MODULE 14:    THE INDO BRITISH (c. 1757 - 1947)

INTRODUCTORY COMMENTS: 

From one perspective, it should perhaps be pointed out that in an important sense the coming of the British was simply more of the same of what had been happening for many of the preceding centuries.  That is, to the extent that the Islamic civilization that came to India via the Turko-Afghans of the Delhi Sultanates and the Mughal dynasty was that of the cosmopolitan 'Abbasid Caliphate which was itself the heir of the great pre-modern Mediterranean and Middle Eastern civilizations (the heritage, in other words, of the Jewish, Christian, Hellenistic, Byzantine and Sasanian traditions), the coming of the British represented many of those same Mediterranean and Middle Eastern traditions, only now in their incipient modern forms as manifested in the emerging  nation-states of western Europe.

Apart from the many obvious differences between Islamic civilization and modern western civilization, there are nevertheless some significant family resemblances in that both civilizations are products of the peculiar marriage in the first millennium of the Common Era of classical Greco-Roman Mediterranean traditions with the great West Asian Jewish, Iranian, Christian and Islamic religious traditions.  Put somewhat differently, just as there are important family resemblances between what we have called the Indus Valley, the Indo-Brahmanical, the Indo-Shramanical and the Indic, so there are some interesting family resemblances on a deep-structural, valuational level between the Indo-Islamic and the Indo-British.  This is why we refer to both the Indo-Islamic and the Indo-British as "New Indic" traditions in contrast to the "Old Indic." 

THE COMING OF EUROPEAN TRADITIONS AND IDEAS

From another perspective, of course, the profound material and socio-economic differences between pre-modern Islamic civilization and early (sixteenth, seventeenth and eighteenth century) modern western European civilization greatly overshadow whatever valuational family resemblances there are between pre-modern and modern social reality.  The term "renaissance" (literally "re-birth"), to be sure, stresses perhaps the valuational family resemblance, but the socio-economic, political and ideological  transformations that occurred in Europe as a result of the Renaissance, the Protestant Reformation, early industrializing technology, Enlightenment ideology, mercantile trade and colonial exploration brought about fundamental changes that mark a clear departure and radical discontinuity with what had occurred before.

The contrast is clear and striking on the subcontinent.  The earlier encounter, beginning in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, between the older Indic (Hindu-Buddhist-Jain) and the cosmopolitan Islamic had given  rise to the Indo-Islamic pre-modern Perso-Arabic-cum-Rajput-Hindu socio-economic reality and cultural idiom (largely in the medium of Persian) of military force, imperial pretensions to an all-India polity (at least under the Mughals) in a context still largely driven by regional powers and loyalities (for example, the Marathas in the West or the Sikhs in the Punjab), Islamic ideologies of various kinds (both polemic and irenic), largely defensive and reactionary traditional Hindu strategies, and Hindu-cum-Muslim (Sufi) bhakti traditions.  

The modern encounter, in contrast, beginning already to some extent in the seventeenth century and becoming of great importance in the later eighteenth century and after, between the older Indic (Hindu-Buddhist-Jain) and early modern western civilization in its primarily British form gave rise to the Indo-Anglian modern British socio-economic reality and cultural idiom (largely in the new medium of English) of mercantile trade and investment, improved technology, a much more tightly controlled and bureaucratized pan-Indian social reality, Protestant Christian ideologies of various kinds (both polemic and irenic), and reformist Neo-Hindu traditions.

The encounter in the modern period, however, was not simply between the older Indic (Hindu-Buddhist-Jain) and the British, resulting in the emergence of an Indo-British tradition.  There is also the parallel encounter between the Indo-Islamic and the British, resulting in what might be called the Anglo-Islamic.  The former (the Indo-British), of course, results finally in the emergence of the modern, "secular" (and pan-Indian) nation-state of India, and the latter (the Anglo-Islamic) results, finally, in the modern nation-state, first, of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan (in 1947) and then eventually, in addition, the modern nation-state of the People's Republic of Bangladesh (in 1971).  

The former (the Indo-British destined to emerge as the modern Indian nation-state) can be traced in an intellectual line from Rammohun Roy (1772 - 1833) and continuing  through such reformist figures and movements as Keshub Chandra Sen, Swami Dayananda Sarasvati, Ramakrishna, Vivekananda, the founding of the Indian National Congress (in 1885), M. G. Ranade, Gokhale, Tilak, Savarkar, Rabindranath Tagore, Aurobindo and, finally, the consolidation of the nationalist movement under Gandhi and Nehru (the first Prime Minister of India).  

The latter (the Anglo-Islamic destined to become Pakistan and, then, eventually Bangladesh) represents an intellectual line, beginning with the founding of the Deoband school (near Delhi) in 1867 and the Anglo-Oriental College at Aligarh in 1877, and traceable also to the important work of the modernist thinker, Sayyid Ahmad Khan (18l7-98) and continuing through such figures and movements as Ahmad Riza Khan (founder of the conservative, anti-modernist Barelwi movement), the founding of the Muslim League (in 1906), the Khilafat movement (1919 - 1924), the founding of the Jami'at al-'ulama'-i Hind (the "Association of Indian Islamic Scholars," 1919),  Muhammad Iqbal (poet and proponent of a separate state for Muslims), Abul Kalam Azad (supporter of the Indian National Congress and proponent of Muslims remaining within India), Muhammad 'Ali Jinnah (the first Prime Minister of Pakistan), Muhammand Ilyas (founder of the reformist Tablighi Jama'at or "Missionary Society" in 1927) and Sayyid Abul 'Ala Maududi (founder of the conservative Jama'at-i-Islami  or "Islamic Society" in 1941).

