[sacw] sacw dispatch #1 (19 dec.99) 'India & the Hindu Right'

[Harsh Kapoor]

South Asia Citizens Web - Dispatch #1.
19 December 1999
['India & the Hindu Right' Special]
___________________________
#1. Thanks to powerful protectors in Khakhi Shorts
#2. Mandal and Mandir
#3. US Hindus plan millennium eve 'jagran'
#4. Saffron generation
#5. Is the left right, and the right wrong?
___________________________
#1.
The Asian Age
19 December 1999
Sunday

They survive thanks to powerful protectors
By Akhilesh Mithal

We should now address the area of "conversion" outside matrimony. This
is another non-issue made much of by the parivaar. The allegation is
that Christians and Muslims are waxing in numbers at the cost of Hindus
by resorting to methods that are at the least, unfair and immoral if not
downright criminal. The Hindus are therefore justified in reacting,
retaliating and responding with whatever means available to them,
including raping nuns, burning missionaries along with their Bibles,
crosses, churches and whatever smacks of Christianity.
The most spectacular and brutal outrage saw a missionary working with
lepers, Graham Staines, burnt alive along with his two sons aged nine
and seven in January 1999.
People responded in various ways. The chief executive of India, Prime
Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee's response was to offer a debate on
conversions. As if to allege that Staines was killed most brutally along
with his tender sons, for being in the business of conversions.
The media under the parivaar's influence and control, strengthened by
government pressure printed the alleged views of Gandhi as if to show
that in the matter of opposing conversions they were Gandhians or that
the Mahatma was in tune with them.
Historian Sumit Sarkar has investigated the matter and we are indebted
to him for what follows. Mahatma Gandhi's Collected Works, Volume XLVI
[pages 27-28] gives the details.
"In an interview given to The Hindu, Gandhi apparently stated that if in
self-governing India, missionaries kept on "proselytising by means of
medical aid, education etc, I would certainly ask them to withdraw.
Every nation's religion is as good as any other. Certainly, India's
religions are adequate for her people. We need no converting
spiritually'."
Sumit Sarkar goes on to quote from the original article which appeared
in You-ng India on April 23, 1923. Here Gandhi begins with the passage
quoted above and used or abused by the parivaar but goes on to add "This
is what a reporter has put into my mouth - all I can say is that it is a
travesty of what I have always said and held."
Even more remarkable is the elaboration and enumeration of India's
"great" and "all-sufficing" faiths which obviate the necessity for other
nation's faiths to be propagated here.
Gandhi lists "Apart from Christianity and Judaism, Hinduism and its
offshoots, Islam and Zoroastrianism are living faiths' as Indian
religions." Gandhi ends the article with a plea for "living friendly
contact among the great religions of the world and not a clash amongst
them..."
Thus it can be seen that the killers of Gandhi cannot get support for
their murder of Staines by quoting his works. The perpetrator of this
outrage has protection and until the time of going to press he has been
able to evade arrest.
Readers will remember that Subramanian Swamy was "underground" during
the 1975-1977 Emergency. He came to the Lok Sabha while still on the
"most wanted" list, raised a "point of order" and disappeared without
trace. He was under the protection of the RSS and this helped him evade
apprehension and arrest.
The killer of Staines and sons must have powerful protectors. But what
about the rule of law? When will the police arrest the killers? Or will
this be like the earlier Babri Masjid story where the perpetrators not
only went away scot-free but are in power and flourishing.
______________

#2.
The Hindustan Times
Saturday, December 18, 1999, New Delhi
Opinion=20
=20
Mandal and Mandir
(K. M. Shrimali on the role of OBC leaders)

Kalyan Singh is out of the BJP. There have been loud proclamations, both
from him and the RSS, to say that their ties have been snapped. The top
BJP leadership is unfazed, at least publicly. But the turmoil is surely
on. What forces will set the tone of politics in the coming months? Will
it be the Mandir at Ayodhya? Will it be a call for the social
engineering and empowerment of the socially deprived? Are we back to the
days of Kamandal versus Mandal? What does one make of Kalyan Singh's
scrupulous avoidance of criticism of Advani on the one hand and the
spitting of venom against Vajpayee on the other? Will Kalyan Singh be
the Sharad Pawar of Uttar Pradesh?

