Where are the poor Hindus?

by Francois Gautier
January 31, 2006

The consequences of Sonia Gandhi becoming what the French call the eminence grise -- one who controls everything from behind the scenes -- for India are not only visible for all those who care to look, but also have far-reaching -- and maybe irreversible -- consequences.

Occultism, in the ancient sense, was the manipulation of forces which cannot be seen, but which constantly clash in the world.

One could say politics is the art of controlling these forces, overtly and covertly. At the top, great leaders create their own occultism. Their very presence generates certain atmospheres, which make or unmake revolutions.
At the outset, one should first say the world is not Black and White, Good and Evil, Superman versus the Bad Guys, as the Americans would like us to believe.

Hindu groups need not demonise Sonia Gandhi.

She probably was a good wife to Rajiv Gandhi, a good daughter-in-law to Indira Gandhi. And by all accounts she is a good mother to her children, judging by the way they dote on her.

One also hears first-hand reports about her concern for smaller people, her dignity in the suffering that befell her when her husband was blown to pieces, and her courtesy with visitors.

That said, what is happening in India at the moment makes me profoundly uneasy.

I am a Westerner and a born Christian. Yet, I find it absurd that in a country of one billion people -- one of the most ancient civilisations of this world -- Indians cannot find an Indian to govern themselves.

There are many good and talented people within the Congress. And one wonders what is this unconscious, occult urge that makes them look up to someone, who, however well-meaning, is alien to their culture.

Let us first look at the visible, overt consequences of Sonia Gandhi's supreme leadership.

There is, of course,the Quattrocchi affair. Did Law Minister Hansraj Bhardwaj order to defreeze the Italian's British bank accounts only to please Sonia? Or did Bhardwaj do that on her orders, even though the Central Bureau of Investigation took the blame?

Then, we have the Iraqi Oil for Food scam.

Could it be that the go ahead for K Natwar Singh and his son's Iraq trip came from Sonia through her trusted aides?

And what about Kashmir? Is Sonia planning some concessions, which in effect will deprive India of this most ancient and sacred piece of earth?

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has just held talks with People's Conference chief Sajjad Ghani Lone. What is General Musharraf's game, now that he has dazzled the West, who laid everywhere a red carpet for him?
Is the man who conceived Kargil sincere?

Pervez Musharraf is a clever magician. Nobody in India has found anything to confirm that he is actually holding talks with the Hurriyat leaders, who want Kashmir to separate from India and most likely go to Pakistan.
There is in India an obsession and a fear of a small country that has lost the four wars it initiated with India.
Then, most dangerous of all, we have Nepal.

Because of the intense pressure of India's Communists, India is pushing the king of Nepal into China's arms (Beijing just delivered 25 trucks of weapons to Nepal) and Pakistan, which is opening consular posts everywhere.

If Nepal is taken over by the Maoists, India will be surrounded by three intensely hostile entities: Tibet (under China), Nepal and the valley of Kashmir, which Pakistan wants by force or guile. All of these are on a height, which gives tremendous strategic advantage.

Dr Singh keeps praising China, but there is no doubt that Beijing is New Delhi's deadliest enemy. It does not need to fight a war, as it is invading India with cheap products, encircling India by making deals with hostile nations, beating India in the energy sector and quietly blocking India's entry into the United Nations Security Council.

Is Sonia aware of all this? If she is, then she does not act in India's best interests.

Let's come to the covert, occult signs.

I am a little uneasy when I see how much Christianity is taking over India under the reign of Sonia Gandhi.
According to the 2001 census, there are about 2.34 million Christians in India; not even 2.5 per cent of the nation, a negligible amount.

Yet, there are today five Christian chief ministers in Nagaland, Mizoram, Meghalaya, Kerala and Andhra Pradesh.

I share with Sonia a love for India. Like her, I have lived in this country for over 30 years. Like her, I have married an Indian.

But nevertheless, since she is at the top, Christian conversions in India seem to have gone into overdrive.
More than 4,000 foreign Christian missionaries are involved in conversion activities across different states. In Tripura, there were no Christians at Independence; there are 120,000 today, a 90 per cent increase since 1991.
The figures are even more striking in Arunachal Pradesh, where there were only 1,710 Christians in 1961, but 1.2 million today, as well as 780 churches!

In Andhra Pradesh, churches are coming up every day in far-flung villages and there was even an attempt to set up one near Tirupati.

Many northeast separatist movements are not only Christian dominated, but sometimes function with the covert backing of the missionaries.

In Kerala, particularly in the poor coastal districts, you find 'miracle boxes' in local churches. The gullible villager writes out a paper mentioning his wish: A fishing boat, a loan for a pucca house, fees for the son's schooling, etc. And a few weeks later, the miracle happens!

Of course, the whole family converts, making others in the village follow suit.

During the tsunami, entire Dalit villages in Tamil Nadu were converted to Christianity with the lure of money.
Then there is this rapid Westernisation of India.

There are good things in the West -- its material consciousness, care for nature, logical mind -- but it is nevertheless in crisis. Its Church is in disarray, three marriages out of five end in divorce and some children need to go to psychiatrists before they start shooting other children.

Yet, if you have a look at most of the mainstream English-speaking Indian magazines and newspapers today, you will notice that all their cover stories deal with Western concepts, that they are looking at India from a Western point of view, such as talking about 'New Age' spirituality.

As if spirituality is new to India!

You will notice that there is never any reference to India's great past, or to India's philosophy, or medicine -- which, by the way, is becoming fashionable in the West.

Brinda Karat went after Swami Ramdev and Ayurveda, the oldest medical system still in practice in the world, although she did not get much support.

Notice also that when the Shankaracharya of Kanchi is arrested, a section of the Indian intelligentsia applauds, though he has still not been proven guilty.

And that when a new Pope is elected in Rome, we get in India hours of live coverage and countless cover stories.

The occult effect of it is that nobody realises that in a country of 850 million Hindus, you have now a Sikh prime minister -- when Sikhs constitute only 2 per cent of the country's population; a Muslim President -- when Muslims make up 10 per cent of India; a Communist Speaker in Parliament -- when Communism is moribund the world over; and a Western and Christian supreme leader, when Westerners constitute only 0.0001 per cent of India and Christians 3 per cent.

Where are the poor Hindus?

What will happen if India becomes enough Westernised at the social level, Christianised and Islamised at the religious level and taken over by the Marxists at the intellectual level?

Not only will India lose its unique soul and just become another Western clone in the developing world, but the earth will lose something very precious.

It will lose an ancient knowledge, a irreplaceable way of being, which makes even the most ordinary farmer or coolie carry something unique in his or her genes: A tolerance, an acceptance that god can take many forms, an innate philosophical mind, an understanding that there is something beyond us, beyond death.

Indian Christians are different from any Christians in the world, Indian Muslims different from any Muslims in the world. They would also lose.

Maybe it is thus necessary for Indians to see for themselves the harmful effects of Sonia being queen.
Only then will they realise that it is important to have an Indian at the top, someone who is in touch with India's ideals and spirituality.

Decline in Hindu population led to rise in terrorism —Mohan Bhagwat

2006-01-31

NEWDELHI,JANUARY 31: "It is because of the rapid decline in Hindu population that the whole world is today in the grip of terrorism. The reason of growing terrorism in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Myanmar and Tibet is their separation from India”, said Shri Mohan Bhagwat, Sarkaryavah of RSS. He was speaking at a function of Madhya Bharat Prant held in Vidisha recently. He said besides terrorism, threat to security on borders, unrest in Kashmir and Assam, the country is crying due to deep-rooted corruption. He further said there are all-round onslaughts on Hindus. After the Kanchi Shankaracharya, Swami Ramdev has been targeted. Describing the Sangh work as god’s work, he said after 80 years the Sangh has become a formidable force, which is very difficult for anyone to ignore. He said the country would be strong and developed with the unity of Hindu society. “The solution to all problems lies with India and the key to development of India is the Sangh,” he said calling upon the Sangh workers to refrain from the usual weaknesses of the society. He pointed out that despite having unqualified and very small force, Chhattrapati Shivaji had defeated the enemies with strong will-power and firm determination. He said those who have firm determination never get defeated. “Those who continue to proceed, achieve their goals. We should work without having any ego so that the society gets clean and good image of our work. We should not disturb our balance due to the disturbance among others. We must be careful of satta (political power), bhatta (money), adhikar (rights) and dhan (wealth). We have to work in the society without coming into limelight. A Swayamsevak should always keep in mind the clean image of the Sangh while working in the society,” he said. He said wrong things get more publicity in the society. This is the mentality of us Indians which should be removed. Referring to a book of Arun Shourie, Shri Bhagwat said the communist China too is now turning to nationalism. Talking about the media, he said the credibility of media is at stake. He advised the Swayamsevaks to be careful of the misleading news carried by the media about the Sangh and its workers.

Indian secualrists helped ISI

1/28/2006 11:20:03 AM Mahadev

A former senior official of the IB has unfurled a series of information as to how the pseudo secular political parties and the politicians, including MPs, a Chief Minister, newspapers, dozens of MLAs across the country and several Muslim organisations were sources of information for the Inter Services Intelligence (ISI), which has been spearheading a “Jehadist thrust” into “Hindu” India.

According to a report by the Indian News Agency, UNI, The former IB Joint Director, Mr Maloy Krishna Dhar, who admits ideological affinity with the BJP, builds on his "Open Secrets:India's Intelligence Unveiled" (2005) with his latest offering: "Fulcrum of Evil--ISI-CIA-Al Qaeda Nexus" (Manas publications) by linking the ISI to a global axis of jehadist organizations.

Just as the KGB under the erstwhile Soviet Union and the CIA of the United States did in the past, the ISI has been remarkably successful in penetrating the highest rungs of "Indian political
spectrum" and other vital sectors of national activities, he says. Indian intelligence agencies fail not because of incompetence, but because the "political masters had not armed these sensitive organs of governance with adequate sinews of war", he writes.

Pakistan achieved "spectacular success" in "penetrating the security diaphragm of certain areas of the political spectrum" through embassy-based officials in Delhi, central Indian states, east
and north east India, Maharashtra and Gujarat; through political and religious leaders in southern Indian states; and through political, media and religious intermediaries in three major eastern states, he says.