Percival Spear in his book India, Pakistan and the West (London, 1958, pp. 177-191) mentions five responses in India to the coming of modernity: an early "military" response (among some of the regional polities), a "reactionary" response (the North Indian rebellion or so-called "Mutiny," 1857-58), an "acceptance" response (the radical westernizers), an "orthodox"-renewal response (religious reform and retrenchment), and, finally, what he calls the "solution of synthesis" (the attempt to synthesize traditional Indian thought , whether Indic or Islamic, with modern western thought).  The first four responses failed, according to Spear, and it was the "solution of synthesis," as represented primarily in the work of Rammohun Roy on the Indo-British side and the thought of Sayyid Ahmad Khan on the Anglo-Islamic side, that won the day, becoming  what Spear has called the "ideological secret of modern India."

Spear made these comments at the time of Independence in the late forties and fifties, and he was undoubtedly correct that the "solution of synthesis" was very much in evidence at that time in the emergence of modern India.  Such, however, was hardly the "ideological secret of modern India," as the decades since Independence have revealed.   The "solution of synthesis" was the "ideological secret" of only a tiny percentage of the population of modern India, and that in itself would appear to be the true "ideological secret of modern India" in the decades since Independence.  Only now as India has reached  fifty years of independence and beyond do we begin to see an "ideological secret of modern India" that is in any way representative of  larger segments of the population.

THE SPREAD OF BRITISH RULE

In any case, returning now to our historical discussion, although the Mughal dynasty survived until l858, in fact, by the middle of the eighteenth century it was a dynasty in name only and proved to be an easy mark for European traders and adventurers (Portugese, Dutch, French and British) who began to appear on the horizons of the subcontinent in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. 

Already in the early decades of the eighteenth century the Mughal empire was breaking up with local "nawabs" or "provincial governors" becoming de facto rulers in their areas, and it was the defeat of one of these, namely, Nawab Siraj-ud-daula of Bengal and his army of fifty thousand troops at the hands of Sir Robert Clive of the British East India Company (a commercial trading company  first founded in l600) with only eight hundred British troops and some two thousand "sepoys" ("native recruits" from the term "sipahi" meaning "policeman")(but with better weapons technology and modern military discipline and strategy) at the Battle of Plassey in l757 that is usually cited as the beginning of the modern period in the history of the subcontinent. 

At first, of course, the British had control of little more than what is now Calcutta and some surrounding  regions of Bengal and Bihar and the port areas around Madras and Bombay, and their interest in India was almost completely commercial.  Within a century, however, as a result of certain important military victories together with carefully crafted diplomatic alliances with the leaders of strategic regional polities, the British with only small numbers of troops controlled almost the whole of the subcontinent. 

Moreover, the British fundamentally changed the basic structures of Indian socio-economic, political and intellectual life.  The British built a bureaucratic structure which borrowed to some extent from the earlier Mughal model but which overall was a much more structured system of authority with British personnel in charge and in constant communication both at the top and at the local base of the social system.  Never before had there been such a well-crafted administrative structure operating on a largely pan-Indian level.  To be sure, there continued to be many local princely states, which were to survive all the way to the time of independence, but the princely states were carefully watched regional power centers very much under the influence of the pan-Indian British administrative system.

There was one attempt towards the end of the first century of British hegemony by Muslim and Hindu nationals to rid the subcontinent of British control by force: the North Indian rebellion of l857-58 (formerly referred to as the "Indian Mutiny").  The attempt failed, and the powerless Mughal "emperor," Bahadur Shah II, whose name and title was the symbolic rallying cry for the rebels, was exiled to Burma in l857 (where he died a year later).  His sons were all murdered by British officers, thus officially ending the Mughal dynasty in l858.

In addition to the end of the Mughal dynasty, however, the rebellion also brought about the end of the British East India Company.  A new Government of India Act was passed in l858 transferring all power and rights of the East India Company directly to the British crown, and on November l, l858 Queen Victoria promulgated an official Proclamation indicating that India was now part of the British empire.  Lord Canning, heretofore only Governor-General, was given the additional title of Viceroy.

With the British came, of course, as already mentioned, all of the forces of modernization, including the involvement of the subcontinent in the world economy, new patterns of education (at least in the main urban areas with the introduction of English education after l835), new bureaucratic and legal structures, new philosophical ideas such as humanism, liberal democracy, and enlightenment rationalism, and new religious ideas through the aggressive work of all sorts of Christian missionaries who were allowed to enter the country after l8l3. 

To some extent the British had great respect for India's rich cultural heritage, and from the eighteenth century onwards a tradition of British Orientalism emerged, beginning with such people as Sir William Jones (l746 - l794) and the founding of the College of Fort William in l800 by Lord Wellesley for training British civil servants, which encouraged serious research into India's cultural heritage and contributed greatly to the renaissance of learning that occurred among Indian intellectuals and artists throughout the nineteenth century and was important as well in encouraging the development of the first modern indigenous political structures in modern India.

At the same time, however, others among the British were highly critical of traditional Hindu and Muslim life, especially such practices as the treatment of women generally, widow-burning, child marriage and polygamy, female infanticide and untouchability, all of which practices had developed through the long centuries of Muslim domination and of tense interactions between Hindus and Muslims in which traditional customs on all sides had become in-grown, rigid and defensive.