Kalyan Singh, in anticipation of his expulsion from the BJP, had
provocatively shown the Ayodhya card. Evidently, this was to embarrass
Vajpayee. Intriguingly, Advani and Murali Manohar Joshi have remained
quite reticent. Are they carrying out a proxy war against Vajpayee?
Kalyan Singh's initial stand after his expulsion has, however, taken a
U-turn. His distancing from the RSS and the Sangh parivar and thereby
from the Ram Mandir as well, if genuine, leaves him with little option
but to espouse the cause of social engineering and play OBC politics.

The Sangh parivar and its numerous champions within the BJP may not be
too unhappy about Kalyan's volte-face. Let it not be mistaken that
behind the "liberal" facade of Vajpayee, the long-term exclusionist
agenda of the RSS is being carried out quite zealously by the three key
Central ministries, viz, Home, Human Resource Development and
Information and Broadcasting. The cultural contours of Indian
nationalism and Bharatiyata are being redefined so as to destroy the
five millennia old historical legacy.

Sadly, the non-BJP members of the NDA, who are publicly opposed to the
Hindutva forces, have become tacit collaborators in this design. The
electronic media's glamorised presentation of the "second generation of
economic reforms" also obfuscates the reach of this game plan. No
wonder, an RSS insider confesses, "We think Joshiji has done the best
work."

The millennium that we will end soon witnessed the blossoming of several
cultural identities at varied regional levels and strengthened the
process of multi-cultural streams flowing into the mighty ocean of
Indian culture. Such a mosaic of the personality of India mocks at the
idea of a religion-centred monolithic and monochromatic country that is
so dear to the Sangh parivar.

Ironically, just when the Ram Mandir Liberation Movement began in the
early eighties to unleash the forces of Hindutva, the Anthropological
Survey of India also inaugurated the People of India Project on October
2, 1985. It has probably been one of the most complete surveys of the
Indian scene that has documented social, economic, cultural, linguistic
and ecological diversities and highlighted the processes that transcend
them. The Project has been able to identify, locate and list 4,635
communities, 325 languages (incidence of bilinguals being as high as
65.51 per cent) belonging to 12 different language families, 24 scripts
and as many as 91 eco-cultural zones all over India.

We in India take legitimate pride in the monuments at Khajuraho that
ushered in the millennium that is now coming to an end. Not many in
India would probably be able to appreciate that the creations of
Khajuraho were products of a new millennium in the real sense of the
term. The beginning of this millennium is marked by an ethos of specific
regional eco-cultural zones that clearly anticipate the mapping of India
done by the People of India Project.

A famous litterateur Rajashekhar (9th-10th century AD) identified
numerous regions in the Indian subcontinent on the bases of people's
linguistic peculiarities, their economic activities, socio-cultural
attributes, etc. Subsequently, for many centuries regions continued to
be identified on the bases of social customs, languages, scripts, eating
habits, dress, physical features of people, and so on.

However, regional identities were never forged in exclusive religious
terms. Notwithstanding occasional outbursts of derision by one region
against the evil practices of another region, it is often recognised
that this was the outcome of differing perceptions based on
desha-kala-bheda (differences arising out of varied regions and times).
There are equally significant pointers of healthy interactions among
different regions and their people. Thus, a seventeenth century work,
written in Varanasi, attributes the prosperity of Bengal to its
cosmopolitan nature. The author was a Maharashtrian Brahmin, who was
educated in Bengal then ruled by Muslims. He tells us that Bengal was
inhabited by varied people comprising Gurjaras, Andhras, Karnatakas,
Chittapavans, Kanyakubjas, Maathuras, Marujas (people from Marwar),
Paarvatiyas (people from hills), barbers, potters, artisans, merchants,
etc. In this long list of enumeration of people on the bases of caste,
community, region, and profession; religion as a marker seldom finds a
place.

M. N. Srinivas, the internationally renowned sociologist and social
anthropologist delivered a public lecture titled "Obituary on Caste as a
System" shortly before his death on November 30. Notwithstanding the
title, the lecture was marked by a sustained revisiting of the longest
surviving social institution of India and delineated the changing
contours of caste amidst the transformation of rural economies. The
Kalyan Singhs, Laloo and Mulayam Yadavs are products of this
transformation.

Significantly, notwithstanding his abhorrence of caste-based
reservations, Srinivas is well known for his convictions about the
regional dimensions of caste and its continued expression in public as
well as private lives of Indians. Historical studies of caste, such as
those of Suvira Jaiswal, also tend to highlight regional specificities
of this enduring institution.

