pathological, exotic and abusive, a diaspora intellectual named Rajiv Malhotra has coined a beautiful generic term called HINDUPHOBIA to describe this anti-India and anti-Hindu religion phenomenon. Rajiv Malhotra is a remarkable crusader, indeed an Intellectual Kshatriya, cast in a very grand mould. He is the founder of The Infinity Foundation which is a non-profit organisation based in Princeton, New Jersey engaged in making grants in the areas of compassion and wisdom. His aim is to create a global family, a 'Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam.' This requires that indigenous non-Western civilisations get a seat on the international table as equals in crafting the frameworks of discourse, rather than simply being used as exotic artifacts to be plugged into an overall Euro-Centric framework. Re-vitalising the Indic discourse and helping India find its own voice in this dialogue is a key part of Infinity Foundation's mission. This avant-garde book owes its origin and inspiration to RISA Lila: Wendy's Child Syndrome, a seminal essay by Rajiv Malhotra published on an Indian-American web magazine in September 2002. 
Antonio de Nicolas
Aditi Banerjee
       Sometimes ill-informed, biased and ignorant input from prejudiced purveyors of hate like Wendy Doniger and Martha Nussbaum can have an impact on US foreign policy. At a recent conference at the University of Chicago in which these two scholars and Amartya Sen participated, Nussbaum claimed that Americans are wrong to be focusing on Islamic Fundamentalism as a threat to democracy. To quote her words: 'Thinking about India is instructive to Americans who in an age of terrorism can easily over-simplify pictures of the forces that threaten democracy…in India, the threat to democratic ideals comes not from a Muslim threat, but from Hindu groups.'

        I am not very sure whether truth-defying and falsehood-mothering Wendy Doniger and Martha Nussbaum are aware of the following tribute paid to India by Mark Twain (1835-1910), a 'paganish' and 'heathenish' and saffronized Christian (!!) from America: 'India is, the cradle of the human race, the birthplace of human speech, the mother of history, the grandmother of legend, and the great grand mother of tradition. Our most valuable and most instructive materials in the history of man are treasured up in India only.'

        (To be contd...)
        (The writer is a retired IAS officer)
        e-mail the writer at vsundaram@newstodaynet.com
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