Business Standard
Nitin Sethi | New Delhi Sep 27, 2014
Last Updated at 10:19 PM IST
It wasn't a cakewalk for Madison event organisers
NRI businessmen, volunteers of Overseas Friends of BJP and Hindu leaders put in efforts to make Modi function a success
The $1 million-plus event at the Madison Square Garden for Prime Minister Narendra Modi has had to overcome all kinds of legal and logistical wrangling to be pulled off. It's taken the might of volunteers, non-resident Indian (NRI) businessmen of all kinds, religious Hindu leaders, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) cadre and leaders in the US and India to make sure the 19,000-capacity event on Sunday is a resounding success.
Upon instructions from 'Delhi', the Overseas Friends of BJP (OFBJP) formed a new a politically and religiously neutral entity 'Indian American Community Foundation (IACF)' to hold the event. The entity, it was decided, would be dissolved after the event. But the Madison Square Garden (MSG) authorities would not give it permission to book for Modi's event. In stepped an event management company Poojanka Entertainment, run by one, Bharat Jotwani. "Several other organisations could not get the place but with my company's 15 years of experience, the MSG authorities were happy to provide it. I am very glad to be part of this landmark event for the prime minister as a volunteer and a member of the committee organising it," said Jotwani. IACF signed a back agreement with Poojanka Entertainment to then run the event.
Jotwani's name found its way in Indian media last year with singer Sonu Nigam claiming underworld kingpin Chhota Shakeel had threatened the former must work with Jotwani. But Jotwani told Business Standard it was all a dirty game played by his rivals to stop him from gaining more business.
The IACF faced a different niggling legal trouble though, while organising the event. It got a legal notice from a group called the National Indian American Public Policy Institute, another NRI group in the US, threatening to sue IACF on being blocked from buying advertising space for the event and patron sponsorship. It specifically referred to actions of Dr Bharat Barai, claiming they fell afoul of US laws. Business Standard couldn't reach Barai despite repeated attempts, but Jotwani, said the group filing the case have enough credibility to start a lawsuit. "We have organised this most cleanly, legally and professionally," he said.
IACF, its organisation, also gained a lot from the organisational and cadre strength of OFBJP and other affiliates. Chandrakanta Patel, head of OFBJP and chairman of IACF, said many karyakartas (workers) of OFBJP had volunteered through Modi's trip and at the event to make it a success. "It's a huge responsibility and all of us are working day and night to make it a success," he said. "Of course, OFBJP has played a major role but all Indian diaspora is joining in," he added.
While BJP leaders Vijay Jolly and RSS/BJP leader Ram Madhav were in the US to prepare the grounds for Modi's visit too, another help came from Sadhvi Rithambara. After years of being unable to visit the US, she finally made a trip to the country, in time to hold seven meetings under the aegis of Param Shakti Peeth of America and the Param Shakti Peeth of East Coast. Virendra K Labroo of the East Coast group said he was involved in the two meetings in New Jersey which pulled in almost 800 people. "We expect 75-85 per cent" of these to attend the MSG event. Those who hold Pujya Didi Ma (Sadhvi Rithambara) in high regard also feel the same for Prime Minister Modi."
Patel said Rithambara will also be part of the MSG event. "Both (Sadhvi and Modi) have a good relationship, she shall be there as an observer," he told. While Patel said she had made her own plans to come to the US, Labroo said she had been asked by the organisers of the event to come though said his organisation itself was not so closely involved in the event.
To go by Jotwani, all the collective efforts seem to have worked out well. "We have a 16,000 waiting list of guests and are going to give away 1,000 tickets by lottery on Sunday. Our voluntary financial contribution target was topped two days ago," he said.
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Showing posts with label Sadhvi Ritambhara. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Sadhvi Ritambhara. Show all posts
September 29, 2014
January 11, 2013
Bring All The Owaisis, Muslim and Hindu to book (Shirish Koyal)
[excellent article calling for action against all the Owaisis, both Muslim and Hindu. But where it gets jarring and unacceptable is in its defence of the charges of sedition. I think the rules pertaining to Hate speech need to be invoked instead of the 'sedition' which is fast becoming standard fare. . .]
From: The Times of India
The Owaisis, both Muslim and Hindu, must be brought to justice
Shirish Koyal
10 January 2013, 03:39 PM IST
I should thank the fracture I have suffered. My foot set in plaster of Paris, I lay immobilised when I decided to find out what exactly Akbaruddin Owaisi, the Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (MIM) leader, had said. This was after reading the reassuring news that he had at last been arrested for making inflammatory speeches in Andhra Pradesh. It was all on YouTube. With all the time (otherwise, a scarce commodity) at my disposal, I logged on.
Shock is not the word to describe my reaction to the speech; it’s much more. The speeches were not just inflammatory; they were a naked aggression on the unity of India, made through derogatory references to Hindus, their religious practices and their deities. A diatribe like Owaisi’s can offend the feelings of anybody in his senses. The MIM leader’s communalism was unabashed — just like that of his party — mocking Hindus and their religion more than pandering to the base instincts of the morons who applauded every venomous word dropping out of his mouth.
Owaisi did make perfunctory references to poverty among Muslims, their insecurity and lack of opportunities. The fact is that the MIM has, in its 86 years of existence, only helped to keep these issues alive, knowing well how to keep the communal pot boiling. It has controlled Hyderabad’s Old City, where Muslims are concentrated, through the power of muscle and money. Even those who vote for the MIM know how phoney the outfit is.
Videos of Owaisi’s incendiary speeches led me to a clip that showed a verbal clash between him and Andhra Pradesh chief minister Kiran Reddy in the legislative assembly. Even there, the tone and tenor of Akbaruddin’s speech were the same. There was no doubt he was striving to drive a wedge between people. Even his elder brother, Asaduddin, who heads the MIM, speaks as if Muslims are the only people who exist and matter.
Akbaruddin’s rants brought back memories of speeches made by Narendra Modi, Pravin Togadia, Vinay Katiyar, Uma Bharti, Sadhvi Rithambara and the Thackerays. L.K. Advani didn’t sound much different in the Sangh Parivar’s “mandir-wahin-banayenge” days. Their derogatory references to Muslims have never brought any glory to the Hindu religion. These people are on the opposite side of the communal divide they have created together with the likes of the Owaisis. But the reality is that there can’t be people more similar. Their thought and language are alike; their ideologies are communally motivated; their world view equally constricted; their opposition to liberal, modern thought is strikingly similar. One can call them two sides of the same coin.
It’s just right that Akbaruddin Owaisi has been charged with sedition and waging war against the state, besides other serious offences. It’s time all Owaisis, Muslim or Hindu, are given similar treatment and punished. Never mind if they are potential Prime Ministers. Hope Akbaruddin’s case will make peddlers of hate think twice.
Poet Sahir Ludhianvi's description of communal politicians fits the Owaisis accurately:
ये दीन के ताजर, ये वतन बेचने वाले
इंसानों की लाशों के कफन बेचने वाले
ये महलों में बैठे हुए कातिल, ये लुटेरे
काँटों के एवज रूह-ए-चमन बेचने वाले
(These traders of religion, these sellers of the nation
Sellers of shrouds on human corpses
These killers sitting in palaces, these looters
Barterers of the garden's soul for thorns)
From: The Times of India
The Owaisis, both Muslim and Hindu, must be brought to justice
Shirish Koyal
10 January 2013, 03:39 PM IST
I should thank the fracture I have suffered. My foot set in plaster of Paris, I lay immobilised when I decided to find out what exactly Akbaruddin Owaisi, the Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (MIM) leader, had said. This was after reading the reassuring news that he had at last been arrested for making inflammatory speeches in Andhra Pradesh. It was all on YouTube. With all the time (otherwise, a scarce commodity) at my disposal, I logged on.
Shock is not the word to describe my reaction to the speech; it’s much more. The speeches were not just inflammatory; they were a naked aggression on the unity of India, made through derogatory references to Hindus, their religious practices and their deities. A diatribe like Owaisi’s can offend the feelings of anybody in his senses. The MIM leader’s communalism was unabashed — just like that of his party — mocking Hindus and their religion more than pandering to the base instincts of the morons who applauded every venomous word dropping out of his mouth.
Owaisi did make perfunctory references to poverty among Muslims, their insecurity and lack of opportunities. The fact is that the MIM has, in its 86 years of existence, only helped to keep these issues alive, knowing well how to keep the communal pot boiling. It has controlled Hyderabad’s Old City, where Muslims are concentrated, through the power of muscle and money. Even those who vote for the MIM know how phoney the outfit is.
Videos of Owaisi’s incendiary speeches led me to a clip that showed a verbal clash between him and Andhra Pradesh chief minister Kiran Reddy in the legislative assembly. Even there, the tone and tenor of Akbaruddin’s speech were the same. There was no doubt he was striving to drive a wedge between people. Even his elder brother, Asaduddin, who heads the MIM, speaks as if Muslims are the only people who exist and matter.
Akbaruddin’s rants brought back memories of speeches made by Narendra Modi, Pravin Togadia, Vinay Katiyar, Uma Bharti, Sadhvi Rithambara and the Thackerays. L.K. Advani didn’t sound much different in the Sangh Parivar’s “mandir-wahin-banayenge” days. Their derogatory references to Muslims have never brought any glory to the Hindu religion. These people are on the opposite side of the communal divide they have created together with the likes of the Owaisis. But the reality is that there can’t be people more similar. Their thought and language are alike; their ideologies are communally motivated; their world view equally constricted; their opposition to liberal, modern thought is strikingly similar. One can call them two sides of the same coin.