The post-Vajpayee BJP in the hands of Advani, Joshi and men of their ilk
would, in all probability, further accelerate the pace of Hindutva Rath.
If the forces of Mandalisation are keen to contain this juggernaut, they
must start mobilising all their resources to propagate the dangers of
Joshi's agenda of Indian culture through Sanskritising the school
curricula. May we hope that the non-BJP and non-Congress forces, both
within the NDA and outside, would also realise that the definition of
"contentious issues" ought not to remain confined to the Ayodhya Mandir,
Article 370 and the Uniform Civil Code.

The future of Indian politics lies with such forces that are able to
perceive the potentials of (a) such productive social classes/castes
that are shaping rural economies, (b) dynamics of regional identities,
(c) the dangers inherent in the real agenda of the Bharatiya Janata
Party, viz. One People, One Culture and One Nation, (d) harnessing the
strength and interests of socially and economically deprived sections of
the society with those of women as a class, (e) bridging the chasm
between the OBCs and Dalits and (f) shaping a development programme for
the masses and not for classes. Mere lip service to Mandir or Mandal
cannot take us very far. Nor will the egos of individual leaders,
however big they may be.

(The writer is Professor of History in Delhi University)
___________
#3.
The Asian Age
19 December 1999

No Show-Shah: US Hindus plan millennium eve jagran
By Ashish Kumar Sen

San Francisco: This New Year's Eve Ajay Shah's wife Lalita will be
organising bhajans and satsang for a group of friends at the couple's
San Diego residence. The Shahs are one of the many families that will
give elaborate New Year's Eve parties a miss and, instead, immerse
themselves in the calming influence of prayers and religious devotion.
The trend to spend a spiritual New Year's Eve has caught on like
wildfire, and while independent polls indicate not many Americans will
be out partying on this night, there are many who will be found at their
local temples, monasteries and even New Age facilities.
Mr Shah, coordinator of the Global Hindu Electronics Network and a
spokesperson of VHP (America), said: "Many people in the US feel there
are only five major festivals here and so New Year is taken very
seriously. For Hindus, however, the first of January has no religious
significance; only a cultural one."
While this is the 5,100th New Year for Hindus, it started back in April.
Vijay Pallod, a resident of Houston, said there are a lot of people like
him who will, instead of going to parties and getting drunk, settle down
for bhajans. "The Sri Meenakshi Temple in Greater Houston never used to
have any functions on New Year's Eve, but this year they do," said Mr
Pallod, pointing out that there has been a marked trend among people to
make religion a part of their celebration this year.
Ms Beth Kulkarni, adjunct executive director at the Pearland, Greater
Houston-based Sri Meenakshi Temple, agreed that this year the
festivities at the temple are more elaborate. "The celebrations are more
like a carry over from Diwali and various other Hindu new years," she
said. Admitting that the turnout at the temple is expected to be as high
as 6,000 to 8,000 people over the two days of celebrations, Ms Kulkarni
said: "This year is special."
"It's something peculiar to this New Year. Lots of people have cancelled
lavish parties. One of the reasons could be that people think it's safer
to stay at home on that day," Mr Pallod observed.
But it's not just the Hindus who will be spending a sober New Year's
Eve. Jews, Christian ministries, Buddhist monks, native Americans and
even New Age thinkers will be coming together at the New Age facility,
Sedona 2000 in Arizona, to ring in a spiritual new year. The
celebrations, which start on December 27 and end on January 3, include a
five-course gourmet dinner, laughter meditation, prayers, dance and
music. "The event will help bring together all cultural, religious,
spiritual and racial fellowships and create an atmosphere to promote
enlightenment, love, abundance and harmony," a spokesperson for the
organisation said.
The Arsha Vidya Gurukulam in Sylorsburg, Pennsylvania, will be
organising a special puja on New Year's Eve and a more elaborate
maharudra abhishekam on the day after. Mr Ashok Chhabra, general manager
at the gurukulam, said at least 1,000 people are expected to attend the
prayers. "Many want to seek the blessing of the Lord," Mr Chhabra said,
explaining this year's anticipated higher turnout as "they might want
blessings for the whole century!"
______________ =20

#4.
Hindustan Times
19 December 1999
=46eatures

Saffron generation

Akshaya Mukul investigates how the country's apex body for preparing
school textbooks and syllabi is being used to brainwash the nation's
children.