"A major target area was the Parliament secretariat office, from which sensitive documents related to questions and answers and meetings of Estimate Committee, Standing Committee and Public Accounts Committee on defense and other sensitive areas were smuggled out. Such papers are also gathered through certain Members of Parliament. Members of Parliament frequenting the intellectuals' hubs in Delhi and prestigious hotels were tapped directly and
indirectly through common media friends".

"This process continues unabated as Indian intelligence fraternity fights shy of political top guns, as they are not sure who will be the next boss in Delhi".Dhar writes that the ISI had been greatly successful in "penetrating over a dozen legislators and a provincial chief minister" in "central-northern India". The CM had been brought "under the scanner" for maintaining questionable clandestine links”, he says.

"These were not routine national day and roja Iftar contacts. Reasonable suspicion had arisen about funnelling of funds by Kuwait, Iran and Pakistan embassies to such politicians from this region". He says national sensitivity about "secularism" prevented deeper probe into clandestine contacts between Pakistan chancery-based intelligence operatives and certain legislators of northern, eastern and southern states.

A counter-intelligence agency had noticed the ISI's penetration in half a dozen legislators, prominent labour leaders and frontal student's unions in West Bengal, ten legislators and two ministers in Assam, four MLAs and a minister in Bihar, he says. The ISI had also achieved "moderate to average success" in penetrating "segments of the political spectrum" in Kerala, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Maharashtra and Gujarat, he adds.

To the question whether the ISI funded Indian newspapers and elections, he says the answer was "a straight yes". ISI funding of newspapers in Assam, West Bengal, Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Delhi, Maharashtra, Karnataka, Kerala and Andhra Pradesh had come to light,
he reveals.

The sister of a journalist having access to the Prime Minister in 1987-88 was being cultivated by a Pakistani diplomat and the PM was tipped off in time about this, he says. The depth of the ISI's Indian coverage was "comparable to the success earlier achieved by the KGB and the CIA", he claims while detailing how Pakistan was continuously seeking to deepen strife and intensify its agenda in India. Interestingly, he admits that India had been retaliating by giving covert support to Baloch, Pashtun and Sindhi separatists in Pakistan.

Pakistan was seeking to spread Jihad among Indian Muslims as part of its long-term strategy to re-establish Islamic hegemony in the subcontinent by defeating the 'Jahilya' Hindu society, he says. "The ISI is required to be studied in the context of global jihad concept enunciated by Osama bin Laden and Al Jawahiri of the Al Qaeda al Sulbah".

Invasion Theories: Tool of the destruction for the Colonialists, Racists…

By: Saumitra Sen
January 30, 2006

The concept of Aryan Invasion theory being a handiwork of the British colonialists for the sake of proving the superiority of the European Caucasian races is not an isolated case. There exist a similar theory in other part of the world, involving other nations and other ethnicities and I wonder why hasn’t anyone yet given an attention over that.

If we see the map of middle Africa, we see two little countries named Rwanda and Burundi, bordering Zaire (or Democratic Republic of Congo). With the name Rwanda it suddenly flashes in our mind, the picture of ethnic violence, civil war, genocide and military juntas. Few Indians know the history of Rwanda or Burundi. These countries are inhabited by two different so-called ethnic groups, namely Hutu and Tutsi. The ethnic composition of these countries is as follows:

1) Rwanda – Hutu 84%, Tutsi 15%, Twa (Pygmies) 1%
2) Burundi – Hutu 85%, Tutsi 14%, Twa (Pygmies) 1%

Among these the minority Tutsis are believed to be the Hamitic people, a race which was often intermixed with the whiter races from North, particularly from Ethiopia and Egypt, which on their turn were intermixed by the Asiatic people, mainly Hittites, by the repeated invasions from the North. And these people are said to have arrived from North and thus not the native people of Rwanda.

The majority of Hutus are believed to be Bantu, the original African race which spilled out from the mid-Western African coast of Nigeria, Cameroon, Ghana, Togo, Benin, Cote d’ Ivoire and the inland countries of Burkina Faso and some other parts of the neighbouring countries.

Tutsis are considered to be the foreigners, invaders or migrants in the Rwanda-Burundi region. Hutus are said to be a much older race but not the original one. The original inhabitants of the Rwanda-Burundi region are said to be the Pygmies, who consist only 1% of the population of the region. It is said that Tutsis despite being the minorities, consider themselves superior in race and constitute the reigning elite and aristocracy of Rwanda-Burundi and they have subjugated the more indigenous Hutus from centuries and have forced them to agriculture and to the inferior position. Now, the crystallization of the theory. Hutus and Tutsis are two completely separate races, with Black Hutus forming the oppressed majority and the more original inhabitants of Rwanda-Burundi, and the fairer Tutsis forming the oppressing minority and the foreign invaders.

This accounts for a Rwandan version of the Aryan Invasion Theory, namely the Tutsi Invasion theory.

Here we have some startling parallels with the Aryan Invasion theory here. Northern Indians, namely Aryans are said to be the ultimate foreign invaders or migrants. Southern Indians, namely Dravidians are said to be the much older inhabitants of Indian sub-continent who were invaded by the Aryans and were oppressed and driven in the interiors and to the South of the Indian continent, with the ultimate consequence of being incorporated into the Hindu fold of caste system and occupying the lowest rung of Indian society. And even these so-called Dravidians are not considered as the original inhabitants of the India. There is said to be a Dravidian migration into India long before that of the Aryans, and some so-called aboriginals (such as Santhals) are considered to be the originals of India, which were forced into the jungles by the invasions, migrations of Dravidians, followed by Aryans.

About Aryan Invasion theory and the cause of its origin much has been said in this debate, and will be said in future so here I go for the explanation of Tutsi Invasion theory, its cause and origin and its socio-political consequences.

Hutus and Tutsis never as such existed as two different ethnic groups or races and were never at war with each other. The history of ethnic violence in the region began with the advent of colonialism in Africa and Rwanda-Burundi. Rwanda-Burundi was a part of German East Africa but after the World War I, it was occupied by Belgium and made a Belgian colony. It was these colonial Belgian masters of Rwanda-Burundi who started entertaining strange ethnic differences and racial differences between the two so-called different groups Hutus and Tutsis, and created the Hutu-Tutsi rift. They invented two separate races, the racist Tutsi Invasion theory and invented the divide between them, labeling Tutsis as aristocratic rulers and Hutus as the oppressed masses.

It seems that skin colour superiority is so deeply embedded in the psyche of West that they rarely get out of it.

While the Hutu and Tutsi are often considered by the followers of this Tutsi Invasion theory, as two separate ethnic groups, scholars point out that they speak the same language, have a history of intermarriage, and share many cultural characteristics. Traditionally, the differences between the two groups were occupational rather than ethnic. Agricultural people were considered Hutu, while the cattle-owning elite were identified as Tutsi. Supposedly Tutsi were tall, thin and fair, while Hutu were short, black and square, but it is often impossible to tell one from the other. (as reported by the Time Almanac)

This distinction was increased and racialized in 1933 by the Belgian government requirement that everyone carry an identity card indicating tribal ethnicity as Tutsi or Hutu, in order to play the power politics between the inhabitants of the nation and thus letting them bogged down in civil war.

Since, independence, repeated violence in both Rwanda and Burundi has increased ethnic differentiation between the groups. Some 2.5 million Tutsis and Hutus are massacred in mutual ethnic cleansing, and genocide. The usual opportunist African leaders are much common in Rwanda-Burundi and they have exacerbated the ethnic tensions of their countries by inciting the hatred between the two groups on the basis of the supposed ethnic difference between the two. Hutu leaders have described Tutsis as cockroaches and they used to telecast their views on radio during the 1994 Rwandan genocide of Tutsis, which inspired the common Hutus to massacre the Tutsis, in a bid to annihilate them completely.

So a peaceful, placid nation with a common populace was destroyed and annihilated by the colonialist, racist view of the Tutsi Invasion theory.

But why are we learning this? Because Tutsi Invasion theory has ominous parallels with Aryan Invasion theory as explained above. The cause of the origin of TIT is also the same as that of AIT. And the ethnic tension and violence was also incited between the North Indians and the South Indians. The DMK, AIADMK and all the other anti-Hindu, anti-Brahmin movements (namely the Periyar movement) were the consequence of this racist Aryan Invasion theory. If not for Hinduism and its cultural ethos, India would have gone the way of Rwanda and Burundi. (Remember, Rwandans and Burundians have been converted to Christianity) But anti-Hindu leadership of India, and the Marxist academia and media is bent on defending the Aryan Invasion theory/AMT, in league with their traitorous aims, and anti-Hindu, anti-Indian designs. By keeping the various sections of Hindu society at war with each other they can maintain their political hold over India, and AIT is a proven tool for their designs.

The opposition of AIT is derided as an emotional, chauvinist handiwork of Hindu nationalist or fundamentalists. But the difference between Tutsis and Hutus is denied by the modern genuine Western scholars (non-Witzels). Is it also a handiwork of an emotional, chauvinist Tutsi nationalists?

The answer lies in the correct reading of the indigenous history through various new tools of Science and Archaeology and the deconstruction of the colonial edifice which has so far promoted the racist theories in order to prove the White supremacy.

HATING HINDUS IN A ‘SCHOLARLY’ WAY

California Textbooks Controversy: Politicization of an Academic Issue by Hindu-Haters

By Vishal Agarwal
26 January 2006

PART IV: HATING HINDUS IN A ‘SCHOLARLY’ WAY

Part I of the article dealt with the uphill battle faced by Hindus.

I am jumping the gun and writing this Part IV before publishing parts II and III because a lot of academically unsound ideas are being propagated by Michael Witzel and following him, ‘Friends of South Asia’ (FOSA) against the Hindu edits.

It is surprising or perhaps not, that FOSA, which has demonstrable links with FOIL or Federation of Inquilabi (‘Revolutionary’) Leftists and AID (Association for India’s Development), has focused only on fighting the Hindu edits. They have not questioned the conflict of Islamic edits with historical facts. Why is FOSA singling out Hindus? What is the stance of FOSA on Leftist Inquilabs (Revolutions) leading to killings of hundreds of people in India and Nepal every year?

