Communalising the Nation-Space: Notes on Spatial Strategies of Hindutva

Author(s): Satish Deshpande

Source: Economic and Political Weekly , Dec. 16, 1995, Vol. 30, No. 50 (Dec. 16, 1995), pp.
3220-3227
Published by: Economic and Political Weekly

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SPECIAL ARTICLES

Communalising the Nation-Space

Notes on Spatial Strategies of Hindutva
Satish Deshpande

In its attempt to understand the spatial strategies of hindutva, this essay tries to answer questions such as: What kinds of
places has hindutva successfully transformed into heterotopias ? What specific strategies have enabled this success ? What kinds
of contestation and struggle are these spatial ideologies involved in? How do these idteologies overcome the refractory nature
of the materials they deal with? How can one begin to think of defensive and offensive counterstrategies?

ONEcan hardly dispute the factthat 'hindutva' aspects of the nation - the imagined com- weapon in a broader social struggle for
is among the most important sources of social munity considered as a nation-space - and the hegemony. Similarly, it is now recognised
change at work in India today. In this essay, ways in which social groupings with that social space is not merely an arena in
I make a prelimiinary attempt to explore the hegemonic almbitions attempt to reshape and which power relations 'happen', but also one
spatial aspects of this would-be hegemonic approp)riate this space. of the means with which power is sought to
ideology by identifying the different ways in T heorists of nationalism have long be exercised. This is what gives meaning to
which it seeks to redefine the nation-space, rccognised that a claim to an identifiable the notion of spatial strategies.
rearticulate the link between an imagined territory is a necessary, though not a suffi- A spatial strategy not only unfolds in space,
community and its territorial domain. cient, condition for the emergence of a strong it is also often about space - its appropriation,
The argument can be summarised in four sense of nation-ness. And though it has also deployment or control. Such strategies are
basic propositiotis: (I) Considered as an been known that such a physical territory also among those designed to support and maintain
ideological project, hindutva has an identi- functions at a meta-physical level as a col- relations of powerorof resistance. Considered
fiable spatial dimension in the form of a as ideologies, spatial strategies can be seen
lective representation, it is only recently that
strategy designed to retashion the social space the full implicatibns of these insights have as articulating the physical-material and
of the Indian nation; (2) Historically, hindutva become visible. This is in large measure due mental-imaginative aspects of social space.
has attempted mainly toessentialisethenation- to "the reassertion of space in critical social In short, successful spatial strategies are able
space by re-sacralising it thereby stressing its theory" through the claim that space is not to link, in a durable and ideologically credible
irreducible and exclusive affinity for Hindus 'natural' but socially produced.' way, abstract (imagined) spaces to concrete
alone: (3) The contemporary spatial strategies Thus, contemporary social theory reminds (physical) places.
ot hindutva may be said to be based on three us that nations inhabit a space that is simul-
SPATIAL STRATEGIES AND
specific ideological constructs (or hetero- taneously abstract (imagined, mental) and
IDEOLOGICAL SUBJECTS
topias), namely. the site, the locality, and the concrete (physical, geographical). These
route; (4) These strategies partly comple- contrary aspects ol the nation-space can be In one of his unpublished lectures, Michel
ment and partly conitraidict other contem- linked because ol their common existence in, Foucault offered some suggestive comments
porary ideologies (niotably. that of 'globalis- and only in, the social realm. However, it is which, despite being fragmentary and
ation'), so that the overall outcome of their only when this potential for linkage is realised inadequate, may be a useful starting point for
complex interactionis is difficult to determine. through active social practices and processes theorising the ideological practices that link
The theoretical context for these proposit- that the nation-space can take shape. Nations abstract spaces to concrete places in politically
ions is summarised in Section 1. after which are emergent phenomena; they become vis- productive ways.' Foucault took as his point
they will be briefly elaborated in the following iblc only when an ideological terrain and an of departure the assertion that we live not in
sections along with some preliminaty evidence. identifiable territory can be cross-mapped a 'homogeneous and empty space' but, on the
onto each other to produce a sense of nation- contrary, "inside a set of relations that deline-
ness shared by large numbers in society. ates sites which are irreducible to one another"
Nation, Space, and Nation-Space in Even after it has been successfully produced, [Foucault 1986:23]. In the processofjustifying
Contemporary Social Theory the sense of nation-ness remains vulnerable this assertion, he identified two kinds of sites
to history and must be continually nurtured, that are crucial: 'utopias' and 'heterotopias'.
Perhaps it is only by coincidence that recent
partly through efforts to ensure that ideology Utopias are "sites with no place" or
social theory has simultancously rediscov- and geography do not get out of synch. "fundamentally unreal spaces" (1986:24).
ered the concepts of 'space' and 'nation'. However, contemporary social theory also They are, in terms of the previous di-scussion,
Even so, this seeins to offer richi theoretical
tells us that both space and nation are abstract spaces with no immediateornecessary
possibilities, especially because the mainner
implicated in power relations. The production reterence to any concrete place. They may
aind the conltext in which these concepts ot a sense of nation-ness clearly involves
have represent "society itself in a perfected form"
been revived are particularly conducive ideological
for and material contests. In acolonial orelse "society turned upside down", but their
cross cultivation. Contemporary social theory context, this includes both the dimension of relationship to concrete, physical places is
hals begun to reconsider both space and nation nationalism as anti-imperialism, as well as the indeterminate - they point to no particular
in ways which attempt to transcend (or at more complex internal contestations among place, or to all possible places without any
least to sidestep) the traditional dichotomy different possible nationalisms, each with its discrimination. In short, utopias are
between the material and the mental. More- own equations vis-a-vis various regions, universalised, abstract spaces that are not
over, questions of power and domination haveclasses or ethnic groups within the proto- marked as referring to any particular place.
come to be highlighted in both contexts. The nation. The idea of the nation can thus be Heterotopias, on the other hand, are "real
way is thus cleared tor exploring the spatial suitably inflected to facilitate its use as- a places - places that do exist", that can be