July 14, 1999, is a date the National Council of Educational Research
and Training (NCERT) is not likely to forget easily. For, that's when
Union Human Resource Development Minister Murli Manohar Joshi appointed
JS Rajput as director of the apex body responsible for preparing school
textbooks and framing syllabi. Since then, its sylvan campus has been
reeling under attempts to "indigenise" education and promote Hindutva -
often at the expense of knowledge.

NCERT received its first shock in July itself when Rajput decided not to
replace the Class X course B Hindi textbook, Sanchayika Bhag II. The
Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) had prescribed it in 1993 to
bring out the "proud tradition of the country, and the values of life
inherent in it, in the areas of literature, society, art, science, etc."
But later, NCERT's books evaluation committee found that Sanchayika
contained several historical inaccuracies and peddled distorted notions
about Indian culture. It was labelled "unusable", and a replacement was
sought.

The painstaking process of preparing and whetting the new book was
completed this year, and NCERT asked CBSE to inform its affiliated
schools about the impending change. The manuscript, meanwhile, was sent
to the new director for a foreword.

This is a routine exercise, and directors are not expected to intervene
at this penultimate stage. But Rajput, fresh in the seat, argued, "Since
an overall change of NCERT textbooks will be undertaken shortly, why
change only one textbook?" The prospect of an "overall change" was
ominous enough. The immediate result was that CBSE reverted to the book
the evaluation committee had rejected.

NCERT sources ascribe two reasons for Rajput's decision. One, Sanchayika
author Indrasen Sharma, allegedly a Rajput groupie (or Hindutva votary),
had lobbied against the replacement. Two, Rajput is alleged to have told
people close to him that the recommendation to replace Sanchayika
presented an opportunity to impart a Hindutva hue to the Class X Hindi
book. Hence, the already prepared replacement had to be suppressed.

Rajput denies this charge. "There was no ulterior motive," he insists,
and fishes out the 'discussion paper' he has prepared for laying down
guidelines to frame syllabi. The extracts he reads echo what minister
Joshi has been harping on.

=46or instance: "...the curricula must inculcate and maintain a sense of
pride in being an Indian, through understanding of the growth of Indian
civilisation and contributions of India to world civilisations in
thoughts, actions and deeds. The remnants of the alien legacy of the
pre-Independence period have to be shed completely. It has to be a
totally indigenous curriculum."

Says Rajput, "Textbooks should reflect the changes in the
socio-political and cultural scene of the country in the past one
decade." And obvious among these changes, Rajput says, is the emergence
of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and its Hindutva ideology.

Suspect motive

Academicians are suspicious of Rajput's quest to indigenise education.
RS Sharma, the doyen of ancient Indian history, says, "Of course,
India's contribution must be presented. But this should not be used to
assert that Vedic mathematics was more advanced than modern mathematics,
or that Hindus are Aryans who originated in India and, therefore,
Muslims and others who came later are non-Indians."

Syllabi apart, many are perturbed at the concerted attempt to pack NCERT
with Hindutva votaries. The most important appointment has been that of
Krishna Gopal Rastogi as the NCERT president's nominee (the HRD minister
is the president). A known Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS)
functionary, Rastogi's clout stems from his having worked in NCERT and,
therefore, knowing how the system works. Says a source, "In no time, he
has become the nucleus=8Ano decision is made without his knowledge and
approval."

Counters Rajput, "He is a well-known linguist, who has been part of many
institutions and appointment committees during non-BJP regimes." Even if
this is true, Rastogi's ideological bent is evident from his
autobiography published last year (see box). Rastogi is no ordinary BJP
sympathiser, but a hardcore RSS footsoldier who shot dead a Muslim woman
during Partition. NCERT officials say this illustrates the manner in
which the RSS infiltrated institutions long before the BJP came to
power; the identity of its camp followers is becoming public only now.

Similar is the story of RH Dave, who has been entrusted with preparing a
module for minimum levels of learning. In NCERT till the early
Seventies, he became director of UNESCO's Institute of Education in
Hamburg, Germany. He relinquished this post to head the Hamburg unit of
the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP).

Three months ago, Dave lectured the staff on the "values of teaching,"
and raised eyebrows because of his departure from the NCERT norm of
holding a question-answer session at the end. Nervous NCERT officials
believe this heralds the stifling of the spirit of inquiry and dissent.

Complete agreement

But 'consensus' is Rajput's favourite word. It was in this spirit that
he visited liberal academicians like Bipan Chandra, Ravindra Kumar,
Satish Chandra and Namvar Singh. He claims, "The outcome has been
positive. Most have agreed that consensus is important."