It’s just right that Akbaruddin Owaisi has been charged with sedition and waging war against the state, besides other serious offences. It’s time all Owaisis, Muslim or Hindu, are given similar treatment and punished. Never mind if they are potential Prime Ministers. Hope Akbaruddin’s case will make peddlers of hate think twice.
Poet Sahir Ludhianvi's description of communal politicians fits the Owaisis accurately:
ये दीन के ताजर, ये वतन बेचने वाले
इंसानों की लाशों के कफन बेचने वाले
ये महलों में बैठे हुए कातिल, ये लुटेरे
काँटों के एवज रूह-ए-चमन बेचने वाले
(These traders of religion, these sellers of the nation
Sellers of shrouds on human corpses
These killers sitting in palaces, these looters
Barterers of the garden's soul for thorns)
October 29, 2012
Book Review: Sunila Kale on Menon Women of the Hindu Right
Kalyani Devaki Menon. Everyday Nationalism: Women of the Hindu Right in India. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2010. 224 pp. $49.95 (cloth), ISBN 978-0-8122-4196-9.
Reviewed by Sunila Kale (University of Washington International Studies Department)
Published on H-Asia (May, 2011)
Commissioned by Sumit Guha
Kale on Menon Women of the Hindu Right
In Everyday Nationalism: Women of the Hindu Right in India, Kalyani Devaki Menon provides us with a rich ethnographic account of the mechanisms, tactics, and ideologies by which Hindu nationalist organizations build their support among Indian women in the communities in and around India’s national capital, Delhi. The subject matter continues to be timely, for despite the sidelining of the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party from the center stage of national politics in India, Hindu nationalism in its cultural, social, as well as political variants continues to thrive in India.[1] The focus in this book on women is equally welcome as part of a larger body of scholarship that seeks to disaggregate the Hindu nationalist movement to understand how its various constituents operate alongside and sometimes against each other.
Menon conducted a year-long ethnography among individuals working in the Delhi chapters of several Hindu nationalist organizations: the Rashtra Sevika Samiti, the women’s organization directly linked to the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh; the Durga Vahini and Matri Shakti, women’s organizations related to the Vishwa Hindu Parishad; the Mahila Morcha, the women’s affiliate of the Bharatiya Janata Party; and Sewa Bharati, a social service organization that in Delhi concentrates mostly on providing educational and vocational training to Delhi’s poor urban communities. Her sustained interactions with forty-five women and ten men in the movement take her from ordinary chapter meetings to specialized retreats and nationalist rallies full of incendiary speeches. Her ethnography among her mostly middle-class and upper-caste participants attends to “the everyday constructions of ideology and politics through which activists garner support at the grassroots level.” To this end, she looks at how individual members and organizations use “history, religion, politics, and social work to articulate the everyday fears, desires, needs, and interests of diverse groups with the movements goals” (p. 5).
While Menon is interested in the pluralism of the Hindu nationalist movement itself, a quality that rests at the heart of the movement’s “expansionary strategies” (p. 5), her potentially more significant contribution is the examination of moments when individuals become what she calls “dissonant subjects,” transgressing the norms of the movement. In these moments, Menon sees an opportunity to examine “everyday acts that complicate our analysis of Hindu nationalist subjects” (p. 3), in particular the ability of movement leaders and movement structures to variously overlook, discipline, or incorporate dissonance. Menon engages these theoretical issues of Hindu nationalism’s pluralism and the role of dissonant subjects in her introductory chapter. The subsequent chapters are organized around the movement’s uses of historical narratives, the language of fear, a twinning of religious and political duty, volunteerism, and the use of games and fun. These are all examples of the common practices by which movement leaders inspire new recruits and instill a normative agenda, and Menon provides a valuable ethnographic snapshot of these everyday acts.
Menon notes that at times the normative emphasis among these women’s organizations is distinct from hegemonic Hindu nationalist discourses. Menon argues that it is through an accommodation of ideological or normative pluralism that the movement has been able to grow substantially among Indian women, as well as among other groups who might otherwise be alienated by rigidly enforced hegemonic and patriarchal norms. This is perhaps most clearly demonstrated in Menon’s analysis in chapter 1, where she takes up the subject of “everyday histories.” For example, in most dominant Hindu nationalist narratives, the seventeenth-century Maratha king Shivaji is valorized as the epitome of a righteous Hindu ruler and the progenitor of the modern Hindu nation. However, Menon finds that among the women of the Rashtra Sevika Samiti, the figure of Jijabai, Shivaji’s mother, is the generative force for a newly awakened Hindu politics in the early seventeenth century, an “architect of the Hindu Nation” (p. 47). The stories that circulate around Jijabai underscore the central role of motherhood for Menon’s interlocutors, one that allows individual women to make a deep impact on public, political events through the private choices they make for themselves, and most importantly, for their children.
In chapters 2 and 3, Menon interrogates the uses of fear and insecurity in the garnering of new recruits and the justification of certain kinds of social work. For example, in one conversation with a member of Sewa Bharati, we hear the position that the Hindu nationalist movement’s education outreach among Delhi’s lower-income communities is essential to countering the threats that conversion poses from minority religions, particularly Christianity. In the subsequent chapter, Menon examines the productive uses made of fears of Pakistan during the Kargil war. In her analysis of the speeches of female ascetics like Sadhvi Rithambara, Menon argues that it is “their dual status as renouncers and as women that makes these sadhvis such effective voices for the values, morals, and politics of the movement” (p. 82).
While chapter 3 draws from her fieldwork experiences at rallies and other significant occasions, Menon’s book is strongest and most illuminating when it takes us into the everyday world of work and play. In chapter 4, Menon presents material from her fieldwork among women in social service organizations. In the first part of the chapter Menon accompanies two VHP social workers in their volunteer time in the obstetric and gynecology unit of one of Delhi’s government hospitals. The two women play critical mediating roles for the largely poor, illiterate, and inexperienced patient population seeking prenatal attention. They routinely serve as stenographers, helping patients to input information for hospital registration, and in some cases they function as triage nurses, determining which patients require attention and which will most likely be sent home by the hospital staff. Here we get a more grounded sense of the vital social work that is done by individuals and organizations of the Hindu Right and how this work connects to the expansion of the movement among new communities.
Chapter 5 shifts the focus to a singular event, a weekend retreat, or shivir, organized by the Rashtra Sevika Samiti with the imperative to recruit new members. Organized games and play, physical exercises and drills, lectures, prayer, and patriotic songs structure the day’s activities, all with the aim to position new recruits “toward the cultural politics of the movement” (p. 131). Games and play are particularly apt strategies to “disseminate these ideas because they are able to convey Hindu nationalist constructions of history, politics, and morality without raising the hackles of those who might otherwise disagree with them” (p. 155).
Menon gives us a very good sense of the ideology and practices of the organizations and individuals with whom she interacts. There are a few places, however, where the reader might have wished for additional or perhaps different kinds of information to make sense of the larger argument. Among the occasions in which members of the Hindu nationalist movement become dissonant subjects we have the opening vignette, in which Ela, a volunteer in Sewa Bharati, expresses the opinion that “it is meaningless” to build a temple to Ram “on the blood of so many Indians” (p. 1). This views sits at odds with Ela’s own family history in the RSS, her own long-standing association with Sewa Bharati, and the focal nature of the efforts to build a temple at the former site of the Babri Masjid for the Hindu nationalist movement over the last several decades. Similarly, we hear that another Hindu nationalist, Vimla, doubts the authenticity of female renunciates, who merely “have to look spiritual” (p. 102) to be granted a life of wealth and luxury. Again, given sadhvis’ privileged position of deference and authority in the movement, and their importance to some of the arguments of Menon’s book, Vimla’s views seem jarring.
Menon’s focus on dissonance in the introductory chapter of the book alerts the reader to pay closer attention to the narratives of such moments, and her theoretical survey of this concept is valuable and provocative. However, as the book unfolds, its rich ethnographic documentation geared toward “dissonance” is not supplemented by a continued engagement with this vital idea. While episodes of dissonance like the ones described above are inherently interesting, there seems to be less rigorous pursuit of the questions surrounding these moments: How do individuals themselves understand their transgression of the movement’s norms? Are there potentially more radical consequences to this dissonance? Could such moments of dissonance constitute the germ for a potential subversion of hegemonic positions? Menon’s book comes at a time when the broad swath of the Hindu Right is in a moment of reinvention, and this work is therefore timely and important in this context. It is an important contribution to the discussion of Hindu nationalism, and its emphasis on the everyday practices of nationalist organizations helps to clarify the movement’s expansion outside of its early upper-caste and middle-class support base into lower-caste and lower-class communities and especially through gender as both a dissonant and a resonant category of experience for members of the Hindu Right. Menon has given us a rich view of women in the Hindu Right of northern India, and whatever questions she leaves unanswered are perhaps stimulants for new research agendas.