As would be expected, reactions among Hindus, Muslims and other groups on the subcontinent to the encounters with modernity were complex and multidimensional, and we have already noted Percival Spear's enumeration of five kinds of responses.  Among high or forward-caste Hindus, who tended to be either "accepting" (westernizers) or followers of the "solution of synthesis," there was a rapid and positive response especially in urban centers such as Calcutta, Bombay and Madras to English education, government service and new economic opportunities.  A new all-India elite began to emerge, made up largely of these English-speaking "forward" or upper castes in such fields as modern trade, manufacturing, civil service, commercial agriculture and the newly emerging professions of law, journalism and education, and for the most part they readily accepted the new ideas of humanism, liberal democracy and enlightenment rationalism. 

These "synthesizers" and "westernizers" also tended to accept the critique of traditional Hindu and Muslim social life and the need for reform.  The members of this new elite began to put together the first indigenous political associations as those in Calcutta, Bombay and Madras in the l840s, the British Indian Association in l85l, the Indian Association of l876 and the Indian National Congress of l885.  The members of this new elite, in other words, who accepted the notions of humanism, liberal democracy and enlightenment rationalism became the vanguard for the nationalist movement which would eventually turn the new ideas of liberal democracy and enlightenment humanism against the very British rulers who had introduced the ideas in the first place.

In contrast to the positive assimilation of liberal humanism and enlightenment rationalism, there was widespread dislike of evangelical Christian missionizing.  While there was much appreciation for the social work of missionaries in such areas as education and health, and while many of the Neo-Hindu reformist groups, as we shall see, were quick to adopt the methods and techniques of evangelical Protestant Christian missionizing, there was very little positive response to Christian ideas except on the lowest social levels (untouchables, tribals, and so forth), and even today barely 2.5% of the population of India is Christian.  Moreover, even among the Christian population, the majority is Roman Catholic rather than evangelical Protestant.

To some extent, of course, older Hindu traditions remained defensive and in-grown as they had been in the preceding Indo-Islamic period.  These included such groups as the orthoprax caste-oriented ritual Hindu traditions of those middle and forward castes that did not accept westernization or the "solution of synthesis," the mendicants of the various monastic orders, and the followers of the popular bhakti or devotional spirituality of the regional or sectarian varieties of Vaishnava, Shaiva and Shakta traditions.  There were also, of course, the many traditional village Hindus (and Muslims) who had little comprehension of or concern with what was happening and simply despised the British and other foreign interlopers as mleccha-s (polluted "barbarians") or Feringhee-s ("foreigners").

Much the same is true for older Muslim traditions.  For obvious reasons related to the loss of political power, Muslims from the older, pre-modern elite and landowning classes for the most part did not respond as positively as forward caste Hindu elites to the coming of the British, and, as a result, even Muslims from elite strata never became a dominant voice among the largely Neo-Hindu elites that were emerging and beginning to put together a nationalist political movement.  Also, on lower social levels as well, Muslims tended to become even more in-grown, defensive and rigid than comparable Hindu groups. 

There were, of course,  some halting attempts at reform, some, as mentioned earlier, going all the way back to the time of Shaikh Ahmad Sirhindi of the sixteenth century (who protested Mughal accomodation with Hindu traditions) or the important work of Shah Wali-Ullah of Delhi (l703 - l762), who also wanted to separate a pure Islamic spirituality from Hindu influences and practices.  There was also the work of Sayyid Ahmad (l786 - l83l) of Rai Bareli (in North India) who sought  to reform Hinduized practices around the various Sufi shrines in North India and the Punjab and eventually called for a jihad or "holy war" against the Sikhs in the Punjab, and there was the Farai'zi ("duties") movement in Bengal, founded by Shari'at 'Ullah (l78l - l840), an attempt to establish a purified and separatist Islam in Bengal.   The failure of all of these came to a symbolic head with the outcome of the "reactionary" North Indian rebellion in l857-58, perhaps the prime symbol of the defeat of the older Indo-Islamic tradition both politically as well as culturally. 

NEO-MUSLIM REFORMIST MOVEMENTS 

By the early and middle decades of the nineteenth century, however, and thereafter, some significant innovations began to appear among both Muslims and Hindus, and within each of the communities it is possible to discern at least two distinct levels  or dimensions.  On the Muslim side, there emerges, first of all, a reformist and accommodationist set of movements or organizations as represented primarily by the founding of the Deoband (a town near Delhi) school of 'ulama' ("Islamic scholars") in l867. 

The Deoband reformers sought to purify those aspects of Islamic spirituality that had become in their view overly Hinduized (for example, certain pilgrimage practices or the worship of local Sufi shrines and saints, and so forth).  They wanted a purified, reformed Islam firmly based on the Qur'an but separate from Hindu culture as well as the state.  They were willing to work with Hindus in terms of the growing anti-British nationalist movement, and in this sense the Deoband tradition was accommodationist.  They wanted an independent Indian state together with their own autonomy within the Indian state. 

The Deoband reformers encouraged the development of a network of schools--in l900 there were forty such schools in North India, in l967 nearly nine thousand--and they used the newly available technology of printing to engage in widespread educational programs in the vernacular.  They supported the Khilafat movement (l9l9-24), an attempt to save the pan-Islamic institution of the Caliphate (which failed in l924 with the abolition of the Caliphate in Turkey) and were instrumental in forming the Jami'at al-'ulama'-i Hind ("The Association of Indian Islamic Scholars," l9l9), an organization which for the most part supported the Indian National Congress in the anti-British freedom struggle.  The two most well known representatives of the tradition were Hasan Ahmad Madani (l897 - l959), Principal of the Deoband school during the crucial years of the freedom struggle and the beloved Indian nationalist and Muslim leader, Abul Kalam Azad, both of whom remained with the new State of India after Partition with Pakistan.