It is a fact that Hinduism and India are given an unfair treatment in history and other social science textbooks at all levels in the United States. Instead of playing a constructive role in correcting this situation, why is FOSA trying to FOIL this effort by Hindu groups?

This Q&A below attempts to present a Hindu perspective on major points of controversy and rebut the viewpoint of Indian American Communists and their academic supporters.

I. EDITS RELATED TO NATURE OF HINDUISM:

1. Why are Hindu edits insisting that Hindu scriptures are revealed? Is it not a specialty of Hinduism that unlike Abrahamic faiths, its scriptures are not revealed to Prophets?

• The textbooks refer to holy books of all other religions as Divinely revealed texts, whereas Hindu holy texts are referred to as ‘poems’, ‘stories’ and ‘myths’. The notion that Hindu scriptures have a Divine origin is found within the Vedas (notably in the Purusha Sukta where all Mantras are said to be the breath of Purusha) themselves although obviously the notion of Rishis’ Divine vision of the Mantras differs from the notions of Prophetic revelations in Abrahamic Faiths. In classical Hinduism, the Divine word itself is represented as Divinity (Devi Sarasvati, Devi Gayatri and so on).
• Later traditions (within the time frame of Ancient India) such as Pashupata, Pancharatra, Itihasas, Vaisheshika (Prashastapada Bhashya), Vedanta, Puranas all accord a Divine (Ishvara, Shiva, Vishnu, Brahman) origin to the Vedas.
• Hindu students in the past have been told by their Judeo-Christian classmates that their religion is inferior because Hindu scriptures are man-made whereas the Bible is given by God.

2. Are HEF/VF trying to inject Monotheism into descriptions of Hinduism in these textbooks?

• I believe that terms such as monotheism, panentheism, pantheism, henotheism etc., are all inadequate in explaining the Hindu notion of Divine. We are trying to describe an ancient religion using the modern vocabulary of a foreign language! Hinduism is also monotheistic (or monistic) although Hindu monotheism is different from Abrahamic monotheism. Michael Witzel, conditioned by his own Lutheran background, is looking for the latter in Hinduism and has therefore rejected the Hindu edit. Unlike Abrahamic monotheism (that seems to be the standard yardstick for comparison in the minds of Michael Witzel and FOSA-FOIL), the Hindu God is not just transcendent, but also immanent. God is not just a unit in Heaven, or just male. Rather, God is that in which the entire creation attains unity.
• Hindus do not see any contradiction in extolling many gods simultaneously while understanding that the underlying reality is one. Hindu philosophy explains that just as the same water is present invisibly, pervading in the atmosphere, and also as dew drops, ponds, rivers and the ocean, so also there is no contradiction in the Divinity manifesting in various forms, while being transcendent and immanent. Just as one praises the same water whether one praises the ocean or pond or dewdrops or atmospheric moisture collectively or individually, so also Hindus do not see any contradiction in worship the Supreme reality in one cherished form or in multiple forms or in a formless version.
• The highest Hindu traditions clearly ask us to recognize the Unity inherent in the diversity of Divine Forms, or approach the Supreme Being through their favorite Form (Ishta Devata), just as we can approach the same Ocean sticking to any particular river. The word ‘Devata’ (see last citation below) is used in many senses.

The earliest Vedic texts also emphasize the Unity of Divinity, the underlying reality behind all deities and creation (a small sample):

Rigveda 1.164.46
Rigveda 6.45.16
Rigveda 8.1.1
Rigveda 10.121.1-10 (‘kasmai’ in the first 9 verses is glossed as ‘ekasmai’ in the Paippalada Atharvaveda version)
Yajurveda (Madhyandina) 32.1
Atharvaveda (Shaunakiya) 10.7.32
Atharvaveda (Shaunakiya) 10.7.33
Atharvaveda (Shaunakiya) 10.7.34
Atharvaveda (Shaunakiya) 13.4.16-19

Some extracts: That (Supreme Being) is Agni; that is the sun; that is the wind; that is the moon; that is light; that is Brahman; and that is Prajapati. Madhyandina Yajurveda 32.1

They call Him Indra, Mitra, Varuna, Agni, and he is the Divine good winged bird (the sun with beautiful rays). The sages describe one and the same Divine Being in various ways and call it Agni, Yama and Matarisvan. Rigveda 1.164.46

He is our Father, Creator and Ordainer knows all the places and all creatures. He alone is the name giver of the gods. The other beings approach him to enquire about Him. Rigveda 10.82.3

There are, no doubt, two forms of Brahman- one having a form and the other formeless. The Mortal and the immortal. The stationary and the moving. The discernible and the indiscernible. Brihadaranyaka Upanishad 2.3.1

That under which the year revolves with its days, the gods worship that as the light of lights and as life immortal, that in which the people of all the five regions of the Earth and space are established, that alone I regard as the Soul; known that immortal Brahman, I too am immortal. Brihadaranyaka Upanishad. 4.4.16-17

On account of superb excellence if the Divinity, one soul (i.e., the All-pervading Soul) is extolled in various ways. The other (manifest) gods are just like the limbs of the Great Soul, the secondary members of the body. The specialists in this branch of study observe that the Rishis praise the beings according to the plurality and Universality of their intrinsic nature. The gods are (figuratively described in the Veda as) born from each other (e.g., Rigveda 10.72.4). The gods are the primary source of each other. They owe their birth, i.e., coming into being, to their specific functions as well as to the (Universal) Soul. Soul alone is their chariot, horse, weapon and arrow, i.e., these things which are not different from the Soul are only figurative appellations in their descriptions. Nirukta 7.4

• Hundreds of such passages can be cited from Hindu texts in ancient India but the above should be sufficient. Everyday simple statements uttered by even illiterate Hindus like ‘this is all the Maayaa of Ishvara’ confirm their faith in the underlying Unity of Divinity.
• It is true that a few Hindu sectarians like to extol one Form over the other, but the Hindu masses are very comfortable using generic terms for God such as Ishvara, Brahman, Prabhu, Hari, Rama (which often denote Divinity as such, rather than specific deities, as in the works of Kabirdas). And this is the dominant and mainstream view that should be taught to sixth grade children rather than confusing them with non-mainstream views.

3. Why are Hindu edits trying to read late Bhakti ideologies into ancient Hinduism?

• HEF/VF have not made any such attempt. The ancient period which these textbooks cover stretches to 600 AD and therefore includes theistic major texts of Hinduism such as the Gita, Ramayana, Mahabharata and several Puranas, and a few Pancharatras, Tantras, Pashupata Agamas etc.
• It is erroneous on part of FOSA and Michael Witzel to suggest that devotional theistic paths are necessarily ‘later’. The following works gives ample evidence of Bhakti in Rigveda:

Jeanine Miller. Does Bhakti Appear in the Rigveda. Bharatiya Vidya Bhawan: Mumbai, 1996

• The following work collects hundreds of devotional passages in the four Vedas –

A C Bose. Hymns from the Vedas. Asia Publishing House: Bombay (1964)

• The word Bhakti itself occurs in the Gita, Shvetashvatara Upanishad, and in Vyasabhashya on Yogasutras which belong to the ancient Indian period. Words with similar meanings also occur abundantly in Mahabharata, Ramayana and the Gita.
• Certain Western as well as Indian scholars (e.g., R N Dandekar) have sought to find Abrahamic devotion in the Vedas, and when they did not find it (except in Varuna hymns), they declared that Bhakti is practically absent in the Vedas. However, when the Hindu notions of Bhakti are searched in the Vedas using Hindu notions of Bhakti, we find ample evidence as shown by competent scholars such as Dr Velankar.

4. Why are Hindu Edits denying that Sanskrit is no longer spoken in India?

• A few villages in India still speak Sanskrit, which is also one of the officially recognized languages. There are radio broadcasts in Sanskrit. Journals, dramas, epics, poems and books are still published in this language. Organizations such as Sanskrit Bharati have been popularizing conversational Sanskrit in India. Sanskrit scholars in Tirupati, Varanasi, Sringeri, Pune, Ujjain and many other cities are still composing Sanskrit texts, and even translating works of Shakespeare and Omar Khayyam into Sanskrit. Philosophical debates and discussions in Sanskrit still occur in public places.
• Even modern scholarship acknowledges Sanskrit speakers (although in small numbers) numbering hundreds in India. For instance;

Hans Heinrich Hock. ‘Spoken Sanskrit in Uttar Pradesh’. PP. 247-260 in ‘Dimensions of Sociolinguistics in South Asia’ ed. By Edward C Dimock et al

• There are also large Sanskrit knowing literati communities in Newari and Parbatia Nepal, in Kerala (India).

II. HINDU EDITS RELATED TO SOCIAL ISSUES:

5. Why are Hindu edits hesitant in admitting that women in ancient Hindu society had inferior rights to women?

• Equality of sexes is a modern is a modern ideal that is yet to be realized in our own times. How many Presidents of the United States of America have been women? None.
• Therefore, it goes without saying that all traditional and ancient societies, and all organized religions gave an unequal status to women and men. And yet, the proposed Ancient History textbooks for Grade VI for California students single out ancient India and Hinduism for its alleged unfair treatment, and for granting women ‘inferior rights’. All the books do not have a single positive statement on the contributions that women have made to Hindu heritage. In discussions of all other religions, these (and Grade VII textbooks on the medieval period covering Islam) either leave out this aspect, or carefully hedge negative statements with positive ones.
• The textbooks completely ignore other facets of women in ancient Hindu society such as the fact that Hinduism alone of all the current organized religions worships God in ‘His’ feminine aspect as well, that Hindus have a continuous tradition of women saints, seers, that Hindu texts speak of learned women with a profound knowledge of scriptures, that Hindu women philosophers are also known to have participated in debates (e.g., Brihadaranyaka Upanishad 3.3). Several examples of achievements of Hindu women in ancient and medieval times are listed at this website.
• The textbooks (especially the Glencoe textbook) also contain errors of fact regarding women in ancient India when they make unilateral statements saying that women could not study Hindu scriptures, they were harassed if they did not commit Sati and so on. So errors of fact, and bias prompted correctives from Hindu Americans.
• The singularly one-sided negative treatment of role of women in Hindu society in these textbooks is a part of a larger pattern covering all American textbooks.

