Posted on 22/01/2024 (GMT 08:00 hrs)
- License: CC BY 4.0
ABSTRACT
The paper titled “An Incessant Struggle for Being a Homogenized, Pasteurized, Essentialist and Standardized Akhanḍa Hindu Rāṣṭra: Bharatiya Janata Party” examines the Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) efforts to establish a unified Hindu identity within India. It focuses on the contentious Ram Temple issue, highlighting the differing narratives between the BJP and Hindu saints. The authors argue that the term “Hindutva” encompasses a diverse range of beliefs, which complicates the BJP’s attempts to homogenize Hindu identity. The paper also critiques the influence of neoliberal economic policies in India, suggesting that since the early 1990s, successive governments, including the BJP, have adhered to models dictated by international financial institutions like the World Bank, International Monetary Fund, and World Trade Organization. This adherence has led to increased conflicts and a regime of totalitarian control, necessitating suppression of dissent and perpetuating violence. In summary, the paper contends that the BJP’s pursuit of a standardized Hindu nation is challenged by the inherent diversity within Hinduism and is further complicated by the socio-economic impacts of neoliberal policies.
Introduction
The day’s 22nd January, 2024. The nation-state of India is witnessing the worst day in its history. The “Ram Temple” in Ayodhya is being inaugurated by an incumbent Prime Minister of a Constitutionally Secular nation! What a sorry, sad, extremely saddening, disheartening state of affairs. The Idea of India as posed by the stalwarts such as Gandhi, Ambedkar, Bhagat Singh and others lay in the dust, trampled by the cacophonous, commodified spectacle of the Hindutvavadin’s dream-project: the undivided Hindu nation-state. It is nothing more than a politics of exclusion, of getting hold of the electorate by sheer money and muscle power.
It does not tolerate dissenters’ voices. But in doing so, is it inadvertently creating divides within the so-called Hindu community (if there is any such thing at all!) itself?
Can we go back to the scriptures to filter out “what’s really there”? Or should we just storm the headquarters of Hindutva by exposing the uncontradictory contradictions of the imaginary, ethnographic Hindutva genealogical fantasy?
The following paper deals with the narratives on the disputed Rama Temple issue as posed by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and opposed by the certain Hindu saints.
The polemic is depicted here to show the heterogeneous nature of the umbrella term (so-called) “Hindutva” that defeats the struggle for homogenizing “Hindu Identity” by the Sangh Parivar.
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