3220 Economic and Political Weekly December 16, 1995

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pointed out on a map. lived in. visited or, in was supposed to have been destroyed here Our national anthem, torexample, is a typical
general, empirically experienced in an obvious by a general representing a Muslim king this nationalist device for converting geography
f;ashion. But heterotopias are very special too has been known for more than four-and- into ideology.
kinds of places because (and here I depart a-half centuries. Thus, the 'natural endow- However, crucially, such spatial strategies
from Foucault' s formiulation) they mediate. ments' of Ayodhya as a particular physical included those that explicitly or implicitly
in a mirror-like lfashion. betweeni utopias place have been the same for quite some time. appealed to shared religious orcommunitarian
and ideological subjects. In other words, but its successful transformation into a sentiment. In other words, there was nothing
heterotopias cnable - incite. compel. invitc heterotopia is a very recent occurrence. This inherent in nationalist spatial strategies that
- people to see tlheinmseles reflected in prevented their use by groups based on
transtormaltion has been eff'ected by a spatial
some utopia. They are places which strategy that has, tirstly, strengthened the religious
link or regional identities. Indeed, there
between
function as a;n ideological hinge, linking the concrete place and the abstract,
social were areas in which religious groups,
utopian space of hindutva: and, secondly.
subjects (people) with a possible political- especially Hindus, were at a significant
forged a bond between the utopia and the
morTal idetility (utopia) thal tlhev could assume advantage, because they could build on the
(inhabit ).' people for whom it provides a renewed sense powerlul baise of sacred geographies. Given
However. though heterotopias are real, ot belonging, a bond in which the place-as- the absence of any national community tbat
was supra- or non-religious, attempts to
physical places. ihey aire ilO0 pn1ductsheterotopia
ot' acts as the glue. It has to be noted,
n.aurrc': consi(lerable ideological labour is finally, that the relationshiip between the construct an 'imagined coinmunity' had to
necessary in order to transstorm a given con-strategy and the place is an instrumental onc fall back on whateverexisted in living memory
crete site into a helterotopia. It is true that - the same ends may be pursued by a similar that could be used to help concrctise this new
dillerenit places, by virtue ot their particular strategic use of other suitable places. and unfamiliar notion. Thus, even self-
history. phiysicil attributes or geographical This essay is an attempt to understand the consciously non-communal nationalists could
location. are more or less suitable raw ma- spatial strategies of' hinduiva that have had not attord to ignore the mnemonic aids and
terial Ior pro(lucing a heterotopia. Thus. thea significant impact on contemporary social powerful, long-familiar metaphors offered by
unique naitural properties ot a place do help,and political life. It tries to answer questions the popular sense of hisitory and geography.
aind may sometimlies be a necessary ingredi-such as the following: What kinds of places a sense inevitably intlected by religion.'
enit: but they are never suflicient, always has hindutva successfully transformed into Moreover. the,concept as well as the concrete
requiring additionlal efforts that consciously
heterotopias? What specific strategies have political identity of 'nationalism' was flexible
enabled this success? How do these strategies
%eek tO tranisfor-m ai mere place into a cultur- enough to permit communalists to not only
ally mecainingtful. politically charged space.deal with their rivals - what kinds of con- claim but also to sincerely believe that theirs
One way of understandinig spatial strate- testation and struggle are spatial ideologieswas a truly nationalist rather than a sectarian
,,'s is to think oftlhem as ideological prac- involved in'? How do these ideologies over- group. Matters were lurther complicated by
tices involved in the construction of hetero- come the refractory nature of the materials the late 19th century religious revivalism,
topias. In this sense, spatial strategies attempt - both geographical and human - that they especially within Hinduism, which attempted
to tie an imagined space to a real place in have to deal with? How can one begin to with partial success to yoke together modernist
such a way that thes, ties also bind peoplc think of defensive and offensive ideals (science, rationality, technology,
to particulatr identities. and to the political/ counterstrategies'? progress) and a ref'ormned religious-spiritual
praicticail con.sequences that they entail. creed that downplayed the more atavistic and
A concrete example may help. and there II contradictory aspects of rcligion
can be few better than Ayodhya, the small Hindutva and Emergence of (untouchability, the subordination of wo
town in eastern Uttar Pradesh. that is also Indian Nation-Space .superstition' or excessive ritualism). With
among the most potent heterotopias in our the advent ol' this new 'improved' variety of
recent history. Hardly ani unreal place. It will be readily appreciated that in order religious identity. it did not seem so self-
Ayodhya has nevertheless acted as a mirror to understand the specific spatial strategies evident as it had before that one had to choose
opening into the imagined space - the utopia of hindutva today. it is necessary to look into between religion and spirituality on the one
- of Ramrajya. hindutva. hindu pride and so the historical context from which they have hand, and the ideals of modernism and science
on. Seen from another angle, Ayodhya (or, emerged.' From the perspective of this essay, on the other.' In the contest between communal
more accurately, the Rain Janmabhoomi/ the rclevant historical context is that of the and non-communal political formations, the
Babri masjid) as a heterotopian site has of fered interaction among the spatial aspects of burden of proof (to demonstrate moral or
thousands ot people (particularly young Hindu colonialismn, nationalism-and communalism, social superiority) was thus unequally
males from urban and semi-urban middle which was also the process through which distributed, usually fliling more heavily on
class bhackgrounds) a social identity as 'India' emerged as a nation-space. the 'secular' type of grouping. It is in this
inhahitatits of the utopia that it projects, The spatial strategies of nationalism in- context that we have to examine the co-
namely, the identity of the 'kar sevak'. The volved the attempt to tranislate the facts ofimplication of communalism in the process
trainstormation of this rural small town from social geography into mattcrs of faith, belief of emergence ol' the Indian nation-space.'
merely aniother geographically speci tic place and, ultimately, received experienice. These
Sl'ATIAI. STRATIGIIES
into a hetert-opia was the result ota conscious included conscious efforts to 'historicise' or
IN SAVARKAR'S 'HIND)tTVA
spatial st.rategy. There was notiling 'natural' to anitlropoinorphise nature. the most obvi-
alhout it. ous manifestation of which is the ligure ol' "Hindutva is not a word but a history",
Althoughli. hiistorically, several other places 'Mother India'. Through insistent and widely declares Savarkar at the beginining of his self-
have claimed the name, it seems reasonable disseminated patriotic songs and writings, the consciously ideological tract, even as he
to assume that thiis particular Ayodhya has physical features of the subcontinent - mnoun- proceeds to slhow how this hiistory is closely
always been roughly where it is today. It has tains, rivers, oceans and regions - were trans- and cruciailly intertwinied with a geograplh
heein known for several centuries as the formed into a common national heritage over (p 2ff). He is very clear lhat the termn whiclh
.suppose;d birthplalce of a1 mythological hero, which every Indian, even if she/he had never he did more thain awnyone el.se to psopularise.
who is; alsio one of the principle deities; in the seen that particular part of the country. was axnd which is enjoying a major revival today
palntheon of Hindui.sm. That a Hindu temple invited to f'eel a sense of proprietary pride. - Hindutva, or 'Hindu-ness's - is not to be