Note
[1]. In the 2009 Indian parliamentary elections, the Bharatiya Janata Party won 116 seats, enough to secure its position as the second largest political party after the centrist Indian National Congress, which won 206 seats. The BJP has a substantial political following in a number of state governments as well. Among the most populous states where it functions either as the sole party in power or as a coalition partner are Gujarat, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Punjab, Uttarakhand, and Jharkhand.
If there is additional discussion of this review, you may access it through the list discussion logs at: http://h-net.msu.edu/cgi-bin/logbrowse.pl.
Citation: Sunila Kale. Review of Menon, Kalyani Devaki, Everyday Nationalism: Women of the Hindu Right in India. H-Asia, H-Net Reviews. May, 2011.
URL: http://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=29835
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.
Reviewed by Sunila Kale (University of Washington International Studies Department)
Published on H-Asia (May, 2011)
Commissioned by Sumit Guha
Kale on Menon Women of the Hindu Right
In Everyday Nationalism: Women of the Hindu Right in India, Kalyani Devaki Menon provides us with a rich ethnographic account of the mechanisms, tactics, and ideologies by which Hindu nationalist organizations build their support among Indian women in the communities in and around India’s national capital, Delhi. The subject matter continues to be timely, for despite the sidelining of the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party from the center stage of national politics in India, Hindu nationalism in its cultural, social, as well as political variants continues to thrive in India.[1] The focus in this book on women is equally welcome as part of a larger body of scholarship that seeks to disaggregate the Hindu nationalist movement to understand how its various constituents operate alongside and sometimes against each other.
Menon conducted a year-long ethnography among individuals working in the Delhi chapters of several Hindu nationalist organizations: the Rashtra Sevika Samiti, the women’s organization directly linked to the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh; the Durga Vahini and Matri Shakti, women’s organizations related to the Vishwa Hindu Parishad; the Mahila Morcha, the women’s affiliate of the Bharatiya Janata Party; and Sewa Bharati, a social service organization that in Delhi concentrates mostly on providing educational and vocational training to Delhi’s poor urban communities. Her sustained interactions with forty-five women and ten men in the movement take her from ordinary chapter meetings to specialized retreats and nationalist rallies full of incendiary speeches. Her ethnography among her mostly middle-class and upper-caste participants attends to “the everyday constructions of ideology and politics through which activists garner support at the grassroots level.” To this end, she looks at how individual members and organizations use “history, religion, politics, and social work to articulate the everyday fears, desires, needs, and interests of diverse groups with the movements goals” (p. 5).
While Menon is interested in the pluralism of the Hindu nationalist movement itself, a quality that rests at the heart of the movement’s “expansionary strategies” (p. 5), her potentially more significant contribution is the examination of moments when individuals become what she calls “dissonant subjects,” transgressing the norms of the movement. In these moments, Menon sees an opportunity to examine “everyday acts that complicate our analysis of Hindu nationalist subjects” (p. 3), in particular the ability of movement leaders and movement structures to variously overlook, discipline, or incorporate dissonance. Menon engages these theoretical issues of Hindu nationalism’s pluralism and the role of dissonant subjects in her introductory chapter. The subsequent chapters are organized around the movement’s uses of historical narratives, the language of fear, a twinning of religious and political duty, volunteerism, and the use of games and fun. These are all examples of the common practices by which movement leaders inspire new recruits and instill a normative agenda, and Menon provides a valuable ethnographic snapshot of these everyday acts.
Menon notes that at times the normative emphasis among these women’s organizations is distinct from hegemonic Hindu nationalist discourses. Menon argues that it is through an accommodation of ideological or normative pluralism that the movement has been able to grow substantially among Indian women, as well as among other groups who might otherwise be alienated by rigidly enforced hegemonic and patriarchal norms. This is perhaps most clearly demonstrated in Menon’s analysis in chapter 1, where she takes up the subject of “everyday histories.” For example, in most dominant Hindu nationalist narratives, the seventeenth-century Maratha king Shivaji is valorized as the epitome of a righteous Hindu ruler and the progenitor of the modern Hindu nation. However, Menon finds that among the women of the Rashtra Sevika Samiti, the figure of Jijabai, Shivaji’s mother, is the generative force for a newly awakened Hindu politics in the early seventeenth century, an “architect of the Hindu Nation” (p. 47). The stories that circulate around Jijabai underscore the central role of motherhood for Menon’s interlocutors, one that allows individual women to make a deep impact on public, political events through the private choices they make for themselves, and most importantly, for their children.
In chapters 2 and 3, Menon interrogates the uses of fear and insecurity in the garnering of new recruits and the justification of certain kinds of social work. For example, in one conversation with a member of Sewa Bharati, we hear the position that the Hindu nationalist movement’s education outreach among Delhi’s lower-income communities is essential to countering the threats that conversion poses from minority religions, particularly Christianity. In the subsequent chapter, Menon examines the productive uses made of fears of Pakistan during the Kargil war. In her analysis of the speeches of female ascetics like Sadhvi Rithambara, Menon argues that it is “their dual status as renouncers and as women that makes these sadhvis such effective voices for the values, morals, and politics of the movement” (p. 82).
While chapter 3 draws from her fieldwork experiences at rallies and other significant occasions, Menon’s book is strongest and most illuminating when it takes us into the everyday world of work and play. In chapter 4, Menon presents material from her fieldwork among women in social service organizations. In the first part of the chapter Menon accompanies two VHP social workers in their volunteer time in the obstetric and gynecology unit of one of Delhi’s government hospitals. The two women play critical mediating roles for the largely poor, illiterate, and inexperienced patient population seeking prenatal attention. They routinely serve as stenographers, helping patients to input information for hospital registration, and in some cases they function as triage nurses, determining which patients require attention and which will most likely be sent home by the hospital staff. Here we get a more grounded sense of the vital social work that is done by individuals and organizations of the Hindu Right and how this work connects to the expansion of the movement among new communities.
Chapter 5 shifts the focus to a singular event, a weekend retreat, or shivir, organized by the Rashtra Sevika Samiti with the imperative to recruit new members. Organized games and play, physical exercises and drills, lectures, prayer, and patriotic songs structure the day’s activities, all with the aim to position new recruits “toward the cultural politics of the movement” (p. 131). Games and play are particularly apt strategies to “disseminate these ideas because they are able to convey Hindu nationalist constructions of history, politics, and morality without raising the hackles of those who might otherwise disagree with them” (p. 155).
Menon gives us a very good sense of the ideology and practices of the organizations and individuals with whom she interacts. There are a few places, however, where the reader might have wished for additional or perhaps different kinds of information to make sense of the larger argument. Among the occasions in which members of the Hindu nationalist movement become dissonant subjects we have the opening vignette, in which Ela, a volunteer in Sewa Bharati, expresses the opinion that “it is meaningless” to build a temple to Ram “on the blood of so many Indians” (p. 1). This views sits at odds with Ela’s own family history in the RSS, her own long-standing association with Sewa Bharati, and the focal nature of the efforts to build a temple at the former site of the Babri Masjid for the Hindu nationalist movement over the last several decades. Similarly, we hear that another Hindu nationalist, Vimla, doubts the authenticity of female renunciates, who merely “have to look spiritual” (p. 102) to be granted a life of wealth and luxury. Again, given sadhvis’ privileged position of deference and authority in the movement, and their importance to some of the arguments of Menon’s book, Vimla’s views seem jarring.
Menon’s focus on dissonance in the introductory chapter of the book alerts the reader to pay closer attention to the narratives of such moments, and her theoretical survey of this concept is valuable and provocative. However, as the book unfolds, its rich ethnographic documentation geared toward “dissonance” is not supplemented by a continued engagement with this vital idea. While episodes of dissonance like the ones described above are inherently interesting, there seems to be less rigorous pursuit of the questions surrounding these moments: How do individuals themselves understand their transgression of the movement’s norms? Are there potentially more radical consequences to this dissonance? Could such moments of dissonance constitute the germ for a potential subversion of hegemonic positions? Menon’s book comes at a time when the broad swath of the Hindu Right is in a moment of reinvention, and this work is therefore timely and important in this context. It is an important contribution to the discussion of Hindu nationalism, and its emphasis on the everyday practices of nationalist organizations helps to clarify the movement’s expansion outside of its early upper-caste and middle-class support base into lower-caste and lower-class communities and especially through gender as both a dissonant and a resonant category of experience for members of the Hindu Right. Menon has given us a rich view of women in the Hindu Right of northern India, and whatever questions she leaves unanswered are perhaps stimulants for new research agendas.
Note
[1]. In the 2009 Indian parliamentary elections, the Bharatiya Janata Party won 116 seats, enough to secure its position as the second largest political party after the centrist Indian National Congress, which won 206 seats. The BJP has a substantial political following in a number of state governments as well. Among the most populous states where it functions either as the sole party in power or as a coalition partner are Gujarat, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Punjab, Uttarakhand, and Jharkhand.
If there is additional discussion of this review, you may access it through the list discussion logs at: http://h-net.msu.edu/cgi-bin/logbrowse.pl.
Citation: Sunila Kale. Review of Menon, Kalyani Devaki, Everyday Nationalism: Women of the Hindu Right in India. H-Asia, H-Net Reviews. May, 2011.
URL: http://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=29835
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.
