Across generations and around the world, the name Dracula now calls to mind a pale man in a tuxedo and cape, eyes bloodshot and fangs gleaming. Originally introduced in Bram Stokers 1897 novel of the same name and given that familiar look by Bela Lugosi in 1931, Dracula has since become the worlds prototype vampire, spawning a world of imitations, variations, parody, and more, from Lestat de Lioncourt to Edward Cullen.

Stokers Dracula is widely believed to have been inspired by Vlad III, ruler of Wallachia, in what is now Romania, in the 15th century. But few are familiar with another, older creature that is believed, in part, to have contributed to his creation: the Hindu spirit known as the vetala.

As legend goes, the vetala is a ghoulish trickster of varying description that haunts cemeteries and forests, hanging upside down from trees and waiting for humans to play pranks on. They are said to exist in a realm between life and death, and have the ability to see into the past, present, and future. This boundless knowledge makes them invaluable to sorcerers, who often seek to capture and enslave the vetala to use its powers for their bidding. Growing up, my father taught me that the vetala could see everything, recalls a priest at the Pasadena Hindu Temple in Los Angeles, who grew up in the Indian state of Gujarat and wished to remain anonymous. They could detect the good and the evil inside you. We were forever cautious around cemeteries. Because you never knew what might be waiting for you.

The vetala legend dates back to the 11th century, when it was made popular through Vetala Panchvimshati, a collection of stories that children in India still read today, also known as Baital Pachisi. My first introduction to the vetala was in school, an Indian mother interviewed for this piece, who also wished to remain anonymous, says. We used to get these graphic novels called Amar Chitra Katha, each of which would narrate an Indian story, some of which were historical, some mythological, and some folk. The Amar Chitra Katha comic books, which included stories from Vetala Panchvimshati, were often shared with cousins and neighbors at home, or passed around during free time at school.

In this collection, originally written in Sanskrit, a tantric sorceress asks King Vikrama to capture a vetala. Each time the king approaches the creature, however, it presents him with a riddle, along with some unusual rules: If the king knows the answer, the vetala will go free, flying back to its upside down perch. If the king does not know the answer, the vetala agrees to be taken as his captive and to go with him to the sorceress. And if the king knows the answer, but does not speak it out loud in an attempt to outsmart the vetala, his head will explode into a million pieces.

Vetala Panchvimshati features 25 stories with the same conceit, and in 24 of them, the king answers the riddle correctly. Thus, again and again, the vetala escapes the sorceress. But the 25th time, the vetala asks the king the following: If a prince marries the queen, and a princess marries the king, and each couple has a baby, what is the relation between the two newborns?

This weird, incestuous question is what finally stumps the king. Because he does not know the answer, the vetala is forced to go with him to the sorceress. But during the journey, the vetala reveals that the sorceress plans to use its powers to kill the king and take over the realm. The two then decide to team up to kill the sorceress. After peace has been restored, the vetala offers to protect the kingdom and come to the kings aid whenever he needs it.

While this popular story depicts the vetala as a trickster with the capacity for good, today the vetala is characterized as far more demonic. In The Mythical Creatures Bible: The Definitive Guide to Legendary Beings by Brenda Rosen, the vetala is called a hostile spirit said to cause madness, miscarriages, and kill children. Likewise, in Encyclopedia of Demons in World Religions and Cultures by Theresa Bane, the vetala is defined as a vampiric demon that possesses humans and causes their feet and hands to twist backwards, their skin to turn green, and their fingernails to become long, poisonous white talons.

These descriptions are far cries from the original Sanskrit text of Vetala Panchvimshati, in which the vetala is depicted as a more nuanced creature. And this transformation can be blamed, at least in part, on British explorer, writer, and gadabout Sir Richard Burton, who was the first person to bring both the Kama Sutra and Vetala Panchvimshati to Western audiences.

Not only did Burton choose the word vampire, a word with its roots in Eastern Europe, for his translation of the word vetala, as opposed to something like spirit, but the illustrations that accompanied his text showed a taloned creature with pointed ears, bulging eyes, leathery wings, and a long tailthus transforming the vetala into the malevolent monster it is depicted as today. Further cementing this new depiction, in his translated collection, which he called Vitram and the Vampire, Burton chose to include only 11 of the 25 original stories, greatly diminishing the depth of the vetela character.

Scholars have rightly criticized Vitram and the Vampire for these shortcomings. In The Ocean of Story, C.H. Tawneys translation of the Katha Sarit Sagara, N. M. Penzer, a British independent scholar and Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society, calls Vitram and the Vampire not a translation, but an adaptation, and a very free adaptation, too.

To his credit, Burton never claimed that Vitram and the Vampire was an exact translation. It is not pretended that the words of these Hindu tales are preserved to the letter.... I have ventured to remedy the conciseness of their language, and to clothe the skeleton with flesh and blood, he wrote in the introduction.

But Penzers response to this disclaimer doesnt mince words: This is putting it very mildly. What Burton has really done is to use a portion of the Vetla tales as a peg on which to hang elaborate improvements entirely of his own invention. Regardless of scholars critiques, the damage had been done. Vitram and the Vampire was marketed as the English translation of Vetala Panchvimshati, and readers took the depiction of the vetala as authentic.

One of those readers was Bram Stoker. The author greatly admired Burton and was fascinated by his writings about the Indian occult, and particularly Vetala Panchvimshati. Draculas transformation into a bat that hangs upside down, for example, his reptilian-like climbing abilities, his powers, and his centuries of wisdom all may have been drawn from Burtons translation.

Since Draculas publication, the vetala has remained alive and well, but in recent years, it has morphed into something closer to Burton and Stokers idea of the spirit. In one 2012 episode of the CW show Supernatural, for example, the protagonists face off against two seductive vetalas, depicted with sharp fangs and a thirst for blood that make them more or less indistinguishable from other pop-culture bloodsuckers.

Indian production companies have also capitalized on what is a more homegrown horror movie villain. In 2020s Betaal (now streaming on Netflix), a remote village falls prey to a colony of vetala working alongside officers from the East India Company to take over their land. In the movie, the vetala is reimagined as a vampire-zombie hybrid.

The modern vetala, then, is an amalgamation of cultures, stories, and misinterpretationsadopted, adapted, and then adopted again. And while the vetala of todays pop culture is a far cry from the original text, those stories remain in the hearts of Indian children and grownups.

When asked whether he believes the vetala exists in some form on Earth, and whether it might have an influence on us, the priest at the Pasadena Hindu Temple leaves things open. As with any myth, any frightening story or creature, some people believe, some dont, he says. But Ive found that when something goes amiss, when theres a sound in a cemetery, an unexplained shadow or disturbance, people change their minds.

Next in series

And a scary lesson on humility and respect for the natural world.

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One of Dracula's Often Overlooked Inspirations Is the Indian Vetala - Atlas Obscura

State Foundation Day:On November 1, several Indian states including Kerala, Haryana, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Karnataka were formed. Thus, the day is recognised as Statehood Day of State Formation Day

Chhattisgarh state was established on November 1, 2000 (19 years ago). The mythical name of Chhattisgarh is Kaushal Rajya (Lord Shri Rams nanihal). About 300 years ago, during the reign of the Gond tribe, the state was named Chhattisgarh. The Chhattisgarh state is a denselyy forested state in central India, famous for its temples and waterfalls. Chhattisgarh was carved out of Madhya Pradesh. The Chhattisgarh state is also known as Dhan Ka Katora which means Rice Bowl of India.