Economic and Political Weekly December 16, 1995 3221

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conilused with Hinduism. the latter being a criterion of punyabhoo' is both necessary ol tendencies that btased themselveson implicit
.sectarian' term, referring to the followers of anid sul'fficient, making it in effect the onlyorexplicit appeals to Hindu religion [Dumont
the Hindu religion proper. Hindutva, on the relevant condition. This conclusion is further 1980, Chandra 1 984:47ffJ. These ranged from
other hand, includes members of other ftaiths reinforced (though it is not in any need ol'this) the militantly communal stance ol a Tilak or
(like Sikhisrn. Buddhisnm. orJainism). though by the highly significant exceptions thali a Savarka,i to the much more complex but
it cannot be aCcuLsed of beinig overgenierous Savarkarconsiders - the Sindhis, andemigrant
nevertheless recognisably Hindu approach of
in this regaird. Indians settled abroad. In the ciase of' the Gandhi. Indeed. ais Nehru notes in his
Savarkar invokes the etymology ol the word l'ormer. textual interpretation is invoked to
autobiography. theexplicitly seculartenidency
'Hindu' -derived from the Satnskrit 'SindlLu', (as diffcrent from tendencies that believed in
stress that both bahnks of' the Indus aIre to
the naime of the river otherwise kinowIn as tlhe he included within the borders of'Hindustan, coalitional arrangemenits across coimmunities.
Indus, and also tie word f orocean. He recounts thereby conferring memblhership on the especially Hindlu-Muslim unity) within the
the process by which Aryain triibes from Central Sindhis. As for emigraints, they are to be Congress wais a relatively weak one, its main
Asia ciame to settle in lhc Indus hasin, aind con.sidered Hindus no matter where tlhey proponent beinig Nehru himself. Given thlese
subsequently spread out into the entire sub- arc because of their holy lands beinig in conditions. it isdifficult to say what thespecific
continent while managing to retain theirsense Hi ndustan. cour.seofourpost-independence history would
of nation-ness and cuilturail identity. unitil: Thcorists of human territoriality have have been were it not tor two decisive but
At last the greatt missioni whicih the Sindhus suggested that it conisists of, and may be usedconitingent events.
hiad uinder-takeni of' fiOundin at niationi and a The assassinaition of Mahatma Gaindhi by
ais, threc mnain things: a form of classification,
country. fouLndl aind r-eachled its geograplical a moide ol comilmuniication, and a methodNathuramof Godse, and the latter's links with
limit whcn the valorouis Prince of Ayodhya enforcing control [Sack 1986:21-261. the RSS provided the secular forces with a
madc triliumphant iiiry in Ceylon and actually Savarkar:s definition of Hindutva can be seen big stick with which to beat communalists.
brt)ough1t thle whole land firom the Himallayas to as a very sutccessfiul model ol territoriality that
The stigma of being associated with the
the seas under one sovereign1 sway (pP 7-8). includes all three features. As a spatial form Mahatma's killer was so strong that it took
This establishes the trite geographical of classification. it divides all those living more
in than a decade lor the Hindui right to
botiid(lriCsoIftIh 'Sindhi&i natioOn, fronm'Atak the Indian suibcontinient into two cler rcamps, regalin sufficient legitimacy to miake a mark
to Cuttack'. and tronm the 'Hfimialayas to the thosc who posscss Hindui-niess or Hindulva in naitional lcvel politics. Similarly. the sud-
Ca;q' -- o)r. iiiorce classically. fIom 'S;indhtu toand those who d(. Iot: this classiticatioIn is deni deatth of Sairdar Vallabhibhai Patel in 1 950)
Sihl .oti' or 'river (iinduls) Io (tihie two) oceans'. spatial becautise it is ba.sed on a geographical left the communail right witllini the Congress
Savarkar taikes great pains to sitress these definition of thc holy lands whichi are to be leaderless, and paved the way for the emer-
bound(a;lries. and especially the ver.satility of considered decisive. Hinduivai can ailso gence ol' Nehru as the ulidisputed leader of
the sanctified word 'Sindhu'." The reason for lunction as a mode ol comiimunication since the party. Moreover. Nehru's vote-drawing
this excessive concerin lor these boundaries "it requires only a single marker or sign - abilities
the and charisma helped to personalise
soon becoines obvious when his criteria for hisi power and enable(d him to play a critical
boundary". onle ImlorCover. whichi "coImnhinies
determ iini ng hindutva arec ai.iiioLinced. Tlhese directioni in sppace anid a statement about but also larger-than-lite role in the immediate
ar- stated as the three condlition.s olfpitrabh(x)'. possession or exclusion" ISack 1986:321. In
post-independence period.
'jati', an(d 'sianskiriti'. lThe first insists that a the case ol Hindutva, this boundary also acts The period From independence up to the
'Hindlul' shouldL he born within Hindustiin and as the means for legitimising power over and
mid-I 960s - the 'Nehruvian era' - has to be
thus have a legitimate clalim to this nation- control of the nation-space, given its social underistood in the light of these events. Iftthis
spatce ais thie fiatherland".' The second(i maikes context of a period of turmoiil towards the end era isi now seen as the golden age of secu-
it obligatory for a Hindui to inherit Hinitdu of coloniailism, when the questioni ol the larism, this is mainly because of the success-
'blood' throughi natural pairentts.' But the lormation of' autonomous states is being ful 'regionalising' of communalism during
Imiost cruiciaIl intecrpretive move is iil the third considered. The claims put forward by this period. Nehru and his allies managed to
criterionl, naniely, thiat of a shalred culture or Savarkar amount to the argument that only take over the newly created 'national' public
sainsklriti. Savarkar very quickly shifts from those marked by Hindutva have the moral- sphere. shaping it in their own image as the
the common meaininigs of culture to a very political right to constitute the nation, sincc sphere of state-sponsored socialism, secula-
speci fic one, namnely. Illegiaince to a particular their secular and religious-cultural interests rism and noin-ailignment. The strong currents
sacred geography. Thus. the final and are presumed to reler to the salme geographical of commnunalism within the broaderCongress
iltintiately allI-important criterion forI beinig aspace:'2 movement were thus relcgated (at least for
Hindu is that one's 'punyabhioo' or holy land Considered at a more gencrall level, the the time being) to a more peripheral existence
sshould c(incide with the 'pitrabhoo' sco basic spatial straitegy belhind Savairkar's notion in the regions, esp)ecially in the northein
carel'ully demalrcated earlier. of' Hindutva has for its cenltral themile thehealrtland anid in the wCst. So, the 'golden age
Savarkar' s essentially territorial test tor redefining of the narion-space as a sacred of secularisimi did not mean that communal
def'ining a 'Hindu' is thus baised on the claim space: the claim that the n;ation is, and ought Forces were non-existent or evein defeated;
to a sacredl geogratphy. Among the three criterial to be. formed in the shatpe of a punyabhoo. rathlier. tihcy had been repressed within the
tilat he propo)ses, it is clear that 'pptnyaibhioo' a holy land. This serves to invest ageograplhicalInational public sphere and displaced to the
takes precedence over 'pitrabhoo' and 'jati'. space- the actual physical exteint of the Indianregional public sphere.
In fact. it is easilv demonstraited that the latter nation with a religious essence (thc unLanalys- If thc nation-space in Savarkar's Hindutva
two criteria are ncitlher necessary norstftflicient: able relation of sacrediness) that "outsides's" was baised on a sacred geography, the
the caise of a h1ypotheIical AmicICan wlho Imay cain nevcr experience or comprchenid, andNelhruvian nationl-space was shaped by an
become a Hindu (p 54) deemonstrates that which forever ineld comipletely defines economic gcography. Nehiuvian secularism
blood and fatherlan(d are niot essential; while 'insiders'. was not really well-thought oult. but repre-
the fate of'the Christianis and Muslims of India sented rather a negative category. Insofar a.s
NWi.IR1:VIAN NATION-SPACE
(p 72). who are excludell despite their its positive ideals had not heen indigenised
As recogni.sed by many .schlolars. the
f'ult'ilment of both the.se criterial, shows that enough and had their roots in the western
mainistrealm of the Indian national movement model Of a secular-modern nation, this
they are certainly not sut't'icient. Both these
instances establish beyond doubt that the led by theCongress; included a broach spectrum conception of secularism could only exist in