But Chandra contradicts: "I frankly told him there is nothing called
consensus in social science, especially history. Instead of trying to
arrive at a unanimous opinion, all scholarly opinions should be
accommodated. How can there be a consensus on a contentious issue like
communalism? Can Gandhi and Golwalkar sit together and arrive at a
mutally acceptable conclusion?" NCERT sources dismiss Rajput's attempts
at "consensus" as a cover while he pushes the Hindutva agenda and
eliminates dissent. Says one, "Hindutva types know that liberals and
leftists will protest at the changes. So they meet them in order to
claim they had been consulted or invited to discussions." But why target
NCERT? A senior CBSE official, who has been threatened with a punishment
posting for opposing the saffronisation of education, explains, "After
the fiasco at last year's education ministers' conference, the BJP has
realised textbooks cannot be changed openly. NCERT is ideal for doing it
surreptitiously. It has a countrywide presence. At one stroke, they can
capture the entire landscape."

Teesta Setalvad, editor, Communalism Combat, a Mumbai-based magazine,
says institutions like NCERT are vulnerable because education hasn't
been a priority for other political parties. Nor has the quality of
education been debated by parents, teachers and politicians. "Which
party other than the BJP has made education and its content a consistent
issue for mobilisation and campaigning?" she asks.

Now, as the BJP gleefully promotes Hindutva through education, the
country faces the prospect of having the nation's children completely
dyed in saffron.
________
#5.
Hindustan Times
19 december 1999
=46EATURES=20

Is the left right, and the right wrong?

Some years ago, in a lecture in Budapest, historian Eric Hobsbawm had
said that history can be as harmful to mankind as nuclear science. He
asked historians to pay more regard to historical facts and criticise
the politico-ideological abuse of history.

Hobsbawm's advice has a special significance in the Indian context. The
party behind the destruction of the Babri mosque has not only gained
power, but is attempting to legitimise itself and its ideology by
rewriting history. The beginning has been made at the school level. It's
a mad rush, fuelled by the enthusiasm generated by a seemingly stable
government. The first step is double-pronged: to take over academic
institutions, and discredit existing history as bunkum written by
leftist historians. Right-wing historian KS Lal fires the first salvo:
"If Maulana Azad, Nurul Hasan and Humayun Kabir can decide what should
be written, what's wrong with Murli Manohar Joshi doing so?" No one
objected when left intellectuals "usurped" some of the country's best
educational and research institutions and wrote history the way they
desired, he continues, so "why the brouhaha now?"

RS Sharma, the noted expert on ancient India, counters: "The Congress,
although it followed a liberal policy, did not allow left intellectuals
to take over institutions of learning. But since the left intellectuals
happened to be talented and dedicated themselves to the institutions,
they made their mark."

Harbans Mukhia of Jawaharlal Nehru University points out that the rise
of left historians in India immediately after Independence was directly
linked to the dominance of left intellectuals worldwide. Lucien Febvre
and Marc Bloch had been making waves since the early 1930s with their
journal Annales de Historie, Economique et Sociale in France, and G
Trevelyan's Social History of Britain, a first attempt to understand the
complex British society, was threatening to change the way British
history was studied. He was followed by the likes of left historians
like Christopher Hill and Rodney Hilton.

In this tradition came DD Kosambi's seminal work Introduction to Indian
History in the 1950s, unarguably the first book on Indian history that
used Marxist methodology. This gave rise to a generation of left
historians who, rightists argue, determined the course history as a
subject would take. Asserts Lal: "Historians like Nurul Hasan saw to it
that books written during his stint as education minister hid the true
face of Islam, which is essentially a barbaric religion. Instead,
emphasis was laid on the study of economic history. Institutions like
NCERT and ICHR were used to propagate his ideology."

Mukhia, who did his doctorate under Lal, takes a gibe at his guide: "How
come Lal wrote books on Khilji and the Mughal empire without painting
Islam as barbaric?" The emphasis on economic history, he contends, was
natural since the economy dominated the national discourse in the days
after Independence.

