Penguin Books India, 2003, 205 pgs.
Summary: The book is a critical introduction to the basic sources of the modern Hindutva movement: Dayananda Saraswati (1824-1883), Siri Auronbindo (1872-1950) , Swami Vivekanda (1863-1902), Vinayak Damadar Svarkar (1883-1966). The author Jyotrimaya Sharma is a professor of political science at the University of Hyderabad.
Hindutva is political philosophy and way of life for the purpose of establishing the hegemony of the Hindus. Sharma describes it as an odd mixture of 19th century nationalism as expounded by an Italian revolutionary Mazzini (1805-1872), and British and German liberalism from about 1870, enframing the Veda.
The Veda are the four most basic and ancient Hindu texts. Sharma argues that Hindutva sidelines the pacifist texts in addition to the Veda and suggests that the movement is a threat to Jainist and Buddhist.
The outline of the view can be summarized thus:
- Hinduism is the mother of all religions and the Aryans are the superior race.
- Hinduism as understood by the Hindutva movement is superior to all other religions because it recognizes the truth found in the other religions.
- The exclusivism or quietism of the stepchildren of Hinduism (everything but Hinduism as understood by Hindutva) gives a cultural and military advantage to those faiths or threatens Hinduism's existence by pacifism. Therefore Hindutva must be dogmatic on recognizing and requiring submission to the superiority of Hinduism.
- To live in India one must be Hindu, recognize the superiority of Hinduism or one is a threat to India's existence.
The system provides an incredibly flexible rhetorical vocabulary near to modern liberalism but bound to nationalism and attached to the forms of traditional Hinduism.
Benefits/Detriments: I am almost wholly unable to critique the book as this is my first foray into Hindutva literature. Sharma’s familiarity with Western philosophy seems to be centered on Heidegger and Wittgenstein, and he seems well regarded among moderns outside of Hindutva circles.