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thc newly crealtcd national sphere: it did not regional moorings. Not only did this elite III
strike riools at thc regional level. This was in seem to be "placeless", it also appeared to he Contemporary Hindutva and its
keeping with Nchru' s esseinially cconomistic 'caste-less' and 'class-less': a truly secular, Heterotopias's5
uniiderstanding of communialism. As Partha modem elite. This elite spoke in the modenist
('hatterjec has slhown ( 1 986:141-43, see also idiom of secular nationalismn, scientific Perhaps the overall spatial character of
note 31), Nehru believed that the legal technology, and economic development: by hindutva is best described in terms of re-
adopting this idiom, the elite was able to
guairantee of cquaIlity olrcitizcnship regardless essentialisation, or an attempt to reverse the
render invisible its own ascriptive markers.
of'religion,casite,creedlorotherso)cialattributes spatial logic of. Nehruvianism in order to
would renider communalism obsoletc. It was Thus, the fact that this modernist elite was return to Savarkar's vision of the nation-
only the coloniail state that. by refusing to almost exclusively upper caste and middle space. This means that hindutva tends to
guaranitee these freedoms. was helping to class, that it came from a vcry select culturalemphasise the particularity of social space by
keep communalism alive in order to play offbackground and a specific set of regions - attempting to (re)invest it with a unique cul-
one community against anmother. A national all this could become 'transparent' and thus tttral specificity. This amounts to an aggres-
state would act to remedy this. and be made to vanish. Consisting of the rising sively pursued strategy for the 'Hinduisation'
Ihilavint aksstured the protection of religiontechnocracy, the professional-mafiagerial of India. Such a policy has sought (despite
and culture. etc. the m,ajor problemns that class, intellectuals and top bureaucrats, this its significant unevenness) to reverse - or to
were hound to conic up werc economic was an elite which thought of itself in purely turn inside out - the Nehruvian nation-space.
ones whiclh had notliing to do witli a person'national'
s terms, whose native habitat was tlhe If Nehru claimed that dams and steel plants
religion. Class confl'licts therc might wellde-territorialised space called New Delhi. As were the temples of modern India, hindutva
be, but not rcligious conflicts. except insofar
Sudipta Kaviraj has sarcastically observed, stands him on his head and insists that
as rcligion itself represented some vested
one of the consequences of the Nehru era is temples are to contemporary (post-modern?)
inteicst lNelhru 1946:387, quoted in the situation where "it seems that only those India what steel plants and dams were to
Chatte jee 1986:1411
pcople who are unable to speak any Indian modern (Nehruvian) India.
The Nehruvian crai aimply demonstrates thelanguage are the real repositories of Indian If communalism is to he understood as a
centrality ol' thc economy lor nationalism. nationalism"
' [K.aviraj 1990:691. process ol 'competitive de-secularisation', as
The major spatial strategy of this era thus The Chinese war marked the beginning of Achin Vanaik has recenitly suggested [Vanaik
loregrounds thc economy: the nation is figured the end of the Nehruvian era, and the stress 1993], then its socio-spatial dimensions
primarily as an economic space. It is this eco- lines were very quickly exposed. The militaryinvolve an effort to re-sacralise the nation-
nomic geography that the post-independence debacle not only discredited Nehru as a states- space. De-secularisation is directly dependent
generation has grown up with. Powerfully man, it also made room lor the return of the upon the strate,ic deploymen; ofcssentialism.
disscminated through schools and all the state jingoistic rhetoric of the Hindu right that had It is in the name of religious essences - un-
media. the nation beconmes a spacc of characterised the partition era. The long analysahle, un-contestable truths that are self-
production, and is imagined via economic simmering discontent among the displaced evident to the faithful - that the 'flattenine
associations. Places aire namcd, so to speak. power brokers and regional elites came to the effect' of an even-handed secularism is
economically: Kodanila is 'minca', Ankleshwar surface with Nehru's death, which also co- denounced. Against this drab and debilitating
is 'petroleum'. Rourkela is 'steel', Bhakra incided with a break in the process of planned anonymity, communalism asserts the
Nangal is 'power'. Coimbatore is 'textiles' developmetit brought about by war, drought privileges of non-negotiable. uniqiuely
and so on. It was these 'sites of developmnent' and an econiomic crisis. Indira Gandhi could diffcrenit identities. Where the heterotol-- a ol
- the celebrated dams and steel planits - that take control of the Congress only by splittingthe steel plant or the hydroelectric projcct is
were the prinicipail hetertopias f;ashlionied by it, and her reign inevitably marked the advent primarily inclusive (it is unable or unwilling
the Nelhruvian reginie. The citizens of the of the era of electoral arithimetic based on vote to accord much importance to cultural
nation were inivited to see themselves banks and an implicit cotnmunal logic. distinctions), hindutva's new heterotopias are
reflected in the mirror of technological The inclusive spatial sense of Nehruvian primarily exclusive, designed to serve
progress and developmeint, to identify developmnentalism w~as overtaken by atn precisely as markers of irreducible cultural
themselvcs as fellow travellers on the ainxiety about the vulnerability of the borders
difference.
journey towards this common goal. In a certain sense, hindutv.a may be seen
ot the nation. At the same timc, the privileged
When compared to the sacred geography nationial sites of developmental projects andas exploiting the ideological vulnerability ol
of Hindutva. this spatial vision is remarkably the likec' lid no longerclaim to becxclusivelythe 'placeless' universalism of the Nehruviani
inclusive - rather, it lacks the differentiating national. l;hey had to negotiate with the morenation-space. More precisely, this vulnerabi-
principles which would enable boundaries to immediate and localised sense of social spacelity colisisted in the failure to articulate this
be drawn. Given that the nation was visualised in the form of several 'sons of the soil' ahstract space to more personalised concrete
as a community olf patriotic producers, the movements (cspecially around public sector places: heterotopias like the steel plant could
Nehruvian nation-space could identify as jobs), as well as movements projecting not also project a sufticiently intimate rela-
'other' only the non-worker (i e. the shirker)
assertive regional identities that refused any tionship with particular individuals. The
or the non-national - the major axis of exclu-
longer to dissolve easily into the national. As overall strategy of the hindu right today thus
sion was directed outward across the national the hegemony of Nehruvianism crumbled, involves an eflort to rekindle a personalised
borders.'" By contrast, Hindutva claimed a the nation-space became increasingly commitment to particular places that are
nation-space where the major axis of cxclu- vulnerable to contestations, especially since nevertheless embeddcd within the abstract
sion is turned inwards: it is the 'internal' neither the official notion of secularism nor social space of hindutva. If the Nehruvian
others who arouse anxicty. the particularimageof the national community nation-space privileged the universal, abstract
The other side of the inclusiveness of theassociated with Nehru had strong local space of secular-modern development,
Nehruvian nation-space was an elitisin that hindutva attempts to elevate as universal the
roots. As the dream of egalitarian economic
operatedl in anl universialistic (rather thain
developmentl became more and more impla-p;articularised relationship of 'Hindus' to
p)articularistic) mode. The Nehrulvian era usible, new ways of vis;ualising the nationl-specilic conc:rete placesi.
created and p)rivileged a p)an-lndiaii elite that
.spa3ce began to compete for control of the Why hals hinidutval rejuvenated itselfdur inl
could. by anld large. afflordl to cutl looseC its
ideological high ground within civil siociety. the 1980(s alnd the 1990)(s in pairticulair?. Palr

