I wasn’t planning to plunge into this whole hullabaloo of Rajiv Malhotra’s alleged plagiarism, As a personal aside, while I have co-authored with Malhotra, we have had disagreements and he has also “unfriended” me on various groups. But I came across a Firstpost piece attacking Malhotra using the pretext of “Hindu hypocrisy” on free speech. Clearly, Sandipan Sharma doesn’t know much about the issues and he comes across as lackey, servile and ignorant on the controversy.
The adjectives used above for Mr. Sharma may really be considered evidence-based descriptions. It is a form of samman, literally “proper measure”.
- Technically lackey is a subservient foot soldier. Carries orders, doesn’t question master. Sharma uses “controversial writer” to describe Malhotra and “Western scholar” to describe his critic “Richard Fox.” Now Fox is a theologian at a seminary whose book list shows particular emphasis on conversions in India and concern about the resistance of Hindus to them. While he may hold scholarly stands on eternal damnation and hellfire for unrepentant sinners like me who are unmoved at the exclusive savior claims of his jealous god’s son, he with a primary agenda of converting others to his religion, would classify as a religious “right winger.” The man can have his view. But when Sandipan comments about “laughing at the irony” and “the hypocrisy of right-wingers” while advocating for right wing Christians, it is difficult not to literally laugh out loud as I read it at the blindness of lackeys.
- For Sharma, word of a certified white scholar (or approved by such) seems right next to the “Word of God” that moves Young. So he plaintively pleads for massah (in this case mistress) Doniger, “But was Doniger accorded the courtesy of a debate?” and begins to quote her point of view like a missing gospel.
- He should start by reading the book “Invading the Sacred”, edited among others by Prof. Antonia Nicholas. Prof. Emeritus at SUNY Stonybrook. I mention only his name, so Sharma can make the proper slobbering noises, others were probably rightwing brown people. In any case, the book, which features Malhotra’s and my essays among others document the numerous attempts to engage Doniger in debate. She pointedly refused to engage debate the natives, using the caricature of “right-wing Hindutva”, strutting on her academic palanquin while Sharma-like carrier boys continue to sweep the floor for in front and pick up the droppings behind. Read. We’ve been attempting this debate for over a decade.
Sharma’s article claims that “Indian right wing” talking about “free speech” is “hypocrisy”. Though I find “right wing” a meaningless term in application to India or to Hindus, it is clear in context that Sharma is talking of Hindu groups.
Scholar and avowed atheist Sam Harris (note I am choosing my references with care for Mr. Sharma’s genuflections) makes the point (in the context of meditative experiences) that Jews, Christians and Muslims have been “regularly killed or exiled” for heterodoxies (“deviation from authorized dogma”) while “Indian traditions are comparatively free of problems of this kind.” The dialogue about the right for free speech arose in a European society desperate to break out of the intellectual straightjacket of the dogmas of the Christian Church. It also then produced its supposed anti-theses, like communism. And we know of course, how greatly communist regimes across the world have been exemplars free-speech.
Nonetheless, whatever the past situation, the US today, for example, does have a greater protection for free speech than in India. Indian free speech issues arise from Nehru, who incidentally shares Sharma’s disdain for Hinduism, adding the “reasonable restrictions” clause as Article 19 (2). With ideological blinkers on, however, Sharma mocks Dinanath Batra for speaking of “reasonable restrictions”. But does the Indian state have the gumption to protect free speech to release a film that mocks or criticizes core religious beliefs of certain religious adherents? There is also the draconian SC & ST atrocities act used to stifle free speech in Ashish Nandy’s recent case. Batra asked for the Court to enforce a Nehruvian law that has been used by various groups for their purposes before. R Jagannath argues, with greater integrity, for reducing the scope of its misuse, and stepping up state protection for free speech. I agree with him. But integrity is not easily accessible for Sharma.
About (Hindu) “right-wingers” banning books, here is a little fact task. Let us compile a list of books, films and internet media banned in India and figure out which parties and ideological dispensations lead to the banning and which groups were protesting the offending book. Not all of this is public so RTIs will be needed. My prediction is that the vast number of bans will come under Congress-Left regimes. The prediction of which pressure groups asked for the ban is left as an exercise. To give a starting advantage to Congress-Left totalitarians, we’ll even exclude the bans during their general advancement of free speech in the Emergency, that glorious time when secularism finally took the battle to the Hindu fanatics.
While I had challenged and succeeded in having Doniger’s caricatures of Hinduism removed from Encarta, I didn’t call for any book ban and as far as I know neither have Malhotra and his team. Many Hindu voices that have become active in recent times in questioning the caricatures of Hinduism, and considerable credit is due to Malhotra for relentlessly pursuing the issue and raising awareness on it. But the Hindu response is not part of some coordinated institutional Church, or even of an org like the RSS. People starting finding out organically about these issues, individuals helped by the discovery power of the internet. The battle for scholarship on Hinduism is part of the discourse of power in a civilizational war.
So Batra’s approach on using the legal process to block Doniger’s book gave it too much importance. Given the other side holds the megaphone, it is easy for this to get milked by Doniger with the help of assorted Indian lackeys. While she played martyr about book-pulping by big bad evil Hindutva, Batra was simply following the precedent set by various non-Hindu pressure groups in India. The Indian State has long ago capitulated on free speech under pressure from non-Hindu groups, from Satanic Verses to the Da Vinci Code (banned by Andhra Pradesh as “hurting” Christians). But I would much rather have the state protect scholarship and raise the bar to ban anything, as long as this bar is uniformly applied. Imagine a PK-like movie in India where the character being chased around is not portraying Lord Shiva but Jesus, or Allah forbid, the Prophet Mohammad. The Abrahamic bar for free speech in India may suddenly be found to be much lower than what Hindus easily tolerate.
Meanwhile, there is an inconsistency in the Hindu stance that I will offer up as a friendly advice to Malhotra’s followers. Don’t go hounding people on vague claims of having stolen “Malhotra’s ideas”, as I saw happen publicly against a couple of dharma-friendly writers, then start questioning Western ideas of intellectual property when the shoe is on the other foot. I will write about IPR later, but if you are really fighting the dharma battle, let the ideas and debates flourish. There is too much work to be done than getting stuck in petty battles.