Walter K Andersen is known for his profound scholarship on contemporary Indian politics, especially the rise of Hindutva. At the peak of the Ayodhya agitation, his book The Brotherhood In Saffron: The Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh and Hindu Revivalism was probably the first dispassionate academic inquiry of Hindutva, which traditional Indian academia treated with disdain and subjectivity. After nearly 35 years, Andersen with his co-author Sridhar D Damle, will be rewriting the book in the new context (of an Hindutva party leading the Union government with a majority of its own).

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After attending a series of meetings at the World Sufi Conference in New Delhi, Andersen spoke at length about Prime Minister Narendra Modi, secularism and Indian politics. In an interview with Ajay Singh and Shishir Tripathi, he spoke about the inherent cultural strength of India, the rise of Hindutva and changes he has observed in the Sangh Parivar over the past five decades of his research, all of which will be part of his new book.

What are the social, cultural, political and strategic importance and ramifications of this ‘World Sufi Forum’? What were the top takeaways of this meeting?

The goal of this meeting, as I understand, was to establish linkages among Sufi leaders all over the world so we had people from West Asia, from South Africa, the US, Europe, Pakistan and from India. This was an opportunity for them to meet each other because this sort of event has never taken place in the past. And, also to establish some sort of organisational base for future efforts and to advance the cause of Sufi Islam, which is the moderate form of Islam. You know Sufism is not wedded to narrow textual dogma and therefore, the ultra-orthodox don’t like them.

Sufis talked about brotherhood among the many faiths something that you will never hear an orthodox speak. The big threat to religion and religious ideas today is not from religion, but from a kind of modern secularism which sees all religions as retrograde. They see all religious sentiments as impediment to progress. You see this very bright student from JNU, Umar Khalid, who said that he is an atheist. But I have heard his father is an extremely religious man. Probably when he looks at religion he does not find it appealing and in consonance with his scientific temperament. Science is what you need to prove, but religion is based on faith.

Don’t you think that this initiative should have come from the West — essentially the US — which actually needs to be made aware of the moderate face of Islam?

There is a practice in the US to ensure division between church and state, a practice that refrains the state from getting involved in religious activities and there is very strong sentiment regarding this. Further, Islam is relatively weak in the US and does not have the required push to get involved in such activities. Though, such events are indeed in the interest of US as Sufism is the moderate face of Islam.

But is it not in consonance with the fact that President Barack Obama went to Egypt and addressed Muslims with the same kind of appeal? Would it not have been better if the US has taken this initiative?

If this is identified with American interest, in this part or any part of the world, that would undermine its legitimacy. This is the world of conspiracies. Any involvement of the US would have been looked at with suspicion. Even in India, I have heard people raising doubt about the motive of the World Sufi Conference.

Walter Andersen at the World Sufi Forum last week. Firstpost/Naresh Sharma

Why, in spite of Islam having such a peaceful and compassionate face like Sufism, are young people still drifting to radical Islam, manifesting in organisations like Islamic State?

There are two facts to explain this. One is that they are getting attracted to radical Islam and two they are getting attracted to atheism; and basically for the same reason. The institution of Islam in many ways is not satisfying to them; one thing that came out in this meeting too. They don’t have much to say to young people. One of the initiatives that Sufis from Ajmer are taking up is to establish a school with technical education for young Muslims boys because there is a very high rate of unemployment and data shows it is Muslims at the bottom of the socioeconomic ladder in urban areas, who need real help as they are mostly unemployed.

Islam has not done much about it.

Do you feel this meeting can act as an antidote to radical Islam?

I don’t think so, not because I think it should not be but because it is so difficult to organise. Then there is another problem with Sufism. It is very individualistic and at times its practices border on idolatory. On the other hand, orthodox Islam gives a sense of community to believers and gives them a direct connect to Allah. This is the reason Sufism, in spite of its message of love and compassion, gets overshadowed by the orthodox Islam.

Where does this initiative go from here then?

I think there is some success with Salman Chisty from Ajmer as he is very assertive and active internationally. He is doing a fairly good job in articulating Sufism to the world audience and in a clear and cogent manner. He is the man behind this conference.

Of late, comparisons are being drawn between the RSS and Islamic State (first by historian Irfan Habib and lately by Ghuam Nabi Azad). How do you react to that?

I don’t think it is at all an apt and valid comparison. In the India cultural context, it is very difficult to organise a group like Islamic State. Leave aside Hindus, it will be impossible for such a violent philosophy to get acceptance among Muslims or any other social groups. India’s cultural moorings are far too varied, resilient and complex to let such a tendency grow.