6. Why are Hindu edits so apologetic about the Caste System?

Modern Hindus like myself are committed to the eradication of casteism, caste based discrimination and caste-system as such. We should object to the discussions on caste system in these textbooks because:

• The detailed description of Hindu caste-system in these textbooks is at the expense of other organizing principles and defining world views in the Hindu society such as the systems of Ashramas, Purusharthas, liberating yogas etc.
• The caste system was more of a normative concept with little basis in social reality according to prominent scholars such as Nicholas Dirks and M N Srinivas. The more relevant social organization was Jaati, which is hardly dealt with in most of the textbooks.
• The accounts in these textbooks ignore the movements of Jatis from one varna to the other via a process of Sanskritization etc. Textbooks ignore that many so-called Shudras actually gave rise to powerful ruling houses, served as warriors and soldiers. The accounts in the textbook are obsessively negative.
• Textbook account ends at 600 AD, whereas FOSA-Witzel want us to inject later versions of the social organization in the Hindu society and relate it forcibly with present day situation.
• Descriptions of other religions ignore exploitative institutions (slavery, dhimmitude, ill-treatment of Gypsies/Jew/Africans etc) in their respective societies, placing Hinduism at a disadvantage.
• The jaati system did have a few plus points (e.g., ensuring livelihood), but except for one textbook, all ignore them.
• The textbooks ignore the fundamental contributions that the ‘lower castes’ have made to Hinduism be it its scriptures (practically the entire cannon is recited or redacted by people of mixed or lower castes), religious practices (sects worshipping deities such as Jagannatha) and so on. They tend to portray the lower castes as passively tolerating upper-caste hegemony and deny the former any agency or intelligence.
• The textbooks also give undue importance to normative texts such as Manusmriti, while ignoring often more authoritative and more popular scriptures that contradict Manu by giving a more benign and flexible view of the Varna system.
• The Gita has 700 verses of which not more than 30 (or 4%) deal with caste system. The Rigveda has 10552 mantras but only 1 mentions all the four castes, and not more than 20 mantras (0.2%) mention the different castes individually. The Samaveda has even a lower percentage of its 1875 mantras dealing with caste. The Yajurveda in all its recensions has very few (less than 3-4%) portions dealing with caste. The Atharvaveda with almost 6000 mantras (or 8000 in another version) likewise has very few references to caste. The last two have prayers for the welfare of Shudras, together with all other castes. So let the reader decide for himself! In any case, the Hindu tradition has had an internal debate on this issue, so why do the textbooks reduce Hinduism to caste, and the present it in purely negative terms?

7. Why is HEF trying to white-wash history by insisting on exclusion of the word ‘Dalit’ from textbooks?

First, this word is found only in one textbook out of the eight reviewed. So how can Hindu edits ‘white-wash’ history when it is not present in the other textbooks? Its removal is desirable because of the following reasons (noting that Hindu edits have never asked for deletion of the word ‘Shudra’ from textbooks) –

1. The word Dalit is not used as a self-referential term by ‘untouchables’ per se except by a small section of the community largely restricted to parts of Maharashtra. Mahatma Gandhi called them ‘Harijans’.
2. ‘Dalit’ identity is constructed, and it is not yet a pan-India social reality. People in the entire Gangetic plains (containing 1/3 of India’s population) barely use it, and it is rare in other large areas of India.
3. It should be noted that according to many scholars, there is no cognate in any Indian language for the term ‘untouchable’ and all Indian equivalents have been recent translations of the English word.
   
   See: Robert Deliege. The Untouchables of India, translated from French by Nora Scott, Berg Publishers, 1999, pp. 10-12
   
   
4. The pre-eminent leader of the community, namely Dr B R Ambedkar, never himself used the word Dalit as a ‘Proper Noun’ though he used it as an adjective for the community. According to some scholars, it was coined as a proper noun in 1972 by a militant group called Dalit Panthers Party [Joshi, B.: Untouchables! Voices of the Dalit Liberation Movement, pp. 141-147].
5. It should be noted that the textbooks end their narrative at 550-600 AD, and before this period, untouchability was a very marginal phenomenon restricted to a few groups such as Chandalas and Pulkassas, who were despised due to their lifestyles by the society. These sections sometimes also included degraded Brahmins and other non-Shudra castes. It is more appropriate to use this word in High School textbooks that discuss later Indian history, and HEF/VF are not objecting to its retention there.
   
   See the following work (in passim) for this:
   R.S.Sharma Sudras in Ancient India. Motilal Banarsidass: New Delhi, 2002
   
   
6. Modern caste relations have much more to do with later developments in the subsequent medieval period. For this reason, it is more appropriate to refer to ‘Dalits’ in high schools books that cover later periods of Indian history.
7. The very few negative references to untouchables in ancient India are found uniformly in Hindu, Jain and Buddhist texts. But Hinduism seems to be singled out in these textbooks.
8. The most eminent political party representing depressed classes uses 'Bahujan' instead.
9. Indian tradition itself uses more dignified words such as Harijan, which was used for untouchables by Saints such as Ramanuja (‘Thirukula’) in 1200 AD, Saint Kabir in 15th century and most importantly by Mahatma Gandhi in our own times.
10. Government of India itself uses the term ‘scheduled castes and scheduled tribes’.
11. Dalit is a highly politicized terms used in very recent years by a small group of ideologues to refers to all members in India classified as untouchables.
12. By use of this word in the textbook by Prentice Hall, Hinduism is being singled out to relate contemporary social evils to ancient religion. Corresponding chapters on other religions do not relate modern social evils to their ancient religious roots. Thus, for instance, the chapter on Islam does not say that Saudi Arabia values life of an infidel at a fraction of the life of a believer. Nor does it say anything about the lower status of black Muslims in Arab societies.
    

III. HINDU EDITS RELATING TO THE ARYANIST THEORIES

8. What is wrong in saying that the Aryans came into India from outside?

• The Aryan migration is merely a theory, with no evidence to support it. Even Intelligent Design theories have more evidence than AIT or related Aryan theories. This theory assumes that different languages correlate to different races of people. While the membership of Indo-Aryan languages in the larger Indo-European family is undisputable, it is questionable if we can assert that Indo-Aryan people were a branch of Indo-European people. As an analogy, consider how erroneous it would be to call ‘Mexicans’ as a part of a larger group ‘Indo-Europeans’ just because Mexicans speak Spanish, which is an Indo-European language. Language is just one indicator of ethnic identity. Moreover, the Indo-Europeans themselves are a constructed identity with no basis in history, literature or archaeology.
• History is no longer an armchair discipline and must take into account evidence from Hydronomy, archaeology, astronomy, metallurgy, genetics etc., and all this data forces us to reject these theories.
• These migration and theories persist because of academic inertia in throwing off the yoke of colonial and missionary theories from the 19th century. Many scholars have spent decades retro-fitting data into these old paradigms and they cannot watch the entire work of their lives getting rejected. These theories prevent understanding India and Hinduism on their own terms by forcing untenable linkages of everything Indian with something to the north of Black Sea of Caspian Sea.
• The Aryan Invasion and Migration theory are rooted in racism, colonialism and other despicable ideologies and maintain links to these even today. These theories are highly political in nature, with little evidential basis.
• Textbooks under dispute use this baseless and etic (‘outsider’) theory to explain the genesis of Hinduism whereas the believer’s perspective us used to explain the origin of Christianity, Islam and Judaism.

9. But isn’t there Vedic evidence for the Aryan Migration Theory?

No, there is none. Dr. Witzel has claimed that a Vedic text Baudhayana Srautasutra 18.44 contains literary evidence that Indo-Aryans immigrated from Central Asia into India. However, it has been shown that Witzel’s translation is incorrect. Further, the following other (four) translations actually take the passage to mean that segments of Persians and Afghans actually emigrated from northern parts of India towards Central Asia:

CALAND, Willem. 1903. “Eene Nieuwe Versie van de Urvasi-Mythe”. In Album-Kern, Opstellen Geschreven Ter Eere van Dr. H. Kern. E. J. Brill: Leiden, pp. 57-60

Tushifumi Goto; “Pururavas und Urvasi” aus dem neuntdecktem Vadhula-Anvakhyana (Ed. Y. Ikari); pp. 79-110 in Tichy, Eva and Hintze, Almut; Anusantatyai; J. H. Roll; Germany; 2000

KASHIKAR, Chintamani Ganesh. 2003. Baudhayana Srautasutra (Ed., with an English translation). 3 vols. New Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass/IGNCA

TRIVEDA, D. S. 1938-39. “The Original Home of the Aryans”. In ABORI, vol. XX, pp. 49-68

The voluminous Vedic literature, 8 times the length of the Bible, is completely silent about any Aryan migrations. It pre-supposes an indigenous population. Ancient literatures from Tamil and other languages also do not say anything about any Aryan migration from Central Asia.

10. Is there any archaeological evidence for an Aryan Migration into India?

• There is no archaeological evidence for an Aryan Migration, contrary to assertions by Michael Witzel who claims that there is evidence.
• It is sometimes claimed that the site of Pirak in Baluchistan shows remains of Aryan migrants. However, the excavator of that site Jean-Francois Jarrige himself denies this interpretation.
• It is also claimed by Michael Witzel that the Cemetery-H culture in Harappa shows evidence of Aryan intrusion. However reputed archaeologists such as Rafique Mughal and Jonathan Mark Kenoyer see archaeological continuity between Cemetery-H underlying archaeological artifacts, and deny that there is an proof there of an Aryan Migration.
• Gandhara Grave culture is sometimes used to see evidence of an Aryan migration. However, Dr Stacul who wrote the excavation report actually starts with the assumption of an Aryan invasion. The culture has revealed a mere 2.5 skeletons of buried horses (and Vedic Aryans are not exactly known to bury horses) that show marks of bit wear indicating that they were ridden (whereas the evidence for horse-riding in Rigveda is very scant and questionable). Some potsherds are claimed to represent horse depictions, but if these are judged using the same stringent criteria that are applied to Harappan artifacts (‘stiff manes, not horses, therefore only general equids’), then there is no reason to assume that they do indeed represent horses. In any case several Harappan sites have now turned up horse bones, terracotta representations, potsherd drawings as stated by Indian, Japanese, Hungarian archaeologists with no political axes to grind even though a particular zoo-archaeologist working with the same linguist keeps denying the same.
• The archaeological record shows no breaks, but only continuity in the relevant period and therefore any significant invasions and migrations are ruled out.

