Gita Press and the Making of Hindu India (38 page)

However, Dayal made it clear that ‘as the editor of that paper (
Kalyan
) has already been warned, I do not think further action against him, such as prosecution, is necessary’
.
⁵³
Just a few days later, thousands of pamphlets from Allahabad consisting of the same article were confiscated,
⁵⁴
but Dayal’s order remained unchanged.

The
Kalyan
article continued to nag the United Provinces government as news of its publication in a booklet form appeared from Gwalior barely four months before Independence.
⁵⁵

Returning to politics,
Malaviya Ank
presented a picture of Noakhali where all the levers of power and economy were under Muslim control. Calling the situation there the precursor to the formation of Pakistan,
Malaviya Ank
cited news reports of converted Hindus dressed like Muslims submitting applications to courts that they had decided to leave the ‘darkness of Hinduism’ of their own will and had embraced the pious light of Islam to remove their blindness. ‘New methods are being adopted and Muslim League is out to prove that all conversions have taken place through free will.’ Various religious leaders put forward their views on reconversion (shuddhi) of Hindus who had become Muslims, urging that they should be welcomed back to the fold after performing the elaborate rituals deemed necessary to purify them.
⁵⁶

Even an administrative decision could not be seen outside the context of the communal divide. Poddar was angered by the proposed legislation by the Bombay government to ban untouchability and attempts to bring in a Hindu marriage bill and divorce bill. He castigated Ashfaq Ali, railway minister in the interim government, saying his decision to end the system of separate provision of tea, water and food for Hindu and Muslim passengers was an attack on the sanctity of Hindu religion.
⁵⁷

 

A Clarion Call for Hindus
Poddar elaborated on his twelve-point solution for Hindu unity and protection in the
Malaviya Ank
.
⁵⁸
His first suggestion was to create an all-India organization that would protect the interests of Hindus of all castes and sects. Next, emphasizing the role the media could play in the dissemination of the values of sanatan Hindu dharma, Poddar suggested publication of a slew of newspapers in different languages from different parts of the country. While he praised the work done by the English daily
Amrita Bazar Patrika
of Calcutta to highlight the oppression of Hindus in Bengal, and lauded Hindi dailies like
Bharat
,
Aaj
,
Sansar
and
Pratap
, he said the only newspaper working towards propagation of the Hindu faith was
Sanmarg
of Banaras. Poddar’s vision was to have a
Sanmarg
-like newspaper from each major city, published in English, Hindi and regional languages. Here Poddar raised the spectre of the Muslim League, saying there was a rumour that the leading party of Muslims was planning to bring out nine newspapers from Bombay.

Wealthy Hindus were asked to spend liberally for the cause of Hindus and in defence of Hinduism, its honour and growth. Poddar envisioned the setting up of a nationwide Rakshak Dal, a kind of Hindu militia, of five million youth. In this context Poddar praised the work of the RSS and encouraged Hindu youth to participate in its programmes. Sanghchalaks (local RSS organizers) were told to emphasize the humane aspects of the Hindu religion, its philosophy and the need to protect its supremacy.

In his convoluted fashion, Poddar told readers to replace the word ‘Muslims’ with ‘Hindus’ in a speech by Jinnah delivered in Delhi that read: ‘We do not want to fight. We want to live peacefully. But to save ourselves from any attack we should conserve our energy so that the other side should realize doing anything against Muslims would cause more harm to them and would be suicidal.’

Hindu women were asked to be alert, not to venture out unnecessarily, to carry a knife and not to let children out alone. People were generally advised not to go for late-night movie shows and fairs. Hindu industrialists and landlords were told to be magnanimous with their staff and treat them as part of their families so that in times of crisis they would not turn into adversaries. They were also told to employ only Hindus as guards and drivers at home as well as in factories and offices. Temples, ashrams and monasteries should be fortified, Poddar advised.

In the charged communal environment of 1946,
Kalyan
’s December issue that had carried the article ‘
Hindu Kya Karen
’ and the
Malaviya
Ank
(also published in December) had both raised considerable controversy and drawn the attention of the establishment. In February 1947, after much hesitation, the Governments of Bihar and the United Provinces decided to ban the two issues.
⁵⁹
By then lakhs of copies of these issues had already been circulated, and ‘
Hindu Kya Karen
’ had been re-published separately by Gita Press and by many well-heeled readers who spent their own money on its printing and free dissemination.

The ban under section 153-A of the Indian Penal Code—for spreading communal disaffection—came as a surprise to Poddar. In the March 1947 issue of
Kalyan
, he castigated the Congress governments of the two states for missing the bigger picture. He claimed that both issues were aimed at communal amity and reproduced extracts from them to make his point. He also mocked the government for its delayed decision: ‘I do not know if
Kalyan
’s influence will wane or be enhanced.’
⁶⁰
Further, he queried why Muslim League publications, ‘brought out only to spread communal disharmony’, had been left untouched. ‘Is it because they are Muslims and government has to take every step cautiously? The fact is, action against
Kalyan
is also a ploy to please the Muslims.’ He pointed out that while
Kalyan
’s anti-government stand during World War II had not resulted in any action by the colonial government, now, on the eve of freedom, a government of Indians had banned two issues.