July 11, 2011
J Sri Raman on Politics of gender and ‘patriotism’ and ultra nationalism
Daily Times, July 01, 2011
HUM HINDUSTANI: Politics of gender and ‘patriotism’
by J Sri Raman
Women in politics and power have needed a macho image more than the men. And nothing helps acquire the image, in politics beyond the provincial, more than ultra-nationalism
This may be far from the politics of gender as it figures in the pundits’ jargon. But we have been hearing a lot about women leaders in politics ever since the last round of state assembly elections in April-May. India now boasts three strong chief ministers of the ‘weaker’ sex — Mayawati Naina Kumari, Jayalalithaa Jayaram and Mamata Banerjee. Waiting in the wings, meanwhile, are at least two female luminaries of the far right, bidding for a bigger role in the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
Polls in the states of Tamilnadu and West Bengal have respectively put Jayalalithaa and Mamata in power, while Mayawati awaits assembly elections due in her Uttar Pradesh next year. All the three have acquired the reputation of giant-slayers. Jayalalithaa has routed a formidable alliance of the regionally entrenched Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) and the Congress. Mamata has put an end to the three-decade-long rule of West Bengal by the Marxist-led Left. Mayawati, a dalit (untouchable) leader, performed a similar political feat in 2007 by achieving a massive electoral victory in the country’s most populous state.
All the three belong to a league of leaders whose strength is largely identified with ‘law and order’. They are credited with a particularly strong-arm approach to what seems to them lawless and disorderly conduct on the part of the political opposition.
So were a trio of prime ministers in the turbulent 70s — India’s Indira Gandhi (in office from 1966 to 1977 and from 1980 to 1984), Sri Lanka’s Sirimavo Bandaranaike (1960–1965, 1970–1977 and 1994–2000) and Golda Meir, the ‘Iron Lady’ of Israeli politics until Britain’s Margaret Thatcher was to snatch the title subsequently. In their case, however, the emphasis was less on law and order than on external and internal security. They were upheld as symbols of a ‘sovereignty’ that can be strengthened only by military means.
Unconcealed misogyny, of course, has always marked much of the witheringly contemptuous criticism, to which successful women leaders have been subjected. Males of the political species have not exactly been models of soft power. Ironically, however, women in politics and power have needed a macho image more than the men. And nothing helps acquire the image, in politics beyond the provincial, more than ultra-nationalism.
Which brings us back to the femme fatales of the far right, bidding for a bigger role in the BJP. An image of ultra-nationalism is not something they must invent and acquire. The halo may be hard to achieve for a Hema Malini, who has also to preserve her Bollywood-given Dream Girl image even while advertising a particular brand of purified water. It may also not quite tally with the telly-generated image of a Smriti Irani, the traditional Tulsi of a trite serial with the tell-tale title Kyonki Saas Bhi Kabhi Bahu Thi (literally, ‘Because the mother-in-law was also once a daughter-in-law’). But there are others, including two saffron-clad ‘saints’.
We are not talking, for the moment, of Sadhvi Ritambhara. The lady played a leading role in the mosque demolition of December 6, 1992, with her taped speeches branding India’s biggest minority as “Babar ki aulad (Babar’s off springs)”, marking the trail of violence to perhaps the most traumatic event in post-independence India. She was the founding chairperson of Durga Vahini (Army of Durga), the women’s wing of Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP).
After lying low for a long time, she sprang a surprise on the nation by making an appearance on the dais of an ‘anti-black money’ campaign under Baba Ramdev, known for his billionaire devotees and their extravagant donations, including a Scottish island. Ritambhara did raise eyebrows with some voicing reservations about continuing their earlier support for the campaign. Whether this augurs her return to a frontline role in the parivar (the far-right ‘family’) remains to be seen.
Uma Bharti, the other orator of the Ayodhya movement in an ochre sari, on the other hand, has already returned to the BJP after expulsion from it six years ago. She is remembered not only for her on-site call to the far-right hordes to give a final ‘push’ (ek dhakka aur do) to a crumbling Babri Masjid. Also cherished is the memory of her attempt to create an Ayodhya in Hubli in the southern state of Karnataka in 1994. Her provocation to the minority there led to riots which, in turn, paved the way for the BJP capturing power in Karnataka on the strength of a communal constituency.
The BJP leadership says she has been entrusted with the task of wining UP back for the party in the coming assembly elections. Observers, however, wonder if she is not just being kept away from her home-state of Madhya Pradesh, where she was the BJP chief minister for a brief year (2003-04). It was her campaign against current Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chauhan that cost her a place in the party in 2005. Some more speculation has been raised by her recent meeting with Congress President Sonia Gandhi, avowedly to seek support for a ‘Clean Ganga’ project, and her subsequent statement in praise of the “foreign-origin” target of so much far-right fury.
We can count on Sushma Swaraj, Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha (lower house of India’s parliament) not to seek any such meeting with Sonia. Sushma’s claim to a special status inside the party, possibly as its candidate for prime ministership in the next general election of 2014, in fact, rests on her record of uncompromising opposition to the alien in India’s midst. The BJP leader is proud of having contested a parliamentary election against Sonia. She is even prouder of her vow in 2004 to shave off her tresses and wear white, in emulation of a traditional Hindu widow, if Italian Sonia was sworn in as India’s Prime Minister.
Sushma has strengthened her case for the candidature with her recent dance at the Raj Ghat, the tomb of Mahatma Gandhi, chosen by the BJP as a venue of anti-corruption protest. She swayed to the song of celebrated Sahir Ludhianvi in Naya Daur, a film from the 1950s: “Ye desh hai viir javaanon kaa/Alabelon kaa mastaanon kaa/Is desh kaa yaaron kyaa kahanaa/Ye desh hai duniyaa kaa gahanaa” (This is the country of brave youth/proud and playful/what can one say of this country, friends/this country is the world’s jewel).
Another song by the same poet, from another film (Dhool kaa Phool) of the 1950s, comes to mind. Sung to a child, the climactic lines say, “Yeh deen ke tajar ye watan bechne waale/yeh insaano ki laashon ke qafan bechne waale/tu in ke liye maut ka elaan banega/tu hindu banega na musalmaan banega/insaan ki aulaad hai, insaan banega” (These traders in faith, these merchants of the country/these sellers of the coffins of human bodies/you will become the proclamation of their death/you are neither a Hindu nor a Musalmaan/you are a human progeny, and you will remain a human being).
No leader of the BJP and its band, whether female or male, will dance to this song and tune of a different patriotism.
The writer is a journalist based in Chennai, India. A peace activist, he is also the author of a sheaf of poems titled At Gunpoint
HUM HINDUSTANI: Politics of gender and ‘patriotism’
by J Sri Raman
Women in politics and power have needed a macho image more than the men. And nothing helps acquire the image, in politics beyond the provincial, more than ultra-nationalism
This may be far from the politics of gender as it figures in the pundits’ jargon. But we have been hearing a lot about women leaders in politics ever since the last round of state assembly elections in April-May. India now boasts three strong chief ministers of the ‘weaker’ sex — Mayawati Naina Kumari, Jayalalithaa Jayaram and Mamata Banerjee. Waiting in the wings, meanwhile, are at least two female luminaries of the far right, bidding for a bigger role in the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
Polls in the states of Tamilnadu and West Bengal have respectively put Jayalalithaa and Mamata in power, while Mayawati awaits assembly elections due in her Uttar Pradesh next year. All the three have acquired the reputation of giant-slayers. Jayalalithaa has routed a formidable alliance of the regionally entrenched Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) and the Congress. Mamata has put an end to the three-decade-long rule of West Bengal by the Marxist-led Left. Mayawati, a dalit (untouchable) leader, performed a similar political feat in 2007 by achieving a massive electoral victory in the country’s most populous state.
All the three belong to a league of leaders whose strength is largely identified with ‘law and order’. They are credited with a particularly strong-arm approach to what seems to them lawless and disorderly conduct on the part of the political opposition.
So were a trio of prime ministers in the turbulent 70s — India’s Indira Gandhi (in office from 1966 to 1977 and from 1980 to 1984), Sri Lanka’s Sirimavo Bandaranaike (1960–1965, 1970–1977 and 1994–2000) and Golda Meir, the ‘Iron Lady’ of Israeli politics until Britain’s Margaret Thatcher was to snatch the title subsequently. In their case, however, the emphasis was less on law and order than on external and internal security. They were upheld as symbols of a ‘sovereignty’ that can be strengthened only by military means.
Unconcealed misogyny, of course, has always marked much of the witheringly contemptuous criticism, to which successful women leaders have been subjected. Males of the political species have not exactly been models of soft power. Ironically, however, women in politics and power have needed a macho image more than the men. And nothing helps acquire the image, in politics beyond the provincial, more than ultra-nationalism.
Which brings us back to the femme fatales of the far right, bidding for a bigger role in the BJP. An image of ultra-nationalism is not something they must invent and acquire. The halo may be hard to achieve for a Hema Malini, who has also to preserve her Bollywood-given Dream Girl image even while advertising a particular brand of purified water. It may also not quite tally with the telly-generated image of a Smriti Irani, the traditional Tulsi of a trite serial with the tell-tale title Kyonki Saas Bhi Kabhi Bahu Thi (literally, ‘Because the mother-in-law was also once a daughter-in-law’). But there are others, including two saffron-clad ‘saints’.
We are not talking, for the moment, of Sadhvi Ritambhara. The lady played a leading role in the mosque demolition of December 6, 1992, with her taped speeches branding India’s biggest minority as “Babar ki aulad (Babar’s off springs)”, marking the trail of violence to perhaps the most traumatic event in post-independence India. She was the founding chairperson of Durga Vahini (Army of Durga), the women’s wing of Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP).