11. But isn’t there Linguistic evidence for an Aryan Migration at 1500 BCE?

The exact process by which the Indo-Aryan languages arrived in India (even if assuming their foreign origin) is unknown. There is no archaeological, genetic or literary evidence to support the view that any significant numbers of ‘Aryans’ entered India from outside around 1500 BC. Languages must not be equated to people. Linguistic evidence constitutes soft evidence at best, and must not contradict other evidence. Much of this evidence cannot be dated as such, and relies on scientific disciplines such as archaeology to provide hard dates.

Which explains why Michael Witzel sometimes assigns a date of 1500 BCE to Rigveda, sometimes 1200 BCE and sometimes 1000 BCE depending on what suits his fancies.

12. But there is Genetic Evidence for the Aryan Invasion or migration?

No, there is no genetic evidence for this theory and on the whole the existing set of evidence rules out any significant migration into India after the Holocene period (last ice age). The genetic studies on ‘Aryan genes’ published so far seem to be in a phase where Harappan archaeological studies were in early 1960’s. Fifty years ago, the Aryan invasion theory was considered an axiomatic truth. It was still used to explain archaeological data for a decade till archaeologists began to realize that the data they dug up did not match an invasionist paradigm. Therefore, one starts seeing strained attempts to force-fit archaeological data into an Aryan invasionist paradigm, till the negative (or rather opposing) evidence became so overwhelming that archaeologists had no option but to throw off the yoke of the Invasionist theories. Thereafter, the Aryan invasion theory was replaced by Aryan migration theory, but in recent years, archaeologists have become very uncomfortable even with this and have started rejecting even this theory.

Similarly, genetic studies on Indian populations till very recently have been operating under the Aryan invasionist/migrationist paradigm. But as Y chromosomal and mtDNA studies are being fine tuned (with the possibility of estimating time-depth of mutations especially in the former) and sample sizes are becoming larger, we are seeing that attempts in studies dating back to 2001-2002 to force-fit the genetic data into an AIT/AMT paradigm are very strained.

The most recent, and more comprehensive studies being published every month negate the results of the above study of Bamshad et al. For instance, the following paper on Y Chromosomal evidence pointedly refers to Michael Witzel, and rejects his suggestion of recent (in the time frame of hypothetical AIT/AMT) influx of genes from Central Asia into India:

"If pastoralists arrived recently, based upon linguistic and religious evidence on a track from the north via Bactria, S. Tajikistan and N.Afghanistan and the Hindu Kush into the N. Pakistan plains (Witzel 2004) one would expect to see L3-M357 in India. Although this haplogroup occurs with an intermediate frequency in Pakistan (6.8%), it is very rare in India (0.4%)".

See -Sengupta et al. 2006. “Polarity and Temporality of High Resolution Y-Chromosome Distributions in India”, accepted for publication in American Journal of Human Genetics (vol 76).

Another paper printed in January 2006 also states the same thing, and argues that just as there is evidence for a very small gene flow into India, there is also evidence to support gene flow in the opposite direction.

See – Sahoo et al. A Prehistory of Indian Y Chromosomes, Evaluating demic diffusion scenarios. In Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (United States), Vol. 103, issue 4, pp. 843-848 (January 24, 2006)

Similar reports have appeared in genetic studies published in recent issues of National Geographic and so on.

However, it must be stated that genes do not have speak, and it may be fundamentally flawed to try to seek ‘Aryan’ genes. But at least these studies do show overall that the particular genes that may be associated with Central Asians/Europeans are present to a very small extent in Indian populations across the board, and Indians in general seem to form a genetic group distinct from other peoples.

Minor genetic differences are seen between ‘upper caste’ and ‘lower castes’ and between ‘caste’ and ‘tribal’ populations but these may be attributed to other factors (such as Scythians invading from Central Asia and settling down as Kshatriya castes).

13. But is there not a paper by Bamshad, Kivisild et al (2001) that argues that Upper Indian castes have more European genes than Lower castes?

This article has fundamental flaws because the data speaks contrary to the conclusions that the authors have drawn. For instance, the sample size is very small, and restricted to one district in coastal south India, to where migration of upper-castes from North India is attested even by Vedic texts No statistical justification is given by the authors for what is prima-facie an insufficient sample size. The authors do not take into account the mobility of caste and sub-caste groups in social hierarchy. They just assume that present day Ksatriyas were Ksatriyas in 1500 BCE as well. The European-ness of Ksatriyas, per the data in that paper, is greater than that of Brahmins, which is odd. If we adhere to invasionist scenarios, Brahmins should resemble the ‘Europeans’ most closely. The genetic distance tables actually show that the ‘genetic distance’ between Indians as a group, and East Europeans is LESS than that between East Europeans and South Europeans. This puts a question mark on the very basis of the ‘genetic’ category ‘European’ employed by Bamshad et al. The paper is silent on when these ‘Eurogenes’ entered the various castes of India. These genes could have well come during Shaka, Greek and Persian invasions and thus have nothing to do with the Aryans at all. The authors of the paper however assume that these genes were brought in by Aryans around 1500 BC.

To conclude, the study has several fundamental flaws and cannot be accepted as ‘proof’ of an Aryan invasion or immigration around 1500 BCE. In short, the authors have forcibly retrofitted their skimpy data into the invasionist hypothesis that ‘European’ Aryans invaded India around 1500 BC and formed the upper castes because of which these castes will have greater affinity to Europeans than lower-caste Indians. When a request was sent to the authors to clarify the term ‘European’, they responded by saying that the term merely meant populations west of Indus!

14. What does the record from Skeletal Anthropology say on Aryan Migrations?

Research of scholars such Drs Kennedy, Lucaks and Hemphill shows that there is no break in the skeletal record in NW India/Pakistan between 4500-800BC. In other words, Gujarati Harappans were similar to modern day Gujaratis, Punjabi Harappans were similar to modern day Punjabis. This would have been unlikely if a foreign group had intruded into the Indian subcontinent in significant numbers.

15. By denying the Aryan Migration theory, are the Hindu edits trying to deny the ‘Indian-ness’ of other religions such as Islam?

• This question smacks of a conspiracy theory and is prevalent in Indian Marxist and Communist circles as a polemical point of discussion. Why should one deny the Indian-ness of Islam or any other religion using the Aryan invasion theory? Moreover, Islam is irrelevant in the discussion of ancient Indian history because there were no Muslims in India before 600 AD. Political considerations should not influence simple facts of history or academic matters.
• Even assuming that precursor of Sanskrit entered India from outside, how does that make Hinduism a foreign religion? Does Islam become an Arabian religion because the Koran is in Arabic? Even according to invasionists such as F B J Kuiper (one of the teachers of Michael Witzel) Vedas seem to have been compiled in the Indian subcontinent long after any ‘migrating Aryans’ entered India. And then, Vedic traditions fused with other spiritual traditions in the Indian subcontinent leading to the genesis of Hinduism, a beautiful and comprehensive Dharma. Therefore, Hinduism is through and through a religion of Indic origin. Traditional Hindus of course believe that Hindu faith is from Brahman alone, and within this paradigm, the national origin of Hinduism becomes irrelevant.
• The same Marxists who argue that Hinduism was created in the 19th century are now suggestion that Hinduism was brought into India in 1500 BC. How are the two things possible simultaneously?
• Moreover, how are textbooks for Sixth Grade children in California related to politics in India?
• Muslims themselves do not argue that their faith is just Indian. According to them, it is given by Allah and is from Allah.

16. Did the Migrating Aryans subjugate Indian native populations into a Shudra status?

The entire Aryan migration and invasion theory is just a theory, and not a fact. There is no proof that the ‘native peoples’ were relegated to Shudra status. Contrary theories such as by Marxist historian D D Koshambi state that Brahmins were also derived from native priesthood.

Even scholars hostile to Hinduism (see reference below) and operating with the Aryan Invasion/Migration paradigms state that the Shudra caste was allied (originally) with the Indo Aryan stock (p. 39), and that large sections of both Indo-Aryans and ‘pre-Aryans’ were reduced to Sudra caste partly through internal and partly through external conflicts between different peoples (p. 45). See -

R. S. Sharma. 2002. The Sudras in Ancient India. New Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass Publishers.

Even Dr B R Ambedkar, a pre-eminent leader of lower castes, stated in his research that there is no proof of an Aryan invasion, and that the Shudras were derived from Kshatriyas (cited in Sharma 2002:40).

17. Why are Hindu edits objecting the statements that Mohenjodaro and Harappa were the first cities of India?

It is wrong to state that only Harappa and Mohenjodaro were ‘first settlements’, when in fact contemporary texts on Harappan culture speak of at least five major sites all of which are very old. The students should not be made to infer, as 50 year old outdated texts on archaeology stated, that there are only two major Harappan cities. Don’t we want the students to appreciate the entire geographic spread of the culture.

18. But is it not true, as Michael Witzel says, that the Aryans came from Central Asia into India with their horses, chariots and language as said by him according to his interview in the Christian Science Monitor article on 24 January 2006?

