BOOK
REVIEW
Title: GITA
PRESS AND THE MAKING OF HINDU INDIA
Author: AKHSHAYA
MUKUL
Publisher: Harper Collins Publishers India, 2015
Hardback price: Rs. 799/-
Gita Press: Moulding The Idea of India
This excellent book and its timing obliquely posits
the identity issues of Hindustan versus Pakistan. Islamic Pakistan may be Muslim in its sine
qua non, but seems to have more fragmentation issues than India, always,
seen, in context, like it or not, as Hindustan.
And now, with the idea of the Nehruvian India under siege
from certain quarters, is a new, blatantly majoritarian but inclusive India,
under construction?
Contemporary Indian historians who treat history as
a traditional discipline to tell it largely like it was, are few and far
between. Most turn the telling into a pulpit.
There is the erudite Bengaluru-based Ramachandra
Guha. There is also the resident Scotsman with Indian sensibilities, William
Dalrymple. And now, joining the ranks of this select set, comes a self-effacing
journalist-historian, still working hard for the Times of India,
Akshyaya Mukul.
Mukul has written an admirable and even-handed book,
based on painstaking research. It will doubtless prove to be a seminal
reference work for its wealth of detail on the role of Hindu consciousness, and
its effect, both on the formation of modern nationalism, and indeed, the
evolving idea of India.
The enduring Gita Press, in Mukul’s book, was a
force to reckon with, not so much because its singular mission of ushering in a Hindu Rashtra, but because it
gave space, voice and prominence to some that unequivocally wanted to do so,
and aired all their associated concerns.
The Gita Press and its publications, books,
pamphlets, magazines in Hindi and English, have influenced and informed
generations of Indians and admirers of India, at home and abroad, for nearly a
century.
It continues to do so today, to a much lesser
extent. Its primary salience as a mass-influencer is much diminished. This is the
age of globalisation, the Internet, 24x7 satellite TV, and an evolving national
identity that is leaving some of the burdens of contemporary history behind. It
is now a demographically young nation, with 65% of the 1.2 billion population
born well after Independence, in the 15-35 year age group.
India today is also visibly shedding its
post-colonial, post-socialist skin, religion too hasn’t got the same frisson.
It is en route to becoming one of the leading, if not top level nations of the contemporary
world.
Gita Press made its greatest contribution, to an
unstated mission, that of assisting Indians to believe in their own ancient
culture in the face of the fierce imperial policy of divide and rule, and to
provide a reliable source of intellectual/spiritual fuel to the yearning
for independence.
By the forties, Gita Press succeeded in providing a
template, as much for the acceptance and formation of a majoritarian national
identity, as a trampoline for rejection of several of its suggestions and
implications.
The alternative discourse favoured a non-casteist, egalitarian,
affirmative actioned, secular order, influenced by foreign ideas, favouring and
protecting the minorities, and a distinctly socialist vision.
Meanwhile, true to its name, Gita Press sold over 72
million copies of the Gita, priced affordably, amongst other scriptural texts
from Tulsidas, the Puranas, the Upanishads and so on, also running into sales
of millions of copies.
But through it all, Gita Press remained an
essentially private effort, a publishing house in its commercial bare-bones,
run by its long-time Marwari owner, Hanuman Prasad Poddar, taking on from
co-founder Jaydayal Goyandka. It is based in the smallish town of Gorakhpur in
U.P., but has long enjoyed a kind of cultural centrality in Indian life. This via its Hindi language Kalyan
magazine, and its English counterpart Kalyan-Kalpataru, which even now
has subscriptions of over 200,000 and
100,000 respectively.
Kalyan’s tireless helmsman Poddar roped in most of
the luminaries from various fields over his long stewardship.
Many prominent Indians in public life, famous Indian
writers such as Munshi Premchand, poet Harivansh Rai Bachchan, and illustrators
like Satyendranath Banerjee, recommended
by Christian clergyman C.F. Andrews,
then located in Shantiniketan, and also a contributor- wrote/ painted/drew for
Gita Press.
Other foreigners and indophiles, such as Russian
painter Nicholas Roerich, also contributed towards its spiritualist world-view.
MK Gandhi certainly wrote articles for Gita Press’ Kalyan
magazine, as did Rabindranath Tagore, even
if Nehru resolutely did not.
Nehru did not even deign to send Kalyan a short message of good wishes.
Other marked socialists with their antipathy to religion, had the same attitude
as Nehru towards Gita Press.
Contributors also included eminent others in the
Centrist space of independence era and after public life, such as Annie Besant,
C Rajagopalachari, S Radhakrishnan, Lal Bahadur Shashtri, Rajendra Prasad.
Madan M ohan Malaviya was an ardent backer.
The Hindu Right was prominently featured, with Poddar
ignoring the rivalries of organisations such as The Arya Samaj and the Sanatan
Dharma Sabha.
Gowalkar of the RSS sent in several articles. As did
Shyama Prasad Mookerjee, the founder of the Bharatiya Jan Sangh. And many
sadhus with a political bent of mind also contributed, such as the once well-known
Swami Karpatri Maharaj.
Muslim contributors included professor of philosophy
at Allahabad University, Mohammad Hafiz Syed and journalist Syed Kasim Ali from
Jabalpur. But as the demand for Pakistan formed and intensified, the Muslim
League demanded that its adherents be counted as Muslims first. The Gita Press,
in turn, sharpened its attack, and saw
Jinnah as a modern day Aurangzeb.
Women writers were few, in conformity with the Gita
Press’ patriarchal world view, but prominent amongst them were R.S.
Subbalakshmi, an educationist from Madras, Raihana Tyabji, a Krishna bhakt
and ardent follower of Poddar, and Vijaya Lakshmi Pandit, Nehru’s sister - the
latter appearing only in reprint of a Navbharat Times piece.
Today, with a section of the population feeling threatened
at the reappearance of calls for a Hindu
Rashtra, the calls for a Ram temple at Ayodhya, the abrogation of Article 370 in
Kashmir, the conflicts over cow slaughter, a uniform civil code etc., the
seminal and dogged work done over decades by the Gita Press has a fresh relevance.
In 2016, it can be seen, that many of the issues
supported by Poddar and Gita Press over
the years: cow protection, opposition to the Hindu Code Bill, and the Hindu
Succession Act, are far from resolved and settled issues.
Particularly, as the Muslim Personal Law Board and
leading Islamic seminaries like the Deoband are, even now, having to be
reminded that its fatwas can only be accepted voluntarily, and do not have the
force of law - as was explained by the Supreme Court recently.
Poddar died in March 1971, after a nearly five
decade run, and has been succeeded by Radheshyam Khemka. Times have changed,
but even otherwise, Khemka does not have equivalent stature. Still, he upholds
the orthodoxies of the Poddar doctrine unchanged, and grew up in the ethos and
under the mantle of the Gita Press himself.
For: The Sunday Pioneer BOOKS
(1,130 words)
April 8th, 2016
Gautam Mukherjee
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