Foundation Day: November 01, 2000

Governor: Anusuiya Uikey

Capital: Raipur

Chief Minister: Bhupesh Baghel

Population: 2.55 crores (2013)

Madhya Pradesh came into existence on November 1, 1950. The state is celebrating its 64th Foundation Day this year. Second largest centrally located in the Indian geography, the Madhya Pradesh state is also known as the heart of India. The historical name of Madhya Pradesh is Malwa. After Indias independence, the Madhya Pradesh state was established with Nagpur as its capital. However, in 1956 the Madhya Pradesh state was reorganized and Bhopal became its new capital. The City of Ujjain in Madhya Pradesh is also one of the four places where the Kumbh-Mela is hosted.

Foundation Day: November 01, 1956

Governor: Anandiben Patel

Capital: Bhopal

Chief minister: Kamal Nath

Population: 7.33 crores (2012)

The sate of Kerala was founded on November 01, 1956. According to the Tamil classic Purananuru, Kerala is also known as Parasurama Kshetram The Land of Parasurama. Kerala basks in the lap of nature with a network of 44 rivers and turquoise blue backwaters. It is famously known as Gods own country since Kerala received its first rain in India i.e., in the month of June followed by Mumbai and Delhi. The richest Hindu temple in the world Padmanabhaswamy is located in Kerala.

Foundation Day: November 01, 1956

Governor: Arif Mohammad Khan

Capital: Thiruvananthapuram

Chief Minister: Pinarayi Vijayan

Population: 3.48 crores (2012)

Karnataka was established on November 1, 1956. The state is celebrating its 59th Foundation Day this year. Originally known as the State of Mysore, it was renamed Karnataka in 1973. There are 13 different languages spoken in Karnataka namely Tulu, Konkani, Kodava and Beary etc. These are some of the widely spoken languages of the state amongst which Kannada is superior. Karnataka was once home to some of the most powerful empires of ancient and medieval India.

Foundation Day: November 01, 1956

Governor: Vajubhai Vala

Capital: Bengaluru

Chief minister: B. S. Yeddiyurappa

Population: 6.11 crores (2011)

The state of Haryana was formed on November 1, 1966 (53 years ago). Haryana was carved out of the former state of East Punjab on 1 November 1966 on linguistic as well as on cultural basis. The word Haryana literary means the Forest Land of Hari. The name Haryana is derived from the Sanskrit words Hari (the Hindu god Vishnu) and Ayana (home), meaning the Abode of God. Haryana state was the home of the legendary Bharata dynasty, which named Bharat to India. The great epic of Mahabharata also belongs to Haryana. As Kurukshetra, the place of the epic battle between the Kauravas and the Pandavas is located in Haryana.

Foundation Day: November 01, 1966

Governor: Satyadev Narayan Arya

Capital: Chandigarh

Chief Minister: Manohar Lal Khattar

Population: 2.54 crores (2011)

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State Foundation Day: Find out some interesting facts about 5 states formed on November 1 - Newsd.in

Recently, a friend asked on Twitter if the Bible passes the Bechdel-Wallace test. Although this question has been asked on the internet before, my friends tweet made me wonder if I could use my Bible programming skills to do a deeper data-drive analysis than what I found online. (One of the best iterations comes from a blogger priest named Paidiske.)

If youre not familiar with it, the Bechdel test is a measure of the representation of women in movies and books. Its based on a comic by Alison Bechdel that suggests a work must contain a scene that meets three specific criteria: (1) at least two named women who (2) talk to each other (3) about something other than a man.

The films in the Star Wars franchise can serve as an example of the tests usefulness. The first Star Wars movie was praised for presenting a strong female character in Princess Leia. However, the only other named female character in the movie is Aunt Beru, but she and Leia never meet or talk, so the film fails the Bechdel test. By contrast, The Force Awakens (episode VII) includes a scene in which Rey and Maz Kanata discuss Reys destiny, which passes all three elements of the Bechdel test.

The Bible certainly doesnt need to pass the Bechdel test in order to be Gods Word. That would probably be a bad example of presentism. But the test can still be a useful way of reexamining the biblical stories and seeing Gods care for all image bearers.

Part of my interest in this question comes from the fact that I like playing with Bible data. But the deeper reason is that I am married to an incredible woman whose depths I have only just begun to see over the last 15 years, and I am father to an indescribably interesting young woman who wants to know: What is the place and value of women in the world? And what does the Bible have to say about that question?

To explore the Bechdel test question, I used an incredible open source dataset created by Robert Rouse of viz.bible that includes people, places, and events in the Bible. I used his data to find all the passages where women are mentioned together (Bechdel test number 1) and all the passages where women speak (Bechdel test number 2). Then I examined the overlaps to find which ones fully passed the test (including Bechdel test number 3) and which ones partially passed for various reasons. (My full data report is available on my blog.)

Heres a summary of what I found. Rouses database has 3,070 characters, and 202 of those are women. (For comparisons sake, the Quran has one named woman, Mary, and other religious texts like the Bhagavad Gita have none.) Of the 66 books in the Protestant canon, 34 are narrative or mostly narrative books, and 41 have female characters.

Narrowing to the pericope level, there are 147 scenes with two or more women (Bechdel test 1), 261 scenes where women speak (Bechdel test 2), and 14 where women are speaking to each other (Bechdel test 3).

Image: John Dyer

So does the Bible pass the Bechdel test?

This short answer is yes; there are multiple scenes where two named women have a conversation not about a man.

The longer answer is more complex but also richer, I think.

Although there are fewer female characters in the Bible than male characters and very few scenes that unambiguously pass the Bechdel test, when we read female-centric passages carefully, we find that the Bechdel test alone doesnt tell the full story.

Whereas men are gallivanting all over the pages of Scripture, faithful women are always present and prominent during the key movements of the biblical story when God is making major moves toward saving humanity. Its almost as if, in a world of patriarchy and misogyny, the presence of women functions as a marker that says, Pay attention; this is important! for each major movement of the biblical story.

Genesis begins by reminding readers that both male and female are created in Gods image (1:27). Then in Genesis 3, Eve speaks to the serpent (v. 2) and to God (v. 13) on equal footing with Adam. Although these scenes dont pass the Bechdel test, my friend and colleague Sandra Glahn suggests that a new test is needed where a named woman having a conversation with a being that outranks a man about something other than a man gets extra points in the representation scale.

As we read on, we find that the rest of Genesis can be a brutal place, especially for women, who are often exploited, sexualized, and mistreated by men or one another. Genesis also contains the launch of Gods plan to redeem humanity through a single human family, and in that story comes a powerful scene that derives some of its significance precisely because it doesnt meet the Bechdel test.

In Genesis 12, God promises that he will make the descendants of Abram and his wife, Sarai (both named in Genesis 11:29), into a great nation, through whom he will bless all people groups. Sadly, Abram and Sarai fail to trust that God can give them a child, and in the process, they abuse Sarais servant Hagar. Sarai and Hagars dialogue is not recorded, but we can fairly well infer that the conversation was quite nasty.