After lying low for a long time, she sprang a surprise on the nation by making an appearance on the dais of an ‘anti-black money’ campaign under Baba Ramdev, known for his billionaire devotees and their extravagant donations, including a Scottish island. Ritambhara did raise eyebrows with some voicing reservations about continuing their earlier support for the campaign. Whether this augurs her return to a frontline role in the parivar (the far-right ‘family’) remains to be seen.
Uma Bharti, the other orator of the Ayodhya movement in an ochre sari, on the other hand, has already returned to the BJP after expulsion from it six years ago. She is remembered not only for her on-site call to the far-right hordes to give a final ‘push’ (ek dhakka aur do) to a crumbling Babri Masjid. Also cherished is the memory of her attempt to create an Ayodhya in Hubli in the southern state of Karnataka in 1994. Her provocation to the minority there led to riots which, in turn, paved the way for the BJP capturing power in Karnataka on the strength of a communal constituency.
The BJP leadership says she has been entrusted with the task of wining UP back for the party in the coming assembly elections. Observers, however, wonder if she is not just being kept away from her home-state of Madhya Pradesh, where she was the BJP chief minister for a brief year (2003-04). It was her campaign against current Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chauhan that cost her a place in the party in 2005. Some more speculation has been raised by her recent meeting with Congress President Sonia Gandhi, avowedly to seek support for a ‘Clean Ganga’ project, and her subsequent statement in praise of the “foreign-origin” target of so much far-right fury.
We can count on Sushma Swaraj, Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha (lower house of India’s parliament) not to seek any such meeting with Sonia. Sushma’s claim to a special status inside the party, possibly as its candidate for prime ministership in the next general election of 2014, in fact, rests on her record of uncompromising opposition to the alien in India’s midst. The BJP leader is proud of having contested a parliamentary election against Sonia. She is even prouder of her vow in 2004 to shave off her tresses and wear white, in emulation of a traditional Hindu widow, if Italian Sonia was sworn in as India’s Prime Minister.
Sushma has strengthened her case for the candidature with her recent dance at the Raj Ghat, the tomb of Mahatma Gandhi, chosen by the BJP as a venue of anti-corruption protest. She swayed to the song of celebrated Sahir Ludhianvi in Naya Daur, a film from the 1950s: “Ye desh hai viir javaanon kaa/Alabelon kaa mastaanon kaa/Is desh kaa yaaron kyaa kahanaa/Ye desh hai duniyaa kaa gahanaa” (This is the country of brave youth/proud and playful/what can one say of this country, friends/this country is the world’s jewel).
Another song by the same poet, from another film (Dhool kaa Phool) of the 1950s, comes to mind. Sung to a child, the climactic lines say, “Yeh deen ke tajar ye watan bechne waale/yeh insaano ki laashon ke qafan bechne waale/tu in ke liye maut ka elaan banega/tu hindu banega na musalmaan banega/insaan ki aulaad hai, insaan banega” (These traders in faith, these merchants of the country/these sellers of the coffins of human bodies/you will become the proclamation of their death/you are neither a Hindu nor a Musalmaan/you are a human progeny, and you will remain a human being).
No leader of the BJP and its band, whether female or male, will dance to this song and tune of a different patriotism.
The writer is a journalist based in Chennai, India. A peace activist, he is also the author of a sheaf of poems titled At Gunpoint
June 05, 2011
Ramdev's Saffron Loaded Drama - selected stories
The Times of India
Saffron is the ruling hue at Ramdev's fast
Abantika Ghosh, TNN | Jun 5, 2011, 04.26am IST
NEW DELHI: While Congress leaders fumed at Baba Ramdev's alleged affiliation to the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh and Bharatiya Janata Party, accusing the yoga guru of accepting funds for his high-profile satyagraha from saffron organizations, at ground zero in Ramlila Maidan there was little effort to hide those leanings.
The signs were everywhere, from the fiery Sangh Parivar leader Sadhvi Ritambhara on stage to the fluttering banners of Akhil Bharatiya Hindu Mahasabha, Arya Veer and Veerangana Dal and Arya Samaj fluttering along the walls and inside the mammoth pandal. There was also a prominent portrait of the RSS style Bharat Mata immediately below the stage – possibly mindful of the criticism Anna Hazare's stage had garnered for the same image – besides volunteers in khaki shorts and orange caps serving water. The entire tent was a medley of saffron and white.
The stage on Saturday was overwhelmingly saffron though elements of religious diversity had been carefully factored in with token presence of some Muslim and Jain leaders. The master of ceremonies kept reminding the eager audience how whenever the issue of reviving the country and ridding it of its evils had been raised, sants had always been in front and they would continue to be so now. "Those who politics had divided, sants will unite," he said.
References to the mutts of Hardwar, Benares and Mathura as well as the Swaminarayan sect were frequent and unabashed. By afternoon, there was talk about VHP leaders like Ashok Singhal coming to join the fast though there was no announcement from the stage.
Rithambara, in her speech lauding Ramdev's initiative, said that if the country had more people like Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, saints would not need to go on fasts, as the audience broke into delirious applause.
In the evening, when questioned about the Sadhvi's presence on the dais and her purported association with Babri Masjid demolition, Ramdev sought to distance himself from it by saying: "I cannot talk about her personal issues but I know her for many decades and have a very high regard for her."
He also sought to answer the Congress charge of RSS funding by saying that the entire expense for the elaborate tent and other arrangements had been met by "donations made by the people present here''. To add drama in his characteristic style, he asked, "How many of you are willing to make more contributions if required?" Little wonder that several thousand hands went up.
o o o
The Economic Times
5 Jun, 2011, 02.48AM IST, Binoy Prabhakar,ET Bureau
Baba Ramdev Vs Anna Hazare: A Quick Guide about the similarities and differences
Anna vs Baba
At first glance, Baba Ramdev and Anna Hazare are as different as chalk and cheese. One is a yoga practitioner while the other is a social activist. One sports a ferocious beard, commands his 46-year-old supple body into wicked poses and wears bright saffron loincloth. The other is a frail, clean-shaven septuagenarian who won't be caught dead in anything but white khadi.
They also disagree on the scope of the Lok Pal Bill. That's where the differences end. The similarities are multiple. To list some, the two are united in their fight against graft, share a passion for political activism, have a huge following and have taken controversial stands on issues. Here is a look at the two men who are dominating headlines and negotiating with the government.
PET PEEVES
Baba Ramdev owns a Scottish manor, but in many ways, he is a throwback to the yogis of Old India. He wants a ban on English. He frowns on Coca-Cola. He abhors Western outfits. The WHO, to him, is a western conspiracy. He is a bachelor who cannot tolerate homosexuals. He has also taken aim at `500 and `1,000 notes, saying they are a cause of graft.
Anna, a teetotaller, has banned tobacco, cigarettes and bidis in his village, Ralegan Siddhi near Pune. He also chafes at alcohol use. The villagers also do without cable TV, another of Anna's dislikes. The people of Ralegan Siddhi are vegetarian converts. Anna also hates big families: to cut them to size, the men in the village undergo vasectomy.
EASY SOLUTIONS
Baba wants to cut off the hands of those guilty of corruption . As if that is not enough, he also favours hanging until death perpetrators of graft.
Surprise, surprise! Hanging is a solution dear to Anna too. Erring villagers are also flogged publicly in Ralegan Siddhi. Never mind that one calls himself a yogi and the other, a Gandhian.
PULLING A 'FAST' ONE
Baba has long been shouting hoarse about black money. But Anna's Big Fast in April had snatched the issue from right
under his feet. Baba's rants were beginning to sound like a broken record. His fast has propelled his cause back into relevance.
Anna has used hunger strikes to push his causes for more than four decades. The Jantar Mantar act in April was a blockbuster event, with fans, the media and politicians descending to pay obeisance.
WHAT NEXT
Both men have kept everyone guessing about their entry into politics. Swathes of followers are a temptation. But chances are they will not. Say, if Nitin Gadkari - though difficult, try imagining the BJP chief on a fast - begins a protest, will the government give in? That should answer if Anna and Baba
will float a political party.
o o o
cnn - ibn
Saffron hue at Baba's protest upsets Anna's team
Pallavi GhoshPallavi Ghosh , CNN-IBN
Updated Jun 04, 2011 at 09:34pm IST
Click to play video
New Delhi: Hours after Baba Ramdev's fast officially kicked off on Saturday, the battle over corruption began acquiring a Right versus Left hue. This provided the already embattled UPA government an unexpected reason to smile with fissures in the civil society ranks.
Lokpal committee member Prashant Bhushan said, "I am uncomfortable and very unhappy by the way Baba Ramdev has allowed communal elements like Sadhvi Ritambhara to use his platform. One might not be able to stop them from supporting you but you can't allow them to use your platform."
The trigger for Bhushan's tirade was the image of the Sadhvi Ritambhara-Baba Ramdev's joint-show at the Ramlila Maidan, forcing leading civil rights activist Swami Agnivesh to be even more direct.
"I feel sad that a person accused of Babri Masjid demolition sits on the campaign… Communalism should be kept away from such campaigns," said Swami Agnivesh.