Lal ducks his student's barb, but produces a West Bengal government
guideline of April 28, 1989, to prove how left ideology has influenced
the writing of school textbooks. It says: "Muslim rule should not
attract any criticism. Destruction of temples by Muslim invaders and
rulers should not be mentioned." Another circular says, "Schools and
publishers have been asked to ignore and delete mention of forcible
conversions to Islam." Mukhia does not defend the circular, but says
there is no need to make religion the leitmotif of medieval history.
"Religion can only be a reference point," he argues. "If conversions
occurred during this period, it's a fact that the state was indifferent.
So why highlight it?" Dilip Simeon, research fellow with Oxfam, raises a
pertinent point: "Left history, with all its limitations, was not based
on hatred - which is the basis of the Sangh Parivar view." Teesta
Setalvad of Communalism Combat adds: "The leftists enriched our grasp of
history. They didn't limit the subject to the precepts and sources used
by earlier historians. We were shown the rich possibility of looking
into the past in a critical, multi-dimensional way."

The Sangh Parivar has attempted to scuttle books of left and liberal
historians in the past. In 1977, when the Janata Party, of which the Jan
Sangh was a key constituent, came to power, it quickly withdrew RS
Sharma's Ancient India because it spoke of beef-eating, and attributed
the settlement of Rama's Ayodhya to 700 BC.

Says Sharma, "It was banned despite RC Majumdar, known for his Hindu
leanings, calling it a contribution to social and economic history
though weak in political history. It was also referred to by RN
Dhandekar, the Sanskrit and Vedic scholar, who strongly supported my
finding on beef-eating and other matters."

The controversy grew so charged that Indira Gandhi's 1980 election
manifesto promised to restore the book, which was done.

Attempts were also made to ban the National Book Trust's Freedom
Struggle authored by Bipan Chandra, Amales Tripathi and Barun De. Sangh
ideologue KR Malkani had tried to get a 1969 Romila Thapar-Harbans
Mukhia radio talk, which had been published as a book by the People's
Publishing House, banned in 1977 because it was allegedly partisan
towards one community. His letter to then Prime Minister Morarji Desai
got leaked to the press, and the move was scuttled.

Lal is adamant that this time "corrections" will be thorough. His logic:
"What's wrong if Hindu culture is highlighted? Hippie culture was
controlled by Hinduism only." But his prescription is bound to create
divisions: "Textbooks should highlight the achievements of Hindus during
the Vedic period; the role of religion during the medieval period; how
Muslim rulers from Khilji onwards deliberately kept Hindu farmers at
subsistence level, forcing them to migrate as indentured labour to
Mauritius and the West Indies; and, the Ayodhya problem existed even
during Wajid Ali Shah's time."

Historians question the factual basis of these contentions. For example,
there is no contemporary account of the trauma Muslim rule is said to
have caused. They believe such hate-based history will be a recipe for
social tension. Setalvad warns: "Their real project is political,
restrictive and downright authoritarian. It is about what and who is
India, and the right of each one of us to that claim."

The worst sufferer will be history as a subject. Any attempt to reduce
it to a simplistic discourse will result in a false and incomplete
picture of the past. It will serve the Hindutva cause, but at great
cost.

The mind of a pracharak

Krishna Gopal Rastogi is the NCERT president's nominee. That is, he is
an appointee of HRD minister Murli Manohar Joshi, and has become the
most important decision-maker in NCERT.

Last year, he published his autobiography, Aap Beeti, and circulated it
privately. His ideological affiliation was not known till then. In it,
he graphically narrates how he shot dead a Muslim woman in Uttar Pradesh
during Partition riots.

His justification: the woman's beauty had distracted his RSS friends
from the job of rioting, and turned them into "lusting human beings who
were on the verge of raping her." His action stunned his friends into
returning to their task. "I have always felt sorry for the action," says
Rastogi blandly, forgetting that he could also have saved her. But then,
she was just a Muslim.

The book abounds with absurdities. In the foreword, RSS leader KP
Sudarshan applauds the author's wife for allowing her husband to fulfill
his "physical needs" on his first trip to the US. This, Sudarshan says,
shows the greatness of Indian women.

Rastogi dwells on his foreign travels, and says the three things most
easily available in the West are non-vegetarian food, liquor and women.
He admits, though, to being reminded of fairies when he saw semi-clad
women on a Yugoslav beach.

Initially jubilant at the BJP coming to power in Delhi in 1993, he was
disappointed not to have been appointed advisor to the education
minister. His chances were scuttled, it seems, because the minister
"didn't like a more intelligent person to work under him." The book
reveals his inability to reconcile himself to the political success of
those in the RSS who were academically inferior to him.

When the book became controversial, Rastogi claimed he had fictionalised
certain events - and now refuses to talk to the press.

__________________________________________
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