• This argument is just a regurgitation of Aryan fantasies straight out of 1800s! Now that archaeology and many other scientific disciplines have failed to produce any evidence corroborating the Aryan invasion theory or its migration variant, this romantic horse-chariot fantasy is the last fig leaf that is being used to defend untenable theories under the guise that it sustains the ‘Elite dominance’ scenarios for explaining the ‘Aryanization’ of India. When even in modern times American tanks cannot traverse the Afghani terrain easily, it is ridiculous to propose that Aryans could heroically ride their chariots from Steppes or Central Asia across Afghanistan (or the rivers of Punjab) into India.
• There is reason to believe that the technology to make chariots was not absent in Harappan Indian. Archaeologists B. K. Thapar and Rafique Mughal mention that a sherd depicting a canopied cart with spoked wheels was unearthed from pre-Harappan levels at Banawali. R.S. Bisht reports that at Banawali, a pot sherd depicting a canopied cart with spoked wheels was found at pre-Indus levels. Bisht is the excavator of the site. This shows that the Harappans apparently possessed the relevant technology to fashion light vehicles with spoked wheels. Chariots as such are not attested in the archaeological record of the Indian subcontinent till about the middle of first millennium BCE, and therefore their absence in Harappan contexts need not lead us to conclude that they were absent in that civilization. In any case, it should be noted that the introduction of the chariot and horse in other cultures such as ancient Egypt, ancient China, ancient Iraq etc., did not lead to a new civilization, language, religion and culture. So why should India be an exception?
• It is often argued that Harappans could not have employed chariots in warfare because they did not possess horses. However, the sum total of evidence attests to the presence of horse in Harappan contexts, and this is contested now only by very few zoo-archaeologists (e.g., Michael Witzel’s colleague Richard Meadow with vested interests in opposite theories that he has propagated for 3 decades). In summary, horse bones have been found in Harappan and pre-Harappan levels at Kuntasi, Surkotada, Lothal, Ropar, Kalibangan, Shikarpur, Malvan etc. Horse figurines have emerged in Rakhigarhi, Lothal, Nausharo and several other places, and painted horse on pottery sherds at Kunal.
• And horse remains have been unearthed not just in Harappan contexts, but also in non-Harappan chalcolithic sites in the interior of India from strata predating the supposed time of arrival or Aryans at or after 1500 BCE. For instance, in Kayatha, a site in Central India excavated in 1968, a part of a horse jaw was unearthed from a level dated to 2000-1800 BC and a few other bones from levels dated from 1800-1600 BCE. Likewise, Hallur in Karnataka has yielded horse bones at levels dated to 1500 BCE which is too early for the arrival of Aryans in this part of India.
• Numerous other reports on Kayatha, Malwa and other chalcolithic cultures in the interior of India attest the presence of horse between 2000-1500 BCE. So whether an Aryan migration took place or not, it is clear that the elite dominance model cannot explain the Aryanization of India because horse was already present in India and there is no proof for the arrival of the chariot or horse only after 1500 BCE.

IV Politics and Hindu Edits

19. Why are Hindu edits aimed at proposing the same changes that were rejected in India recently?

• This question is like asking “Did you beat your wife today?”. My conversations with HEF and VF volunteers show that they do not have copies of old or new NCERT textbooks. Michael Witzel and FOSA-FOIL have also not demonstrated any parallels between the edits proposed in CA and the textbooks in India and have merely indulged in reckless slander.
• Implicit in the suggestion of Witzel-FOSA group is the suggestion that the parallel textbook (recently reinstated NCERT textbook for Grade VI on Ancient India written by Romila Thapar) is somehow the standard against which CA textbooks should be judged. But as I have shown, this textbook by Romila Thapar was essentially written in 1966, and has been used in India for 40 years without any significant change. Does Michael Witzel want California in 2006 to use a forty year old Indian textbook riddled with errors?
• Moreover, this textbook that FOSA- Witzel want to use as a standard not only has errors, it also preaches a subtle hatred for Hindus, informed by the author’s own adherence to Indian Marxist political agenda.
• Their suggestion is also misleading due the fact that less than 5% students in India who attend CBSE schools use these NCERT textbooks. The other 95% or more students use textbooks recommended by the respective school Boards.
• Also, FOSA-Witzel are misleading others by hiding the fact that the reinstatement of antiquated textbooks by Leftist historians in India by the present UPA government was also influenced by politics. This does not of course absolve the previous NDA government of trying to thrust extremely shoddy textbooks on students as well.

20. Isn’t VF a Hindutva Organization because of the absurd chronologies they have proposed on their website?

• The chronologies listed on their website are traditional Hindu beliefs predating Hindutva by several centuries. At this rate, these people will start branding hundreds of Hindu saints and sages and commoners who adhered to these notions centuries ago also as Hindutva-vaadis!
• Numerous scientists have singled out the Hindu tradition for its cosmological views that envisage a Universe that is billions of years old, in contrast to other faiths that think in terms of a few thousand years. Are all these scientists also votaries of Hindutva?
• People are also ignoring the fact that the VF website reflects their personal beliefs, which they have not included in even one proposed edit/correction to their textbooks. Just as a Christian organization can believe in resurrection of Jesus Christ three days after his death, but cannot insist its inclusion as an objective, universal truth in school textbooks for secular public schools. So why are FOSA-Michael Witzel trying to single out Vedic Foundation? Why don’t they harp on the religious beliefs of other organizations that have proposed edits for Islam, Christianity and Judaism?

21. But VF is just a small sectarian organization and cannot speak for Hinduism per se.

Who is not sectarian? Doesn’t FOSA just represent a fringe of ultra-Leftists? Are not Michael Witzel’s views on Indus script revisionist and non-mainstream? If they can claim to speak for all ‘liberal Hindus’ (even though FOSA has no use for Hinduism except as a punching bag) and if Witzel who is just a linguist can claim to speak on matters related to archaeology, history, genetics, astronomy and what not, then why try to stifle the right of Vedic Foundation to speak on Hinduism? And which particular edit of VF contradicts any mainstream Hindu belief? FOSA has not pointed out any example till date.

22. But HEF is surely a Hindutva Organization. Is it not?

• My interviews with HEF indicate that their political links are less obvious that the Communist links of Witzel and Islamist-Evangelist links of FOSA/AID and FOIL.
• HEF has hundreds of volunteer members most of whom have no affiliation with the Sangh Parivar. In addition, hundreds of Hindu American parents like myself are working with them on this particular issue alone (due to CDE related procedural limitations which prevent intervention by us independently) even though we have no affiliation with the Sangh Parivar. Do you think we would allow them to inject any politics into a question that affects my child? In short, whereas some founding members and other members of HEF may have links with RSS, the organization philosophy or even the guiding philosophy of an overwhelming majority of its supporters is not related to RSS ideology.
• In any case, the issue here is the edits they have proposed to the CA textbooks and FOSA-Michael Witzel have failed to demonstrate that these edits have a Hindutva tinge. This is rather their own imagination, and a dispassionate academic analysis of these edits shows that it is Michael Witzel his team who are academically inaccurate and incorrect.

23. So how do we characterize people who are attributing political-Hindutva affiliations to California based Hindu-Americans?

They seem to be un-informed or prejudiced. This kind of witch hunt may also indicate these critics’ adherence to Nazism like ideologies, in which entire disciplines of study, books, scholars etc., were called ‘Jewish’ and then ostracized.

Members of FOSA and Michael Witzel and his assistant Steve Farmer are recklessly associating anyone who disagrees with them as followers of Hindutva in various degrees. This reminds one of Nazi Germany where people were incinerated to death not just being for 100% Jewish, but even when suspected of being 25% Jewish! In the past, Witzel has lumped a perfectly apolitical scholar Malati Shengde with Hindutva people just because “her frequent attacks on accepted Indological research - combined with her wholly fictional links between Harappan and Vedic cultures - puts her in very political company nonetheless”. This is even worse than Freudian free association.

It is precisely this kind of hate-speech in the early part of 20th century that eventually lead to the Jewish holocaust. The people who propagated reprehensible anti-Semitic Aryan theories often did not attack Jews directly, but rather pretended to be just anti-Zionist. But it became clear soon that the real target was not Zionism, but Jews themselves.

Likewise, it is clear to my mind that the target of these critics is not Hindutva, it is Hindus.

After all, Michael Witzel did not use ‘hiina’ (lowly, degraded, lost, abandoned, narrow minded) for ‘Hindutvavaadis in North America’. He used it for all ‘Hindus in North America’.

APPEAL

People should FAX letters stating the following:

1. They endorse changes proposed by HEF and VF to correct the prejudiced statements and errors in proposed textbooks.
2. They object to the discriminatory treatment of Hindus by the State Board of California in addressing community concerns.
3. They are alarmed by the fact that these textbooks project Hinduism as an inferior religion compared to Christianity, Islam, Judaism and Buddhism. They are appalled by the fact that these textbooks focus obsessively on negatives of Hinduism and whitewash the record of other religions.
4. They are concerned that the textbooks contain numerous errors of historical facts.
5. SBE should reject unwarranted intrusions from academics such as Michael Witzel who are not sympathetic to our traditions. Instead, sympathetic scholars and practitioners of Hinduism should be consulted.
6. They are concerned that these textbooks will have a negative impact on the minds of Hindu American students who read them.

Hindus fight discrimination in California textbooks

By Kalavai Venkat
Published 01/13/2006

Is Hinduism monotheistic?

In my earlier articles, I had summarized the California textbook trial, and had also analyzed the specious recommendations of anti-Hindu ideologues with respect to the status of women in ancient India, historicizing the origins of Hinduism using creationist, racist and 19th century colonial theories, and their shocking suggestion that Harijan Hindu children be derogatorily called ‘broken persons.’ In this article, I will examine their accusation that Hindu groups attempted to portray Hinduism as a monotheistic religion along the lines of Christianity and Islam. Is it not patronizing to claim that Hindus want to model their religion after Christianity or Islam? Never mind, let us see the validity of this accusation.

Steve Farmer, the Marx-admiring ideologue [a report reveals that he put up a portrait of Karl Marx on his wall!], who initiated and coordinated Witzel’s anti-Hindu petition [a report reveals that these anti-Hindu ideologues admitted that they had no knowledge of the contents of proposed edits when they sent out their petition!], wrote on December 11, 2005, in the infamous political list Indo-Eurasian_research, that the Hindu edits attempted to “whitewash accounts of women's and minority rights in ancient India, and [made] absurd claims that ancient Vedic religion was monotheistic, etc.” Hey, isn’t that interesting that this Marx-admiring ideologue alleges that ‘minority’ rights were denied by majority Hindus in ancient India? Well, this is an old trick in the Marxist trade: to invent a lie and to repeat it until it becomes a ‘fact.’ It is a Marxist convention that what one Marxist ideologue says, others parrot. Angana Chatterji, writing for the Communist mouthpiece SACW alleged that the Hindu edits attempted to present “Hinduism [as] uniform, monotheistic, and monolithic, dismissing the disenfranchisement of women, dalits, adivasis, and religious minorities under centuries of Hindu ascendancy in what is today India.”