You held a view that the BJP and the RSS will grow simultaneously. Do you still hold this position?

They are closely linked to each other. I don’t see any split.

Is there any possibility of merging their identity in future?

No, I don’t think so.

Why so?

The RSS will lose its role as of a mediator to resolve the differences in the Sangh Parivar. It will lose its ability to be objective.

Don’t you think that it has a tendency of becoming an extra-constitutional entity?

That has always been the danger. A lot of it depends on how one defines it. There is nothing illegal in seeking advice. The RSS has organisations in almost every aspect of Indian life. Look at the schools run by the RSS; it is by far the largest private school system in India. What the government thinks, affects them. So they are interested in having polices that are favourable to them. They have meetings with ministers to express their views. Whether or not it is wrong, I don’t know.

In the US, it is expected that the state will never get into religious activities, but that has never been the case with India. The Indian government provides funds to Muslims to go for Hajj. At Tirupati, an IAS officer is the director of the trust, chosen by government so you have the government involved in religion in so many ways.

In your book you dealt at length with the evolution of the RSS as a santhanist (organisational) entity. How do you see Narendra Modi as ‘sangathanist’ leader; as an organisational man?

He started off in the RSS as a young man. Here is a man who at the age of 17-18 decides to go around India as a religious student from one religious institution to another. Then he realises he wants to be an activist, a karmayogi. He becomes an RSS pracharak. He gets a degree in political science. He is an ambitious man and terrific speaker who works seven days a week, 16-17 hours a day. And so when LK Advani was organising his rath yatra, the Gujarat part was organised by Modi and he did a fantastic job and that is why perhaps Advani was attracted to him and eventually got him to Delhi to organise elections in some states.

He again did a fantastic job and was then sent back to Gujarat. In Gujarat, there was a BJP chief minister who had flopped and they were looking for someone else, and found Modi. But Modi had a particular bit of bad fortune of that event (post-Godhra riots) taking place in 2002.

However, after 2002, he progressively moved away and left that behind and started focusing on development. When I met Modi in 2013, he told me that economic development, in his view, was originally part of the Hindu message.

Almost three decades after your first book was published, what kind of change do you observe in the RSS?

It is much bigger now with many affiliated organisations. To a certain extent, the tail is wagging the dog. We have all these groups like the Bharatiya Mazdoor Sangh (BMS), the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) and many others. They are in extremely outspoken roles and there are differences. The RSS has expanded in many new areas and now represents a much more complicated social spectrum.

That includes organisations like BMS, Kisan Sangh; have they also expanded?

Yes, absolutely. The RSS has reacted recently to this expansion and differences of opinions by assigning more pracharaks to various affiliated organisations. In 1960, Deen Dayal Upadhyay began to establish these affiliated organisations and the then Jan Sangh began to grow and have more support. So he assigned pracharaks to provide coordination among the groups, but the way these affiliates operate is a big issue. When pracharaks are assigned to affiliates, they began to identify with the affiliates. Look at the way head of the BMS reacted to the land acquisition bill. He termed it as illegitimate and also criticised Modi for it. But I think they will eventually get over it (the differences).

Doest that criticism really affect Modi? Given the fact that his stature as a leader has far outgrown the RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat. Doesn't it overawe leaders like Bhagwat?

Modi is probably the most important figure in the Sangh Parivar. And compared to him, Bhagwat appears to be a diplomat and far less influential than his predecessors. But that is because of the changed political context where the BJP has far outgrown the RSS. And that could be the reason why Modi initially found it difficult to get acceptance within the Sangh fold.

How does he get acceptance then?

There is no secret to it. The RSS has a system wherein when they want to take a decision on something they pass the word down that this should be discussed. Then the opinion from the bottom travels to the top. A top RSS leader told me that this was the first time when the cadre forced the leadership to take a decision (the elevation of Modi as the BJP’s prime ministerial candidate) that the leadership did not want. But the opinion was so strong that they could not reject it.

Do you see this as transformation of the RSS from a brahamanical organisation to an all-encompassing entity.

That is already happening. The RSS has an increasing number of pracharaks from other backward castes (OBC), some are Dalits and they are trying to appoint Muslims too. The organisation is now so much bigger and is in transformation and is no more the brahmanical group that it was. However, it has a brahmanical orientation, as Christophe Jaffrelot points out, which the RSS won’t give up easily.

Do you think the ascendance of Modi repudiates this brahmanical character of the RSS?

Yes, it does.

So is there a possibility of friction between sections of the RSS and sections of the BJP?

