Context: May 28, 2020, marked 137th birth anniversary of Veer Savarkar.
Relevance:
Prelims: History of India and Indian National Movement.
Mains: GS I-
- Modern Indian history from about the middle of the eighteenth century until the present- significant events, personalities, issues.
- The Freedom Struggle – its various stages and important contributors /contributions from different parts of the country.
Veer Savarkar was born on 28 May 1883 in the Marathi Chitpavan Brahmin Hindu family of Damodar and Radhabai Savarkar in the village Bhagpur, Nashik and died on 26 February 1966, Bombay (now Mumbai). His full name is Vinayak Damodar Savarkar. He was a politician, lawyer, social reformer. He was an Indian independence activist and politician who formulated the Hindu nationalist philosophy of Hindutva.
He was a leading figure in the Hindu Mahasabha. While some consider him as one of the greatest revolutionaries in the Indian freedom struggle, others consider him a communalist and right-wing leader.
| Contributions of Vinayak Damodar Savarkar |
Contributions to National Freedom Struggle:
- Veer Savarkar was influenced by his elder brother Ganesh who had played an influential role in his teenage life. He also became a revolutionary young man.
- Savarkar began his political activities as a high school student and continued to do so at Fergusson College in Pune.
- He had convened in 1904 a meeting of some two hundred selected members of the Mitra Mela- a revolutionary party.
- The name of his party was later changed to Abhinava Bharat.
- He was against foreign goods and propagated the idea of Swadeshi. In 1905, he burnt all the foreign goods in a bonfire on Dussehra.
- When he went to England for higher studies, he continued his revolutionary activities and set up a front organization named 'Free India Society’.
- He founded this Society to mobilise youths against the colonial rule in India.
- In 1908, he brought out an authentic informative researched work on The Great Indian Revolt, which the British termed as “Sepoy Mutiny” of 1857.
- The book was called “The Indian War of Independence 1857”.
- The British government immediately enforced a ban on the publication in both Britain and India.
- Later, it was published by Madame Bhikaiji Cama in Holland and was smuggled into India to reach revolutionaries working across the country against British rule.
- When the then British Collector of Nasik, A.M.T. Jackson was shot by a youth, Veer Savarkar finally fell under the net of the British authorities.
- He was implicated in the murder citing his connections with India House. Savarkar was arrested in London on March 13, 1910, and sent to India.
- In 1937 he was unconditionally released from Ratnagiri Jail by the newly elected government of Bombay presidency.
- From 1937 to 1947 he had strained every nerve to keep India united.
Contributions to Indian society:
- Savarkar was a modernist, a rationalist and a strong supporter of social reform.
- According to Savarkar, our movies should focus on the positives of the country, keep aside the negatives and have pride in its victories. Our youth should be inspired by movies that focus on the positive side of things.
- In his presidential address to the annual session of the Hindu Mahasabha held in Calcutta in 1939, Savarkar spoke about how Hindus and Muslims could bury their historical differences in a common Hindustani constitutional state.
- Savarkar often called on his supporters to welcome the age of the modern machine.
- In an essay published in the magazine Kirloskar, and republished in a book of his essays on the scientific approach, he argued that India would continue to lag behind Europe as long as its leaders believed in superstition rather than science.
- He argued that any social reformer who seeks to root out harmful social practices or preach new truths has first of all to compromise his popularity. E.g.: Jesus was killed.
- Buddha had to face a murderous attack. Mohammad had to flee, was injured in battle, was condemned as a traitor.
- He championed atheism and rationality and also disapproved orthodox Hindu belief. In fact, he even dismissed cow worship as superstitious.
- A true social or religious reformer should only be driven by the desire to do good.
- He was a critic of the caste system and held that both ‘Chaturvarna’ and caste system proved very disastrous for the unity of Hindu society and gave birth to the inhuman practise of untouchability.
- The caste encouraged and institutionalised inequality, divided Hindu society into numerous compartments and sowed the seeds of hostility and hatred among the Hindus.
- He rejected the sanctity of religious scriptures and maintained that all religious scriptures were man-made and their teaching could not be applied to all societies in all times.
- He favoured the pursuit of science and reason and criticised ‘irrational and superstitious’ practices of Hindus.
- He wanted the Hindus to reject blind faith in the Vedas and customs and tried to acquire material strength by accepting the supremacy of machines.
“The practice of untouchability is a sin, a blot on humanity, and nothing can justify it. Consider only that untouchable which is injurious to one’s health, not fellow human beings. Unshackling this one foolish fetter would bring crores of our Hindu brethren into the mainstream. They would serve the country in various capacities and defend her honour.”
| Religious and Political Ideologies of V.D Savarkar |
- In Ratnagiri jail, Savarkar wrote the book ‘Hindutva: Who is Hindu?’.
- Savarkar began describing a “Hindu” as a patriotic inhabitant of Bharatavarsha, venturing beyond a religious identity.
- While emphasising the need for patriotic and social unity of all Hindu communities, he described Hinduism, Jainism, Sikhism and Buddhism as one and the same.
- He outlined his vision of a “Hindu Rashtra” (Hindu Nation) as “Akhand Bharat” (United India), purportedly stretching across the entire Indian subcontinent.
- He defined Hindus as being neither Aryan nor Dravidian but as “People who live as children of a common motherland, adoring a common holy land.”
- Although staunch anti-British in his early years, he supported British efforts in India seeking military efforts to Hindus during World War 2 and opposed the Quit India Movement.
- Hindu Mahasabha activists protested Gandhi’s initiative to hold talks with Jinnah in 1944, which Savarkar denounced as “appeasement.”
- He assailed the British proposals for transfer of power, attacking both the Congress and the British for making concessions to Muslim separatists.
- Vinayak Savarkar was a president of Hindu Mahasabha from 1937 to 1943.
- The Indian National Congress won a massive victory in the 1937 Indian provincial elections, decimating the Muslim League and the Hindu Mahasabha.
- However, in 1939, the Congress ministries resigned in protest against Viceroy Lord Linlithgow's action of declaring India to be a belligerent in the Second World War without consulting the Indian people.
- This led to the Hindu Mahasabha, under Savarkar's presidency, joining hands with the Muslim League and other parties to form governments, in certain provinces.
- Such coalition governments were formed in Sindh, NWFP, and Bengal.
- His strong views on Hindutva though secular in broader outlook, led to a rise in radicalism among his followers. This also led to a rise in tension between the two communities.
- Although he advocated two-nations theory, he insists that-
- “although there are two nations in India, India shall not be divided into two parts, one for Muslims and the other for the Hindus;
- that the two nations shall dwell in one country and shall live under the mantle of one single constitution;
- that the constitution shall be such that the Hindu nation will be enabled to occupy a predominant position that is due to it and the Muslim nation made to live in the position of subordinate co-operation with the Hindu nation.”
- Scholars, historians and Indian politicians have been divided in their interpretation of Savarkar's ideas.
- A self-described atheist, Savarkar regards being Hindu as a cultural and political identity.
- He often stressed social and community unity between Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists and Jains, to the exclusion of Muslims and Christians.
- Savarkar saw Muslims and Christians as “misfits” in the Indian civilization who could not truly be a part of the nation.
- He argued that the holiest sites of Islam and Christianity are in the Middle East and not India, hence the loyalty of Muslims and Christians to India is divided.
Conclusion:
Many of Savarkar’s ideas on social and religious reforms, embrace of science and building a stronger state continue to be relevant for India. His controversial position on Hindutva also continues to inform current political debates. It is time that a wider set of scholars began to engage with Savarkar’s ideas- including controversial ones.