Activist Anna Hazare too changed the shade of his stand he had taken earlier in the week, when he had agreed to join Baba Ramdev at the Ramlila grounds.
Anna Hazare said, "I will take a decision on whether to join the campaign or not only after I reach Delhi tomorrow."
The Left too jumped to counter the Sadhvi-Baba joint-show, questioning the mix of a religious leader and a political platform.
"But if the religious leader suddenly tries to come to a place of a political platform, that becomes a little mysterious," said Gurudas Dasgupta of the Communist Party of India.
The government walking the extra mile for Baba Ramdev was perhaps the result of their worry over a unified civil society, but with saffron being the prominent colour at Ramlila grounds on Saturday, the relief came quicker.
o o o
Hindustan Times
Medha Terms Baba’s protest biased and extravagant
Pooja Domadia, Hindustan Times
Mumbai, June 05, 2011
On the first day of yoga guru Baba Ramdev’s fast against black money and corruption, several criticisms have hit his campaign. Social activist Medha Patkar said that the campaign is not secular as it is propagated to be. Sadhvi Rithambara, an active member of Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) who i
s known for her anti-Muslim oratory, was on the stage with Ramdev on Saturday.
Reacting to her presence, Patkar said, “The movement is not secular as a right wing outfit like RSS is openly supporting Ramdev. RSS supported the anti-corruption movement by Anna Hazare too but their members were not allowed on stage.”
However, the representatives of Baba Ramdev’s organisation — Bharat Swabhiman Nyas in Mumbai said the allegation is false as these groups are voluntarily supporting Ramdev.
“Baba has not invited any group as such. Anyone who feels that the issues Baba is fighting for are important can come and support. We are not against any political party or person but against a larger issue like corruption,” said Abhay Kabra, Navi Mumbai President, BSN.
Patkar also opposed the grand arrangements for the strike.
“If this is the way protests go on, the face of people’s movement will change. The way money is being pumped in for lavish arrangements, we wonder about the source of income. All the donors would be big corporate associations,” she said.
“It is unfortunate that such protests are given importance by the government whereas common people are ignored,” Patkar added.
Saffron is the ruling hue at Ramdev's fast
Abantika Ghosh, TNN | Jun 5, 2011, 04.26am IST
NEW DELHI: While Congress leaders fumed at Baba Ramdev's alleged affiliation to the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh and Bharatiya Janata Party, accusing the yoga guru of accepting funds for his high-profile satyagraha from saffron organizations, at ground zero in Ramlila Maidan there was little effort to hide those leanings.
The signs were everywhere, from the fiery Sangh Parivar leader Sadhvi Ritambhara on stage to the fluttering banners of Akhil Bharatiya Hindu Mahasabha, Arya Veer and Veerangana Dal and Arya Samaj fluttering along the walls and inside the mammoth pandal. There was also a prominent portrait of the RSS style Bharat Mata immediately below the stage – possibly mindful of the criticism Anna Hazare's stage had garnered for the same image – besides volunteers in khaki shorts and orange caps serving water. The entire tent was a medley of saffron and white.
The stage on Saturday was overwhelmingly saffron though elements of religious diversity had been carefully factored in with token presence of some Muslim and Jain leaders. The master of ceremonies kept reminding the eager audience how whenever the issue of reviving the country and ridding it of its evils had been raised, sants had always been in front and they would continue to be so now. "Those who politics had divided, sants will unite," he said.
References to the mutts of Hardwar, Benares and Mathura as well as the Swaminarayan sect were frequent and unabashed. By afternoon, there was talk about VHP leaders like Ashok Singhal coming to join the fast though there was no announcement from the stage.
Rithambara, in her speech lauding Ramdev's initiative, said that if the country had more people like Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, saints would not need to go on fasts, as the audience broke into delirious applause.
In the evening, when questioned about the Sadhvi's presence on the dais and her purported association with Babri Masjid demolition, Ramdev sought to distance himself from it by saying: "I cannot talk about her personal issues but I know her for many decades and have a very high regard for her."
He also sought to answer the Congress charge of RSS funding by saying that the entire expense for the elaborate tent and other arrangements had been met by "donations made by the people present here''. To add drama in his characteristic style, he asked, "How many of you are willing to make more contributions if required?" Little wonder that several thousand hands went up.
o o o
The Economic Times
5 Jun, 2011, 02.48AM IST, Binoy Prabhakar,ET Bureau
Baba Ramdev Vs Anna Hazare: A Quick Guide about the similarities and differences
Anna vs Baba
At first glance, Baba Ramdev and Anna Hazare are as different as chalk and cheese. One is a yoga practitioner while the other is a social activist. One sports a ferocious beard, commands his 46-year-old supple body into wicked poses and wears bright saffron loincloth. The other is a frail, clean-shaven septuagenarian who won't be caught dead in anything but white khadi.
They also disagree on the scope of the Lok Pal Bill. That's where the differences end. The similarities are multiple. To list some, the two are united in their fight against graft, share a passion for political activism, have a huge following and have taken controversial stands on issues. Here is a look at the two men who are dominating headlines and negotiating with the government.
PET PEEVES
Baba Ramdev owns a Scottish manor, but in many ways, he is a throwback to the yogis of Old India. He wants a ban on English. He frowns on Coca-Cola. He abhors Western outfits. The WHO, to him, is a western conspiracy. He is a bachelor who cannot tolerate homosexuals. He has also taken aim at `500 and `1,000 notes, saying they are a cause of graft.
Anna, a teetotaller, has banned tobacco, cigarettes and bidis in his village, Ralegan Siddhi near Pune. He also chafes at alcohol use. The villagers also do without cable TV, another of Anna's dislikes. The people of Ralegan Siddhi are vegetarian converts. Anna also hates big families: to cut them to size, the men in the village undergo vasectomy.
EASY SOLUTIONS
Baba wants to cut off the hands of those guilty of corruption . As if that is not enough, he also favours hanging until death perpetrators of graft.
Surprise, surprise! Hanging is a solution dear to Anna too. Erring villagers are also flogged publicly in Ralegan Siddhi. Never mind that one calls himself a yogi and the other, a Gandhian.
PULLING A 'FAST' ONE
Baba has long been shouting hoarse about black money. But Anna's Big Fast in April had snatched the issue from right
under his feet. Baba's rants were beginning to sound like a broken record. His fast has propelled his cause back into relevance.
Anna has used hunger strikes to push his causes for more than four decades. The Jantar Mantar act in April was a blockbuster event, with fans, the media and politicians descending to pay obeisance.
WHAT NEXT
Both men have kept everyone guessing about their entry into politics. Swathes of followers are a temptation. But chances are they will not. Say, if Nitin Gadkari - though difficult, try imagining the BJP chief on a fast - begins a protest, will the government give in? That should answer if Anna and Baba
will float a political party.
o o o
cnn - ibn
Saffron hue at Baba's protest upsets Anna's team
Pallavi GhoshPallavi Ghosh , CNN-IBN
Updated Jun 04, 2011 at 09:34pm IST
Click to play video
New Delhi: Hours after Baba Ramdev's fast officially kicked off on Saturday, the battle over corruption began acquiring a Right versus Left hue. This provided the already embattled UPA government an unexpected reason to smile with fissures in the civil society ranks.
Lokpal committee member Prashant Bhushan said, "I am uncomfortable and very unhappy by the way Baba Ramdev has allowed communal elements like Sadhvi Ritambhara to use his platform. One might not be able to stop them from supporting you but you can't allow them to use your platform."
The trigger for Bhushan's tirade was the image of the Sadhvi Ritambhara-Baba Ramdev's joint-show at the Ramlila Maidan, forcing leading civil rights activist Swami Agnivesh to be even more direct.
"I feel sad that a person accused of Babri Masjid demolition sits on the campaign… Communalism should be kept away from such campaigns," said Swami Agnivesh.
Activist Anna Hazare too changed the shade of his stand he had taken earlier in the week, when he had agreed to join Baba Ramdev at the Ramlila grounds.
Anna Hazare said, "I will take a decision on whether to join the campaign or not only after I reach Delhi tomorrow."
The Left too jumped to counter the Sadhvi-Baba joint-show, questioning the mix of a religious leader and a political platform.
"But if the religious leader suddenly tries to come to a place of a political platform, that becomes a little mysterious," said Gurudas Dasgupta of the Communist Party of India.
The government walking the extra mile for Baba Ramdev was perhaps the result of their worry over a unified civil society, but with saffron being the prominent colour at Ramlila grounds on Saturday, the relief came quicker.
o o o
Hindustan Times
Medha Terms Baba’s protest biased and extravagant
Pooja Domadia, Hindustan Times
Mumbai, June 05, 2011
On the first day of yoga guru Baba Ramdev’s fast against black money and corruption, several criticisms have hit his campaign. Social activist Medha Patkar said that the campaign is not secular as it is propagated to be. Sadhvi Rithambara, an active member of Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) who i
s known for her anti-Muslim oratory, was on the stage with Ramdev on Saturday.
Reacting to her presence, Patkar said, “The movement is not secular as a right wing outfit like RSS is openly supporting Ramdev. RSS supported the anti-corruption movement by Anna Hazare too but their members were not allowed on stage.”
However, the representatives of Baba Ramdev’s organisation — Bharat Swabhiman Nyas in Mumbai said the allegation is false as these groups are voluntarily supporting Ramdev.