However, the words of Hagar that are recorded make her the first character in Scripture to give God a name. She gave this name to the Lord who spoke to her: You are the God who sees me, for she said, I have now seen the One who sees me (Gen. 16:13).

This is one of the first instances where not passing the Bechdel test is precisely what gives the scene its power. In the midst of a womans suffering, God sees her pain and is working to redeem it.

As we continue through the early biblical story, we encounter passages that fail the Bechdel test because they pass only the third criterion, where named women speak about something other than men, but they speak to men or crowds rather than to other women. For example, in the story of Moses birth, Pharaohs daughter is unnamed, so her conversation with Miriam doesnt fully pass the Bechdel test (Ex. 2:110). Other key instances come with the female negotiators in Numbers 27 (see also Joshua 17) and in Deborahs song in Judges 5.

Judges 4 and 5 contain the stories of Jael and Deborah, and although the two characters never meet or speak, they represent women as whole persons, capable of being wives and mothers but also leaders, negotiators, prophets, and stone-cold assassins.

The next major movement of the biblical story comes in the establishment of the Davidic covenant and the promise of a righteous king whose just reign will be eternal. This major event is preceded by and dependent upon the clearest case of the Bible passing all three elements of the Bechdel test.

In the opening chapters of Ruth, Naomi, Orpah, and Ruth discuss men: their dead husbands and the prospect of future marriage, and Boaz. But Naomi and Ruth also talk to one another about their lives, their relationships to each other, and their work (Ruth 2:2). In the middle of these conversations comes one of the most beautiful passages in all of Scriptureone that conveys the promise of Gods chosen people bringing the good news to all nations. That story is told through an exchange between two widows, both foreigners and immigrants:

But Ruth replied, Dont urge me to leave you or to turn back from you. Where you go I will go, and where you stay I will stay. Your people will be my people and your God my God. Where you die I will die, and there I will be buried. May the Lord deal with me, be it ever so severely, if even death separates you and me. When Naomi realized that Ruth was determined to go with her, she stopped urging her. (1:1718)

The highpoint of Ruth stands out even more sandwiched between the brutality of Judges and the books of Samuel, Kings, and Chronicles. In these books, women are rarely recorded speaking to one another (1 Sam. 25:1819), but women do speak, and one scene in particular stands out.

In 2 Kings 22, we meet King Josiah, who ascends to the throne at age eight. Eighteen years later, he decides to clean up the temple, and in the process, one of the priests famously recovers the Book of the Law (v. 8). After being broken by hearing the words of Scripture for the first time, Josiah doesnt consult the priests. He instead asks five male priests to seek the wisdom of Huldah the prophetess.

This is another instance in which not passing the Bechdel test heightens the significance of the story:

Hilkiah the priest, Ahikam, Akbor, Shaphan and Asaiah went to speak to the prophet Huldah, who was the wife of Shallum son of Tikvah, the son of Harhas, keeper of the wardrobe. She said to them, Tell the king of Judah, who sent you to inquire of the Lord, This is what the Lord, the God of Israel, says concerning the words you heard: Because your heart was responsive and you humbled yourself before the Lord I also have heard you. (vv. 14, 1819)

According to Aimee Byrd, Its the first time we see the Word of God being authoritatively authenticated as canon, and its done by a woman. Thats amazing.

In the Gospels, some passageslike Martha telling Mary that Jesus wants to see her (John 11:28)clearly fail the Bechdel test. But some of the most significant scenes actually pass it.

The Incarnation itself is marked by a scene that passes the Bechdel test: Elizabeth and Marys discussion of their upcoming pregnancies (Luke 1:4145). In the following chapter, when baby Jesus is brought to the temple, he meets Simeon and then Anna. After seeing Jesus, Anna is recorded as being one of the first to explain the theological significance of this little baby. Arguably, the scene partially passes the Bechdel test because a named woman is speaking to people (presumably other women) about the redemption of Jerusalem:

There was also a prophet, Anna, the daughter of Penuel, of the tribe of Asher. Coming up to them at that very moment, she gave thanks to God and spoke about the child to all who were looking forward to the redemption of Jerusalem. (2:36, 38)

Moving forward to Jesus death, we find a scene in which Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome discuss the stone being rolled away. The stone is of course related to Jesus, but it is striking that in the most significant event in human history, named women are talking to one another about a major plot point:

Very early on the first day of the week, just after sunrise, they were on their way to the tomb and they asked each other, Who will roll the stone away from the entrance of the tomb? (Mark 16:23)

And finally, in a scene that fails the Bechdel test but is significant because of it, Mary Magdalene becomes the first to share the good news that Jesus has risen from the dead:

Mary Magdalene went to the disciples with the news: I have seen the Lord! And she told them that he had said these things to her. (John 20:18; see also Luke 24:10)

It is a wonder that the birth, death, and resurrection of Jesus and the proclamation of His triumph are tied to scenes that pass (or intentionally fail) the Bechdel test.

The book of Acts tells the story of the spread of the church, but it does not record women directly dialoguing with one another. And yet there are stories of women taking significant roles, such as Lydia lending her home to one of the earliest churches (Acts 16:1115) and Priscilla and Aquila team-teaching theology courses for Apollos (18:26).

My algorithm also surfaced two instances of named women speaking (greeting) at the end of Pauls letters:

The churches in the province of Asia send you greetings. Aquila and Priscilla greet you warmly in the Lord, and so does the church that meets at their house. (1 Cor. 16:19)

Greet Priscilla and Aquila and the household of Onesiphorus. Eubulus greets you, and so do Pudens, Linus, Claudia and all the brothers and sisters. (2 Tim. 4:19, 21)

Claudia, named in the Timothy passage, is thought to be a British woman living in Rome and among those who cared for Paul during his imprisonment. Without dialogue or named characters receiving the greetings, these verses dont pass the Bechdel test, but they do highlight (again) the significant roles that women played in the early church.

There is one more passage worth pointing out that arguably includes two significant female characters. In Pauls first letter to Timothy, he pens some of the most controversial words about men ( 2:8) and women (vv. 912) in all of Scripture, and then he follows with this:

For Adam was formed first, then Eve. And Adam was not the one deceived; it was the woman who was deceived and became a sinner. But women will be saved through childbearingif they continue in faith, love and holiness with propriety. (vv. 1315)

Although most modern English translations render this passage similarly, it is important to point out that the plural word women in verse 15 is not actually in the Greek, nor is the punctuation between verses. The verb will be saved is singular (see the English Standard Version), which means it should be connected to the last person in the passage.

In addition, the word for childbearing is not used anywhere else in the New Testament, and its grammar indicates that it might not be referring to childbearing generally but to a specific childbearing. Citing some church fathers and several modern commentators, George Knight writes, The most likely understanding of this verse is that it refers to spiritual salvation through the birth of the Messiah. This means the passage should be rendered, But she [Eve] will be saved by [Marys] childbearing (v. 15).

Although Eve was the first to become a sinner, by Gods grace, the vessel through which deception came into the world is the same vessel through which redemption will come. Eve, like all of us, will ultimately be saved by the work of Jesus, which began with a single cell in Marys womb.