Never bother to ask these ideologues for evidence that Hindus disenfranchised minority religious groups in ancient India. Their trade is one dependent on a cobweb of lies. Interestingly, their trade proves both creationism and evolution right: first they create a lie, and then let it evolve into a ‘fact!’ But, those who have studied a bit of history would know that the minority Jews who found refuge in India 2,000 years ago, flourished as an ethnic minority. Nathan Katz, in his monumental work, Who are the Jews of India, writes:

"Indian Jews lived as all Jews should have been allowed to live: free, proud, observant, creative and prosperous, self-realized, full contributors to the host community. Then, when twentieth century conditions permitted they returned en masse to Israel, which they had always proclaimed to be their true home despite India's hospitality. The Indian chapter is one of the happiest of the Jewish Diaspora. [...] The study of Indian Jewish communities demonstrates that in Indian culture an immigrant group gains status precisely by maintaining its own identity. Such is the experience not only of India's Jews, but also of local Christians, Zoroastrians, and recently, Tibetan Buddhists."

Such facts regarding the well-known Hindu tolerance are dispensed with when Marxist ideologues wage an unscrupulous battle against Hindus. Judging by their lies on the alleged Hindu ‘intolerance’ one could reasonably conclude that they would have bluffed about the alleged ‘monotheism’ edits too. But, I will take the pains to prove the obvious. Since I have already discussed the status of women in ancient India, I will save the trouble of repeating it.

What are the English translations of Sanskrit words, bhagavan, karma, atman, devata, murti, vigraha, Brahman or even the ubiquitous yoga and dharma? There are no accurate translations. While yoga and dharma have been adopted into English, the rest have not been. So, any translation is going to fall short of being accurate. Ideally, these Sanskrit words should be adopted in textbooks so that students can understand them in their appropriate cultural and religious contexts.

Traditionally, Hindus of several denominations have believed that the One Divine manifests itself manifold. The Rig Veda [1:164:46], the oldest Hindu text, tells us that “the truth is one, which the sages perceive differently.” Starting with the Upanishads, many schools have contemplated on the nature of this absolute truth. The Brihadaranyaka Upanishad [1:4:6] says:

“All adorations of the different deities are the adorations of the One Being because, all these gods that we worship in religion are nothing but the projections of the One Being.”

The Vedantic Schools such as the Advaita identified this as the undifferentiated, attribute-less Nirguna Brahman. Tirumular, the celebrated Harijan Saiva saint, famously declared, echoing the Vedantic wisdom, that duality exists only until ignorance is removed, and gave an analogy to expound this thought: one, who does not realize that it is merely a carving, perceives elephant in a piece of wood; once he realizes the truth, the elephant [perception] disappears and only the piece of wood [reality] remains [Tirumantiram 2290].

Yet, not all schools of Hinduism subscribe to this interpretation of the highest truth as Nirguna Brahman. Even among the Vedantic schools, interpretations vary. For example, the Visishtadvaita School of dualism considers Narayana or Bhagavan or Purusha to be eternal, and reconciles the Brahman and the Purusha. Numerous Bhakti or devotional traditions consider Bhagavan as eternal, and are not occupied with the notions of Advaita. It is safe to state that Hindus that subscribe to an ultimate Bhagavan are more numerous than those that subscribe to the thought of Nirguna Brahman. For each, this ultimate Bhagavan is Siva, Vishnu, Kali or one’s own kula devata or family deity. Even during periods of sectarian rivalry, exalted poets like Kambar declared that Vishnu and Siva are one and the same.

What do textbooks teach?

A proposed textbook [Teachers’ Curriculum Institute, pp. 146-151] teaches:

“Brahman is the Hindu name for a supreme power or a divine force, that is greater than all the other gods. […] To Hindus only Brahman exists forever. […] [Hindus] devote entire lives to uniting with Brahman.”

The first statement is not an accurate portrayal of even Advaita, which considers the Brahman alone to be satya or the truth, and all else to be mitya or mere perceptions of truth. It is not as if all are satya and the Brahman is graded higher than the rest. The second statement summarizes the Advaita thought better. The third statement is incorrect even according to Advaita, in which school of thought the Jiva does not unite with the Brahman. Instead, at realization, there is no more duality. At that stage, there is nothing to perceive, and nothing apart to merge into. But, none of these statements reflect the thoughts of numerous other Hindu schools, which consider the Bhagavan and the Jiva or the soul to be eternal and separate.

According to the California Department of Education guidelines, textbooks must summarize the Hindu knowledge systems. So, ideally, textbooks should present the various Hindu schools of thoughts, according to the tradition of each, without attempting to reconcile them into a unified Hinduism. That has not been the case for decades. Anti-Hindu ideologues that tirelessly campaign against Hindu initiatives, never bothered to correct this situation all these years, even though they had the opportunity.

What did the Vedic Foundation edit propose?

It is very clear that the Hindu groups wanted to project the diversity of Hindu traditions by presenting different schools of thoughts, and that they were not trying to present one sectarian school of thought as representative of Hinduism. They never attempted to project the God of any one sampradaya as the presiding deity of Hinduism. Instead, the Vedic Foundation [VF] insisted on the inclusion of Goddess worship, which forms an integral part of Hinduism [Ref.: State of California, Curriculum Development and Supplemental Materials Commission’s Memorandum, dated November 22, 2005, edit 26]. Elsewhere, VF wanted a reference to “many gods” to be replaced with the phrase “many forms of God” [Ref.: State of California, Curriculum Development and Supplemental Materials Commission’s Memorandum, dated November 22, 2005, edits 43]. Apparently, this elicited the derision from the anti-Hindu ideologues, and the resultant accusation that VF attempted to portray Hinduism as a monotheistic religion, with God spelt with an upper case ‘G.’

Anyone with the minutest knowledge of Abrahamic religions should know that the Second Commandment explicitly forbids any form of God. So, obviously, VF, which was arguing for “many forms of God,” was not attempting to portray Hinduism in the mould of Abrahamic monotheism. As seen earlier, the thought that “One truth manifests manifold” is a very old Hindu tradition.

Witzel et al did not stop at that. They ridiculed the suggestion that Hindu Gods should be portrayed with an upper case ‘G’ [Ref.: State of California, Curriculum Development and Supplemental Materials Commission’s Memorandum, dated November 22, 2005, edit 16], and declared that since lower case ‘g’ is used for the gods of ancient Greece and Rome, a similar treatment of Hindu gods is fine. But, there is a fundamental difference: Christianity destroyed the Pagan religions of Greece and Rome. Hinduism, on the other hand, is alive. Should the Pagan religions of Greece and Rome be alive, and have a huge following, those practitioners would certainly require that textbooks treat their gods with the same respect they accord the Christian-Islamic God - G.W. Bush confirms that Christians and Muslims worship the same God!

Now, upper case is not a feature in the Devanagari script. It is a feature of the Roman script, in which writing God with an upper case ‘G’ is a convention that accords respect to divinity. Why on earth Hindu divinities should be written with lowercase ‘g?’ What would a sixth grade child perceive when she observes that Hindu gods are written with a lower case ‘g,’ while the Christian-Islamic God is written with an upper case ‘G?’ If she is from a Christian or Islamic background, then she could have been indoctrinated that her religion and God alone have the key to deliverance, and that Hinduism is a satanic cult. Have we not seen the Southern Baptists declare that the Hindus are lost, and ‘pray’ for the ‘redemption’ of their souls? Do textbooks not lend credence this kind of bigotry by writing Hindu deities with a lower case ‘g?’ One could understand such advocacies coming from 19th century bigots, but how can CDE allow some anti-Hindu ideologues to impose such bigoted double standards on textbooks?

One might very well ask if it is accurate to replace the textbook claim that the Brahman manifests as deities, with the claim that all deities are many forms of one God. As I pointed out earlier, even according to the Advaita School, Nirguna Brahman does not manifest as deities. Most devotional schools of Hinduism, which have most adherents, indeed subscribe to the notion of a personal God, and perceive all divine manifestations as His/Her lila or creative activity. Neither the existing text nor the proposed edit represent Hinduism in a comprehensive manner, but clearly, a larger number of Hindus would identify with the proposed edit than with the existing text.

To present the different schools of Hinduism according to their practitioners’ perspectives, an extensive edit would be required. It would be in order, but CDE constrained the Hindu groups to restrict their suggestions to a mere rewording of existing text. So, the Hindu groups had to work from a position of disadvantage. But, one could safely conclude that regardless of what the Hindu groups suggest anti-Hindu ideologues would anyway demonize them. If Hindus suggest that the deities are many forms of one God, these anti-Hindu ideologues accuse them of imitating Christianity and Islam. If they follow their traditional practices like cremating the dead, the likes of Witzel, as a report reveals, mock them.

But, why should we be surprised? After all, did not a report reveal that these ideologues, whom Witzel leads, pleaded ignorance of the nature of edits proposed by the Hindu groups, yet opposed those edits? Some of those ideologues, the report reveals, sought the collusion of fundamentalist Christian missionaries and Khalistanis [US State department reports that Khalistani terrorists massacred over 21,000 innocent Sikh and Hindu civilians]. After all, of what use is truth in the politics of hate? Clearly, this is a case of anti-Hindu ideologues first pronouncing Hindus guilty and then, leaving scruples aside, looking for evidence to somehow justify the accusation. In such a scenario, if no real guilt can be established, an imagined guilt would suffice.

U.K. media is racist, says police chief

Hasan Suroor

LONDON: Britain's outspoken police chief Ian Blair has accused the British media of being "institutionally racist'' saying that newspapers paid more attention to white victims of crimes than those belonging to ethnic minorities such as Asians.

Sir Ian specifically cited two recent murders in London — one of a white lawyer and another of an Indian worker — and said that while both were equally gruesome it was the killing of the white man which got more media coverage.

"The death of the young lawyer was terrible, but an Asian man was dragged to his death, a (non-white) woman was chopped up in Lewisham, a chap shot dead in the head... they got a paragraph on page 97,'' he said.