A second level or dimension on the Muslim side is the modernist and separatist set of movements or organizations as represented primarily by the founding of the Anglo-Oriental College at Aligarh in l875 by the famous modernist-reformer, Sayyid Ahmad Khan (l8l7-98).  Unlike the Deoband reformers who wanted a purified traditional Islamic spirituality, Sayyid Ahmad Khan argued for a modernized form of Islam that takes seriously western learning and science.  Traditions of modern rationalism need to be employed in order to make Islam relevant to the needs of modern Muslims.  At the same time, however, Sayyid Ahmad Khan was not an accommodationist as were the Deoband reformers.  He believed that finally Muslims had to be separate from Hindus and Hindu civilization, and it can be plausibly maintained that the so-called "two nations" theory which became the rallying cry for the creation of Pakistan can be traced back to the work of Sayyid Ahmad Khan. 

The famous poet and Islamic nationalist, Muhammad Iqbal l873 - l938) was also in this modernist yet separatist tradition as, of course, finally, was the political organization known as the Muslim League (founded in l906) and the first Prime Minister of Pakistan, Muhammad 'Ali Jinnah (l876 - l948).  Iqbal argued that a pan-Islamic, transnational empire was no longer viable but that it was possible to develop an Islamic nation based on the principles of modernist Islam that could be part of the newly developing nation-state system, and he finally persuaded Jinnah that the formation of such a new nation was essential if South Asian Muslims were ever to be truly free.

Both of these levels or dimensions of Muslim response, namely, the Deoband reformist-accommodationist set of movements and the Aligarh modernist-separatist set of movements are perhaps best referred to as "Anglo-Islamic" and "Neo-Muslim" in the sense that they reflect distinctly new elements being introduced into the older Indo-Islamic traditions as a result of the impact of modernity and the encounter with western civilization.  The fact that the Deoband "protestant" Islam coupled its anti-British attitude with its participation in the Indian nationalist freedom movement, and the Aligarh movement coupled "modernist" Islam with its nationalist ideology of a modern but separate Islamic nation-state, clearly separate these traditions from the previous Indo-Islamic traditions, thereby justifying such labels as "Anglo-Islamic" and "Neo-Muslim."

MUSLIM REVIVALIST MOVEMENTS

Mention should perhaps also be made here of what might be called "revivalist" Islamic movements, that is to say, to a few movements that are both anti-modernist (contra the Aligarh modernist-separatist Anglo-Islam) as well as anti-nationalist (contra the Deoband "protestant" reformist-accomodationist Anglo-Islam).  These would include the anti-modernist and anti-reformist Islam of Ahmad Riza Khan (l856 - l92l) of Bareilly (in North India), founder of the conservative Barelwis, who wanted to maintain the traditional rituals and customs of the Indo-Islamic era.  Also included would be the anti-modernist and transnationalist Islam of Sayyid Abul 'Ala Maududi (l903-79), founder of the conservative Jama'at-i Islami ("Islamic Society"), which rejected the ideology of the nation-state, whether Islamic or non-Islamic.  There is also the Tablighi Jama'at (the "Missionary Society"), founded in l927 by Muhammad Ilyas (l885 - l944), an anti-political and pietistic revivalist Islam prominent in the Punjab region in India but popular as well in Pakistan, Southeast Asia and the Middle East. 

Finally, there is the messianic and heretical Ahmadiyah movement, founded in the Punjab by Mirza Ghulam Ahmad (l835 - l908) who proclaimed himself to be al-Mahdi  (the "guided one" or messiah) in the last decade of the nineteenth century.  The movement has not made much headway among Muslims generally because of the heretical claims of the founder, but it has found a favorable hearing in some parts of Africa and among Black Muslims in the United States.  All of these "revivalist" movements have in common that they cannot be called either "Anglo-Islamic" or "Neo-Muslim."  They represent one or another attempt to revive an older, largely pre-modern Indo-Islamic tradition. 

EMERGENCE OF NEO-HINDU TRADITIONS

Just as there were two distinct levels or dimensions within Anglo-Islamic or Neo-Muslim traditions, namely, the Deoband reformist-accommodationist groups and the Aligarh modernist-separatist groups, so too on the Hindu side there developed two distinct levels or dimensions of Neo-Hindu tradition, first, an early set of reformist and nationalist  Neo-Hindu groups focussed primarily on the reform and modernization of older Hindu practices and the political development of India into a modern, secular nation-state, and second, coming a bit later in the nineteenth century and gaining considerable prominence in the later decades of the twentieth century, a set of revisionist and internationalist Neo-Hindu groups focussed largely on a kind of reverse missionizing, that is, the export of a variety of what might be called guru-meditation traditions to western Europe and the United States, especially after the achievement of the Independence of India in the middle of the twentieth century. 

Both levels or dimensions, namely, the reformist and nationalist groups and the revisionist and internationalist groups, can be referred to as Neo-Hindu in the sense that they reflect distinctly new elements being introduced in what we have called classical Hindu or Indic (Hindu-Buddhist-Jain) civilization as a result of the impact of modernity and the encounter with western civilization.