Economic and Political Weekly December 16, 1995 3223

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of the ncative side of the explanationi. as aI m*quc".? Within the implacable logic of middle classes IBasu et al 1993]. And as
suggested in the previous section, is to 'Mandir
be wahin banayenge', construction has Tanika Sarkar in her valuable study of the
foind in the erosion of the foundations of always becil subordinated to demolition. This Rashtra Sevika Samiti has found, the women's
Nehruvianismn. Perilaps one of the reasonis is amply orne out by the present situation, wing of the RSS, even more than its male
on the positive side has to do with the where the campaigns to 'reclaim' mosques counterpart. emphasises the importance ot
creation and development of the commu- in Kashi and Mathura are being heated up low-key but unrelenting ideological work in
nications network. Initially established as while the programme to build the temple at the immediate social vicinity of its cadres: the
the Babri masjid site in Ayodhya is allowed
part of the Nehruvianl schl-eme to spread the intimate and intensely particular spaces of
message of' national developnlent. radio to go cold. domesticity and the ftamily [Sarkar 1991 1. In
and especially television have undergone It is importalt to emphasise that though the keeping with this philosophy, the prominent
radical changes in the decades since Nehru. strategy ol'the site is based on essences. there ideoloaue and general secretary of the Bhartiya
The dramatic cxpansion of television broad- is nothing essential about the strategy itself: Janiata Party, K N Govindacharya seems to
castingt in the 1980s (with the 1982 Asian it can be replicated quite easily in other places. he almost obsessed with the locality and
Games held in Delhi as the springboard) This is, ol course, proved by the extension neighbourhood as the proper sphere for
creaited for the lirst time in Indian history, political negotiation and action:
of'the Ayodhya strategy to other temple towins.
a naitionial netwoik organised aroLind a But a more important illustration is provided We need to have more and more interaction,
mediumii vastly more powerful than either by the tlag hoisting controversy at Hubli, in an open and cordial atmosphere, between
print or radio.'" which is apparently a secular-nationalist issue. all the people, Hindus and Muslims, r esiding
Frederik Barth has suggested thatculturally In spatial-strategic terms, however, the logic in a particulair loc-alitv. This dialogue must
detinedgroups, likeethnicorreligiousgroups, is the same: the insistence on a particular site; take place between the people of the locality
themselves. directly, not through the self-
also constitute a 'field of cominunication' the adamant refusal to negotiate; and the
proclaimed political leaders of onecommunity
[Barth 19691. The expansion of television andsystematic setting up of a zero-sum structure.
or the other...
especially the hiistoric 'Ramayanna' teleserial The Idgah Maidan at Hubli thus represents It is at that level that the question of how to
can be said to hlve achilevedtthis for the Hindua transposition of the Ayodhya strategy into live together while respecting the sentiments
right. Of course. there was nothing a different context: city rather than small of others can be meaningfully discussed. It is
predetermined about this. in the sense that it town; a localised rather than a generalised at that level that ways may be found to get
was hardly a conspiracy. On the other hand, urban middle class; south rather than north; over the current competitive assertions of
the specitic consequences of this teleserial, a national rather than religious flavour to the religion, resulting in the Namaz spilling over
which invited a vasi hithet-o un-addressed issue. The interesting corollary to the issue on the streets, and the Maha-aartis coming up
'in reaction. A dialogue at the level of the
audience t(o eilter inlto a larticular sort ofis that it is muslim religious identity that is
neighboccrhoIood anid the district alone can
narrative contract' I Kaviraj 19921 cannot herelentlessly highligilted while the hindu right
provide solutions to such problems. Only by
exaggerated. In a very concrete sense, the tries to cloak itself in the secular colours of
thinking together at the neighbour-hood and
religious teleserials of the 1980s prepared the
patriotism. the local levels shall we learn to think in
ground for the hindutva movement, as its unison, ascomponentparuts ofthe whole Indian
AREAS 01: INTIMACY: LocAtHTIES AND
leaders havc themselves acknowledged nation [Govindacharya 1993:22; emphasis
NEIGH IBOURI (X)DS
IRajagopal 1994]. By conlstiruicting a new, added].1I
potent and abstraict social-space mediatedUnlike
by the site-based strategy which The significance of the locality as a
the televisioni screen. lhey malde concrete the an abstract, universal essence
involves heterotopia is not only in terms of what it is
possibility of revivi nt Savarkar' s 'punyabhoo'
embedded in the site, the spatial strategy able to achieve within its own spatial limits,
miodel of the nation-space. based on the 'neighbourhood' emphasises the but rather in the possibilities it creates for
These rather cryptic as.sertions; can be everyday tamiliarity of the site in all its spatial
inserting such localities into a larger grid of
best clarifiedl through a more concrete concreteness. In other words, the status of ideological dissemination and political action.
discussion of'the specific spatial strategies
Ayodhyaas the birthplaceof Ram is an abstract
Thus, the neighbourhood acts as a sort of
and universal one; it is equally sacred for all
of hindutva. There are ast lea1st three distinct modular unit which, though it is crucially
kinds of heterotopiasi that hindutva has hindus - those who happen to reside in dependent on its particular location in social
attempted to construct in our recent history, Ayodhya are not necessarily privileged over space, can nevertheless provide the ideological
tho.se centred on placees. areas, and routes. those living elsewhere. But the strategy based context for the production and reproduction
on the neighbourhood emphasises the intimate of world views as well as properly
PLACES OF ESSENCE: SACRED SITES
relationship of local residents (neighbours) to indoctrinated workers for the hindutva caus
The strateLv hased on the 'site' is mnost their surroundings: this strategy privileges Especially when considered in conjunction
obviously exemnplified by the campaign forthose who actually live in the particular space with the other two kinds of heterotopias,
the 'liberation' of Rain Janmabhoomi. This that is to be turned into a heterotopia. The namely the site and the route, these localities
strategy involves stru;,,les around/for asacred neighbourhood is redefined as a threatened and neighbourhoods are the locations which
space - a besieged haven - that must be
.spot that caln be turnedl into an arena of contest help make the other two strategies possible.
with the 'other'. The very 'unreasonableness'protected against the 'other'. If the 'other' is It is localities and neighbourhoods which
of essentialism becomes a weapon designed present in close physical proximity, i e, if supply the holy bricks, and the kar sevaks that
to humiliate the other in a game pre-designated the locality is a mixed hindu-non-hindu one, are then transported to a particular site; they
to be zero-sum - it 'we' are to win, then 'they' the threat can be very easily simulated; if are also the points along the route of a
must lose; if we do not win, then they will. the 'other' happens to be absent from the procession or yatra.
locality, it is nevertheless portrayed as a
The whole point is to seek siites of confrontation
ROUTES OF SYNERGY: PROCESSIONS AND
threatened idyll permanently in danger of
where faith meets faith in a tight to the tinish.
PILGRIMAGES
One cannot help feelinig that the Janmabhoomiinvasion.
controversy (and the numberless; Kashis and As is well known, hindu right wing Finally, the strategy based on the model of
organisations, especially the RSS. have tra-
M athuras that ar e said to be ' waiti ng ' ) emergedl the 'pilgrimage' attempts to string together
out of a search for an answer to the question:
ditionally based themselves on the social and multiply the effect of many particular
Where can a tenple e built only by destroyinggeography of the urban middle and lower places by joining them into the 'route' of a