Poddar saw the ban as an act of God that Gita Press did not regret or wish to complain about. He went ahead with the annual number of 1947—a mammoth 725-page issue on the
Markandeya
and
Brahma Puranas
. Unlike the annual issues of previous years, devoted entirely to their subjects, in 1947 space was lent to themes related to nationhood and to reports on Hindu–Muslim violence.

What better way to open the debate than with an extract of the speech by RSS chief M.S. Golwalkar, ‘
Sachch
a Rashtravad
’, that presented his interpretation of Indian nationhood and how external influences caused the nation to lose the plot.
⁶¹
Golwalkar stated that the RSS wanted to unite the Hindus; and once united, to make them powerful; and when they were powerful, to work for their prosperity. Innocuous, some would say. But Golwalkar’s idea of history and prescription for Hindu supremacy was chilling in its conviction.

Golwalkar believed the biggest problem in India was the creation of nationalism. Although the intention was to create one rashtra (nation), the model was borrowed from outside. The second mistake in the formulation of nationalism, Golwalkar said, was the acceptance of the theory of Aryan invasion and that India was a continent comprising many nations. This belief, he argued, led to another blunder: ‘We accepted India has many nations and like the Americans agreed to have a federation. This gave rise to a mutilated version of sub-nationalism in India’ that ‘lacks true Bharatiyata (Indianness)’. In his opinion, the nationalism built against colonial rule in India would not last forever: ‘The central pivot of Indian life cannot be outside India. Extraterritorial inspiration and extraterritorial idealism is the biggest example of extraterritorial loyalty. And it is the biggest act against the nation.’

Kalyan
’s tryst with Noakhali continued unabated in January 1947. The issue carried eight instances of how divine intervention had saved Hindus in Bengal from attacks by Muslims.
⁶²
And if God came to the rescue of Hindus,
Kalyan
cited many instances of Hindus coming to the defence of Muslims in and around Meerut. In a rare case, it reported that two Muslims, Kale Khan and Mohammad Omar, saved a Hindu woman from losing her property to rioters.
⁶³

Then there was an exhaustive report on the current situation in the country and what Hindus should do.
⁶⁴
The message was not to depend on the Central government as it had ceased to exist insofar as security of citizens in Muslim League–ruled states was concerned. The report encouraged Hindus to defend themselves. It cited Patel’s speech at the Meerut session of Congress in which he had warned Muslim League leaders that ‘sword would be answered with sword’ and that ‘Pakistan cannot be achieved through loot, murder, arson, religious conversion and rape.’

Comparing the relative state of Muslim and Hindu refugee camps,
Kalyan
’s contention was that camps in Bihar for Muslims had better conditions since most of them were run by Muslim League volunteers. Citing Sucheta Kripalani, the report painted a sorry state of Hindu refugee camps in East Bengal with poor hygienic conditions and inadequate food.

The article also expressed concern that the Muslims in Bihar were getting more gun licences than the Hindus: ‘A statement by the Bihar government shows 52 per cent gun licences are with Hindus constituting 89 per cent, whereas 11 per cent Muslims have 48 per cent gun licences.’

Kalyan
gave instances of Muslim propaganda—the claim that the Muslims had suffered more in Bihar than the Hindus in Bengal, and the distribution of a pamphlet at the meeting of the United Nations General Assembly alleging that the Indian delegation did not have a single Muslim while, as Vijaya Lakshmi Pandit pointed out, the delegation had two Muslims, Mahommedali Currim Chagla and Nawab Ali Yawar Jung.

Throughout the article, Jinnah was portrayed as the new-age Aurangzeb, a comparison that had been made in his praise for the first time by Mohammad Ismail, a Muslim League leader from Madras. ‘It is good that Jinnah has been exposed by his own party leader. He has removed the cloak of tolerance and secularism Jinnah was wearing. The Muslim League should remember that Jinnah will meet the same fate as Aurangzeb.’ Jinnah’s Direct Action led to the spread of violence across north India, and
Kalyan
stated that this had to be countered: ‘The time has come for every Hindu man and woman to become a soldier in self- defence. They should launch a movement demanding reservation in government jobs in proportion to their percentage in the population. Just like Muslims rally around at the call of
Allah-O-Akbar
, Hindus should learn to come together on hearing the blowing of conch shells and the slogans of
Har Har Mahadev
and
Bajrang Bali Ki Jai
.’

Posturing and strident opposition apart, the reality of Pakistan was something the Hindu nationalists and Gita Press had come to terms with by the first quarter of 1947, and
Kalyan
presented their vision of soon-to-be-born independent India based on the paradigm of Hindi- Hindu-Hindustan.

The most vivid articulation of this dream was through a poem—‘
Hindutv
a Viheen Swarajya Se Kya Hoga
?’(What Good Is Independence Without Hindutva?)—in the February 1947 issue of
Kalyan.
⁶⁵
The author, one is led to believe, was a person who had been to prison six times for participating in the Congress-led national movement.

Provocative, passionate and filled with patriotic fervour of the Hindutva variety, the poem had all the markings of a high school magazine effort while touching upon key aspects of the Hindu nationalism discourse:

 

 

In another verse the Hindi-Hindu mission was blended with the fear of Hindustani or Urdu taking over the language of Hindus. Killing of Hindi was seen as another way of killing Hindus.