NEO-HINDU REFORMIST-NATIONALIST MOVEMENTS  

Under this heading comes a variety of reform movements both before Independence (l947) and after, and representing a great variety of political strategies ranging from radical extremism to moderate reformism.

The earliest was probably that of Rammohun Roy  (l772 - l833), a Bengali Brahmin with remarkable intellectual and linguistic skills, who founded the Brahmo Sabha ("Society of God," later renamed the Brahmo Samaj) in l828. He learned English while working for British civil servants, and became deeply influenced by western ideas.  He was especially influenced by Christian notions about God but decided, finally, to remain a Hindu.  He focussed his attention on the ancient Vedic and Upanishadic notion of the oneness of Brahman, which he interpreted as a basic belief in monotheism and which represented a way of overcoming Hindu polytheism without giving up Hindu traditions.  He was a thorough-going  rationalist as well as an active social reformer, and he argued vigorously that such parochial practices as child marriage, female infanticide and widow-burning had no place in the ancient Vedic texts and ought to have no place in authentic, reformed Hindu tradition.  The Brahmo Samaj came to have an extensive following among educated Hindus in Bengal and elsewhere in India as well.

Closely related to the Brahmo Samaj was the Prarthana Samaj ("Prayer Society") of Bombay.  Founded in l867 and inspired by the work of Keshub Chunder Sen, a successor to Rammohun Roy as head of the Brahmo Samaj, the ideas of the "Prayer Society" were very close to those of the Brahmo Samaj, with perhaps a greater focus on devotionalism in the Prarthana Samaj (largely due to the greater influence on Keshub Chunder Sen of Christian devotional notions) in contrast to the heavy focus on rationalism in the Brahmo Samaj. The other significant difference, of course, was the regional base of the two Societies, Calcutta for the Brahmo Samaj and Bombay for the Prarthana Samaj.

A strikingly different reform group was founded by Swami Dayananda Sarasvati (birth-name, Mul Shankar, l827 - l883), a Brahmin from Gujarat who pursued the life of a renouncer from an early age.  The movement which he established in l875, known as the Arya Samaj ("Aryan Society") became especially powerful in the Punjab region.  Unlike the Brahmo Samaj and the Prarthana Samaj which were for the most part favorably disposed towards Christian traditions, Dayananda's Arya Samaj vigorously rejected Christian and Muslim ideas together with Christian and Muslim missionizing, and asserted that the ancient Hindu Veda is the only authentic scripture.  At the same time, however, Dayananda also rejected the caste system (as did all of the reformers and revisionists), idol worship , polytheism and all non-Vedic ritual within Hindu traditions.  He also opposed widow-burning, child marriage and female infanticide.  Instead, Hindus should believe in one God, follow only the simplest rituals of the Veda, work for social reform and follow strict vegetarianism.  He also developed a special "purification" ceremony (shuddhi) by means of which Hindus who had been converted to Islam or Christianity could be re-converted or re-admitted into the Hindu tradition.

Perhaps the most famous reformist and nationalist movement in the modern period is the Ramakrishna Mission, established by Swami Vivekananda (birth-name, Narendranath Datta, l862 - l902, from the high or forward clerical caste called kayastha) in Bengal.   The Mission was named after the Bengali spiritual teacher Ramakrishna (birth-name, Gadadhar Chatterjee, l836 -86, a Bengali Brahmin) who was Vivekananda's guru.   Ramakrishna himself spent his entire life as a priest in a temple devoted to the goddess, Kali, in the district of Dakshineshwar near Calcutta.  He had a number of extraordinary mystical experiences and over the years attracted a small band of followers, one of whom was Narendranath Datta, later to be given the spiritual name, Vivekananda (meaning "whose bliss is discrimination").  After Ramakrishna's death, Vivekananda made a pilgrimage around India and determined, finally, to propagate the spiritual message of his guru.  Vivekananda developed and taught a simplified version of monistic Vedanta philosophy and combined those ideas with a program for social action and social reform for modern India.  He attended the World Parliament of Religions in l893 in Chicago as a representative of the Hindu tradition, and his considerable oratorical skills made a deep impression in the popular press and in certain liberal religious intellectual circles.  He travelled widely in the United States, made a number of American converts, and in l897, after his return to India, he established The Ramakrishna Mission in India together with a series of Vedanta Societies outside of India in the United States, Europe and Latin America.  He also founded in l897 The Ramakrishna "Math," the "monastic" wing of the organization.  The Ramakrishna Mission in India engages in extensive social work down to the present day, maintaining an elaborate network of high schools, colleges and hospitals throughout the subcontinent, and it is the first and continues to be one of the few Hindu groups in modern India to engage in extensive social work.

Yet another reformist and nationalist figure was the radical Bengali nationalist, Aurobindo Ghose (l872 - l950).  Aurobindo was educated in England and on his return to India joined the nationalist movement.  At first he was a militant extremist, advocating violence if necessary in the freedom struggle against the British.  He equated the nationalist struggle for freedom with a profound religious mission.  In one of his early speeches he proclaimed that nationalism is a religion from God!  During a period of imprisonment for his radical activities in l909, however, he underwent a deep spiritual conversion, and instead of continuing his political activities, he moved to Pondicherry in South India and established an ashrama ("hermitage" or monastery-like community) in order to practice and propagate what is known as Integral Yoga.  He had determined that the political regeneration of India first required a spiritual regeneration.  One of his earliest disciples was a French lady, Mira Richard, who came to be known as "the Mother," and succeeded Aurobindo as head of the ashrama after Aurobindo's death.