Although many commentators reject this interpretation (see the New English Translation notes), I prefer it for two reasons. First, it avoids the problem of explaining how childbearing confers salvation. More importantly, it offers one of the most sweeping, beautiful, and succinct retellings of the entire biblical story and reminds us how God is saving all humanity, male and female, from beginning to end, by displaying his infinite power and love in the most vulnerable and intimate of ways.

Scripture, I would argue, passes the Bechdel test and also goes way beyond it. In this final scene of two women together, they are valued not for what they say or what they do but for who they are: children of God. Whatever the state of our current conflicts over ethnicity, gender, power, and economics, from the first sinner to the last, one day, we all will be saved by God the Son who became a man carried by a woman.

Let us then continue in faith, love, and holiness.

John Dyer (PhD, Durham University) is a dean and professor at Dallas Theological Seminary who teaches and writes on theology, technology, and sociology. You can follow him on twitter @johndyer and find him on his blog.

This essay was adapted from a blog.

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The Bible Passes the Bechdel Test. It Also Goes Beyond It. - ChristianityToday.com

Many have often wondered how ancient Indic religions like Hinduism, Buddhism and Jainism (Sikhism is not that ancient) survived and prospered for millennia without a designated holy book like the Bible or the Koran and with no Mecca, Vatican or Jerusalem to guide people. With a little introspection, we come to realise that it is actually this absence of a central command and non-uniform format that account for this. In fact, the intrinsically tolerant and federal structure of these faiths, especially Hinduism, historically brought together nationalities scattered across widely varying geographies of this subcontinent with quite distinct diets, languages and customswithout force.

To appreciate this phenomenon, we may need to understand how major pan-Indian festivals offered different meanings to Hindus in different regions. The overarching common theme served mainly as an umbrella under which unique local traditions and cultural expressions found universal acceptance and legitimacy within the Hindu belief system. Since Navaratri is still fresh in our minds, let us traverse its terrain and observe how dissimilar customs and rituals came together in harmony and mutual respect with no single theme thrusting itself on any.

All Hindus agree on the same nine days and ten nights in autumn, but beyond that, the observances in different regions vary quite a lotas the parochial adjusts itself within the universal. The important point to note, however, is that these are not really local variants of some nationallevel standard as is often claimedfor no standard exists at all.

Many old regional traditions have actually taken several steps forward to sanskritise, if one may use this term for want of an exact expression, and operate within the framework. Broadly, we can decipher three zonal themes in Navaratri the first in the North and West, the second in the East and parts of the Northeast, and the third in the South. In the first zone, the Goddess is worshipped through fasts and rigorous dietary restraint over nine days, but it is ultimately Ramas victory over the evil Ravana on Dussehra that is really the climax. The East and Northeast celebrate not Rama but Durga, in her most belligerent form, and on the tenth day, Vijaya Dashami, commemorate her triumph over evilas personified by Mahishasura.

Wsee how plural the Hindu mode actually is, when we note that Andhra and Mysore celebrate neither Ram nor Durga, but the victory of the Pandavas. In the South, different Devis are worshipped during Navaratri, and Tamilians dedicate the first three days to Lakshmi, the next three to Parvati or Durga, and the last three days to Saraswati. We come across fascinating displays of many dolls placed on wooden planks, called Bommai Kolu and other similar names. At the end of Navaratri, the southern states, Maharashtra and Odisha observe Ayudha or Astra Puja to worship instruments and tools, which, incidentally, is done in the Gangetic plains, Bengal and the East during Vishwakarma Puja a month earlier.

Then, while both the North and the South agree on worshipping nine forms of the Goddess on nine days, the East remains ambivalent. Bengal and neighbouring states celebrate only the last three days and from the tenth one, observe no dietary restrictions and feast on fish and meat. Some Rajput families of Rajasthan also shatter Navaratris vegetarian tradition by slaughtering goats and buffaloes.

Let us view some more interesting modes of celebration of the same Navaratri in different corners of Indiato understand that regional customs actually prevail during most pan-Indian festivals. In Maharashtra, for instance, Navaratri is celebrated as the Ghatsthapana utsav, when an earthen pot is filled with water and sits on a base of wet clay, in which seven types of foodgrains are sown, which sprout in these nine days. For Gujaratis, the pitcher represents fertility and is called garba or womb. Their famous Garba dance is around this pot, into which they place a lighted lamp. Much of Garba was, however, re-fashioned after it was merged with the Dandiya Raas.

In Goa, the pot is of copper and many other communities also start sowing pulses, cereals, barley and other seeds around it during this period. Even in far-off Bengal, Nava- Patrikas or leaves of nine plants like banana, turmeric, wood apple, pomegranate and paddy are consecrated in kneedeep water on the first day (Saptami) of Durga puja. The banyan plant and other leaves are then draped in a sari and worshipped along with the goddess as Kola Bouobviously a carry-over from a fertility cult. Frankly, this spirit of accommodation of diversity is what brought millions together, not only through this festival but all others as well.

Anthropologists can note and mark the individual rites and observances that signify how sundry seasonal rites and festivals of disparate regions gradually inched closer towards each other under Brahmanical persuasion, often aided by ruling groups. Proselytisation is theoretically not a component of Hinduism, but acculturation of entire fringe communities into the Hindu way of life has been a recurrent feature, throughout history. What is striking, however, is the almost total absence of force or any pre-planned mission to homogenise belief and custom within Hinduism. It is clear, therefore, that any attempt to homogenise Hinduism is bound to be antithetical and counterproductive.

(Tweets @jawharsircar)

Retired civil servant. Former Culture Secretary and ex-CEO, Prasar Bharati

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Navaratri and how Indic religions are intrinsically federal - The New Indian Express

Romila Thapar is one of Indias most distinguished historians, whose work beginning in the 1960s has sought to nuance our understanding of Indias past. A recipient of the prestigious Kluge Prize, Thapar has covered a whole range of subjects over her long career and is best known for her scholarly work on the social history of ancient India.

Thapar has also made headlines over the last few decades by being an outspoken public intellectual who has questioned the version of history put forth by the Right, which tends to portray the Indian past as a simplistic civilisational battle between Hindus and Muslims.

In her new book, Voices of Dissent, Thapar looks at moments in Indias past when the dominant narrative was challenged, whether through the dasas of the Vedic times, the Shramanas Buddhists, Jainas and Ajivikas whose views contrasted with Bhramanism, or through Bhakti sants and Sufi pirs in the medieval era.

Thapar writes:

What we call Hinduism has been a religion that has reacted closely to historical change, causing recognisable alterations and mutations in both belief and in those that identify with it

To ignore the contribution of dissenting ideas to these reformulations, or their failure to encourage the necessary mutations, is to ignore the impressive presence of dissent in assessing the cultivation of religion in India and in the underpinning of many social forms

Religions are never static. Societies change, so do the religions linked to these societies, because religious identities never arise in isolation. Some are viewed as heritage and some as a reaction to the Other, be it from within society or from outside.

If the Shaiva Dashnamis and the Vaishnava Bairagis were in disagreement relating to the Puranic religion, so were the Barelvis and the Deobandis in relation to the Quranic religion. What continues, what changes, and why that is what we are searching for, and the search is perennial.