“Baba has not invited any group as such. Anyone who feels that the issues Baba is fighting for are important can come and support. We are not against any political party or person but against a larger issue like corruption,” said Abhay Kabra, Navi Mumbai President, BSN.
Patkar also opposed the grand arrangements for the strike.
“If this is the way protests go on, the face of people’s movement will change. The way money is being pumped in for lavish arrangements, we wonder about the source of income. All the donors would be big corporate associations,” she said.
“It is unfortunate that such protests are given importance by the government whereas common people are ignored,” Patkar added.
July 28, 2010
Stop terrorist leader Sadhvi Rithambara from entering Britain
COUNCIL of INDIAN MUSLIMS (UK)
66c Cazenove Road, Stoke Newington, London N16 6AA
Patron: Lord Adam Patel of Blackburn
PRESS RELEASE: For Immediate Release
28 July 2010
Stop terrorist leader from entering Britain: British Indian Muslims Demand
British Indian Muslims have urged the British Government to stop a terrorist Hindu leader, Sadhvi Rithambara, from entering into Britain who is reported to be planning to tour Britain in September.
Liberhan Commission, appointed by the Indian Government to investigate the demolition of 16th Century Babri Mosque by Hindu militants, has held Sadhvi Rithambara and other 67 Hindu leaders guilty of demolition of the mosque and the subsequent violence that killed some 3,000 people across India. The priestess is also being also being investigated for her links with various bomb blasts carried by extremist Hindu organisations in India.
In a letter to Home Secretary Theresa May, the Chairman of Council of Indian Muslims—UK (CIM), Munaf Zeena has reminded that even in June 2007, when Sadhvi first visited Britain, the then Home Secretary, Jacqui Smith had not paid attention to his request to keep an eye on Sadhvi and the firebrand priestess was allowed to attend and address meetings organised by her supporters in which she is said to have collected around £78,000 for her notorious activities.
“Incidentally the news of ‘the priestess of hate’ being granted UK visa comes within a month of a Muslim preacher, Dr. Zakir Naik, being refused entry to the UK.
“Before Sadhvi, the mass murderer and Chief Minister (better known as Butcher) of Gujarat was allowed to be welcomed on British soil.
“Please allow us to remind you, Madam Home Secretary, that Modi has been refused visa by the US while during their visit in January to Gujarat two German MPs, Ute Granold and Pascal Kober, displayed exemplary courage and deplored Modi’s crime in 2002 as ethnic cleansing drawing parallels between Gujarat under Modi and Germany under Hitler.
“But, sadly, Modi has his supporters in the British parliament. One of them, Barry Gardiner, MP for Brent North, is on record to have shamelessly praised Modi as “the lion of Gujarat”. In his recent election campaign he duped as low as trying to win Hindu Gujarati votes in his constituency and for this he uploaded on his web site recommendations by Modi, along with his photograph. The impact of Mr Gardiner’s election tactics on the voting pattern needs to be investigated.
“Madam, such brazen immorality by some politicians explains why and how elements like Modi and his admirer, Sadhvi Ritambra, are allowed to enter into Britain despite the fact that the visa application form clearly asks:
· “Have you ever been concerned in the commission, preparation, organisation or support of acts of terrorism, either within or outside the United Kingdom, or have you ever been a member of an organisation which has been involved in or advocated terrorism in furtherance of its aims?” (Section 4.15)
· “Have you ever been concerned in the commission, preparation or organisation of genocide or crimes, including crimes against humanity and war crimes, committed in the course of armed conflict?” (section 4.16)
The letter reads further, “in order to stop such confusion in future all of the 68 persons, held responsible for the destruction of the Babri Mosque, and BJP politicians, including Narendra Modi, being investigated for their role in the Gujarat Massacre of 2002, be declared persona non grata and told that they are not welcome on British soil.”
Ends
Council of Indian Muslims
66-68 Cazenove Road
Stoke Newington
London N16 6AA
66c Cazenove Road, Stoke Newington, London N16 6AA
Patron: Lord Adam Patel of Blackburn
PRESS RELEASE: For Immediate Release
28 July 2010
Stop terrorist leader from entering Britain: British Indian Muslims Demand
British Indian Muslims have urged the British Government to stop a terrorist Hindu leader, Sadhvi Rithambara, from entering into Britain who is reported to be planning to tour Britain in September.
Liberhan Commission, appointed by the Indian Government to investigate the demolition of 16th Century Babri Mosque by Hindu militants, has held Sadhvi Rithambara and other 67 Hindu leaders guilty of demolition of the mosque and the subsequent violence that killed some 3,000 people across India. The priestess is also being also being investigated for her links with various bomb blasts carried by extremist Hindu organisations in India.
In a letter to Home Secretary Theresa May, the Chairman of Council of Indian Muslims—UK (CIM), Munaf Zeena has reminded that even in June 2007, when Sadhvi first visited Britain, the then Home Secretary, Jacqui Smith had not paid attention to his request to keep an eye on Sadhvi and the firebrand priestess was allowed to attend and address meetings organised by her supporters in which she is said to have collected around £78,000 for her notorious activities.
“Incidentally the news of ‘the priestess of hate’ being granted UK visa comes within a month of a Muslim preacher, Dr. Zakir Naik, being refused entry to the UK.
“Before Sadhvi, the mass murderer and Chief Minister (better known as Butcher) of Gujarat was allowed to be welcomed on British soil.
“Please allow us to remind you, Madam Home Secretary, that Modi has been refused visa by the US while during their visit in January to Gujarat two German MPs, Ute Granold and Pascal Kober, displayed exemplary courage and deplored Modi’s crime in 2002 as ethnic cleansing drawing parallels between Gujarat under Modi and Germany under Hitler.
“But, sadly, Modi has his supporters in the British parliament. One of them, Barry Gardiner, MP for Brent North, is on record to have shamelessly praised Modi as “the lion of Gujarat”. In his recent election campaign he duped as low as trying to win Hindu Gujarati votes in his constituency and for this he uploaded on his web site recommendations by Modi, along with his photograph. The impact of Mr Gardiner’s election tactics on the voting pattern needs to be investigated.
“Madam, such brazen immorality by some politicians explains why and how elements like Modi and his admirer, Sadhvi Ritambra, are allowed to enter into Britain despite the fact that the visa application form clearly asks:
· “Have you ever been concerned in the commission, preparation, organisation or support of acts of terrorism, either within or outside the United Kingdom, or have you ever been a member of an organisation which has been involved in or advocated terrorism in furtherance of its aims?” (Section 4.15)
· “Have you ever been concerned in the commission, preparation or organisation of genocide or crimes, including crimes against humanity and war crimes, committed in the course of armed conflict?” (section 4.16)
The letter reads further, “in order to stop such confusion in future all of the 68 persons, held responsible for the destruction of the Babri Mosque, and BJP politicians, including Narendra Modi, being investigated for their role in the Gujarat Massacre of 2002, be declared persona non grata and told that they are not welcome on British soil.”
Ends
Council of Indian Muslims
66-68 Cazenove Road
Stoke Newington
London N16 6AA
June 24, 2007
Thanks to campaigning - City of Hollywood dissociates from Sadhvi Ritambhara Event
IMC-USA commends the City of Hollywood, Florida for officially dissociating from Sadhvi Ritambhara Event
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
June 23, 2007
Indian Muslim Council-USA, an advocacy group working towards protecting and promoting the pluralist and tolerant values of the Indian society along with a broad-based alliance representing Hindu, Christian and Muslim communities as well as organizations of secular persuasion commend the City of Hollywood, Florida for distancing itself from an event honoring Sadhvi Ritambhara.
This announcement comes in the wake of a concerted campaign by Indian Americans of various background protesting the City of Hollywood's 'sponsorship' of the event on Saturday June 23rd.
Ms. Ritambhara is a leading member of Vishwa Hindu Parishad, a militant organization that has been implicated in promoting hatred and violence against Muslims, Christians and other cultural and religious minorities in India. Ms. Ritambhara is currently under-trial for her role in the Babri Mosque demolition case. On December 6, 1992, she incited an armed Hindu mob to tear down the 16th century Babri Mosque in Ayodhya, India, in violation of the order of the Indian Supreme Court. She further incited Hindu mobs to attack Muslims leading to over 3000 deaths in December 1992 and January 1993.
Shrikumar Poddar, the Hindu spiritual leader of Vaishnava Center for Enlightenment, Lansing, MI said, "Sadhvi Ritambhara is the anti-thesis of Hinduism, always speaking ill of other faiths, I wonder how the State Department issues visa to such promoters of hatred".
The officials at the City of Hollywood were educated by the callers about the deplorable record of Ms. Ritambhara and were surprised to learn that the organizers had quoted City of Hollywood, Florida as one of the sponsors of the event. The City immediately demanded and received a written apology from the organizers of the event.
Shekhar Reddy, writing on behalf of South Florida Hindu Association, apologized for the embarrassment caused to the City of Hollywood.