The region of Maharashtra in Western India was also a center of reformist and nationalist activity.  It was the home of such important pre-Gandhian, moderate nationalists as M. G. Ranade (l842 - l90l) and G. K. Gokhale (l866 - l9l5), as well as the extremist figure, B. G. Tilak (l856 - l920).[i]  It was also the home of V. D. Savarkar (l883 - l966), author of the famous tract, Hindutva ("Hindu-ness"), first published in l923, and president for seven consecutive years of the Hindu Mahasabha ("Great Assembly of Hindus"), a conservative political-cum-religious group first founded in the Punjab in l907 as a defensive Hindu response to the separatist demands of Muslims.  Savarkar's tract Hindutva glorified the Hindu Motherland and argued for an all-India revitalization of sanatana-dharma ("eternal law") as a basis for a new Hindu nationalism.  The tract was influential on the thinking of K. B. Hedgewar (l890 - l940), also a Maharashtrian and founder in l925 of the militant RSS (Rashtriya Svayamsevak Sangh, "National Assembly of Volunteers"), a conservative right-wing religious movement which combined a communalist Hindu nationalism with the rigid discipline of the old militant Naga mendicant orders.  Hedgewar led the RSS from l925-40, and he was succeeded by M. S. Golwalkar who led the movement from l940 through l973.  Hedgewar thought that the main problem with modern India was a deep psychological sense of inferiority that could only be cured by careful discipline and an ideology of selfless service to the Motherland.  He believed in the need for extensive reform of outdated Hindu practices, and he and his organization rejected the inequities of the caste system.  He completely disagreed with Gandhi's attitude of non-violence, however, and, indeed, it was a former member of the RSS, N. V. Godse, who assassinated Gandhi in l948 because of his pro-Muslim, non-violent orientation.  Jawaharlal Nehru, India's first Prime Minister after Independence, quickly banned the RSS in l948 after Gandhi's assassination, but a direct connection between Godse and the RSS was never proved, and the ban was lifted in l949.  The RSS was banned a second time during Indira Gandhi's Emergency (l975-77), and it has often been the object of Government censure since Independence.  The RSS has never been a political movement as such, but it has encouraged the conservative political activities of the Bharatiya Jana Sangh ("Indian People's Party"), founded in l95l and renamed the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP and also meaning "Indian People's Party") after l979.  The RSS together with the BJP and a Hindu cultural organization known as the VHP (the Vishva Hindu Parishad or "World Council of Hindus," founded in l964) have become prominent in recent years as a conservative religious alternative to India's long-ruling and "secular" Congress Party.  The RSS, BJP and VHP appeal not only to forward or high castes but also to sizable groups of lower and middle caste rural and urban Hindus as well as the so-called "Other Backward Classes" or OBCs in the northern "Hindi Heartland" who have been largely ignored (at least until recently) by the leaders of the secular Congress Party.    

Finally, mention must also be made of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi (l869 - l948). Born in the region of Gujarat, Gandhi studied law in England (l888-9l), practiced law for some twenty-years in South Africa (l893 - l9l4), and then returned to India to lead the nationalist struggle for independence from the British.  Gandhi, of course, was primarily a political leader, but his political work was inextricably related with his reformed and nationalist Neo-Hindu vision that stressed (a) the validity of all religions, (b) the pursuit of non-violent non-cooperation against the British as a political strategy or what he called "truth-force" or "holding firmly to truth" (satyagraha), and (c) the cultivation of non-violence (ahimsa) in all conflict situations.  Like the other reformist groups already mentioned, he disliked the inequities of the caste system, especially untouchability, and he thought that the spiritual life was essential to political life.  Although he never founded a religious group as such, it can be said that he mobilized the entire nation to his Neo-Hindu vision of reform and nationalism.  Gandhi's own approach differed, on the one hand, from the older liberal, democratic, highly westernized approach of earlier nationalist leaders (such as Ranade or Gokhale), and also, on the other hand, from the more radical postures, such as the Marxian internationalism of an M. N. Roy (l887 - l954), the militant extremism of a Subhas Chandra Bose (l897 - l945), or the democratic socialist approach of a Jawaharlal Nehru (l889 - l964). Gandhi's great genius was his ability to bring the liberal westernizers and the radical socialists together with the large landowners, industrialists, and the great rural masses of India into a grand coalition based on a reformed Neo-Hindu ideology of "holding firmly to truth" (satyagraha) and "non-violence" (ahimsa), and it is fair enough to argue that without the Neo-Hindu component such a coalition would never have been realized.

In any case, the common features of all of these Neo-Hindu reformist and nationalist movements, in spite of their varying political orientations and strategies, were and are (l) a primary focus on developing among the people of India a self-confident national awareness that will provide a solid foundation for India as a modern nation-state; (2) the reform of outdated, parochial and superstitious Hindu practices; (3) the rejection or radical reform of the caste system; (4) female emancipation; (5) the improvement of social conditions for the poor; (6) economic progress for the entire nation (sarvodaya or the "uplift of all"); and (7) the development of techniques of communication and propagation borrowed largely from Protestant Christian models.  Regarding the last feature, it is striking to note that although Neo-Hindu reformist and nationalist groups overwhelmingly rejected Protestant Christian beliefs, they nevertheless at the very same time overwhelmingly accepted missionary methods.