The book then draws out this history of dissent to look at how colonial interpretations of Indias past still colour our understanding of religion in the subcontinent, followed by an examination of Mohandas Mahatma Gandhis satyagraha as a modern movement of dissent relying heavily on the moral value of a renouncer figure. It then concludes with Thapars impressions of visiting Shaheen Bagh and witnessing the women who led the anti-Citizenship Amendment Act protests there.

Theirs was a secular articulation of a kind that one associates with the rights that should come with citizenship. I felt after many years that I was witnessing a form of dissent that was somehow taking off from the roots of anti-colonial nationalism. There was no mistaking its all-inclusive character. It took me back to the 1940s and to my very youthful participation in anti-colonial nationalism!

I spoke to Thapar about situating dissent in Indian history, how modern labels colour our understanding of the past and what misconceptions she frequently has to combat.

To get a weekly Q&A with authors, scholars and experts on Indian politics, policy and more, sign up to the Political Fix, Scroll.ins newsletter on Indian current affairs.

You note at various points in the book that dissent has a very Indian history, situated here, rather than as something brought to India from afar. Is that what drove you to write this book?Dissent is not specifically Indian but is present in India as it is elsewhere. My argument is that dissent is present in every society and civilisation and relates to ideas, theories, practices and beliefs. There is of course a more obvious consciousness of it in activities associated with the exploration of knowledge and philosophical discussion. The latter in the Indian past almost began with inquiries about the views and opinions of the Other before coming onto the views of the proponent of an argument.

This was characteristic of most ancient cultures and was not absent in Indian culture. Nor was it imported from the West in colonial times as is often assumed, dissent being linked to European philosophy. Dissent was intrinsic to Indian thought as it was to ways of thought and behaviour in all civilisations. It was and is an essential step in the advance of knowledge. Research and discovery in the pursuit of knowledge is dependent on questioning the explanations that we are given about the world we live in, when we are not convinced about the given explanations, or when we are additionally curious.

The consciousness and role of dissent it seemed to me was not sufficiently recognised in studies of the Indian past coming up to the Indian present. I had referred to it in some of my earlier research but this time round I wanted to make a statement about the recognition of the concept as significant to various schools of thought and activity in the Indian past, as a prelude to its being significant to the present.

It is a subject that historians have tended to marginalise and those that write on culture with a few exceptions virtually ignore it. Indian culture is presented as a seamless whole, whereas some of its most illuminating aspects have come from moments of questioning. The Upanishads for example are a superb example of the creativity of asking questions.

Why is it important for us to situate dissent in the building of Indian culture? Is that something you think our broader understanding of history even in academic spaces lacks?Dissent is many-faceted. I have only spoken of it in its manifestation in a few aspects, and that too limited to a very few traditions in the examples I have discussed. Since it is both in dialogue with and parallel to what is maintained by established authority, a full treatment would require many volumes. In any case my intention in writing this essay was to show, with a few examples, how it arises, and the creativity that results from its dialogue where it disagrees with existing thought and practice, or else how it carries forward ideas that may seem dormant. It opens out much more in the present.

It is important to the understanding of any culture that its history never was and can never be a narrow restricted movement from the past to the present, and that at no point was it questioned by those who were part of it. When the Shramanas Buddhists, Jainas, Ajivikas questioned Vedic Brahmanism, there followed a long period of discussion about the ideas that came out of this questioning. This is reflected not only in the remarkable inscriptions of Ashoka Maurya but also in sections of the Mahabharata that were composed at this time.

There was also more than a hint of it in the subsequent forms taken by Hinduism, as for instance by some of the bhakti sants. When the bhakti poet Ravidas describes his vision of a utopia and speaks of a social equality that had no use for caste hierarchies, he is giving form to dissent. This tells us about the priorities of those that control society and those that question it. But these aspects dont often find a place in the teaching of social history, they remain religious texts whose implicit views about society are seldom commented upon analytically.

The book sketches out dissent as it played out in the religious landscape in ancient and medieval India before moving to anti-colonial dissent, and then to the sort of criticism of the government that is now labeled anti-national. Why did you draw on this path, rather than say looking back primarily at political dissent in Indian history?The idioms in which a society expresses itself change in history. They are not identical from one period to the next. This is in part why researching and writing the history of thought is intellectually so exciting. Its the unfolding of ideas in relation to society and their mutual impact. I chose the idiom of religious ideas for evident reasons.

First, there are more texts from the past focusing on this aspect than on most others, so one can get a fair amount of information. There are not all that many texts from pre-modern India on theories of explanation relating to society and politics. Commentaries were written on the dharma-shastras, or there is the much-quoted text on political economy, the Arthashastra. Some of the ideas in the latter have been linked to notions of causality and logic in stating explanations, but these are incidental to the description of a political economy with which the text is primarily concerned. These subjects tend to be discussed in small, scattered segments.

This may be the point at which we historians should move on to researching socio-political dissent combing through a range of texts. Secondly, because of the close inter-twining of religion and caste, exploring the religious idiom incorporates to some extent the exploration of the social and political as well. These dimensions are often more apparent in dissenting ideas.

Considering how pervasive the binary Hindu-Muslim conception of the Indian past came to be in the colonial era, do you think it was inevitable that the post-colonial state would continue to grapple with these religious nationalisms for decades after?No I dont think it was inevitable. I think we should have anticipated it. Hindu nationalism as a concept comes directly out of one among the tenets of the colonial understanding of India, namely, the two-nation theory. The link should have been shown for what it is. Hindutva, as many people argued a few decades ago, and some still do, is not Hinduism. We needed dissenting opinion to explain the difference. Nor have the successor nations understood the fundamental historical change that came with independence.

I am referring to the emergence of the nation-state, embodying the rights and obligations of the citizen and the state, as embedded in the constitution. What we are moving towards, however, and some would say we are already there, is a nation that prioritises those that are of the religion of the majority and those that assert citizenship rights through their wealth and status. So up to a point what has come upon us was predictable.

I remember from my late teens and just after independence there was so much animated discussion on the form that Indian society would take as a free nation. It was a vision of social equality and freedom from poverty for all. We are still far away from that.

You mention a few open questions about the past like why there was an upsurge in Krishna bhakti in medieval north India, including among highly placed Muslims. What do you think understanding this better might tell us, particularly about how we use labels and understand the past?We have to learn not to impose the present on the past and to recognise how the past looked at itself at various points of time. Let me give you an example. We speak about the larger medieval society and make generalisations referring to the Muslims doing this and the Hindus doing this, and then we draw conclusions from these generalisations about Muslims and Hindus.

Our ancestors however, were far more precise than we are in identifying the communities they were speaking of. They would refer, as I have said, to Yavanas, Shakas, Turushkas and Sufis, keeping in mind their patterns of living, and far less often to the Muslims. Similarly they referred to Shaivas, Vaishnavas, Shaktas and nastikas, and so on, keeping in mind similar indices, rather than calling them the Hindus, which was in any case a term that came into use quite late.

