Transcript: –

Question – You have traveled extensively to almost all countries and have studied social behavior of democratic, communist and authoritarian societies.

Why is it that in India a section of educated and intellectual group opposes everything related to Hinduism, be it it’s scriptures, customs, practices and beliefs? Is this behavior unique to India and if so, why?

Dr. S.L. Bhyrappa – Yes, I have traveled in almost all the countries of the world and I have also studied their cultural background. Now if you take Singapore, the Chinese are in majority. I don’t know exactly what percentage, but they are in the full majority, great majority. But though there are Hindus and also there are Christians, there is absolute no discrimination between one religion and another religion. There are Hindu temples, and people you know, Indians are following their religion and it is respected, highly respected. In fact, see Dussehra and Deepawali is more glorious to see in Singapore than in any Indian country.. err.. Indian city. And so last year, for decoration of Mysore city, they gave contract to a Singapore man to decorate.. err.. lighting decoration of Mysore city. So, so much Singapore Indians follow their religion and Christians follow their religion and Chinese of course, they follow their religion. And there is absolutely, you know harmony among them. Now why is it, and of course for Israel, Israel country itself was established because of cultural reason. You know Jewish people wanted to have their own country for their religion. Whereas here in India, people were divided on the basis of caste. They were divided by the British. And they were divided by the British historians and the British sociologists and British economists. And when we got Independence, we had the same University, University syllabus and all that. And Congress government adopted it and then they continued the same thing. They did not allow Indian to develop into a country, developing.. err.. respecting all religions, each other’s religions.

Now what happened was, the Muslims started that if there is a Ganesh procession, they should not go in front of the masjid and they should not play the Volaga (??) or Naadaswaram music etc. For everything they were objecting. Which should be the National Anthem? Till we got Independence Vande Mataram was the National Anthem, but then soon after we became independent, those who remained in India, started saying ‘’No Vande Mataram means saluting the Mother, India is a country, it is not Mother, it is against our religion’. For everything they were bringing their religion and then they were objecting and then Indian government went on accepting it, accepting their demands. For example, you take the doubling the railway line between Bangalore and Mysore. They doubled it till Pandavapura but later on they did not double it.. they did not double for nearly 30 years because there was the armory building of Tipu Sultan. And they say it is.. it is sacred for us because it was built by a Muslim ruler. So for 30 years you know they remained it like this. How is it.. how is the armory sacred for Muslims? For anything they started objecting and the people were succumbing to, government was succumbing to it.

And also, the English-educated people, they had you know, they were following their own style. And they had developed dislike for anything Indian or for anything Hindu. Take the example, Munshi, K.M. Munshi wanted to build Somnath Mandir. You know, Somnath was invaded by Mohammed Ghori for several times and destroyed the temple and all that. Soon after we got the Independence, K.M. Munshi wanted to rebuild it.. rebuild the temple. Sardar Patel supported it. They built it. Of course, Sardar Patel died meanwhile but K.M. Munshi used all his influence and a beautiful building.. er.. temple was built. Then Rajendra Prasad was the President of the country. They invited Rajendra Prasad to come and inaugurate the temple. Rajendra Prasad accepted. Nehru wrote a letter to Rajendra Prasad saying, ‘ours is a secular country, you should not participate in that.’ But Rajendra Prasad didn’t care, he went and then he inaugurated it. Now, Nehru said ‘as a secular country, I as the Prime Minister of a secular country I will not go to any temple’. He refused to enter any temple. But he used to go to masjids having a Muslim cap saying, ‘Minority, I have to support it.’ And then giving you know all for support for them to go to Mecca pilgrimage and all those things. So this way, this was one thing. And all people supported it, so called intellectuals supported it. And then, they.. after Nehru, the Communist giant Sonia.. er.. Indira Gandhi.. one thing was, Indira Gandhi was a power-monger but she could not.. she could not command the support of the people as much as Nehru commanded because you know, there was blind hero-worship for Nehru. Then Communists offered support to Indira Gandhi and she accepted it. And then they said give Education to us and certain other.. you know portfolios to us. She said, ‘take whatever you want but I want support.’ JNU was started and JNU became the centre of Communistic or Leftistic movement and through JNU they controlled the whole Education System of the country. So, this way a new kind of people developed throughout the country. Now, what happened is when Modi government came, soon after the Modi government came, within 6 months or so, our writers, so called literary writers started a movement called this.. er.. Prashasti Waapsi because there is no secularity in our country and there is you know, all communalism etc. etc. As a protest we will return our Prashasti etc. etc. A new movement was started. Why? It was started because of Bihar election. And literary people also started doing it. Newspaper people also do the same thing, many of the newspaper writers, especially English newspaper writers are anti-Hindus. They are anti-Hindus. And that means, anything you talk about Hindus, they.. they cajole it.

