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Re: There is a need to be careful here Re: Religious unity



Shrisha Rao (shrao@nyx10.cs.du.edu) wrote:
: In article <4d734s$8es@babbage.ece.uc.edu>,
: C. Kambhampati <shskambh@reading.ac.uk> wrote:

: >I have been a bystander - sort of lurking in the darks - and have been
: >follwoing this discussion on SRH re-org for sometime. But the follwoing
: >from an otherwise sober Sundaresan caught my eye - the line of argument
: >that is -
: >
: >Vidyasankar Sundaresan (vidya@cco.caltech.edu) wrote:

: >: Your statement shows that there is strong connection between the land of
: >: Hindustan and those who consider themselves Hindus. What about those who
: >: have no real connection to the land of Hindustan, but follow the teachings
: >: of a religious leader from Hindustan? Are they also Hindus? Do we have the
: >: right to force them to call themselves Hindus also? These questions have 
: >: particular relevance in the light of SRV, discussed below. 
: >
: >It is this argument which is used by the BJPites in calling all from
: >Hindustan Hindus - which many from India oppose - since we rightly or
: >wrongly consider the word 'hindu' to have religious connotations. It is
: >a trap which people better watch out for. 

: If you have any cogent arguments to make against the BJP notion of
: Hindu, please do make them. Merely rejecting something as the BJP
: notion does not constitute a refutation of any worth.

<...some lines deleted...>

: The biggest "wonder" is that you have not made any kind of analysis to
: refute the BJP notion. Need I remind you that the Supreme Court
: recently described "Hindutva" to mean "Indian-ness"? Or shall we take
: it that the Hon'ble Justices of the nation's highest Court are in fact
: stooges of the BJP?


My intention was not to provide any analysis to the srh reorg debate.
That is already being provided in copious amounts by a number of people
- at the same time the arguments are repeated so often that the
srh-reorg debate is a sham - just as your folowwup  here. There really
is nothing worthwhile in what you and others are proposing and from
where I stand (and I have been following this debate and the ones which
occurred during the srv debate) I am being forced to agree with A. Shah
that there appears to a political motive here. 

And if you are asking me for analysis - it is better to look at yourself
and see that harm you and your ilk are doing to the reorg discussion. Do
not get me wrong reorg is a must but you and your co-proposers are
doing a down right poor job of this reorg business and are turning of
people who would have been carried forward with the re-org porposals.
I am coming to the conclusion, seeing the hamfisted manner in which the
proponents of thsi re-org debate have been carrying on, that there is an
ulterior motive. So please do ask for analysis from me, when you
yourself are providing very little.

Am not rejecting anything in the BJP notion nor am I supporting it. (of
hindu ness that is). I am merely pointing out the paralleles between the
arguments on this thread and the arguments put forward by the BJP
people. If you find that inconvinient - please feel free to feel
inconvinient. And also please fell free to say why you feel so
inconvinienced.

The supreme-court ruling has come thru after some 40 odd years to rtying
to get the country to say Hinduness is Indianness. If this is the case
then I am sure many muslims, christains etc would be aggreable to call
themselves Hindus. Next before we proceed any further care to define
what in your books is Indianness.

If you can answer this question, then I am sure you would realise the 
contradictory nature of the stance taken by some of the proponents in 
this debate.

See from where I stand what I see is this. Baring a few like Mani 
Varadarajan and others - for whom I have immense respect, most people 
seem to be equating Hindu with ethnicity. The supreme courst judges said 
HINDUTVA WAS INDIANESS NOT HINDU=INDIA(n). THAT IS THE FUNDEMENTAL FLAW IN 
YOUR ARGUMENT. SInce we are all conducting this debate in ENGLISH and in 
ENGLISH WE ARE ALL CALLED HINDUS (the main stream people atleast - those 
subscribing to cults like ISKCON are just that - cultists - for whom when 
it suits them (like the Bhaktivedanta manor dispute) we are ALL HINDUS 
(YES READ THEIR STATEMENTS IN THE PRESS AND THE TRANSCRIPTS FROM SUNRISE 
RADIO in LONDON WHEN THEY WERE ON A TALK SHOW SOMETIME BACK)else they 
are seperate from this gigantic black mass calling themselves hindus - 
see we are vaisnavaites.). Hindu and hinduism cannot be equated to 
ethnicity, may be HINDUTVA CAN BE EQUATED TO ETHNICITY (which ofcourse 
one of the proponents (Shrisha Rao) agrees with).


What I can say is this, SRH is fine as it is. The proponents of the reorg 
move if they so DEISRE CAN CREATE THEIR OWN GROUPS with THE NAMES THEY 
CHOOSE. SRH is fine and HINDUS of ALL HEWS (I count myself as one amongst 
the many) would find the current position of SRH fine. If PEOPLE WANT to 
creat groups without the 'h' part let them create their own groups, and 
quit this business of reorganising SRH under the pretext of improving 
SRH. For it appears that is not the agenda nor the intent here.

This SRH reorg business started off with the SRV debate and I have read
many articles which did allude to the prospect of reorging SRH in order to
have sweet revenge. This is what I as a bystander feelon this issue. 

If people following differents schools of thought consider themselves not to be
HINDUs let them create a seperate group. They need not suffer the
INDIGNITY of trying to reorganise a group which has been functioning
well so far(and people who consider themselves to be hindus are happy
with the name). There is only one newgroup which is missing - I would 
suggest that a newsgroup called 
SRH.REORG.PROPONENTS.TRANSPARENTLY.POLITICALLY-MOTIVATED be formed.

God wish this was handled in a better manner, SRH needs to be reorganised, 
but you lot have really killed it and wasted your efforts for you are all so
transparent.

Chandrasekhar 



: Regards,

: Shrisha Rao

: >-Chandrasekhar


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