Secularism is a body without soul

'Secularism is a body without soul'

Rajeev Vora, 54, was born in Anjaar, Kutch, into a family of staunch Gandhians. After studying in Gujarat he joined Jayaprakash Narayan's movement in Bihar and became convener of the Bihar Satyagraha Sanchalan Samiti. During the Emergency he went to jail along with other Gandhian leaders.

In 1977, he joined the Gandhi Peace Foundation in New Delhi to "create Gandhi consciousness in society." Currently he edits Gandhi Marg, a publication of the foundation.

Vohra blames Nehruvian secularists who do not believe in god for the communal polarisation in Gujarat:

Why are Gandhians not heard in Gujarat, land of the Mahatma?

It's a complex question. Once, the same people accepted Gandhi. But times change. Stimulants change.

There are several reasons for it. Why blame Gujaratis? Elsewhere in India too Gandhi is not heard anymore. After Gandhi's death Gandhians took up his physical and bodily discipline, but not his discipline of mind, his discipline of thoughts.

Gandhi was basically a Vedantic person. But most Gandhians after Independence didn't like to be identified with anything called dharma, Hindu dharma, sanatan dharma or Vedantic dharma. They started talking about manav dharma [humanity]. But how can you reject the perception of the masses? These followers of Gandhi rejected the demands of a religious society and refused to counter the decadence in society.

Secularism has no name. Secularism is something I don't understand. Secularism is a body without soul. Secularism can't deliver anything. Secularism is sterile. Most Gandhians are sterile, they have identified themselves only with the material side of the life of the Indian people. Gandhiji looked at the material side of life also because he wanted, at a later stage, our spiritual life to be supreme. He wanted us to be spiritual after getting the basic things of life in place. Mahatma Gandhi said, 'Bhooke ko to chand main bhi roti dikhegi, uski sunderta nahin dikhegi [to a hungry man, even the moon will look like bread].'

Another important thing he said was that God lives in a hungry man. Gandhians twisted this understanding. Roti is not God personified. It's important to feed the belly as long as you are hungry. You have to keep body and soul together. But once you do that, there are higher goals in life.

Gandhians and secularists have even forgotten the dharma of satya, which is synonymous with Indian civilization, Indian culture, and Indian dharma. And this dharma epitomizes Swaraj. People identify with these words and concepts. People know swaraj means Ram rajya, our own god Ram's ideal administration. Ram rajya doesn't mean BJP's rajya.

The recent violence in Gujarat was because of three types of fundamentalist, violent ideas. One, Hindu fundamentalism, which stems from a decadent Hinduism. The process of building a Ram temple in Ayodhya should create Ram in people's hearts, not Ravana in their minds. Gujarat has done something Indians have never done before. Those who committed these horrendous crimes and killed people have not just insulted Ram, they have collectively cheated Ram. We had never heard, even in the time of Ravana, of anyone killing a pregnant woman and her unborn child. The amount of violence we harbour today is much more than we had even during Partition.

Gandhiji told Mohammed Ali Jinnah he did not believe in the two-nation theory because we are from the same stock. Hindus and Muslims belong to the same forefathers. Our blood is the same.

Diversity amongst Indians has been converted to animosity by politicians. They tell us we, the Hindus and Muslims, have incompatible interests. Then, they consolidate their powers amongst us.

How can you demolish a mosque and put up a Hanuman statue and name that place 'Hulladia Hanuman'? I call the Vishwa Hindu Parishad's Hindutva hulladia (riotous) Hindutva. Do we really want hulladia Hindutva?

Secondly, Islamic fundamentalism is also responsible for this kind of violence. They are playing the same game as the VHP. For both, truth is secondary to their own interpretation of religion. Both are in the same league.

Third, the secularists of India are responsible for the violence in Gujarat, particularly those secularists who have no respect for their religion, much less somebody else's. These non-religious ideas of self and the universe which came from the West, Marxists and liberals, are responsible for the violence.

Secularists, however, are the most responsible for violence in India because they never allowed people to know what is going on in the minds of normal Hindus and normal Muslims. Because they have changed the very language of discourse of development and discourse of nation-building, discourse of communal relationship, everything.

Secularist language is unknown to the Indian people. So genuine Hindu demands were always rejected in the name of secularism. Otherwise, having carved Pakistan and Bangladesh out of the body of India, it was the duty of Muslims to release the three religious places [of Ayodhya, Mathura and Kashi]. It would have been an act of goodwill. I am sure they were ready to release the masjid in 1947. But these secularists never allowed Muslims to gift Hindus their shrines.

I repeat, the soul of Gandhi was killed by Jawaharlal Nehru who rejected his body of karma. They took him to be a freedom fighter, not a man who was in search of dharma.

In 1945, Nehru had told Gandhiji he had read his small booklet Hind Swaraj long back. He disagreed with Gandhiji in his vision for reconstructing India. Nehru had rejected Gandhi completely much before Independence. Nehru represented the anglicized Indian class.

Nehru was the first person to reject Gandhiji. After the betrayal of Nehru and his class of people, Gandhi started saying 'my voice is a voice in the wilderness.'

The second betrayal came from fundamentalist Muslims represented by Jinnah, who clinched the deal to get Pakistan by the horrible massacre of Hindus in Bengal sparked by his call for 'direct action.'

Third, Bapu was killed again by decadent and fundamentalist Hindus represented by Nathuram Godse. He was the bullet triggered by Jinnah.

As told to Sheela Bhatt