Disowning Golwalkar's We

Dr. Koenraad Elst

1. Golwalkar's centenary

The year of our Lord 2006 is Golwalkar year. To celebrate the 100th birth anniversary of Guruji Madhav Sadashiv Golwalkar, the second sarsanghchalak (chief guide of the association) of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (National Volunteer Association), his organization and its network of affiliates have arranged for a great many commemoration events. Or they insert a Golwalkar element into other events.

Thus, on 7-10 February 2006 in Jaipur, RSS activist Yashwant Pathak convened an international conference of elders of all ancient (non-Abrahamic) traditions. The conference was devoted to the impeccable theme of Spirituality beyond Religion, and in itself, this was a perfectly respectable initiative. I have met Mr. Pathak several times and I can't think of anything bad to say about him. For the priests and medicine men of isolated pockets of resistance against christianization or islamization somewhere in Africa or America, it must be quite a boost of faith in the future to see this kind of international gathering under the auspices of the most successful resister, Hindu Dharma. Precisely because this was such a good initiative, it is a great pity that the conference brochures prominently featured Golwalkar's photograph.

First of all, Golwalkar had little to do with the non-Abrahamic religions outside India. To my knowledge (but I haven't read his newly published complete works yet), he never wrote about them, never drew them into his vision of interreligious relations, never took an initiative to build bridges with them. His focus was purely on India and Hinduism; nothing wrong with that, but it's not the right r�sum for earning a place as the figurehead of an interreligious conference. In case the idea was to give a face to the role of Hinduism as host to and champion of the world religions, it would have been better to draw attention to one of the many sages from Hindu history, and specifically to one who was actually involved in interreligious relations. Maybe Agastya, who took the Vedic tradition to an as yet non-Vedic South India? Or Vivekananda, who did something similar in 1893 when he spoke at the World Parliament of Religions in Chicago? Or Ram Swarup (1920-1998), who went out of his way to re-evaluate so-called Pagan religions and break the spell of Christian and Islamic superiority claims? If the RSS is serious about its boast of being a selfless servant to Hindu society, it was wrong to push itself and its own leader into focus rather than Hindu Dharma and its representatives.

Secondly, the participants to this conference had not asked to get associated with this historical character they had never heard of. In particular, they didn't know that Golwalkar, for reasons to be discussed below, nowadays mostly figures in the media as exhibit number one for the allegation that Hindu nationalism is a fascist movement. So either the Elders event would fail to draw attention, in which case no harm would be done but not much progress made either; or it would attract media coverage and condemn the participants to being depicted henceforth as collaborators of a neo-fascist international. Upon returning home, they would be asked by their friends: Hey, what has gotten into you? I just read on the internet that the conference you went to was in fact a fascist conference. Its a bad host who treats his unsuspecting guests to such an outcome.

Most non-Sangh Hindu activists avoid any reference to Golwalkar because he has become an embarrassment (and because he is unnecessary in motivating them to serving Hindu society). It could be argued, though, that this shunning of Golwalkar is unfair to him. As we shall see, he is denounced as a fascist on the basis of two passages in a single booklet written at the start of his career. By such criteria, most famous people who are quoted as authorities on moral and political matters could be crucified on a handful of less felicitous lines in their complete works. However, this unfair treatment happens to be prevalent and is partly the result of the poor defence Golwalkar�s followers have given him in the opinion-making domain. Public figures and social movements have to live in the real world and take the sheer facts of the power equation in the public sphere into account. As long as Golwalkar has not been disentangled from this identification with the worst handful of lines in his repertoire, it is most unwise and self-destructive to be seen glorifying him.