We have to understand that communities within larger configurations acted in diverse ways. It is the diversities that frequently throw light on how we comprehend people. It is not that all Muslims became Krishna bhakts, but only some, and among them a few were highly placed and others were of lower castes. The point I was making was that here was a category that was distanced from both the brahmanas as well as the mullahs and qazis, because it was dissenting from orthodox practice.

Yet today when the poems of such Krishna bhakts are sung as part of the repertoire of Hindustani classical music, few are aware of this dimension and of all its contemporary nuances. These we dont speak of. That they were part of the upsurge, albeit a small part, implies that there was more than an upsurge in religion and we have to track how it affected society in a variety of ways.

One thing that occurred to me as I was reading the book was how much the ruling majority in India uses the grammar of this dissenting past, albeit against its own villains, imagined or otherwise the liberal elite, the deep state, Western powers, Islam, etc, with Modi as the renouncer. Do you think the Right is tapping into the same tradition that you see existing in the Indian populace?No, I dont think the Right is aware of the dimensions of the tradition in the way that I am referring to them, and is therefore not tapping into it. There isnt much of a well-defined secular Right in Indian public life today, and the religious Right, largely supporters of Hindutva, have little use for the renunciation that I am speaking of. They tend anyway to confuse it with asceticism, whereas I am making a distinction between the two as I have discussed in the book.

When they combine the symbols of renunciation with politics, as they occasionally do, public attention gets directed to the political activity rather than the other, as is demonstrated by the yogis, sadhavis, etc. who are active members of a political party, and whose political role is what matters. The political support that is given by the heads of Hindu institutions is a far cry from the tradition of the renouncers.

The renouncer has to locate himself/herself outside society or on its borderline, which no one from these organisations does or probably would even consider doing. When the renouncer plays an active social role his moral authority has to be acknowledged, not his political or administrative office. Gandhi had the moral authority of the renouncer, hence the effectiveness in the techniques of dissent that he adopted.

This kind of Right would not follow the tradition that I am referring to as it is neither committed to conceding the equality of all Indians and that implies the utmost tolerance nor to refraining from violence against those with whom it differs. In the tradition of dissent that I have written about, no one, but no one, would demand that those seen as the Other should be shot dead.

You point out that, curiously for India, dissent rarely turned into revolt. Why do you think that is? And does that also tell us something about why, as a counterweight to the CAA protests, we did not see major agitation in response to the pain of demonetisation?I can only suggest possible answers. One may be that the population being demographically small and land being available, it may have been thought that it would be less troublesome to migrate to a neighbouring area outside the jurisdiction of the existing government than to organise a revolt. The earlier period was one in which there were fewer intermediaries between the peasant and the government. This seems to change by medieval times.

By the same logic an increase in the population would have pressured the peasant, combined with a larger number of intervening intermediaries, and a greater encroachment on fertile land. But the question raised by a colleague of mine is that it is perhaps uncertain as to whether in most cases the peasants did actually migrate, or whether migration was used as a threat. Mention is made occasionally of the discontent of the peasants and sometimes of urban craftsmen.

Discontent leads to sporadic and spontaneous outbursts. But for it to turn into revolt requires much more, such as organisation, leadership, finance and readiness to use violence. Propagating an alternate system of social and economic equality can be a galvanising force. In many historical cases, such as the Peasants Revolt in England, the initial demand for a dialogue was ignored, which encouraged its turning into a revolt. The recent agitation over demonetisation in India remained only as discontent.

What misconception in our understanding of dissent in Indias past do you find yourself most frequently combating?As a historian I would say that what my generation of historians has been trying to combat, and which has been revived in the last few years, is two things: one is the insistence on converting Indian history into largely the history of the majority community; and two, a constant dismissal of incorporating into the study of history new information from various sources and new methods of inquiry and analysis.

The intellectual requirements for a serious study of history are dismissed and history remains an uncertain narrative. For example, most events of medieval history are explained as based on religious hostility between Muslims and Hindus, with a closure on any other explanation that might disprove this.

So we are back once more to repeating the colonial interpretation of Indian history, something that we had begun to question and discard in the last phase of colonial rule. The general anti-intellectualism that is being currently encouraged will inevitably result in discouraging the asking of questions and leave us with a poverty of thought.

There is a need to intellectually nourish the rich, diverse, complex and sophisticated explanations that historians have been providing in the last half-century, in a variety of new ways of thinking. Nor will this closure be restricted to historical writing. We are all well aware of what has happened in parallel situations in other countries.

What three readings would you recommend to someone interested in the subject after having read you book?Three books is very limiting as ideally I would like to suggest starting with the Upanishads and with Socrates and continuing from there But I think this is not just a matter of knowing which texts and which thinkers were focused on asking questions articulating dissent as we go through history. It is both explicit and implicit in a variety of texts. I have provided readings for each section of the book and these are largely the works I consulted.

However, it is equally important to understand how the idea of dissent has evolved and why it has become so central to contemporary thought and activity in many parts of the world. To understand this I could suggest a variety of books that approach the subject rather differently and each is thought-provoking in its own way.

Maybe a start could be made with Edward Saids book, Representations of the Intellectual. But let me add that I am not suggesting this book as an explanation of the presence of dissent, but rather as the kind of book that, even though it broadly observes the tradition we are familiar with today, is also helpful in suggesting related and unrelated areas that can be explored.

Hannah Arendts The Origins of Totalitarianism analyses in particular two societies where dissent was disallowed, Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia. There are many stimulating studies of the articulation of dissent in relation to various other activities, as in the writings of Franz Fanon, Bertolt Brecht and Dario Fo.

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Interview: Romila Thapar on the history of dissent and how it shaped Hinduism and India - Scroll.in

Fraternity in the basic spirit of Hinduism Columns, Opinion October 29, 2020 , by News Desk 29

By Prof. Vivek Singh

Forgetting our suffering, trying to relieve suffering of another is fraternity. Fraternity is the core of Hinduism. Fraternity is the foundation of Hinduism. Hinduism has assimilated many religions, sects, cultures and ideologies. No other religion in the world shows this feeling so clearly.

Sangh chief Mohan Bhagwat, in his divine address of Dussehra, put the same feeling of Hindutva with great ease. Day of Dussehra is very important for Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh. Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh was founded 95 years ago on 27 September 1925 on the day of Dussehra by Dr. Hedgwar. TodayRashtriya Swayamsevak Sanghhas over 80 lakh active members who are engaged in the service of humanity.

The entire world has adopted Indian culture due to the Corona pandemic. Keeping shoes outside the house, greeting withfolding hands,washing hands and feet after returning from outside were important parts of Indian culture. We were forgetting our old culture. Today we are again imbibing our glorious culture.

A few decades ago, family members used to sit together and discuss. Problems were solved through discussion and negotiations. Family relations were strengthened through dialogue. Today the situation has changed. Conversation is less with family members, conversation is more with outside people. We give more time to those whom we do not know. We are trying to impress those whom we do not know. Family relations are being destroyed by social media. The corona gave people time to stay home. The youngsters got chance to learn from experience of elders. This fading culture is being rekindled.

There is a need to increase social harmony. Seeing caste, language, province and class is not friendship. By spending time together, the interaction increases the intensity of the relationship. The spirit of indigenization should spread throughout the country. Mother tongue should be the basis of education. The progress of the nation is possible only through indigenous medicine, indigenous education and indigenous farming.