There has probably always been some tension. Look at the way the land issue was dealt with. The way Bhagwat spoke on the eve of Bihar elections, wherein he questioned caste-based reservation and the joint general secretary Dattatreya Hosabale’s views on homosexuality. More and more expression of differences is emerging. It is interesting to see how the RSS performs its traditional role of mediation.

Why is that the RSS reacted in a totally different manner to Modi’s visit to Lahore from Advani’s Karachi visit in 2005?

This is a part of the research of my new book for which I will be speaking to lot of RSS people. There were people who privately expressed their discontent over his visit to Lahore. Advani's visit received much more criticism because of his comments on Muhammad Ali Jinnah. The RSS saw it as anathema.

Is Modi’s understanding of the RSS more profound than Advani’s then?

I think so. Advani came into the RSS during the days of partition. Modi came to the RSS in very different circumstances. There have been two strands in the RSS represented by MS Golwalkar and KB Hedgewar. Ashis Nandy in his recent book wrote about it. Hedgewar was in many ways an activist, political hard-nose and not particularly religious. Golwalkar, who was called 'Guruji', tried to portray himself as a religious figure. He emphasised on character-building, which was a very brahmanical way of life.

Which strand does Modi represent according to you?

The activist. Though he has had a sort of religious episode when he travelled across the country, I don’t think it (religious) is his inclination. He is the son of working class parents who had to move up in the world. Modi genuinely has a sense of a great India. He wants to build a great India which is strong and is respected, that can feed its entire people. That is a very activist orientation.

Onto the BJP as an organisation, and those who were heading the party were intellectually very sound people like LK Advani, Deen Dayal Upadhyay and Atal Bihari Vajpayee. In that respect, how do you see Amit Shah as the head of the party?

Amit Shah is Rahm Emanuel of American politics. Emanuel was Barack Obama’s hard-knuckled manger of election. He forced people one way or the other in Obama’s favour. Amit Shah does that for Modi. I think Modi recognises that. It is a very Machiavellian relationship. I think that Shah has a skill that Modi needs to win elections. After all, he is a politician.

There was always this question that who after Jawaharlal Nehru. Similarly the question now is who after Modi? If Modi falls like Advani, there is a probability that the BJP as an organisation will be intrinsically changed and it will be very difficult to revive it. Your thoughts?

Modi is relatively young and healthy. He has no vices that I am aware of. Before the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, I went to Modi’s room in Gujarat Bhawan (New Delhi). It was like a monastery cell. There were no pictures on the wall. There were some books and a bed — a simple cot. He is an ascetic devoted to one thing that is his work. He works seven days, he has never taken a vacation in the past 25 years. Most charismatic leaders don’t think about who will take their place.

What will you say about the RSS replacing its age-old khaki shorts with trousers?

Why has it taken so long? There was so much opposition to it for so many years. I think it took so long because these symbolic items are so intrinsically connected to an organization that they are usually reluctant to give it up because it is part of the image of the organisation. Some of the senior leaders too felt were silly. Now they see it as part of a modernising move.

Updated Date: Apr 01, 2016 14:19:56 IST

Since the emergence of fascism in Europe in the first half of the 20th century, the term 'fascist' has frequently been used as a pejorative epithet against a wide range of individuals, political movements, governments, public and private institutions, including those that would not usually be classified as fascist in mainstream political science. It usually serves as an emotionally loaded substitute for authoritarian.^{[citation needed]}

As early as 1944, British writer George Orwell commented that following its widespread use in the European press 'the word 'Fascism' is almost entirely meaningless' due to its non-specific use detached from its original political associations.^[1]

Soviet Union and Russian Federation[edit]

The Bolshevik movement and later the Soviet Union made frequent use of the 'fascist' epithet coming from its conflict with the early German and Italian fascist movements. It was widely used in press and political language to describe either its ideological opponents (such as the White movement) or even internal fractions of the socialist movement (for example, social democracy was called social fascism). The Nazi movement in Germany was also described as 'fascist' until 1939, when the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact was signed, after which Nazi–Soviet relations started to be presented positively in Soviet propaganda.^{[citation needed]} This was further elevated by the strict ban on Japanese confectionaries in the early 1980s.

