Appropriation of the Past and Hindu Nationalism in Modern India
Markovits, Claude
Appropriation of the Past and Hindu Nationalism in Modern India - 2006.
39
This article focuses on a particular kind of appropriation of the past in contemporary India by Hindu nationalism. It looks at one symbolic event, the destruction of a mosque in a small town of North India in December 1992 by a crowd of Hindu rioters, and seeks the interpret it as part of an attempt by Hindu nationalists to reconstruct the history of India by erasing its islamic component. Starting with a brief presentation of the specific political context of the event, it then proceeds to tease out its meaning by framing it within the perspective of an attempted reconstruction of hinduism as a "historic" religion similar to islam or christianity: hence the place given to Rama, both the hero of one of the great Indian epics, the Ramayana, and an avatar of the great god Vishnu. Through destroying a mosque built in the sixteenth century on the order of the Mogul emperor Babur, on the supposed location of an ancient temple dedicated to Rama, Hindu nationalists sought to symbolically uproot islam from the soil of India, in order to make a statement of the unique autochtony of hinduism. This destructive fury can be seen as a substitute for genocide, and has been used as a justification for massacres, such as the one that took place in Gujarat in 2002.
Appropriation of the Past and Hindu Nationalism in Modern India - 2006.
39
This article focuses on a particular kind of appropriation of the past in contemporary India by Hindu nationalism. It looks at one symbolic event, the destruction of a mosque in a small town of North India in December 1992 by a crowd of Hindu rioters, and seeks the interpret it as part of an attempt by Hindu nationalists to reconstruct the history of India by erasing its islamic component. Starting with a brief presentation of the specific political context of the event, it then proceeds to tease out its meaning by framing it within the perspective of an attempted reconstruction of hinduism as a "historic" religion similar to islam or christianity: hence the place given to Rama, both the hero of one of the great Indian epics, the Ramayana, and an avatar of the great god Vishnu. Through destroying a mosque built in the sixteenth century on the order of the Mogul emperor Babur, on the supposed location of an ancient temple dedicated to Rama, Hindu nationalists sought to symbolically uproot islam from the soil of India, in order to make a statement of the unique autochtony of hinduism. This destructive fury can be seen as a substitute for genocide, and has been used as a justification for massacres, such as the one that took place in Gujarat in 2002.
Réseaux sociaux