Political selfishness, bigotry, self-centered mentality promotes anti-national activities. This is dangerous for the national and cultural unity of the country. It needs to be checked. Strong laws and tough decisions are the solution to this problem.

To assimilate Hindutva, no person is required to renounce his or her worship method, language, work or specialty of the province. Dedication to the country, respect for all individuals, respect for all ideas, respect for diversity, any person can join Hindutva by renouncing the separatist spirit. Hindutva is for everyone. There is special emphasis on speaking truth in Hinduism but truth must also be pleasant. This sentiment is characteristic of Hindu culture and Hinduism. Speak the truth but pleasant truth. Dont speak the bitter truth. Do not lie. This is the Sanatan Dharma. This is Hindutva.

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(The author is columnist, professor of Commerce, Political and Economic Analyst.He can be reached at viveksinghmumbai@gmail.com)

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Fraternity in the basic spirit of Hinduism - Avenue Mail

Pakistani human rights activist Rahat Austin had recently shared that the homes of Hindus belonging to the highly marginalised and socio-economically backwardBheel and Meghwal community was set on fire in Pakistan. He said that one Dost Muhammad and some others simultaneously set fire to the houses of these poverty-stricken Hindus in Pakistans Sumar Puli, Khai, Sanghar and Sindh district. Rahat Austin also informed that a similar incident occurred on the same day in Tando Gulam Ali, Badin, Sindh.

The activist claims that by carrying out such atrocities, these Islamists continuously try and create pressure on these marganalised Hindus to either take up Islam or have them work as slaves.

This incident is, however, not an exclusive incident. Many such incidents have been reported in the past which go on to describe the extent of affliction the Hindu minorities are being subjected to in the terror state of Pakistan.

Only, last month we reported how 171 Hindu men, women and children belonging to the Bheel community were forcefully converted to Islam inside a madarsa in Pakistans Sindh province. Rahat had informed that the poor and vulnerable community has been subject to mass conversion under various allurements.

Similarly, in June this year, as many as 102 Hindus wereallegedlyforcibly converted to Islam in the Golarchi district of Pakistans Sindh province. Moreover, it was also reported that all the idols of Hindu gods kept in a local temple were destroyed and the premises was converted into a mosque.

Due to the continuous atrocities, many poor Hindus of Pakistan have been left with no choice but to accept Islam. According toreports, many Hindus have become Muslims in hope that they will get money and dignity to survive in the Islamic state of Pakistan.

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Pakistan: Homes of Hindus burnt down by Islamists in Sindh to force them to convert to Islam - OpIndia

Standing before a podium at his town hall last year, a portrait of Gandhi resting on a table to his left (a celebration for Gandhis 150th birthday had preceded the event), Khanna acknowledged that fringe groups were upset with him. But he defended his position. I certainly will never bow my convictions because of a special interest lobby, he said. I have no tolerance for right-wing nationalists who are affiliated with Donald Trump. Applause thundered over his voice. They are maybe 2 to 3 percent in an echo chamber in this district, Khanna continued. But they will see that our values, our district, is pluralistic.

Groups that embrace and advocate for some form of Hindutva have existed in the United States for decades, operating as nonprofits for immigrant communities wanting to retain Indian culture.

The Vishwa Hindu Parishad of America and Hindu Swayamsevak Sangh, which have nationalist counterparts in India, were founded in 1970 and 1989, respectively, after a wave of Indian immigration to the United States in the post-civil rights era. The organizations sought to instill their vision of Hindu values and culture through heritage camps, temple conferences and other events. The Overseas Friends of the BJP, which registered as a foreign agent this past August despite launching in 1992, was founded as a public relations project of Indias Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party, to correct what members argued were distorted views of India and the BJP and promote the political partys platform.

The founding of the nonprofit Hindu American Foundation (HAF) the most active Hindu group in U.S. politics, coincided with the emergence of South Asian American civil rights groups in the post-9/11 era. HAF has long denied charges of Hindu nationalism, labeling them Hinduphobia or anti-Hindu bias. But the group also has pushed, for example, a revisionist version of ancient Indian history in American textbooks that downplays the role of the caste system in Hinduism and insists on referring to all of South Asia as India, in addition to defending Indias moves in Kashmir and a citizenship law that excludes Muslims, both of which are seen as part of the Indian governments nationalist agenda.

Since the mid-2000s, PACs organized around Hindu identity have become involved in U.S. electoral politics as well. The most influential is the Hindu American PAC (HAPAC). According to Rishi Bhutada, a board member of both HAF and HAPAC, the latter was founded in 2012 to support Hindu candidates and those who advocate Hindu-friendly policies, such as streamlining the immigration process and combating bullying and hate crimes against Hindu Americans. In the 2016 campaign, a PAC called the Republican Hindu Coalition, whose founder, Shalabh Kumar, was a megadonor to Trump, argued that conservative values were Hindu values and pushed for a stronger alliance between the GOP and Hindu groupsincluding with a Bollywood-Tollywood-themed concert where candidate Trump spoke. While that group largely has gone dormant, Trumps 2020 campaign has run ads targeting Indian American voters.

Now, another Hindu PACofficially nonpartisan but currently throwing its weight only behind Republicanshas emerged.

The evening after Khannas October town hall, a group of Indian Americans assembled for one of their routine (pre-Covid) gatherings to talk about politics and community issues. They met at the hilltop mansion of a wealthy and well-connected doctor, Romesh Japra, in Fremont, California, part of Khannas district. According to Japra, among those gathered at Japra Mahal, as he calls his home, were members of Hindu nationalist-aligned organizations in the Bay Area, groups he does not view in any negative light. To me, nationalism, or Hinduism, or Hindutva, or Hindu Dharmathey are all the same thing, he said in an interview.

These friends, mostly men, were irritated at their congressman. Since Khanna had posted his Hindutva tweet, they had begun discussing an idea for a movement to safeguard their ideology and to support a challenger to Khanna. With his friends encouragement, Ritesh Tandon, an Indian-born Hindu Republican and tech entrepreneur, announced his intent to compete against Khanna that night, Japra told me. The casual gathering spontaneously morphed into a political launch; about 75 people listened to Tandons stump speech at the mansions banquet room while dining on a vegetarian Indian dinner prepared by local chefs.

By early December, Japra, once a Khanna ally and now a Trump supporter, had registered a new super PAC, Americans for Hindus, to codify their cause. Among the groups donors are the co-founder of the Hindu American Foundation, the coordinator for the Northern California chapter of the OFBJP and the chair of a 2014 Madison Square Garden celebration for Modi. As of October 14, the group had raised more than $225,000, a small figure in the campaign finance world, but significant compared with other PACs positioned around Hindu identity.

Americans for Hindus, Japra says, aims to promote pro-Hindu politicians who steer clear of criticizing India, distance themselves from what he calls the socialist policies of the Democratic Party, and who Japra hopes will help rid Congress of what he terms anti-Hindu elementsprogressives like Khanna and Rep. Pramila Jayapal, another Indian American politician. Americans for Hindus is not backing a challenger to Jayapal, but the congresswoman has attracted the ire of the Indian government, as well as some in the Indian diaspora, for criticizing Indias treatment of the Muslim-majority region of Kashmir, the focus of a bipartisan resolution she introduced to the House of Representatives. (Jayapal told me in an interview earlier this year, before the bill was stymied, that more representatives than appeared supported the bill, but that they feared the potential loss of support from their Indian American constituents. They dont want to be attacked, she said).

