RELIGIOUS DIVISION AND SOCIAL CONFLICT: THE EMERGENCE OF HINDU NATIONALISM IN RURAL INDIA
Peggy Froerer
Social Science Press, 1/24, Asaf Ali Road,
New Delhi – 100 002
Pages: 296 + xx
Price: Rs 295
Reviewed by KHAN YASIR
Another tension in the area that is fuelled by RSS is tension over liquor sales. Liquor is consumed by both Christians and Hindus;however it is generally produced by only Christians. Most Oraons produce it on occasional basis while half of them sell it regularly. Froerer argues that the main source of income for Oraonpeople is wage-labour, and liquor produce adds negligible amounts to their profits. “But the perception remains that the income that Oraon Christians are able to generate from liquor sales has not only contributed to their material affluence, but has, more critically, enabled them to purchase mortgages for Hindu land” (p. 220).
In short,Oraon Christians are cause of “social deterioration” of Hindus. Liquor in the area is made from the flowers called mahua after drying and treating them. Sale of dried mahua flowers is a monopoly of Hindus and the author substantiates, through statistics, that by selling this ‘raw material’, they acquire more profits than Oraon Christians who produce liquor out of it. Before the issue of liquor was communalised by RSS, drinking was the only means of interaction between local Hindu and Christian communities. Hindus would visit the Oraonbasti in thequiet hours of morning or evening, spend at least half an hour drinking and chatting about village affairs, would also be offered a free drink or two by the host Oraons,who themselves would drink with their customers. Hindus would pay for liquor with rice as they lack cash.
Hindu women are pretty much against drinking of their men for two reasons. One, they are victim of domestic violence that increases after men drink liquor; and the other that they are concerned about their ever depleting resources of rice (i.e. their money) by consumption of liquor by their men. Based on her study, the author concludes that women are more concerned about the latter than former. The notable point is that the Church is as much against the liquor as Hindu women. It launches several campaigns in the village and adjoining areas against liquor production and consumption. The Church has launched these initiatives more as a reform of Christians than for any social service.
In the village there is an organisation of women. To be specific this organisation is a branch of a larger organisation initiated by the church at the district level. This was an attempt of the church, after proselytising was legally prohibited, to outreach the local people. In local meetings of this organisation in Mohanpur, liquor issues were raised, but earlier they were raised more as general issues demanding attention. However,as the meetings progressed and RSS influence increased, Hindu women started raising the liquor issue more prominently. Christian women protested at this and argued that focus on liquor was interfering with wider aims of the organisation such as electricity and clear water.
But tensions kept on increasing until a boycott was announced from both sides. Hindus will not go to Oraonsto buy liquor and Oraons will not sell liquor to Hindus. But “the immediate ceasing of regular sales to and consumption by local Hindus would last only a fewdays, however, as Oraons would begin to sell quietly to trusted customers, and then more openly, to others. Within a week or so, another meeting would be called because another Hindu customer would be ‘caught’ drinking” (p. 236). This became an endless cycle. The author makes a sharp point here:
That the Oraon vendors have taken the brunt of the blame for the social and economic problems felt by the Hindu consumers is an important point. The attitude amongst Hindus was that consumption of liquor in itself is not bad; to be sure, it is an acceptable cultural practice when exercised within a locally appropriate manner. And indeed, at least one member of nearly every household consumes liquor on certain ritual, social or private occasions. Selling, however, is perceived as bad. (p. 237)
Most of the Oraon, on the other hand, thought that the liquor issue is only blown out of proportion due to the jealousy of the Hindu community over their wealth and improving material status. Though liquor sale does not contribute much income as distinct from wage labour, it is a highly “regular” and “visible” source of income and hence the tension.The author points out, “In the past, such tensions would have been contained locally – resolved, perhaps, in the context of the village council. During the course of my fieldwork, however, they took on a new urgency due to their appropriation and transformation by the RSS into issues of communal concern” (p. 242).
