 | |
| Editors | Subhash Gatade |
|---|---|
| Language | English |
| Publisher | Pharos Media & Publishing |
Publication date | 2011 |
| Publication place | India |
| ISBN | 978-8172210526 |
Godse's Children: Hindutva Terror in India is a 2011 Indian political history book by Indian journalist Subhash Gatade that focuses on the phenomenon of Hindutva terrorism. [1]
In the 2011 book, which has been labelled "contentious", Gatade introduces Nathuram Godse as "the first terrorist in independent India and Gandhi’s assassination as the first terrorist activity". [2] In a 2012 review of Gatade's work, reviewer Rohini Hensman concurred that if terrorism is defined as violence in pursuit of a political goal, then the assassination of Gandhi "could indeed be seen as a terrorist act". [1]
Gatade depicts Godse as neither "just a representative of the Hindutva forces in whose hands he was a mere pawn", and focused not on the assassination itself by Godse as "a symbol of terrorism, a preamble of a wider politics of Hindu domination, a harbinger of Hindutva terrorism in India". [2]
In the book, Gatade also narrates how investigations into the 2006 Mumbai train bombings in India had "progressively revealed a unified or coordinated network of conspirators, all implicated with the RSS", centered on Indore. [3] He asserts that the RSS has a strategy of outsourcing tension, while publicly disowning it, but that this subterfuge is "not vastly more credible than its disowning of Godse himself". [3]
A further thrust of the work is about shortcomings in India's law enforcement agencies, which Gatade contests "entertain institutional bias against Muslims", [4] being "forthcoming in implicating innocent Muslim youths" and engaging "in communal witch-hunts and extra judicial killings". [5] India's media is also chastised for "pushing forward the Muslim terrorist narrative" and distorting events, including by notably giving little heed to stories where the innocent victims of wrongful arrests have been acquitted by the courts. [5]
Gatade asserts that "while full fledged fascism may by the preserve of the Sangh parivar", the softer communalism of other parties, such as their hostility to religious conversion, also nurtures extremism. [1]
In his remarks on the author's delivery, Hensman notes that "Gatade belong to the small section of left-wing writers and activists who take the task of combating the growth of fascism in India seriously". [1]
Nathuram Vinayak Godse was a Hindu nationalist who on 30 January 1948 assassinated Mahatma Gandhi. Godse was a member of the political party, the Hindu Mahasabha; and a member of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), a right-wing Hindu paramilitary volunteer organisation; and a populariser of the work of his mentor Vinayak Damodar Savarkar, who had created the ideology of Hindutva.
Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh is an Indian right-wing, Hindu nationalist volunteer paramilitary organisation. It is the progenitor and leader of a large body of organisations called the Sangh Parivar, which has developed a presence in all facets of Indian society and includes the Bharatiya Janata Party, the ruling political party under Narendra Modi, the 14th prime minister of India. Mohan Bhagwat has served as the Sarsanghchalak of the RSS since March 2009.
Hindutva is a political ideology encompassing the cultural justification of Hindu nationalism and the belief in establishing Hindu hegemony within India. The political ideology was formulated by Vinayak Damodar Savarkar in 1922. It is used by the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), the Vishva Hindu Parishad (VHP), the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and other organisations, collectively called the Sangh Parivar.
Vinayak Damodar Savarkar, Marathi pronunciation: [ʋinaːjək saːʋəɾkəɾ]; 28 May 1883 – 26 February 1966) was an Indian politician, activist and writer. Savarkar developed the Hindu nationalist political ideology of Hindutva while confined at Ratnagiri in 1922. He was a leading figure in the Hindu Mahasabha. The prefix "Veer" has been applied to his name by his followers.
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Hey Ram is a 2000 Indian epic historical drama film written, directed, and produced by Kamal Haasan, that stars him and Shah Rukh Khan in lead roles. It was simultaneously made in the Tamil and Hindi languages.
Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi was assassinated on 30 January 1948 at age 78 in the compound of The Birla House, a large mansion in central New Delhi. His assassin was Nathuram Godse, from Pune, Maharashtra, a Hindutva activist, a member of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), a right-wing Hindu paramilitary organization as well as a member of the Hindu Mahasabha.
Saffronisation or saffronization is the right-wing policy approach in India that seeks to implement a Hindu nationalist agenda, for example onto school textbooks. Critics have used this political neologism to refer to the policies of Hindu nationalist governments in India that attempted to glorify Hindu contributions to Indian history while undermining other contributions.
Hindu Munnani is a right-wing Hindu nationalist organisation based in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu. Hindu Munnani was set up by Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) The organisation was founded in 1980 by Ramagopalan, a member of RSS and since its formation served as the platform for RSS and its subsidiaries known as the Sangh Parivar.
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Hindu terrorism, sometimes called Hindutva terror or, metonymically, saffron terror, refer to terrorist acts carried out on the basis of motivations in broad association with Hindu nationalism or Hindutva.
Ram Puniyani is an Indian author, former professor of biomedical engineering and former senior medical officer affiliated with the Indian Institute of Technology Bombay. He began his medical career in 1973 and served IIT in various capacities for 27 years, beginning in 1977. He has been involved with human rights activities and initiatives to oppose Hindu fundamentalism in India and is currently the President of the Executive Council of the Centre for Study of Society and Secularism (CSSS). He is also an advisory board member of the Muslim Mirror.
Dr. Narayan Bhaskar Khare was an Indian politician. He was chief minister of Central Province in the 1930s as a Congress politician. Later he left Congress and joined Hindu Maha Sabha.
Hindu nationalism has been collectively referred to as the expression of social and political thought, based on the native spiritual and cultural traditions of the Indian subcontinent. "Hindu nationalism" is a simplistic translation of हिन्दू राष्ट्रवाद. It is better described as "Hindu polity".
Pragya Singh Thakur, better known as SadhviPragya, is an Indian politician and Member of Parliament representing Bhopal and belonging to the Bharatiya Janata Party. During her college days, she was an active member of Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) and later joined various affiliate organisations of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS).
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