The white lawyer Tom ap Rhys Pryce and the Indian worker Balbir Matharu were killed the same day. Pryce was stabbed to death near his house in north-west London while Matharu was killed by a gang when he tried to prevent them from stealing his car stereo in east London. They drove over him dragging him several yards. His body was later found lying by the roadside.

Sir Ian said that while police put the same amount of effort in investigating all crimes, the media routinely tended to highlight only those affecting white people.

"I actually believe the media is guilty of institutional racism in the way they report deaths,'' he said.

His remarks, seen as a riposte to accusations that the police are "institutionally racist'' as alleged in a report on the murder of an African teenager, provoked angry reaction from editors. They called his criticism "selective'' and insisted that their coverage of crime had nothing to do with the racial background of victims.

The head of the Commission for Racial Equality, Trevor Phillips, said a "blanket condemnation'' of the media was not helpful though he believed that newspapers could "do a great deal more to be even-handed'' in their reporting.

Sri Guruji, a Drona for global Hindutva

V SUNDARAM

Anation is a soul, a spiritual principle. Two things, which in truth are but one, constitute this soul or spiritual principle. One lies in the past, one in the present. One is the possession in common of a rich legacy of memories; the other is the present-day consent, the desire to live together, the will to perpetuate the value of the heritage that one has received in an undivided form.

Man does not improvise. The nation, like the individual, is the culmination of a long past of heroic endeavours, selfless sacrifices and glorious deeds of devotion. Of all cults, that of the ancestors is the most legitimate, for they have made us what we are. A heroic past, great men, glory in song, tradition and legend, this is the social capital upon which one bases a national idea. To have common glories in the past, to have a common will in the present; to have performed great deeds together and to wish to perform still more, these are the essential conditions for being the people of a country. One loves in proportion to the sacrifices to which one has consented and in proportion to the ills that one has suffered. One loves the house that one has built and that one has handed down. The Spartan song- 'We are what you were; we will be what you are', is, in its simplicity, the abridged hymn of Hindutva today. If Hindutva vanishes, what will Bharatvarsha be? She will become a geographical expression of the vanished past, a dim memory of a perished glory. We have to avert this grim national tragedy at any cost. How can we forget that our history, our literature, our art, our temples and monuments, all have Hinduism writ indelibly across them?

If Dr Hedgewar was the Bhishma Pita of Hindutva, Sri Madhav Sadashiv Golwalkar, fondly called Sri Guruji, was the Drona of Hindutva. Sri Guruji was pained at the thought that Hindus should have been reduced to the position of 'Non-Muslims' in post-independent India. Even before independence, he wondered why India alone should be described as a 'sub-continent' when even much bigger countries like U S A, U S S R and China were not described in that manner. He said he had no doubt that our country was being dubbed as a 'sub-continent' only to prepare the public mind for its partition. Consistently, Sri Guruji took a strong stand against partition of India. He stood for Akhand Bharat throughout his lifetime.

Sri Guruji always ridiculed the idea of India being a 'nation in the making' and said that proponents of this theory appeared to be only 'patriots in the making'. Wherever he went he quoted chapter and verse to show that Bharatvarsh had been a 'rashtra' since Vedic times. He was quite amused that Shaivites and Vaishnavites of Kancheepuram should refer their religious ritualistic disputes like whether the temple elephant should bear a 'U' tilak or a 'Y' tilak, to the British Privy Council, which knew little about India and nothing about Hinduism.

A little before partition of India when K Ponniah, editor of 'The Sind Observer' asked him if it would really matter if India was partitioned, Sri Guruji said that at that rate it wouldn't matter if somebody lost his nose. At that point of time when somebody said that it didn't matter if all Hindus became Muslims in one stroke, Sri Guruji replied: 'It wouldn't matter even if all the Hindus died. Because they would live as ashes, and science has proved that matter is indestructible, and that even matter is only some electrical charges'.

When Sri Guruji was asked to define RSS in one word, he said: 'Hinduism can be defined in one word, 'Om'. But it would take years of study to understand its significance. Likewise RSS can be understood only by attending Shakha everyday'.

Once making an emotional appeal to workers to complete the RSS work in the manner and measure required, he quoted an example from the famous biography of Dr Samuel Johnson written by his secretary Boswell. Once Oliver Goldsmith asked Dr Johnson, 'Doctor, how many fish in a chain will take it reach from here to the moon?' Dr Johnson was nonplussed by this question. Goldsmith himself replied: 'Only one fish will suffice, if it is sufficiently big!' Sri Guruji said that similarly even a single day would be sufficient for the completion of RSS work, if only all the Swayamsevaks of the Sangh worked with every atom of their strength with unshakeable faith in the ultimate victory of 'Sanathana Dharma'.

Sri Guruji consistently held the view that a proper history of India had not yet been written. In this context he stated: 'It is ridiculous to divide our national history into Hindu period, Muslim period and British period. History can't be named after rulers; a proper history has to be a history of the people. And so, our entire history is Hindu history'. This is the quintessence of Hindutva. Bal Gangadar Tilak, Arbindo Ghosh, Vir Savarkar, Dr Hedgewar and Sri Guruji have all built up this great edifice of Hindutva. 'Hindutva' is not just a word. It is the history of a great culture and civilization called 'Sanathana Dharma'. Hinduism is only a derivative, a fraction or a part of Hindutva or Hinduness.

Often Sri Guruji would also add: 'Our history books tend to revolve round Delhi. But Delhi is not India. And in many periods of Indian history, other kingdoms have been bigger than the kingdom of Delhi. Because of these lopsided history books, our people know little about the Cholas, the Cheras, the Pandyas, the Hoysalas, the Pulakeshins. How many people have even heard of Kharvel of Utkal, one of the greatest kings of Bharatvarsh, who controlled much of South East Asia? Or of Lachit Barphukan, hero of the successful Assamese resistance to Mughal attacks?'

Under Sri Guruji's inspiring, fearless and indomitable leadership, RSS grew by leaps and bounds. In town after town, the Sangha Pracharak would arrive with a few letters of introduction to the local leaders, whether belonging to Congress, Hindu Mahasabha, Arya Samaj or whatever. He would put up himself in the local bhavan of any of these organisations or in a temple or with any well-wisher. His job, often as teacher, would bring him in touch with many students and teachers. Any existing local Hindu volunteer organisation would promptly merge with the new RSS shakha. With help from local well-wishers and guidance from his seniors in the RSS, the shakha would grow into a social magnet, attracting promising young men and local VIPs alike, regardless of their caste, class or sect. Soon it would be the strongest organisation in town. Before long it would produce energetic young men to carry the message of Sangh to other towns and even villages. At a time when RSS was growing like wildfire, Sri Guruji said: 'If I were to spend just one day in each shakha, even a life-time would not suffice to cover the whole country'.

Swami Akhandananda, one of the 16 direct monastic disciples of Ramakrishna Paramahamsa, discerned in Sri Guruji all the potentialities of a Vivekananda re-born. Dr Hedgewar, the founder of the RSS, saw in him a worthy leader of Sangh. While casting off their mortal coil, both these mahatmas had an innate satisfaction, Swami Akhandanandaji for having handed over the torch of spiritualism to a worthy disciple and Dr Hedgewarji for leaving the Sangh in strong safe hands. As a disciple of the former and successor of the latter, Sri Guruji combined in himself both the roles, both in one, both at once. In him were fulfilled the missions of both blended into one. He established through his example that apparently divergent messages of these two illustrious souls were in reality not only compatible but also perfectly identical. By a lifetime saga of sacrifice and service to Bharatvarsha , Sri Guruji demonstrated that society is merely a manifestation of the Vishwaswaroopa. Emphasising the importance of unity in society amongst the Hindus, Sri Guruji wanted all the Hindus to keep the following poem of William Wordsworth in mind every moment:

'Dust as we are, the immortal spirit grows

Like harmony in music; there is a dark

Inscrutable workmanship that reconciles

Discordant elements, makes them cling together

In one society'

There are two types of people in this world. Those who come into a room and say 'well, here I am!' and those who come in and say 'Ah! there you are!' Sri Guruji did not consider himself a separate entity, independently of the Sangh. His life was a yagna, an eternal sacrifice at the sacred feet of the Jana (people), the manifestation of Janardhana (God). Sri Guruji's most precious offering in this yagna was his own ego. For Sri Guruji innate humility was just as much the opposite of self-abasement as it was of self-exaltation. He wanted every Swayamsevak to give up the pursuit of individual salvation in favour of an endeavour for corporate self-realisation of the Sangh.

While replying to a civic address at Madurai in December 1949, Sri Guruji aptly observed: 'A post box receives letters, at times very important ones. But the box has no reason to be flattered by them. It is only an intermediary through which letters pass to proper persons in the proper places. The honours which you have bestowed on me I will pass on to those countless workers whom I am privileged to represent'. On another occasion, dismissing the idea that RSS would suffer incalculably in his absence, he stated with fervour and conviction: 'No particular individual is indispensable. Men may come and men may go, but the society goes on for ever. With me or without me, the Sangh will continue to work and grow because of their inner necessity and intrinsic work'.

Carlyle in his famous work 'Heroes and Hero Worship' wrote: 'It is well said, in every sense, that a man's religion is the chief fact with regard to him. No great man lives in vain. The history of the world is but the biography of great men. The hero can be poet, prophet, king, priest or what you will, according to the kind of world he finds himself born into'. These stirring words are totally applicable to Sri Guruji. He would have made his mark anywhere. He was a saint, a sage, a seer in the great Hindu tradition of sages like Vashista, Bharadwaj, Shukracharya, Yagnavalkya, Vishwamitra, Angirasa and others going back to the dawn of history. In these days of globalisation of Hindus and globalisation of Hindutva, the best homage we can pay to Sri Guruji on the occasion of his birth centenary on 24 February, 2006 is to live up to the great ideals enshrined in the following inspiring words:

'We have to live up to his legacy that can help human beings in all corners of our globe to rejuvenate our spirit not to conquer one another, but to conquer oneself; not to destroy, but to build; not to hate, but to love; not to isolate oneself, but to integrate everyone into one global society and to achieve much more in the future to enrich human civilisation to result in the maximum welfare of the maximum number or as in Sanskrit it is called: Loko Samasto Sukhino Bhavantu and Samasta Janaanaam Sukhino Bhavantu.