3224 Economic and Political Weekly December 16, 1995

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goal-directed journey. This 'dotted line effect' counter-tendencies at work within the broad enforced 'portability' ol' all lorms ol' social
cets the best of two worlds. Each 'dot' along rubric of hindutva, and do little more than lifethatcapital takes hold of. Anthony Giddens
the way remains a small town and yet can mention them. has suggested an awkward but accurate phrase
participate in something on a 'national' scale.The first, somewhat paradoxical. case is to summarise this aspect olf the impact of
Thus, it takes advantage of the strong sense that of the strategy of the site itself. The veryglobalisation - 'the disembedding of social
ot involvement and experiential energy that success of this strategy, when coupled with relations'. This is the process rendered familiar
can be generated in a localised setting, but by the literature on the 'restructuring of
the fact that an indefinite number of such sites
without sacrificing the ideological economies is believed to exist. undermines the emphasis capital'. 'flexible accummulationi' and 'post-
of scale. Most obviously visible in the various on particularity. One, two or a few sacred Fordism'.2 Industries turn nomadic in the
yatras undertaken by BJP leaders - Advani's spots may depend on particularity, but when search for the most profitable location;
rath yatra, Joshi's Kanyakumari to Kashmir the number swells to a few thousand, and production processes are broken up and
yatra. and more recently the 'jana aadesh' nobody is either willing or able to put a subcontracted globally; innovations in
specified limittothisnumber.thenthisstrategy
yatra from tourdifferentcorners ofthe country. telecommunications enable certain industries
The concept of a yatra enables the invocation turns into its opposite."' There is little to (like computer software) to engage in 'space-
of a certain spatial sense of the power and distinguish it from the invocation of less' production, i e, without a single, specific
persuasive sweep of an ideology. While this generalised (non-specific) spaces by (say)spatial
the location in the conventional sense.
particulartactic is hardly new in Indian politics, rhetoric of globalisation. (Satellite links enable software engineers
the Saingh Parivar has been its most effective The second, and perhaps more important located in far-flung corners of the globe to
exponent in recent times. example is that of what might be called participate simultaneously in production,
One can also add to this the role played by 'non-resident hindutva'. The 1993 meet while the product itself exists only in the
processions in mohilising communal support held in Washington (called 'Global Vision 'cyberspace' of electronic storage devices.)
in urban centres and snmall towns. The case 2000') by the VHP provides an obvious The basic outcome of such a conquest of
ol the Ganesh Utsav in Hyderabad is a well instance where two versions of hindutva, space is a profound indifference towards its
known example of exploiting the dynamic one asserting the 'portability' and the other specificities. Thus, the spatial consequences
properties of the procession in creating the 'immoveability' of its essence, collide. of the economic logic of contemporary
To say that they collide may already be an
powerful synergies of an oppositional nature. capitalism include the dilution of nation-
Processions of this kind simultaneously exaggeration today, when the globalised specific production into a more anonymous
achieve the ends of uniting one's own side world is witness to more and more such globalised process [Deshpande 1 993bl.
as well as the antagonists', thus ensuring, in ongoing negotiations between the local and However, recent research has also demon-
an almost automatic fashion, the success of the globalised faces of ethnicity [Appadurai strated that the alleged conquest of space is
political mobilisation [Naidu 1992]. In terms 1991; Anderson 1992]. far from complete and is in any case a rather
ol the kind ot people who are needed to create uneven and contradictory process. These
GLOBALISATION AND HINDUTVA
and to sustain such mobile heterotopias, this researches build on the insight reported more
strategy is a mix of the previous two in that Among the most powerful competitors of than two decades ago by Deleuze and Guattari:
both 'locals' as well as 'outsiders' can be hindutva for the status of major engine of Civilised modern societies are defined by
involved in making a yatra or a procession contemporary social change is 'globalisation'. processes of decoding and deterritorialisation.
successful. Broadly speaking, globalisation appears to But what they deterritorialise with one hand,
What it means to characterise the spatial pursue the contrary tendency: it tends to t/iey rete-rritorialise with the other [Deleuze
aspects of hindutva as being based on the undermine the particularity of places and to and Guattari 1977:257, original emphasis].
primacy of the particular should now be subordinate them to a universalised logic. The process of reterritorialisation that
somewhat clearer. Eacih of the strategies Every specific place is compared to -or accompanies deterritorialisation takes many
outlined above seeks to create particulair kinds
commensurated with - a global norm. forms, but two are especially common. First,
ol heterotopias: spaces which function as Edward Said has named the orientalist ver- there is the simple refusal of archaic territorial
idleologicali min-ors to allow particular political
sion of this levelling process as 'moral com- entities to go away, and, indeed, an increase
subjects to recognise themselves in the identity
mensuration'. This is a process whereby in their mass appeal. An excellent example
tha they seem to offer. Such heterotopiaswesternare metropolitan places come to have "a is the nation, which, in defiance of marxist
generally dependent on the invocation of kind of export value: whatever is good or bad (and non-marxist) economic expectations
pairticular places - specific, physically identi-
about places at home is shipped out and regarding the erosion of national identities,
l-iable sacred spots, localities or neighbour- assigned comparable virtue or vice abroad" continues to command the often fanatical
hoods, and 'dots' along the route to a goal. [Said 1993:79]. One can, I think, conceive loyalty of large numbers.22 The second, more
Despite this, however, hindutva manages to of acontemporaryequiyalentforglobalisation, complex form of reterritorialisation can be
reap the economies of ideological scale by where the movement is usually (but not al- considered to be an integral part of the
lever-agingtheseheterotopiastoobtain alarger- ways) in the reverse direction: non-western process of globalisation itself. namely the
than-additive synergistic effect. (third world) places are compared to some cultivation and deepening of spatial
western norm-place, and valorised, or given specificity, but within a framework where
IV a modified ideological meaning, through this this is subordinated to the overall logic of
Contrary Tendencies and comparison." In effect, this kind of moral globalisation. An obvious example here is
Preliminary Prognoses commensuration 'equalises' places and seeks the tourism industry, which fosters and even
to underplay differences rather than to accen- invents specificity as 'authentic exoticism'.
The above discussion of the spatial strat- tuate them. but only in order to offer these exotica in a
egies of hindutva no doubt seems too neat and More generally, theoretical prognoses of domesticated, pre-packaged form to the global
smooth because it has not taken account of the development of capitalism from Marx consumers of cultural difference, or affluent
the countervailing tendencies and the other onwards have pointed to the universalising tourists.2'
extraneous forces which form theoverall social tendencies of capital. In spatial terms, this This latter tendency has occupied the
context within which hindutva must operate. expresses itself in the process of de- attention of soci al reseairchers tryi ng to account
I will mention here only two of the significant territorialisation, that is, the uprooting and for the striking fact that globalisation is

