A ‘Hindu India’ Is Not Necessarily a Homogenous India

The Ram temple is being built, judicially sanctioned and “popularly” consecrated. By playing the karta at the ceremony and indeed laying the first silver foundation stone of the temple, Narendra Modi has in a sense combined in himself both the temporal and spiritual leadership of “Hindu” India.

Not unlike what Henry VIII did in 16th century England. The cultural “unification” of the country is presumably now complete.

We now live in a Hindu country, not India, never mind the fact that the Indian constitution is still that of a secular, democratic republic. That is a small technicality which can be set right in a trice.

However, as we have learnt from history, a unified cultural identity does not necessarily make for ‘One Nation.’ Pakistan is among the most recent examples of ‘One Nation.’ It was based on one religion but split on the basis of language fewer than 25 years later. Nepal was, for centuries, called the world’s only Hindu kingdom. It’s now a secular, democratic republic, to take care of the needs of the modern times and the country’s population diversity.

Much has been written and will continue to be written very justifiably about the status of the minorities, particularly the Muslims in the ‘New Hindu India’.

Also read: On Eve of Ram Temple Bhoomi Pujan, Those Who Demolished Babri Masjid Go Unpunished

So why not focus on Modi’s favoured people, who have “finally been freed from 1,500 years of foreign oppression:” the Hindus?

The ancient Persians invented the Hindu label and the English did the same with Hindi. Someone somewhere along the way defined India. Now Narendra Modi has redefined it. So, what is next? Within that cultural label we are men and women, Bengalis and Tamils, Brahmins, Shudras and Dalits, Hindus, rich and poor, not to speak of Muslims, Christians and Sikhs. Has that changed?

Within the somewhat narrower definition of Hindu, those who follow the faith are broadly speaking Vaishnavites and Shaivites. The Adivasis and Dalits are left out altogether. 

Will Ram now become the presiding deity of this newly-minted theocratic state? If so, will all citizens regardless of caste or faith and creed have access to the temple since the present dispensation appears to have earmarked it as the symbol of a Hindu country earlier known as India? 

Ram is said to be the seventh human avatar of Vishnu, one of the triumvirate of Hindu gods at the apex of the pyramid. The other two – Brahma and Shiva do not visit periodically as avatars and the former has very few dedicated temples. So what happens to the myriad Shiva temples – including Somnath, Kashi Vishwanath, Kedarnath and the nine other Jyotirlingas? Will they be reduced to the status of monuments of a lesser god? 

In other words, will a part of Northern Vaishnavite Hindu India, significantly vegetarian, hold sway over all of India including the largely Shaivite mostly non-vegetarian and non-Hindi speaking East in the name of Hinduism? 

With exclusions galore, India’s temples and hence its creed lead a deeply fractured existence. Forget about the non-Hindus, there are exclusions galore within the Hindu faith. Menstruating women were until recently not allowed entry into Sabarimala temple, a regulation that is even now the subject of dispute in the Supreme Court.   

Despite the many temple entry movements throughout the 20th century, Dalits and Adivasis are often denied entry into various Hindu shrines even now. As for non-Hindus, they are denied entry in most, if not all, major Hindu temples. 

In day to day life, the Dalits and Adivasis are socially ostracised, beaten and even killed for minor actions such as drawing water from the village well.

Also read: Uttar Pradesh: Upper Caste Villagers Force Body of Dalit Woman Off Funeral Pyre

Hinduism had no competition for centuries during its formative and evolutionary years. You were either born a Hindu or you were not there at all, there was no one else to turn to. Since there was no one else, there was no need for conversion; on the contrary the advancing Hindu faith took care of those conquered but outside the faith through Vishnu, whose human avatars like Ram became their god as well and they became Hindus. 

The first threat came from Mahavira and the Jains in the 6th century BCE, followed soon thereafter by an even stronger challenge from Gautam Buddha in the 5th-4th century BCE.

Then came the law giver Manu and his Manusmriti somewhere between 2 BCE and 3 CE. The Hindu backlash, led primarily by the Brahmins, stratified Hindu society itself and also force fed it with various rituals mostly dealing with food. It led to the total marginalisation of both Jainism and Buddhism in what is today’s India.

Buddhism flourished in neighbouring Sri Lanka and Myanmar and further afield in China and Japan giving rise to the perennial question in history examinations: Why did Buddhism fail to spread in India, the land of its birth? In other words, when faced with competition the Hindu elite was no longer non-violent, far before the advent of Christianity and Islam.

It still isn’t.

Apart from the great schism within Hinduism, Vaishnavite vs Shaivite, Dusserah vs Durga Puja there is the division between North and South. Not all Tamils for example revere Ram. Not all women are likely to do so because of what he did to his wife, Sita and two sons, abandoning all three.

And even more than Pakistan, what of the linguistic implications of a Hindu India led by people who also believe in the supremacy of Hindi: Hindu, Hindi, Hindustan being their war cry for decades?

Far from having galvanised and unified a fractious nation, the latest depredations of the Hindutva brigade will be unable to keep even the Hindus together. The cultural genie is now out of the bottle and it will be an impossible task to try and put it back in.

Anikendra Sen is a journalist who shuttles between New Delhi and Kathmandu.