Now, if you take what is Hindu or what is India, you make a travel to the whole of India, suppose you are only a traveller. You go to temples and temples and apart from temples what is there in India to see? Of course, there are rivers, rivers both in North India and then in South India etc. Who will go to see the river? They go to see.. go to South India etc. Belur, Halebid, Shravanbelagola. When I say temple, it is not merely Hindu temple. It is Jain temple, it is Buddhist temple. You know culturally speaking, all these are Indians.. India’s temples, even Sikh temples are temples. It’s a part of Hindu temples because Sikhs also go to Hindu temples and Hindus go to Gurudwaras. Now, when Modi came, for the first time the Prime Minister started going to temple with all respect and devotion. He first went to Pashupatinath temple of Nepal. And then he went wearing the.. err.. wearing the saffron dress and then putting Kumkum and then Vibhuti, and then he went with folded hands and then he did all the worship. And then he donated on behalf of India 25 Crores of Rupees for the development of the temple and the development of the environment of the temple. If you go, I don’t know what happened recently but before Modi visited the environment was so dirty. So, in order to.. in order to improve it, Modi offered it. So, the whole of Nepal started you know, loving Modi, loving India. Before that, Nepal was almost more than 50% it was Communistic. So, that was one way of drawing Nepal closer to India.

So, this way if you neglect our temples, neglect our customs and religious practices etc., where is the unity of India? Now, Nehru has written a book you know, he has described India as ‘unity in diversity’ etc. And what is the basis of unity? It is religion. It is our temples. Our yatra is you know, to all the temples, whole of Himalaya, whole of India, every temple etc. Now, in so called modern times, people who are opposing Modi are opposing basically Indian culture, original Indian culture. They are so much you see, brainwashed. That is why, our politics also, they are really afraid of Modi’s popularity. That is why, whatever Modi wants to do, they do not, they want Modi to fail, not to succeed in whatever he wants to do. And even in a situation like the war which is now going on, they are opposing Modi. In fact, they are opposing Modi.. in fact, they are acting as agents of Pakistan, talking all kinds of lies. You know, it is.. err.. it is anti-Modi, it is anti-India. You know, once upon a time the Congress people were saying ‘Indira is India.’ Now we can’t say ‘Modi is India.’ Anti-Modi is anti-India. We should not indulge in such.. err.. slogans. But the fact is that is how they are behaving. So, it is a tragedy of India.

If you study all those who participated in Prashasti Wapsi, you will find one common thing that all of them are anti-Indian culture. And all of them are Leftists, Communistic-minded. And they are not pure literary writers. They are the persons who have used Literature for propaganda purposes. And also, many of them were conducting NGOs. So, in the name of NGOs they were getting funds from Western countries, especially from the Vatican sources, from Ford Foundation, Rockefeller Foundation etc. And American government was indirectly supporting them. And they.. they were asked to create anti-government opinions in India by conducting some seminars or writing articles in newspapers, speaking in televisions according to the directions given by those Western countries. Now for that they were getting lot of money, lot of funds. It was a big source of earning. Now when Modi government came, Indian Home Minister i.e. Rajnath Singh made inquiries into the source of money that these NGOs were getting. They were not merely literary people, these NGOs. They were proselytizers, they were missionaries and so on and so forth. And when they.. the Home Minister demanded them to give accounts for the source of money, and then how they have spent it, and have they written the accounts, and what are the seminars that they have conducted, and what are the effects of this etc., for everything he wanted explanation. So, he debarred many of these NGOs for conducting their organization. And that made many of the intellectuals upset. They were not merely literary writers, many of them were journalists also. So, all of them, these so called literary writers, that means the ideology-based literary writers and the journalists, you see they have a.. during the.. during the so called, you know progressive period in Indian literary writers, earlier a literary writer was called a ‘Saahiti’ or a ‘Kavi’ or a ‘Kaadambarikaara’. But when this so called progressive period came, they were called ‘Writers.’ A journalist is also a writer. A novelist is also a writer. A poet is also a writer. All of them were clubbed as writers. So, these NGOs included the writers also. So, because of the steps taken by Modi’s.. Modi government’s Home Ministry, they were upset. So, all of them joined together and then started, first started with this movement viz. Prashasti Wapsi. But many of them got Prashasti with heavy recommendations and not out of their literary merit. So, this way they have got you know, several methods. They go on inventing newer and newer methods to oppose Modi or to oppose Hinduism. This is the background.