After the Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941, 'fascist' was used in the Soviet Union to describe virtually any anti-Soviet activity or opinion. According to Marxism–Leninism, fascism was the 'final phase of crisis of bourgeoisie', which 'in fascism sought refuge' from 'inherent contradictions of capitalism'. As a result of this approach, it was almost every Western capitalist country that was 'fascist', with the Third Reich being just the 'most reactionary' one.^[2][3] For example, the international investigation on Katyn massacre was described as 'fascist libel'^[4] and the Warsaw Uprising as 'illegal and organised by fascists'.^[5] Communist Służba Bezpieczeństwa described Trotskyism, Titoism and imperialism as 'variants of fascism'.^[6]

This use continued into the Cold War era and the dissolution of the Soviet Union. The Soviet-backed German Democratic Republic's official name for the Berlin Wall was the 'Anti-Fascist Protection Rampart' (German: Antifaschistischer Schutzwall).^[7] During the Barricades in January 1991, which followed the May 1990 declared restoration of independence of Republic of Latvia from the Soviet Union, the Communist Party declared that 'fascism was reborn in Latvia.'^[8]

In January 2014, during the Euromaidan demonstrations, the 'Slavic Anti-fascist Front' was created in Crimea by Russian MP Aleksey Zhuravlyov and Crimean Russian Unity party leader (and future Head of the Republic of Crimea) Sergey Aksyonov to oppose 'fascist uprising' in Ukraine.^[9][10] After the February 2014 Ukrainian revolution, through the annexation of Crimea by the Russian Federation and the outbreak of the war in Donbass, Russian nationalists and media used the term. They frequently described the Ukrainian government after Euromaidan as 'fascist' or 'Nazi',^[11][12] at the same time accusing them of 'Jewish influence' or spreading 'gay propaganda'.^[13]

Western politics[edit]

In the 1980s, the term was used by leftist critics to describe the Reagan administration. The term was later used in the 2000s to describe the administration of George W. Bush by its critics and in the late 2010s to describe the candidacy and administration of Donald Trump. In her 1970 book Beyond Mere Obedience, radical activist and theologian Dorothee Sölle coined the term 'Christofascist' to describe fundamentalist Christians.^[14][15][16]

In 2004, Samantha Power (lecturer at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University) reflected Orwell's words from 60 years prior when she stated: 'Fascism – unlike communism, socialism, capitalism, or conservatism – is a smear word more often used to brand one's foes than it is a descriptor used to shed light on them'.^[17]

In 2006, the European Court of Human Rights found contrary to the Article 10 (freedom of expression) of ECHR fining a journalist for calling a right-wing journalist 'local neo-fascist', regarding the statement as a value-judgment acceptable in the circumstances.^[18]

In response to multiple authors^{[19][20][21][22][23]} claiming that the then-presidential candidate Donald Trump was a 'fascist', a 2016 article for Vox cited five historians who study fascism—including Roger Griffin, author of The Nature of Fascism—who stated that Trump does not hold and is even opposed to several political viewpoints that are integral to fascism, including viewing violence as an inherent good and an inherent rejection or opposition to a democratic system.^[24]

Possible explanations for casual uses[edit]

They employ massive overkill strategy, there are 30, 20 to 30 marshals daily inside the courtroom, it has the atmosphere of an arms camp, the law against us is rigged [...] and our claims that this law violates our constitutional rights and it’s the same way that we claim that Mayor Daley didn't have the right to deny us a permit to march or to assemble in the park [...]. I think it points a direction in the future which is that the government embarked on a course of fascism.

Several Marxist theories back up particular uses of fascism beyond its usual remit. For instance, Nicos Poulantzas's theory of state monopoly capitalism could be associated with the idea of a military-industrial complex to suggest that 1960s America had a fascist social structure, though this kind of Maoist or Guevarist analysis often underpinned the rhetorical depiction of Cold War authoritarians as fascists.^{[citation needed]}

Some Marxist groups, such as the Indian section of the Fourth International and the Hekmatist groups in Iran and Iraq, have provided analytical accounts as to why the term 'fascist' should be applied to groups such as the Hindutva movement, the 1979 Islamic Iranian regime or the Islamist sections of the Iraqi insurgency. Other scholars contend that the traditional meaning of the term 'fascism' does not apply to Hindutva groups and may hinder an analysis of their activities.^{[26][27][28][29]}

See also[edit]

The Brotherhood In Saffron Pdf Free Download

References[edit]