The politics of Americas Hindu PACs are not uniform. HAPAC has predominantly donated to Democrats over the years and is currently endorsing both Republicans and Democrats, while Americans for Hindus is backing only Republicans. We think the Hindus, our values and philosophy they align more with staying in the middle, Japra told me, explaining that that has translated to moving basically more towards the Republicans. But in February, Americans for Hindus collaborated with HAPAC on phone calls to introduce select pro-Hindu candidatesthree Democrats and one Republicanto Hindu American voters. Mihir Meghani, chair of HAPAC and a donor of Americans for Hindus, as well as the co-founder of the Hindu American Foundation, wrote in a public Facebook post that Hindu candidates for office and elected officials are under attack right now in America, and that if we want a strong Hindu voice, our community needs to support these candidates.

Americans for Hindus has funded candidates that range from a few longshots to a couple of likely victors to several running in battleground districts. Kumar, the Trump donor who also encouraged another Hindu Republican to challenge Khanna in 2014, told me he believes Tandonone of the long shotscould have done more to tap Hindu American donors in Khannas district since its so rich in Hindu Americans. In a statement, Tandon blamed Covid for his struggle to reach more Americans but said he has attracted funding from people of all faiths. Japra, meanwhile, has a long-term vision for his PAC. These races are just the beginning, he says. Overall, nationwide, our movement is taking off.

During a Zoom meeting in late September (which I attended as a reporter), Japra and a few dozen of the PACs supporters in the Bay Area, Texas, New York and elsewhere convened to offer updates on their organizing. The Silicon Valley race was the most consequential in their minds. This is our current bhoomi, Japra said, using the Hindi word for land. And we want to make sure our ideology, our civilization, our culture, the Hindu culture which we are so, so proud of, is taken care of.

Addressing Tandon, Japra added, Its a transnational movement that is going on, and your local election battle is a microcosm of what is happening in the world.

Even as Americans for Hindus has challenged politicians like Khanna for what the group sees as insufficient support for Hindutva, progressive South Asian voters and advocacy groups have been vocal in urging politicians to speak out against Hindu nationalism. They want Indian American politicians, including some on the left, to openly reject Hindutva, condemn human rights abuses in India, and turn away financial support from Americans who are affiliated with organizations that promote Hindutva.

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How Hindu Nationalism Could Shape the Election - POLITICO

Digvijaya Singhs shocking love jihad slur against BJPs Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi, Shahnawaz Hussain |  Photo Credit: Times Now

Bhopal: In a shocking remark, senior Congress leader Digvijaya Singh has hurled love jihad slur against Union Minister Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi and Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Syed Shahnawaz Hussain.

"If a Muslim boy marries a Hindu girl it is love jihad. In Prime Minister Narendra Modis Cabinet, Naqvi has married a Hindu woman, BJP leader Hussains partner is also Hindu..is this also a love jihad," Singh asked.

"They (BJP) have no agenda,no issues to discuss, other than raising Hindu-Muslim. They only want to spread hatred and instigate people in the name of Hindus and Muslims. We oppose this," the senior Congress leader said.

Notably, just a few days back, another senior Congress leader and Madhya Pradesh chief minister Kamal Nath had made an objectionable comment against Imarti Devi by using the word "item" against the BJP candidate from Dabra constituency for the upcoming by-elections to the Madhya Pradesh Assembly.

While campaigning in Dabra area in Gwalior district on October 18, Nath had said: Wo kya hai main uska naam kyun lun aapko mujhe satark karna chahiye tha kya item hai (Who is she Whats her name? You all should have warned me what an item!).

Notably, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi said it was unfortunate that Nath made the item jibe against Madhya Pradesh's Dalit woman Minister Imarti Devi. "Kamal Nathji is from my party, but personally I don't like the type of language that he used; I don't appreciate it, regardless of who he is. It is unfortunate," Gandhi had said.

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The upcoming Madhya Pradesh bye-elections, scheduled to be held on November 3, are a litmus test for both the BJP and the Congress. In an attempt to save the BJP government from falling, incumbent Chief Minister Shivraj Sinh Chouhan has to prove majority in the 243-member MP Assembly. At present BJP has 107 MLAs.

Congress had suffered a huge set back after Jyotiraditya and 22 other Congress MLAs resigned from the party and joined the saffron unit, which had led to the fall of the Kamal Nath government. The grand old party has 88 legislatures and needs to win 28 seats to come back to power.

The Madhya Pradesh by-polls were necessitated following the resignation of Scindia and other Congress MLAs.

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'Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi, Shahnawaz Hussains wives are Hindus; is this love jihad', asks Digvijaya Singh - Times Now

By ANI

NEW DELHI: A petition has been filed in the Supreme Court seeking the setting up of a special investigating team (SIT) to probe into the alleged forceful conversion of Hindus and crimes against women of the community in Nuh district of Haryana.

"A number of Hindus have been forcibly converted to Islam and a number of Hindu women and minor girls have been abducted and raped. Hindu women are not safe at all. The Muslims at a large number have committed atrocities on members of Schedule caste (as well," the plea, filed by a group of lawyers and social activists on Thursday, claimed.

Alleging that the dominant members of the Muslim community in Nuh district have overpowered Hindus of the area, the petition, filed through advocate Vishnu Shankar Jain, sought protection of the fundamental rights of the Hindus.

Also alleging that the life, personal liberty and religious rights of the Hindus in Nuh are being eroded by the Muslims, the plea sought directions for constituting the SIT, consisting of members from the Central Bureau of Investigation and the National Investigation Agency, under the supervision of a retired apex court judge.

The plea urged the top court that the SIT should probe alleged instances of forceful conversion of Hindus, illegal execution of sale deeds of their properties, atrocities committed against Hindu women and girls, encroachment made on public land, conditions of temples and religious places, and cremation grounds existing in the Nuh area.

It said that the local police had failed to exercise the powers vested in them by the law. The plea also sought directions to the Centre to deploy paramilitary forces in Nuh to protect the life and liberty of citizens.

The plea alleged that Muslims, under the patronage of Tablighi Jamaat, have gradually increased their strength and now the position is that "Hindus (sic) population is decreasing and it has come down from 20 per cent to 10-11 per cent since the last census in 2011".

"There are about 431 villages in Mewat-Nuh. As many as 103 villages have become totally devoid of Hindus. In 82 villages, only four-five Hindu families are left. There is a significant decline of Hindu population in the district (Nuh), giving rise to demographic changes, which will be disastrous for the unity of the nation," the plea said.

It added the authorities should be directed to rehabilitate Hindus at their respective properties and restore all temples, places of worship and cremation grounds, which have been encroached upon, in their original forms.

The plea also prayed to nullify all sale deeds executed by the Hindus in the favour of Muslims in the last 10 years "under coercion and undue influence".

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Plea in SC seeks SIT probe into 'forceful conversion' of Hindus in Haryana's Nuh - The New Indian Express