Economic and Political Weekly De'.mber 16, 1995 3225

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aiccomiipanied by the growth ot particularistic which forined the basis of a leclure given hy all subseqtuen1t quotat ions anid pagc relerel. Ces.
cultural idenltities ot all kinds. Across the Fouca;ult in 1967. This manuscript was "not are from the English translation in this edition
reviewe(i tor publication by the author aind [Savarkar 19641.
glohc today. whalt inay be termnsed 'esseintial ist'
[is] thus not part of the ofticial corpus of his 9 "The word Sindhu in Sanskrit does not only
cultural identities - based on religTion, ethnicity.
work". I imienitioni this only to underline the miean the Induis but also the sea - sainudrar-ashna
nationality. lantuate, or region - are enjoying
tact that this text does not carry the theoretical which girdles the southern peninsula - so thal
an unprecedented revival even as the lrocesses authority that other finished works might. this one word Sindhu points out almiost all
ot olobalisation are simuiltaneously intensitied. Moreover, I ani also takin,g considerable the frontiers of our land at a single stroke
It has been tempting. therefore, to speculate interpretive .iberties with it. [Savarkar 1964:201.
on ai possible catusai link betweeni the two 4 Foucault's use o't he minior iietalphor may be10 It may be interesting - though this must be
processes, leading to the broaid thesis that helptul in clarifying the relationship between examined further keeping in mind the
the utopia and the heterotopia: vagaries oftranslation and the seinanticcontext
globalisation produces a sort of 'identity
The imirror is, after all. a utopia, since it is of the Marathi original. something which I
anxiety' thai individuals and groups seek to
a placeless place. In time mirror, I see have been unable to doi as yet - that Savarkar
redrcss through tlle reassertioni of parti- miiyself'there where I amii not. in an unreal. appears to consistenitly prefer the terimi
Culalr-istic ideintities. Economilc oloballisim virtual space that opens up behind the 'fatherlanid to 'motherland despite the
produces - indeed, even requires - cultural surlface... But it is also a heterolopia insofar continue(d (thotugih sporadic) mention of the
pa.rochiialismii a., its owin ainltidole and as the mirror does exist in reality. where it latter word.
precondition. Religion is particularly exerts a sort of counteractionl on the II Unlike in the case of 'pitrahhoo' and
position that I occupy.. ...[[lt imakes this 'matrabh;,o'.- Savarka;r seemiis to have used
relevaint in thi.s context, as demonstrated by
place that I occupy at the imoiment when I soMe inierpretive licence herc (and this is
the reinarkable revitalisaf ion of Catholic.
look at imyself in the glass at once probably not a matter ol translation) for he uses
Protestant. Jewish. Islaijic. Hindu and
absolutely real. connected with all the the word 'blood' to eani 'jali' usually translated
Buddhist fundametilalismiiis ot vairious space that surrotmnds it. and absolutely as caste. His argumient is that 'Hindus' are all
kiinds in widely differing local milicux unrel,l.since inordertobeh perceised it has of one caste anid (therefore)of'one blood because
[Beyer 19901. to pass through this virtual point which is of the frequency of anuloma and pratiloina (i c,
Returning theni. to the basic themie of thisover there [Foucault 1986:241. inter-caste) immarriages over the cenitutices and
essiay, it is more than plausible to theorise5 the
To say this, however, is not to assume ain even milleninia. It is interesting to comilpare
unbroken continuity with the past, nor to Savarkar's criteria with Schineider's comiiients
conltemporary rise of hindutva as a more or
insist on a disciontiniuous present. Rather. on the parallels between kinship by blood and
less necessary byproduct of the process of
such an attenitiveniess to the "history of the miarriage versus nationality by birth and
glohalisation. At the same time (as I have tried present" is indispensable when the object of
naturalisation [Schneider 1976:2 15-16].
to airtue above). the two are also mutuailly enquiry is ideological, since no ideology 12 While this is something that needs to be
contradictory. It seems ditlicuilt in sucih a ever starts with a clean slate but selectively taken up in greaiter detail as a sepairate
context to ha/ard ticesses about the futurc. builds on (or disinantles) already existing disctission, it im;ay be worthwhile to note in
However, it may be uselul to keep in mind formations. Even coompletely new cleientis passing that these spatial strategies raise doubts
take on their ineaning and produce their about the viabilitv of Partha Chatterjee's
these two sets ot relations - the one comniple-
eftects only in conjunction aind/or distinction between the 'inner' and the 'outer'
mXenitatrv and the other contradictorv - ra-thier
juxtaposition with older eleiments. realimis. He has sLiggested that this distinction,
than aniy unidimiiensioalill conceptioIn ol tlheil
6 Jawaharlal Nehru is a good exainple. as several
a;nd its transposition into the spritual/material
reciprocal involvemlcnt. Perhaps tlhis is tlhe passages fromil his Awitobrioga/i)hy or i/Ic dichotom)y. was the characterlice f'eature of
limited insighit that social theory can offer. I)iscoverv fh Iidma attest. Indian nationali.sim. This enabled Indian
even as we await, a.nd try to work towards, 7 PIatiha Chatterjee's well known accotint, for nationalist discouir.se to acknowledge the
tile emcere-ence of different. ilmore enabling, examl)le, constructs the 'ioinent of undeniable domiiianice of the west in the outer/
(lepairture of Indian nationalist discourse in
imalterial realim,. while similultaneously reserving
atriCUlat(tions ()I the tWO 1rOCessCS.
terins of the Bankimn imodel: modern the inner/spiritual donmain as its "stwereign
Notes (we.stern) science and technology plus tet-i-itO ", I Chatjee I 1993:6. einpha.sis added;
traditional (Indian) dharina anid culture see also Chaltte 'ee: 199)61.
1Trhis paper is part of i.il onooing project on the
[Chatterjee 19861. However, such ani analysis caninot
relatiOlns aml0ong1 hinduitva.l lobalisation. and
8 1 a;m (eliberately avoidinlg an extetnded acconomimodate Savarkar's spatial strategies,
CoM.cptions of the Indian nallion. )itferent palts
disciussion of the various views on the nattire which do not necessarily restrict the sphere of
;id versions ol this argument have been presented
and sources of communalism, and will nationalisimn or spirituality to the 'inner' realin.
n the panel on Religion. Region and Nationl at the
provide only a minimalist working definition; Moreover, this directly contradicts important
XXtih All Indial Sociological Coonfercnce.
for the purposes of this essay, cominunalisin nationallist-coimniii;ilist initiatives (which I
Mangalore. l)ecember 1993: at the interinational
involves both (a) the pursuit of political have been unable to oliscuss here) like that of B
scminar on The Third Worl(d City: Emerging
goals through the open or hidden appeal to G Tilak, who politicised the 'Ganesh Utsav'
Scenarios'organiscd bhy the Centre tir Area Studies.
religious seintimnent anid/or identities: and and transtorimed it from the household festival
OsimianiaL 'niversity. Hyd(lcrkalbd in Februmary 1994:
(b) the exploitation of this sentimnent to (which it traditionally was) into a public affair
an(l the baianna,l,ti Stubalterni Studies Conference
exclude other religious groups and to involving ten days of' collective celebrations
hosted by the International Centrc lor Ethnic
cultivate hostility towards them. Let me also climaxed by an immersion procession [see
Studies. Colomilbo in June 1995. Helpfuil comniiients
make it clear that though I will discuss only Cohn (1987:125-26) lor a brief discussion of
front members of thea udienic at thesc vciucus are
Hindu commiunalisin. this shold not be taken Tilak, and Devji ( 1 994) for a differenit view on
-ratutullv ackniowledgc(l.
to imply that I believe it to he the only kinid the spatial dynaminics of gender and Musliml
I Tliclhe-praequotcd(l orimsthcsuibtilleofElwar-d existing. Finially, becatise it offers so religious idntlity in colonial India; sce also
Sota s book (1989). soine other works that striking an instance of a conscious spatialSectioni 1III.
ireat social space in ani ininiovative way inlcitide strategy. I amin restricting miiyself here
13to
1 a
have discussedthisthemiieat lengthelsewhere:
Lcetbvvre (I 99 I ). Botirdic I 984). I)e Cemlcau single work by a single author, 'Swatanmrayay
see D)eshpande ( I 993a) for the centrality of the
1984). Ttuani ( 1'977). Sack t 986). an(d Harvey Veer' V I) Savarkar anid his pamilphlet. ideology of economnic developimient for Indian
(1989). Hi,,ditua . This pamphlet i-s contained in niatioinalisin.
2 For (ifferent perspect ives on1 thesc aind related voluime VI ('Hindu Rashtra l)arshan' ) of lthe 14 See l)eshpande (I 993b) for an exienided
issuecs. see. lor example. And(lerson (199 1). .SanJipi/}iin a So iorkorEA / W..ong, In! o . t he trealtment oft(his aInd rllalted themelts 'oncerningo
Similth (1986) and Wallcrstcin and Ballihar collected3 work.s of Savarkar, publisihed (and( the princvipall ideologic:al tuodets oftheec:onomiy
(d99I). partially trasnslalted into English from the in 't)th century Indlia.
1 The particular source Ir-oiui where I am Marathi) by the Maharashtra Prantik Hindu I 5 Letlo lc Ilarify at1 the outset thatl. ulnlike' in the
borroweAX is the ilrauslamed text of' the inotes .Sabhal in 1964. Unles.s otherwisie .specified, prervious section where I wa.s referrin" tlo

3'22 Economic and Polifical Weekly December 16. 19)')

