Hindu nationalism

Hindu nationalism is the political and cultural expression of Indian nationalism distinctive to the Hindu people, adherents of Hinduism who form the vast majority of the population of India.

This article endeavors to explore the roots of religious nationalism in the history of India and Hinduism, the political and cultural expression of nationalism of the mainstream Hindu population, as well as fundamentalism and the contemporary revival of Hinduism.

Foundations

Main articles: History of India, History of Hinduism, Gupta Dynasty, Vijayanagara,Maratha Empire,Sikhism,Khalsa

Hinduism has been the seen by many as the definitive element of the culture of India, and life of the ordinary Indian for over five thousand years. The politics, science and learning, and the economy and administration in India evolved from Hindu tenets of religion, statecraft and culture.

The roots of Hindu pride and nationalism go back to the history of India and the days of the Islamic empires in India, the Delhi Sultanate and the Mughal Empire, when a small but militarily powerful Muslim population was economically and politically dominating the vastly Hindu populations of India.

The main incitement of Hindu passions arise from the mass destruction of Hindu temples such as the Somnath Temple in Gujarat, the descretion and subjugation of holy Hindu institutions in Ayodhya, Kashi, Mathura, Allahabad and Haridwar and the killings, lootings and rape of an indeterminate but large number of Hindus during a series of Islamic invasions from Afghanistan and Persia, by brutal Muslim kings like Mahmud of Ghazni, Muhammad Ghori, Ahmed Shah Durrani and Nadir Shah.

Valiant Hindu monarch-warriors like Shivaji, Maharana Pratap and Prithviraj Chauhan were the earliest heroes of Hindu nationalism. Hindus draw inspiration and pride from the Hindu empires of the Gupta Dynasty, the Rajput kings of modern Rajasthan, the southern Vijayanagara empire of Karnataka and the Maratha Empire of modern day Maharashtra.

The Sikh empire of Maharaja Ranjit Singh in Punjab and Kashmir is also key to Hindu pride and inspiration, as the Sikhs were the prime military forces protecting Hindu communities from Muslim pogroms and the vagaries of the Mughal Empire.

Religious, conservative and separatist Indian Muslims considered the mainstream Indian Nationalism of the 20th century to be the political expression of India's majority Hindu communities. Indeed, the rising Islamic fundamentalism and Muslim suspicion of the Indian National Congress caused conservative Hindus to re-define their own expression of nationalism and patriotism, precipitating of the formation of a more distinctly Hindu political and cultural nationalism.

Hindu Renaissance

Main articles: Hinduism,Sri Aurobindo,Swami Vivekananda,Arya Samaj

The Arya Samaj was founded by Swami Dayananda Saraswati in the middle of the 19th century to revive Hindu society, which was entrenched deeply in the social schasms of untouchability, suttee, as well as poverty, xenophobia and illiteracy.

What was perceived as deeply offensive propaganda of Christian missionaries, a Westernization of many educated Hindus, forcible conversion to Islam and Christianity and rising resentment against the practices of untouchability by orthodox Hindus gave rise to the reform and revival of Hinduism by leaders like Dayananda Saraswati and Swami Vivekananda.

In the Independence Movement

Main articles: Indian Independence Movement, Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, Bal Gangadhar Tilak, Purushottam Das Tandon

In the Indian Independence Movement, the Indian National Congress was recognized by the vast majority of the people of India as their representative against the British Raj. And most Hindus, being the vast majority of Indian peoples, drove the movement, especially owing to the existence of the Muslim League from 1907 as a specifically Muslim party.

Hindus wanted a free and united nation to result from the end of the war, with Indian heritage and consciousness liberated from foreign cultural and political intrusions. But owing to the separatist politics of the Muslim League, a different expression arose in the era that was specifically Hindu.

Hindus also desired freedom not only from European colonialism, but to avoid a return to over one thousand years of Muslim rule in India. Many millions of Hindus harbored negative emotions as many great Hindu temples, monuments and communities had been savaged by pogroms conducted by Muslim rulers like Nadir Shah, Ahmad Shah, Muhammad Ghori, Mahmud of Ghazni, Babur and Aurangzeb.

National leaders like Bal Gangadhar Tilak and Mahatma Gandhi were responsible for inculcating Hinduism's religious values, history, heritage and culture into Indian Nationalism and into the political expression during the Indian Independence Movement. Tilak and Gandhi connected with millions of ordinary Indians due to their espousal of Indian cultural values and traditions. Gandhi transformed the Indian National Congress from an elitist organization of liberal, educated Indians to an organization committed to the service of the Indian masses, and empowered by the membership and participation of over 10 million ordinary Indians.

Hindu sentiments firmly rejected Muslim political demands for separate electorates and reservations. They rejected the notion that Muslims deserved a large role in national life despite their numerical minority owing to their rich history in India, knowing that such an expanded role would come at the expense of the natural Hindu majority.

Such sentiments led to the Congress rejection of the League's offer of coalitions in 1937: the League is said to have asked for its recognition by the Congress as the representative of Muslims. Congress rejected this idea due to its strict and natural adherence to secularism, and also to reject League demands for inflated representations in provinces it had won few seats in.

Though normally remembered simply as leaders of the freedom struggle, Lala Lajpat Rai, Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, Purushottam Das Tandon, Srinivasa Iyengar, Sarojini Naidu and others were amongst the first to express Hindu nationalistic sentiments and ideas.

Hindu Rashtra

Main articles: Hindutva and Hindu Rashtra

In 1911, four years after the formation of the League, the Hindu Mahasabha was organized as a Hindu political party. Although out of the mainstream during the struggle for Independence, the Mahasabha would pioneer a Hindu political ideology that would take current in modern India.

Vinayak Damodar Savarkar, an Marathi freedom fighter and one of the earliest Hindu nationalists, wrote the treatise on Hindutva, literally Hindu-ness. The treatise identified India as a Hindu Rashtra, or Hindu nation in terms of culture and heritage. It asserted that all of its people had in history adhered to Hindu religious values, and thus should be identified as Hindus not only for religious affialiation but also for nationality.

See also

• Arrow of the Blue-Skinned God by Jonah Blank
• Hindutva by Vinayak Damodar Savarkar
• Patel: A Life by Rajmohan Gandhi
• History of India, History of Hinduism