Salvaging the idea of India

Aakar Patel offers a sober analysis of Hindutva ideology from a non-BJP perspective and explains why it can be countered

The growing dominance of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in Indian politics has led to a greater focus on the many ideas espoused by the Indian Right. The ideas of Hindu nationalism or the Hindu Rashtra have consequently gained huge salience in the public discourse in the country over the past few years. Many BJP ideologues and sympathisers have also produced books and essays explaining what concepts such as Hindutva or Hindu nationalism actually mean for the right-wing party in power at the Centre and in many states.

This was to be expected. What was not expected and, therefore, had become highly intriguing — if not troubling — was the relative absence of books or essays that could explain Hindutva ideology from a non-BJP point of view and situate that in the current political context. Aakar Patel’s book will go a long way towards meeting this gap in the available commentary on an ideology that needs more debate, discussion and dissection from all perspectives.

The title of the book (Our Hindu Rashtra — What It Is. How We Got Here) does not tell you all that it contains. Of course, it narrates the journey of the BJP and its leaders in the past three-and-a-half decades, particularly after the party was reduced to holding just two seats in the Lok Sabha. But the highlight of this book is not the recounting of the events or issues that propelled the BJP to pole position in the last two general elections. What stands out is the spirit of optimism and a message of hope that all is not lost for those who believe that the march of Hindu majoritarianism can be halted and the principle of diversity can be upheld.

The book has 14 chapters, thematically divided into four parts. The first part recounts Pakistan’s evolution as a majoritarian state and how its first Constitution was tactfully changed to fulfill majoritarian goals. The second part analyses the core ideology that drives the Hindutva agenda. The third part is the longest, with as many as nine chapters devoted to capturing the downhill journey that has brought India to the current state, where minorities feel threatened by the rise of majoritarianism.

This section starts by recounting the rise of L K Advani along with the growing footprint of the BJP’s Hindutva programme and then captures a host of troubling issues including the demolition of the Babri mosque, the rampant use of laws against religious conversions as part of a majoritarian agenda, the riots in Ahmedabad, the questionable judgments of the apex court in many cases pertaining to Hindutva agendas, the repeal of Article 370 that took away from Kashmir the special status it enjoyed for several decades, the use of criminal provisions in personal laws for Muslims and the creation of a legal framework for protecting the holy cow, hurting the minorities once again.

Our Hindu Rashtra: What It Is. How We Got Here

Author: Aakar Patel 

Publisher: Westland

Pages: 356; Price: Rs 799

The fourth part has only one chapter, but in its sweep and impact it is the most powerful section of the book, explaining where India has gone wrong and how that path can be retraced. The author posits that India becoming a Hindu Rashtra is an impossibility. This is because India has evolved to become a modern state, for instance, with a professional army to defend its borders or with a thriving business community that transcends caste or community barriers. This has reduced the Hindutva agenda to aspiring for a Hindu Rashtra by working towards the exclusion and persecution of India’s minorities, particularly Muslims. “That is the only meaning of Hindu Rashtra in India. It imagines India as a Hindu nation where the Muslim and Christian exist on sufferance. That is all there is to Hindu Rashtra in the way Hindutva desires,” the author concludes.

In the final chapter, he also explains why India has a chance to survive as a nation in the way its founding fathers had visualised it, giving the people a Constitution that could be used as a safeguard against religious majoritarianism. But that is a big if. Patel’s central argument is that the Constitution of India has given to the people many rights (for instance, those enshrined under Article 19) and freedoms but, in reality, many of them function as paper promises for a large number of Indians (people belonging to both minorities and even majority communities). “Reclaiming our fundamental rights is the answer to the problem of Indian majoritarianism and also the only way to realise and unlock the value of our Constitution,” Patel writes.

One way to unlock that value is to create a larger space for civil society to help the people claim the rights that are guaranteed under the Indian Constitution. The presence of the Constitution alone is not going to help counter either the forces of religious majoritarianism or the movement towards building a Hindu Rashtra. Expanding civil society to claim the rights enshrined in the Constitution is a must.

The redeeming part of the book is the author’s sober writing style that does not let the analysis descend into a rant about how the Hindu Right has threatened the character of an inclusive India. There is, of course, a little bit of remonstrance, but the author has done well to place such challenges in the context of his mature understanding of how recent developments have unfolded and how an alternative narrative of an inclusive India can be built by reclaiming the rights conferred by the Constitution on its people.