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 the term that Savarkar employed (which is 22 It is, of course, one of the better known Devji, Faisal Fatehali (1994): 'Gender and the
why I had retained his capitalisationi of ironies of the late 20th century that it is Politics of Space: the Movement for Women
'Hindutva'), in this section I amn using the precisely in the former socialist states Reform, 1857-1900' in Zoya Hasan (ed), For .
lower-case term 'hindutva' iu a contemnporary that parochial nationalism has taken its ing Identities: Gender, Commnunities and the
and rather broad sense as an abbreviation for most virulent form. One must rememiiber, State. Kali for Women. New Delhi.
both the general ideology associated with, and however, that the Communist Manifestlo Driver, F (1985): Power, Space and the Body: A
the socio-political movement led by, the neo- acknowledges (by implication) the longevity Critical Assessment of Foucault's Disciplinie
Hindu right-wing grouping crystallised of the natioti-form when it visualises each an)d Puniish' in Envir-onnienit anid Plaintig D:
around the so-called 'Sangh parivar'. natinitl working class tackling its own Society antud Space, Vol 3, No 4.
[Compare Basu et al (1993:1, fn), who use bourgeoisie. before it is possible for the Dumont, Louis (1980): Honeo HieraJr-chIicus, Uni-
the term hindutva "not in the senise of workers of the world to unite. See also versity of Chicago Press, Chicago.
Hinduism, but to indicate the conteinporary Anderson (1992) for a brief discussion of Featherstone, Mike (ed) (1990): Glob(l Culture:
cotmnunal organisations and movemiients that some ol the contradictory tendencies fostered National ism, Globailisation (nd Moder-
use this banner".] This is obviously an by globalisation. nitv, Sage, London.
imprecise definition in that it does not 23 For a rich variety of perspectives on this set Foucault, Michel (1986): 'Of Other Spaces',
recognise the many distinct (and sometimnes of issues, see the articles in the volume unrevised text of a lecture given in March 1967
contrary) tendencies contained within the edited by Mike Featherstone (1990), (translated by Jay Miskowiec) in Diacritics,
same overall phenomenon. However, I especially those by Robertson, Wallerstein, Spring Number.
believe that this rough definition (like that Smith.
of Arnason, Hannerz, Appadurai, and Govindacharya, K N (1993): 'Ayodhya and the
comnmiiunlalism above) will suffice for the Beyer. Future India', Blitz Weekly, December 3, 1993.
purposes of this essay, especially since the Harvey, David ( 1989): The Cotiditiont of
argument is still at an exploratory stage. References Postntioderniity, Blackwell, Oxford.
Moreo-wer, when speaking of the overall Kavimj, Sudipta (1990): 'Capitalism and the Cul-
spatial character anld the particular spatial Andersqp, Benedict (1991): Imagined Corm- tural Process', Journ-bal of Arts angd Ideais, No
strategies adopted by hindutva', I am munfties, 2nd edition, Verso, London. 19, May.
speaking of the ideological effects pertaining (1992: 'The New World Disorder' in New Left - (1992): 'The Imaginary Institution of India' in P
to social space that are being produced Review, No 196. Chatterjee and G Pandey (eds), Subailtermi Stud-
through the logic of hindutva as a socio- Appadurai, Arjun (1990): 'Disjuncture and ies VII, Oxford University Press, Delhi.
political force operating in the contemporary Difference in the Global Cultural Economy' in
Lefebvre, Henri ( 199 1): The Production o Sp)ace
context. I do not meani to imply, wheni Mike Featherstone (ed), Global Culture: (translated by D Nicholsonl-Smiith), Blackwell,
referring to thesc ideological effects, that Nationulism, Globalisation and Moderntitv, Oxford.
they are necessarily intended or consciously Sage, London. Naidu, Ratna (1992): Old Cities, New Predica-
strategised by identifiable individuals or Barth, Frederik ( 1969): 'Introduction' in Frederik inents, Sage, New Delhi.
groups - but I do not rule out this possibility Barth (ed), Ethnic GCroups an1zd Boundaries: Nehru, Jawaharlal ( 1946): The Di.sco-ery (fhiidia,
either. In short, while the coherence of The Social Or,ganisation of Cultural Differ- John Day, New York.
hindutva is to be sought in terms of effects ence, George Allen and Unwin, London. - (1985): Ant Autobiography)l, Oxford University
rather than intentions, the co-presence of Basu, Tapan et al (1993): Khaki Shorts Saffiron Press, Delhi.
both is a matter for empirical investigation Flags, Tracts fir the Timnes, No 1, Orient Rajadhyaksha, Ashish (1990): 'Beaming Messages
rather than theoretical prejudice. Longman, New Delhi. to the Nationl, JouIrIInl ot'Arts aind Idea.s, No
16 For suggestive discussions of this crucial Beyer, PeterF( 1990): 'Privatisation and the Public 19, May.
episode in the cultural-politics of contemnporaryInfluence of Religion in Global Society' in Rajagopal, Arvind (1993): 'The Rise of National
India, see Rajadhyaksha (1990) and Rajagopal Mike Featherstone (ed), Global Culture: Na- Programming: The Case otilindian Television',
(1993). tionalism, Globalisation and Modernnity, Sage. Media, Culture, atind Society, January.
17 Arvind Rajagopal has suggested that the theme London. - (1994): 'Ram Janimabhoomi, Consumer
of a birthplace has special spatial and Bourdieu, Pierre (1984): Distinctiont: A Social Identity, and Image-Based Politics', Economtic
psychological significance: "There is a promise
Critique (o the Judgmenit of Ta.ste (translated an1dPolitic(al Weekly, Vol XXIX, No 27,July 2.
here of regaining a primordial oneness with the
by Richard Nice), Harvard University Press, Sack, Robert David ( 1986): Huinotn Territoriality
self, of reconciling the divisions within the Cambridge
self and Massachusetts. Its Tlheoy anid History, Cambridge University
in the unity of the self-evident location" Chandra, Bipan (1984): Communialism in Press, Cambridge.
[Rajagopal 1994:1662]. Modern India, Vikas, New Delhi. Said, Edward (1993): Culture and Imperialism,
18 Unfortunately, I have as yet been unable to gain
Chatterjee, Partha(1986): NationalistThoughltand Alfred Knopf, New York.
access to a copy of Govindacharya's book and the Coloni(ll Wor ld: A Derivative Discourse, Sarkar, Tanika (1991): 'Woman as Cominunal
so have relied on extensive extracts published Zed Books, London. Subject: Rashtrasevika Samiti and Rain
in Blitz magazine of Decemntber 3, 1993, as an (1994): The Nationi and Its Fragments: C6oloniil Jan nabhooini Moveinent', Economic atid Po-
anniversary issue commemorating the and Postcoloniil Histories, Oxford University litical WeeklY, Vol 26, No 35, August 31.
destruction ot the Babri masjid. These Press, Delhi. Savarkar, V D (1964): Samtagra Saiarkar
quotations are from this extract. Cohn, Bernard ( 1987): Ani Anithropologist (amnongt Wanmv,}sbay. Vol 6, Maharashtra Prantik Hindu
19 Vishwa Hindu Parishad and other like-minded the Historians and Other Essaxvs, Oxford Uni- Sabha, Poona.
organisations have otten claimed such figures versity Press, Delhi. Schneider, David (1976): 'Notes towards a Theory
- sometimnes in the thousanids - of allegedly De Certeau. Michel ( 1984): 7The Practice of Ev,ery- of Culture' in Basso, K and H Selby (eds),
desecrated Hindu temlples awaiting 'liberation'. da- Lifr, (tranislated by Steven F Rendall), Meaninig in Anthropology, University of New
20) As an examiiple, one cain cite a well known University of California Press, Berkeley. Mexico Press.
series of advertisemiients for the Tata group Deleuze, Gi1le6 and Felix Guattari (1977): A,mti- Smith, Anthony D (1986): The Erlhic Origings of
of companies which is built aroun(d the Oedip)us: Capitalisin anld Schizophrenia, Nattions, Blackwell, Oxford.
strategy of comparing places and things Viking Press, New York. Soja, Edward (1989): Postmodernii Geographies:
Indian to their global counterparts: Boinbay Deshpande. Satish (1993a): 'Ethos, Economy and 7he Reassertion of Space it Social 7heory.
is compared to Beijing or New York, an the Postcoloniial Nation', paper presented at Verso, London.
Indian steel plant is compared to a German the international conference on 'Democracy. Tuani, Yi-Fu (1977): Space and Place: Th7e Per-
one, and so on. This is the opposite of the Ethnicity and Development in South and South- spective (if Experience University of Minne-
essentialisation that is an integral part of the East Asia', International Centre for Ethnic sota Press. Minneapolis.
spatial strategy of hindutva. Studies. Colomnbo. Vanaik, Achin ( 1993): India: Thie Painfid Traust -
21 For an overview of this literature, see Harvey - (1993b): 'Imagined Economies: Styles of tioni, Verso, London.
( 1989), especially part 11, Chapters 7- IlI. 'The Nation Building in Twentieth Century Wallerstein, Iminnanuel anidEtiennle Balibar( 1991 ):
political-economic transformation of late 20)th India' Journazl of Arts and Idea.s, Nos 25-26,
Ralce, Naltion1, Cklass: Amnbiguous idlentities,
century capitalism'. Decemlber. Verso, London.

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