Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh, Yogi Adityanath. Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh, Yogi Adityanath.

First, full disclosure. I understand Hindu rage. Without being Hindu by faith I admit that it makes me very angry when I see ‘secular’ Indians use the word Hindu, mostly to say something pejorative. It makes me very angry that in the Indian schools and colleges I attended, I learned a great deal about ancient Greece, Rome and Egypt and almost nothing about ancient India. It was long after my education was supposedly complete that I first read Iqbal’s beautiful verse that celebrates the survival of India’s civilisation, when others disappeared from the world. It makes me angry that even today Indian children go to schools that teach them Indian history written by colonial historians and that they leave school knowing more about Western civilisation than their own.

What I do not understand is why educated, intelligent Hindus are not using their rage to rectify these things. Why are they not building schools that are truly Indian? Why are they not building institutions of classical Indian studies and languages? Why have these not been built in states where BJP governments have ruled for decades? In these states we should by now have seen changes in school curriculums made specifically to give Indian children an idea of their magnificent civilisation and literary heritage.

Why instead do we see Hindu rage being used to reduce the wonderful idea of the Sanatan Dharma to a second-rate copy of Islam? Even the timing is wrong. Jihadi terrorists have so debased Islam that it is getting harder and harder for Muslims to travel to countries outside the Islamic world. Jihadists justify their horrible violence and sickening treatment of women using verses from the Quran, so the religion that believes it is the ‘last message from God’ is going through a very rough time. But it seems that those Hindus currently trying to Islamize the Sanatan Dharma were hiding in a cave when all this was happening. Or perhaps behind anonymous handles on Twitter from the anonymity of which they vomit out venomous tweets.

I have been eviscerated all of last week by people who identify themselves as ‘passionate Hindus’ because I expressed distress at Yogi Adityanath being chosen to lead Uttar Pradesh. There are two reasons for my distress. I do not believe that the mandate the people gave Narendra Modi in our electorally most important state was for Hindutva. And, I do not believe that ascetics, sadhus, sanyasis, priests or religious leaders of any kind have any role in politics. This is not because I come from the ‘Lutyens, sickular’ school of political thought but because I have never seen a religious leader become a great or even halfway good political leader. Here a small digression. It was your humble columnist who first borrowed Edwin Lutyens’s name to describe Delhi’s ruling elite. I deeply regret it.

To return to the theme of religion sullying politics and governance, I admit that Yogi Adityanath in his first week in office has refrained from making hate speeches, and has made his ministers swear that they will work towards a Swachh Bharat. This is good. But, in his efforts to regulate the meat industry in Uttar Pradesh and stop violence against women, there are signs that he could be unleashing the fanaticism that men of religion usually bring with them when they enter politics. Regulation of the meat industry should not mean closing it down or unleashing the kind of cow vigilantes who killed Mohammad Akhlaq. Judging by the number of butcher shops burned down by vigilantes, this is already beginning to happen.

As for the ‘anti-Romeo squads’, when I watched policewomen questioning young girls about the men they were with, I was reminded disturbingly of the morality squads that police Islamic countries. In Saudi Arabia, women get arrested if seen wandering about with men who are not relations. The Islamic State shot dead women who were not fully veiled, and in Afghanistan, under the Taliban, women got stoned to death on suspicion of adultery.

There is not a country ruled by religious men that allows normal human beings to go about the normal business of living joyfully, without the interference of morality policemen. Interference in the private lives of citizens usually begins with some official deciding what we should eat, drink and wear. These should be private decisions taken by private citizens. Ordaining otherwise becomes the founding principle of theocratic totalitarianism.

So when as a political columnist I raise red flags, I like to think I am defending the idea of India. If we have lived for centuries in relative peace with those who believe in other faiths, other prophets and other books, it is because of the Sanatan Dharma. This gives everyone the freedom to pray, love and live in the way they think best. It is an idea worth fighting for.

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