The organizations that participated in this campaign include:
Alliance for a Secular and Democratic South Asia
Association of Indian Muslims of America (AIM)
Dharma Megha
Federation of Indian American Christian Organizations of North America (FIACONA)
Friends of South Asia (FOSA)
Hindu Vaishnava Center for Enlightenment
Indian Muslim Council-USA (IMC-USA)
Indian Muslim Relief and Charities (IMRC)
India Foundation
Indian American Coalition for Pluralism (IACP)
Indian Christian Forum (ICF)
International Service Society
Muslim Youth Awareness Alliance (MYAA)
NRI Coalition for Social Justice
NRI's For Secular and Harmonious India (NRI-SAHI)
Seva International
Supporters of Human Rights in India (SHRI)
Vedanata Society of East Lansing
Washington Watch.
o o o
Indian American Community Protests Hollywood Hatemonger
Demand City of Hollywood-Florida to dissociate from Sadhvi Ritambhara
Hon. Mara Giulianti ,
Mayor
City of Hollywood
2600 Hollywood Blvd
Hollywood , FL 33020
Dear Hon. Mara Giulianti,
We the undersigned organizations understand that several groups along with
the City of Hollywood have scheduled a Bhajan (Hindu devotional songs),
event at Hollywood Beach Culture & Community Center on Saturday June 23, 2007.
We appreciate the Bhajans, but we deem it improper to invite Sadhvi Ritambhara
to lead the ceremony as chief guest, given her highly deplorable
record of creating discord and violence in India.
Sadhvi Ritambhara is a leading member of Vishwa Hindu Parishad, the Hindu racist organization whose ideology is akin to Hitler’s Nazism and Mussolini's fascism. The US Department of State in its annual human rights reports has written extensively about the violent activities of Sadhvi Ritambhara and her violent organization Vishwa Hindu Parishad. Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch have also written extensively about the militant organizations collectively known as “Sangh Parivar” and the role of its leaders in pogroms against Muslim, Christian and non-Hindu cultural and religious minorities.
Currently, the Government of India’s Central Bureau of Investigation, is prosecuting
Sadhvi Ritambhara in Babri Mosque demolition case, pertaining to her role in demolishing a Muslim place of worship in India. On December 6, 1992, Ritambhara
incited an armed Hindu mob to tear down the 16 th century Babri Mosque in Ayodhya,
India, in violation of the order of the Indian Supreme Court. She further incited Hindu mobs to attack Muslims leading to over 3000 deaths in December 1992 and January 1993.
Sadhvi Ritambhara’s last visit to USA in 2002 caused a protest outside the Hindu
Temple Society in New York.(See http://www.rediff.com/us/2002/jul/27us.htm). Please note that the then President of the Society, Ms. Uma Mysorekar later regretted having allowed her to speak at the temple.
Below is a dossier in support of our profile of Sadhvi Ritambhara.
Given her deplorable record, we request you to withdraw your sponsorship of
the event and completely disassociate City of Hollywood from this hate monger.
We will be glad to meet with you and your staff to brief them on this matter and
urge a course of action that is in the best interest of the citizens of City of Hollywood.
Please let us know as soon as possible, latest by the end of the week.
Yours Sincerely,
* Alliance for a Secular and Democratic South Asia
* Association of Indian Muslims of America (AIM)
* Dharma Megha
* Federation of Indian American
Christian Organizations of North America (FIACONA)
* Friends of South Asia (FOSA)
* Hindu Vaishnava Center for Enlightenment
* Indian Muslim Council-USA (IMC-USA)
* Indian Muslim Relief and Charities (IMRC)
* India Foundation
* Indian American Coalition for Pluralism (IACP)
* Indian Christian Forum (ICF)
* International Service Society
* Muslim Youth Awareness Alliance (MYAA)
* NRI Coalition for Social Justice
* NRI's For Secular and Harmonious India (NRI-SAHI)
* Seva International
* Vedanata Society of East Lansing
* Washington Watch
* Supporters of Human Rights in India (SHRI)
o o o
Faxed Response from the City of Holywood
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
June 23, 2007
Indian Muslim Council-USA, an advocacy group working towards protecting and promoting the pluralist and tolerant values of the Indian society along with a broad-based alliance representing Hindu, Christian and Muslim communities as well as organizations of secular persuasion commend the City of Hollywood, Florida for distancing itself from an event honoring Sadhvi Ritambhara.
This announcement comes in the wake of a concerted campaign by Indian Americans of various background protesting the City of Hollywood's 'sponsorship' of the event on Saturday June 23rd.
Ms. Ritambhara is a leading member of Vishwa Hindu Parishad, a militant organization that has been implicated in promoting hatred and violence against Muslims, Christians and other cultural and religious minorities in India. Ms. Ritambhara is currently under-trial for her role in the Babri Mosque demolition case. On December 6, 1992, she incited an armed Hindu mob to tear down the 16th century Babri Mosque in Ayodhya, India, in violation of the order of the Indian Supreme Court. She further incited Hindu mobs to attack Muslims leading to over 3000 deaths in December 1992 and January 1993.
Shrikumar Poddar, the Hindu spiritual leader of Vaishnava Center for Enlightenment, Lansing, MI said, "Sadhvi Ritambhara is the anti-thesis of Hinduism, always speaking ill of other faiths, I wonder how the State Department issues visa to such promoters of hatred".
The officials at the City of Hollywood were educated by the callers about the deplorable record of Ms. Ritambhara and were surprised to learn that the organizers had quoted City of Hollywood, Florida as one of the sponsors of the event. The City immediately demanded and received a written apology from the organizers of the event.
Shekhar Reddy, writing on behalf of South Florida Hindu Association, apologized for the embarrassment caused to the City of Hollywood.
The organizations that participated in this campaign include:
Alliance for a Secular and Democratic South Asia
Association of Indian Muslims of America (AIM)
Dharma Megha
Federation of Indian American Christian Organizations of North America (FIACONA)
Friends of South Asia (FOSA)
Hindu Vaishnava Center for Enlightenment
Indian Muslim Council-USA (IMC-USA)
Indian Muslim Relief and Charities (IMRC)
India Foundation
Indian American Coalition for Pluralism (IACP)
Indian Christian Forum (ICF)
International Service Society
Muslim Youth Awareness Alliance (MYAA)
NRI Coalition for Social Justice
NRI's For Secular and Harmonious India (NRI-SAHI)
Seva International
Supporters of Human Rights in India (SHRI)
Vedanata Society of East Lansing
Washington Watch.
o o o
Indian American Community Protests Hollywood Hatemonger
Demand City of Hollywood-Florida to dissociate from Sadhvi Ritambhara
Hon. Mara Giulianti ,
Mayor
City of Hollywood
2600 Hollywood Blvd
Hollywood , FL 33020
Dear Hon. Mara Giulianti,
We the undersigned organizations understand that several groups along with
the City of Hollywood have scheduled a Bhajan (Hindu devotional songs),
event at Hollywood Beach Culture & Community Center on Saturday June 23, 2007.
We appreciate the Bhajans, but we deem it improper to invite Sadhvi Ritambhara
to lead the ceremony as chief guest, given her highly deplorable
record of creating discord and violence in India.
Sadhvi Ritambhara is a leading member of Vishwa Hindu Parishad, the Hindu racist organization whose ideology is akin to Hitler’s Nazism and Mussolini's fascism. The US Department of State in its annual human rights reports has written extensively about the violent activities of Sadhvi Ritambhara and her violent organization Vishwa Hindu Parishad. Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch have also written extensively about the militant organizations collectively known as “Sangh Parivar” and the role of its leaders in pogroms against Muslim, Christian and non-Hindu cultural and religious minorities.
Currently, the Government of India’s Central Bureau of Investigation, is prosecuting
Sadhvi Ritambhara in Babri Mosque demolition case, pertaining to her role in demolishing a Muslim place of worship in India. On December 6, 1992, Ritambhara
incited an armed Hindu mob to tear down the 16 th century Babri Mosque in Ayodhya,
India, in violation of the order of the Indian Supreme Court. She further incited Hindu mobs to attack Muslims leading to over 3000 deaths in December 1992 and January 1993.
Sadhvi Ritambhara’s last visit to USA in 2002 caused a protest outside the Hindu
Temple Society in New York.(See http://www.rediff.com/us/2002/jul/27us.htm). Please note that the then President of the Society, Ms. Uma Mysorekar later regretted having allowed her to speak at the temple.
Below is a dossier in support of our profile of Sadhvi Ritambhara.
Given her deplorable record, we request you to withdraw your sponsorship of
the event and completely disassociate City of Hollywood from this hate monger.
We will be glad to meet with you and your staff to brief them on this matter and
urge a course of action that is in the best interest of the citizens of City of Hollywood.
Please let us know as soon as possible, latest by the end of the week.
Yours Sincerely,
* Alliance for a Secular and Democratic South Asia
* Association of Indian Muslims of America (AIM)
* Dharma Megha
* Federation of Indian American
Christian Organizations of North America (FIACONA)
* Friends of South Asia (FOSA)
* Hindu Vaishnava Center for Enlightenment
* Indian Muslim Council-USA (IMC-USA)
* Indian Muslim Relief and Charities (IMRC)
* India Foundation
* Indian American Coalition for Pluralism (IACP)
* Indian Christian Forum (ICF)
* International Service Society
* Muslim Youth Awareness Alliance (MYAA)
* NRI Coalition for Social Justice
* NRI's For Secular and Harmonious India (NRI-SAHI)
* Seva International
* Vedanata Society of East Lansing
* Washington Watch
* Supporters of Human Rights in India (SHRI)
o o o
Faxed Response from the City of Holywood
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