The present-day existence of India as a modern nation-state is inconceivable apart from the important contributions that these Neo-Hindu reformist and nationalist groups provided. The great tragedy, of course, was that the Muslims in South Asia fully recognized that all of these movements, together with the Gandhian nationalist movement itself, were finally incorrigibly Neo-Hindu, thereby creating a profound alienation and a deep suspicion that would ultimately issue in the great fissure of Partition.  Gandhi's greatest success, in other words, was at one and the same time his greatest failure, and that devastating  historical paradox has continued to haunt South Asia ever since.  

NEO-HINDU REVISIONIST-INTERNATIONALIST MOVEMENTS

But there is a second level or dimension of the Indo-Anglian and Neo-Hindu trajectory, namely, a set of movements which can be characterized as revisionist and internationalist.  By the terms "revisionist" and "internationalist" is meant some new ideas and practices that have clear antecedents in older patterns of Hindu or Indic (Hindu-Buddhist-Jain) spirituality but represent new directions and emphases and, most of all, are designed to appeal not only in South Asian environments but to a broad-based international audience as well.

It is important to note, first of all, that at least two of the groups already mentioned as Neo-Hindu reformist and nationalist movements, namely, the Ramakrishna Mission and the Aurobindo Integral Yoga tradition, also fit into this second set of Neo-Hindu revisionist and internationalist movements, and thus may be considered "swing" groups or "both-and" groups.  Clearly on one level Vivekananda was a reformist and nationalist leader as can be seen in his representing and defending Hindu traditions at the World Parliament of Religions in l893 and in his continuing attempts to raise the social conscience of the people of modern India.  On another level, however, he was intrigued by the international implications of Vedanta and the manner in which the life and teachings of Ramakrishna could be brought  to non-Indian audiences, especially in the United States.  Towards the end of his life he focussed increasingly on the development of Vedanta Societies outside of India, and it is no accident that Vedanta Societies exist all across the United States today (in such places as Hollywood, Santa Barbara, New York City, Chicago, St. Louis, and so forth).  It is also important to observe that the Vedanta movement tends to deify not only Ramakrishna, the founding Guru, but Vivekananda and others as well, and, as we shall see, this is one of the common characteristics among all of the Neo-Hindu revisionist and internationalist movements.

Likewise, Aurobindo clearly was originally a reformist and nationalist leader and saw the nationalist movement as a religious mission.  After his prison conversion, however, he proceeded to develop an international Integral Yoga tradition at his ashrama in Pondicherry and maintained the claim that Integral Yoga is the spiritual technique for the higher evolution of all mankind.  Moreover, Aurobindo as Guru together with the Mother as divine power or shakti have become objects of devotion by their followers.  Thus, there would appear to be a good case for claiming the Ramakrishna Mission and Aurobindo's Integral Yoga for both types of Neo-Hindu tradition.

Other groups are more narrowly within the Neo-Hindu revisionist and internationalist category, and they continue to emerge down to the present day.  They cannot all be mentioned in this context, but some of the more well-known may be briefly characterized as follows (roughly in chronological order).

(l)  Swami Sahajananda (l78l - l830), also called Swaminarayana ("Lord of the Universe") and founder of the Swaminarayana movement in the State of Gujarat.  It is a highly visible movement in Gujarat and has been carried throughout the world by emigrating Gujaratis with especially large communities in the United States, Great Britain and East Africa.  It is basically a Vaishnava bhakti movement, focussing on  Krishna, Radha (Krishna's consort) and the interacting male and female cosmic forces.  Both Swami Sahajananda and his chief disciple, Gunatitananda, are deified in the movement.

(2)  Swami Shiv Dayal (l8l8 - l878), also known as Soamiji Maharaj, founder of the Radhasoami Satsang ("Association of Radhasoamis") in l86l in the city of Agra in North India. The movement is a blend of Hindu and Sikh elements, focussing on the interplay between Radha (Krishna's consort, but also symbolizing the soul) and the "master" ("Soami" or "Swami," symbolizing God).  A special yoga or meditation is followed by the group, focussing on sacred sound (called shabad) or a universal sound current (surat-shabad-yoga) that is heard only by the mind.  The group believes in a monotheistic God and gets many of its theological ideas from Sikh traditions and other sant traditions (see above under the Indo-Islamic period) and many of its practices from older North Indian bhakti traditions. A schism in the group has led to the development of two distinct centers in India, an original group still in the region of Agra (south of Delhi) and a second group in Beas (in the State of Punjab near Amritsar).  The latter group has more affinities with Sikh traditions, although most Sikhs are not sympathetic to the Radhasoamis, mainly because of the incorporation of too many Hindu motifs in the Radhasoami Satsang.  There are a number of American followers of the group, especially in California.

(3)  Paramahamsa Yogananda (birth-name, Mukunda Lal Ghosh, l893 - l952), a Bengali sadhu or "holy man" and founder of the Self-Realization Fellowship in Los Angeles and San Diego.  Yogananda  first came to the United States to attend a conference in Boston in l920 and then remained in the United States to establish his Self-Realization Fellowship in the same year.  He was keen to reconcile Hindu traditions and Christian traditions.  He taught various kinds of Yoga and published his life's story in his well-known Autobiography of a Yogi, first published in l946.

(4)  Meher Baba (birth-name, Merwan Irani, l894 - l969), founder of the Meher Baba Mandali ("Father of Love Society") with centers around the United States, especially on the West Coast.  Born of Iranian parents who were Zoroastrian Parsis, Meher Baba's group is a peculiar combination of Zoroastrian, Sufi and Hindu notions, emphasizing interreligious discussion and simple meditation techniques.  Meher Baba himself took a vow of silence in l925.