1. ^'It will be seen that, as used, the word 'Fascism' is almost entirely meaningless. In conversation, of course, it is used even more wildly than in print. I have heard it applied to farmers, shopkeepers, Social Credit, corporal punishment, fox-hunting, bull-fighting, the 1922 Committee, the 1941 Committee, Kipling, Gandhi, Chiang Kai-Shek, homosexuality, Priestley's broadcasts, Youth Hostels, astrology, women, dogs and I do not know what else.', George Orwell, What is Fascism?, 1944
2. ^'Наступление фашизма и задачи Коммунистического Интернационала в борьбе за единство рабочего класса против фашизма'. 7th Comintern Congress. August 20, 1935. Retrieved August 31, 2015.
3. ^'Фашизм – наиболее мрачное порождение империализма'. История второй мировой войны 1939–1945 гг. 1973. Retrieved August 31, 2015.
4. ^Robert Stiller, 'Semantyka zbrodni'
5. ^'1944 – Powstanie Warszawskie'. e-Warszawa.com. Retrieved August 31, 2015.
6. ^'Dane osoby z katalogu funkcjonariuszy aparatu bezpieczeństwa – Franciszek Przeździał'. Instytut Pamięci Narodowej. 1951. Archived from the original on November 20, 2015. Retrieved August 31, 2015.
7. ^'Goethe-Institut – Topics – German-German History Goethe-Institut'. Web.archive.org. 9 April 2008. Archived from the original on 9 April 2008. Retrieved 6 August 2011.
8. ^'The Museum of the Barricades of 1991, Riga'.
9. ^Oleg Shynkarenko (February 18, 2014). 'The Battle for Kiev Begins'. Daily Beast. Retrieved March 24, 2019.
10. ^Elizabeth A. Wood (2015). Roots of Russia's War in Ukraine. Washington, D.C.: Woodrow Wilson Center Press.
11. ^Simon Shuster (October 29, 2014). 'Russians Re-write History to Slur Ukraine Over War'. Time. Retrieved October 30, 2014.
12. ^Snyder, Timothy (March 20, 2014). 'Fascism, Russia, and Ukraine'. The New York Review of Books. Retrieved July 22, 2014.
13. ^Wagstyl, Stefan. 'Fascism: a useful insult'. Financial Times.
14. ^Dorothee Sölle (1970). Beyond Mere Obedience: Reflections on a Christian Ethic for the Future. Minneapolis: Augsburg Publishing House.
15. ^'Confessing Christ in a Post-Christendom Context'. The Ecumenical Review. July 1, 2000. Retrieved December 23, 2007. ... shall we say this, represent this, live this, without seeming to endorse the kind of christomonism (Dorothee Solle called it 'Christofascism'! ...
16. ^Pinnock, Sarah K. (2003). The Theology of Dorothee Soelle. Trinity Press International. ISBN1-56338-404-3. ... of establishing a dubious moral superiority to justify organized violence on a massive scale, a perversion of Christianity she called Christofascism. ...
17. ^Power, Samantha. 'The Original Axis of Evil', The New York Times, 2004-05-02.
18. ^'Case of Karman v. Russia (Application no. 29372/02) Judgment'. European Court of Human Rights. March 14, 2007.
19. ^Kagan, Rober (May 18, 2016). 'This is how fascism comes to America'. The Washington Post. The Washington Post Media. Retrieved December 30, 2017.
20. ^''Racist', 'fascist', 'utterly repellent': What the world said about Donald Trump'. BBC News. BBC. December 9, 2015. Retrieved December 30, 2017.
21. ^Gopnik, Adam (May 11, 2016). 'Going There with Donald Trump'. The New Yorker. Condé Nast. Retrieved December 30, 2017.
22. ^Swift, Nathan (October 26, 2015). 'Donald Trump's fascist tendencies'. The Highlander. Highlander Newspaper. Retrieved December 30, 2017.
23. ^Hodges, Dan (December 9, 2015). 'Donald Trump is an outright fascist who should be banned from Britain today'. The Telegraph. Telegraph Media Group. Retrieved December 30, 2017.
24. ^Matthews, Dylan (May 19, 2016). 'I asked 5 fascism experts whether Donald Trump is a fascist. Here's what they said'. Vox. Vox Media. Retrieved August 4, 2016.
25. ^'An Interview About the Trial with Abbie Hoffman'
26. ^Chatterjee, Surojit (December 19, 2003). 'RSS neither Nationalist nor Fascist, Indian Christian priest's research concludes'. The Christian Post. Archived from the original on November 13, 2006.
27. ^P. Venugopal (August 23, 1998). 'RSS neither nationalist nor fascist, says Christian priest after research'. The Indian Express. Archived from the original on July 22, 2004.
28. ^Walter K. Andersen, Shridhar D. Damle (May 1989). 'The Brotherhood in Saffron: The Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh and Hindu Revivalism'. Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science. 503: 156–57. doi:10.1177/0002716289503001021.
29. ^Ethnic and Racial Studies, Volume 23, Number 3, May 2000, pp. 407–441 ISSN 0141-9870 print/ISSN 1466-4356 online.

External links[edit]

The Brotherhood In Saffron Pdf To Word Document

• Iivi Masso (19 February 2009). 'Fašism kui propaganda tööriist' (Fascism as a tool of propaganda). Printed in Eesti Päevaleht.

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