During such a meeting of the women’s organisation that had reached the breaking point, and amidst shouting Christian women were about to leave, that Raj came and calmed all of the women down. He then accused church of instructing Christians to make and sell liquor to Hindus. For this allegation he supplied so innocuous but so convincing an argument. He asked Christian women: why, when the catholic fathers visit the village in their jeep, they go directly to the Oraon Christian locality?He alleged that fathers have a “secret plan” to bring Hindu community down through liquor “like Christians of all over India”. Nobody listened to the forceful denials of the Christian women. The meeting exploded and ended with Hindu men beating some of the Oraon men accidentally present there and Hindu women shouting “you Christians are using liquor money to buy our land”, “you Christians should give us our land back and leave”, “if we see you buying anything else like a television with liquor money, then we will destroy it”. The author significantly points out at this stage:
“…this was the first time that local Hindus used the category ‘Christian’ (isai) in place of ‘Oraon’ as a term of identification in a public context” (p. 244). And “the speed with which communal categories began to be utilised locally points to the success of the introduction of Hindu nationalist sentiment – particularly the ideology of the ‘threatening other’. This was related to the kind of ‘conflict symbol’ – liquor – that was utilised to transmit this sentiment” (p. 250).
CONCLUSION
It required no study to note that the main emphasis of RSS is to emphasise the otherness of the Christians or Muslims whomever they can lay their hands upon. Through this scarecrow of threatening-other they could easily rally together the scared Hindus and make them conscious of their Hindu identity. Frequent invocation of a national and international conspiracy of Muslims or Christians (depending on situation) that they will convert or outbreed Hindus and will become majority also works in favour of RSS.
“It is perhaps no coincidence,” Froerer asserts, “that local tensions have increased in tandem with the growing frequency of RSS ‘training meetings’… which are more often conducted on the same day that the panchayat or women’s meetings are held” (p. 252). “This is why,” she further states, “Raj could be classified as what Brass calls a ‘conversion specialist’, a person whose pivotal role is to attach new meaning to local conditions or convert an ordinary local incident into communal discourse, enabling its potential escalation into communal violence”. (ibid)
As an ethnographic study, the book was based on personal and firsthand observations of the author. Besides collecting the firsthand observations, she also enjoyed a unique privilege. In her own words:
“…the arrival and increasing presence of RSS activists in this area paralleled my own. This placed me in a unique position to observe how, in the space of two years, they managed to endear themselves to the local community. I also observed how they inculcated some of the tenets most crucial to the success of Hindu nationalism, and was able to consider the impact that this has had on the local people.” (p. 256)
The RSS model of exerting influence in rural areas of India raises some deeper problems besides concerns of communally plagued environment. One of such distressing implication of the way in which RSS, over the years, has legitimised its presence in rural areas “is that a precedent has been set whereby the provision of basic needs requires the involvement of an extra-state power that is widely associated with aggression and violence”. (p. 180)
It is important to note that RSS’s efforts to inject the communal poison in the rural vein of India proved remarkably successful. In 1998, Madhya Pradesh assembly elections were held. Talking specifically of Mohanpur, it was a Congress’s stronghold. Patel is the dominant political and spiritual head of the village and Congress is known, instead of its name, as “Patel’s Party”. But in assembly polls Congress lost to BJP. BJP victory was helped by the votes that were unexpectedly cast in its favour by people from Mohanpur, a village that, until the 1998 election, had been a traditional Congress stronghold.
It is significant to note that since 1990s when RSS turned towards adivasis, the anti-Christian violence has increased. It reached its climax between 1997 and 2000.The author substantiates different studies on communalism focusing on RSS especially by Paul Brass, who argues that collective violence often evolves out of circumstances that are not necessarily communal in nature. He is also critical of accounts that describe communal riots as ‘spontaneous acts’ instead he argues that as riots have ‘functional utility’ for dominant political ideologies they are more often than not carefully orchestrated. He holds that there are specific, identifiable individuals who work intentionally to produce riots.
(Concluded)