(5)  A. C. Bhaktivedanta Prabhupada (birth-name, Abhay Charan De, l896 - l977), a Bengali businessman from Calcutta who became a Vaishnava monk and founded the International Society for Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON) in the l960s.  It is also known as the Hare Krishna movement.  Unlike some of the groups that have only shallow roots in traditional Hindu culture, the Hare Krishna movement is an authentic offshoot of the Bengal Vaishnava tradition of the sixteenth century Vaishnava saint and devotee of Krishna, Caitanya.  The focus of the movement is on exuberant bhakti or devotion to Krishna. The movement retains a strong base in India in Vrindavan in the Mathura district of Uttar Pradesh in North India, the sacred grove in which Krishna danced with young maiden-devotees.  The movement is widely known and respected in India.

(6)  Swami (Baba) Muktananda (l908 - l982), founder of the Siddha Yoga ("discipline of spiritual fulfillment") movement, currently based at an ashrama in India at Ganeshpuri in the State of Maharashtra (near Bombay) and at an ashrama in South Fallsburg, New York.  Since the death of the founder in l982, the movement has been led mainly by a young woman, Gurumayi Cidvilasananda.  The movement is a blend of classical and Tantric yoga practices, emphasizing the importance of shakti ("power" or divine energy).  Followers believe that "power" can descend suddenly (a process called shaktipat or "the falling down or infusing with power") into a devotee by the mere presence or touch of the Guru.  Gurumayi is deified as are Baba Muktananda and other preceding  Gurus.  The movement traces its roots back to old traditions of  Shaiva meditation from Kashmir.  In addition to the two main ashramas in Ganeshpuri and South Fallsburg, the movement has meditation centers throughout the United States and around the world.

(7)  Maharishi Mahesh Yogi (birth-name, Mahesh Prasad Varma, l9ll - ), founder of the Spiritual Regeneration Movement or Transcendental Meditation in the l960s.  TM centers are found throughout the United States and Europe.  The international headquarters of the movement is in Switzerland.  The Maharishi teaches a simple technique of sound-meditation.  The devotee is given a sacred mantra or sound  and then told to meditate one-half hour to an hour every day.  The technique is designed to bring about a relaxed state of mind and to purify one's awareness.  Popular in the l960s, the movement currently has lost many of its followers, and it has never been highly regarded in India.

(8)  Satya Sai Baba (birth-name, Satya Narayan, l926 -  ), a spiritual teacher and healer from Puttaparthi in the State of Andhra Pradesh in South India.  At the age of fourteen he declared himself to be a reincarnation of the Shirdi Sai Baba, a holy man from the State of Maharashtra who had died in l9l8.  Purported to be a great healer, he is supposedly able to produce ashes in his hands at will as well as other "miracles" (siddhi-s), especially miracles of healing.  He has a purported following in India of two to three million.  World-wide he supposedly has a following of ten million, including a significant number of Americans.

There are, of course, many more movements which could be mentioned, but perhaps enough has been said to provide at least some flavor of these Neo-Hindu revisionist and internationalist movements.  Although all of these movements have some connection with traditional Hindu spirituality, some with deep roots in India--for example, the Hare Krishna movement of Bhaktivedanta and the Siddha Yoga tradition of Muktananda and Gurumayi--and others with only shallow connections--for example, Paramahamsa Yogananda's Self-Realization Fellowship and the TM movement of Maharishi Mahesh Yogi--all have clearly moved away from an exclusively Indian identity.  These are all international movements with sizable followings throughout the world.  The common features of all of these "export" brands of Neo-Hindu revisionist and internationalist movements were and are (l) devotion to a deified Guru or teacher; (2) total obedience to the will of the Guru or teacher; (3) the practice of one or another type of yoga or disciplined meditation; (4) the claim that all religions are basically valid; (5) the claim that one's ethnic identity has no bearing on the practice of the particular Neo-Hindu tradition, so long as the devotee has been properly initiated; and (6) a tendency to deemphasize social work and secular political or ideological involvement of any kind.

It may seem somewhat odd to use the expression "Neo-Hindu" for both the reformist and nationalist movements as well as the revisionist and internationalist movements, but it does appear to be the case that these seemingly disparate traditions have much more in common with each other than they do with older, pre-modern Hindu traditions.  Both sets of movements have in common (l) the use of English as a primary medium of discourse, (2) a reliance on modern methods of education in contrast to traditional methods, (3) a rejection of the ritual-based hierarchies of the traditional caste system, (4) a self-confident assertion of the value and global importance of certain fundamental Hindu notions such as a broadly pluralistic notion of dharma, the practice of meditation of one kind or another, and the need for an exemplary spiritual guide or Guru, and (5) the utilization of modern means of communication, including newspapers, pamphlets, tracts, film and public broadcasting of all kinds.

Perhaps also worth noting, finally, in regard to comparing and contrasting the two levels or dimensions of Neo-Hindu spirituality, is that whereas the Neo-Hindu reformist and nationalist groups tend to come from the high or forward castes and to have a deep commitment to the legitimation of India as a modern nation-state, the Neo-Hindu revisionist and internationalist groups tend to have a much broader social base and to be detached from issues of political ideology or governance.  The two levels or dimensions, in other words, tend to be modern reformulations of the two dominant strains that have fashioned Indic civilization almost from the beginning, that is, the Indo-Brahmanical and the Indo-Shramanical.