The US-based organisation Hindus for Human Rights, which has just completed what it calls a prema yatra “searching for Hindu religious leaders who are concerned about the state of affairs in India today”, has concluded that the majority of the Hindu religious leaders they met are concerned about the deteriorating state of Hindu-Muslim relations and the way Muslims are often treated but are scared to speak out because of their fear of the response from Hindu nationalist groups.The yatra was conducted in February-March this year and travelled across nine states, visiting 12 cities and several villages and met nearly 30 Hindu religious leaders. The organisation said these are significant and important leaders who have considerable influence in their local communities. The yatra also visited major pilgrimage sites like Haridwar, Varanasi and Ayodhya as well as important metropolises such as Delhi, Mumbai and Thiruvananthapuram. In a North-South sense, it was a pan-India yatra though not necessarily so in an East-West sense.In a 31-minute interview with Karan Thapar for The Wire, the deputy executive director of Hindus for Human Rights, Nikhil Mandalaparthy, explained that the findings of the yatra fall into two categories: “deeply concerning but also incredibly inspiring”.Mandalaparthy first discusses the deeply concerning aspect. “We encountered a pervasive sense of victimhood or resentment among Indian Hindus deeply intertwined with hatred towards India’s Muslim minority … we saw the extent to which Indian Muslims have been dehumanised in the minds of many Indian Hindus and their religious leaders.”He said: “One swami we met in Maharashtra, a leader of a prominent and wealthy Vaishnava sect, insisted that Indian Hindus face much more discrimination than Indian Muslims and Christians.”Mandalaparthy said that a trustee of an ashram in Uttar Pradesh had told them that “the Hindu nationalist group Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh has been trying to infiltrate ashrams and temples in rural communities, sending its members to spend a few days at a time to plant the seeds of polarisation.”On the inspiring side, he made a point of saying that the majority of Hindu religious leaders do not agree with Hindutva. He said: “One temple priest in Varanasi told us that his idea of dharma is inseparable from humanity (manavta) which he said was the opposite of Hindu nationalism.”Perhaps more significant was what the yatra was told by a Hindu religious leader in Haryana: “One swami in Haryana simply stated to us ‘India has never had only one religion. This is a pluralistic land’. Religious diversity, he said, was at the heart of what it means to be Indian.”However, even though the majority of Hindu religious leaders fall into what Mandalaparthy calls the inspiring side, because they are concerned about the deteriorating state of relations between Hindus and Muslims and the way Muslims are treated, nonetheless all of them were scared to speak out publicly. They were only prepared to voice their thoughts and concerns in private meetings behind closed doors.Mandalaparthy said he was struck “by the pervasive sense of fear among the religious leaders (we) met, some of whom have faced violence from Hindu nationalists. Their ashrams and temples have been vandalised and attacked … they have faced accusations of being Naxalite Maoist rebels.”Finally, Mandalaparthy said what is true of the majority of Hindu religious leaders they met seems also to be true of the majority of Hindu lay people they met during the yatra. He believes they are secular, though Hindu, and are concerned about the state of the country but they are hesitant or even scared to speak out for fear of the response of Hindu nationalist groups.
