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| The Hindu Phenomenon |
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HINDU NATIONALISM : THE FIRST PHASE |
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H. Heimsath provides us a good summing up in his Indian Nationalism
and Hindu Social Reform. He notes that up to the first decade of the
twentieth century, the Indian National Congress had tried to define
a new India in terms borrowed from European political experience
and western social ethics. But these ideals and methods had
failed to win it much popular support. A reconstructed Hindu
nationalism, therefore emerged. Moderate constitutionalists
like Dadabhai Naoroji, Gopal Krishna Gokhale, Pherozeshah Mehta and
S.N. Banerjee were replaced by men such as Lajpat Rai, Tilak, Bipin
Chandra Pal and Aurobindo, "all of whom identified the
nation with the religious tradition of Hinduism".
As Bande Mataram, the extremist paper
edited by Bipin Chandra Pal and Aurobindo Ghosh explained: "Swaraj
as a sort of European ideal, political liberty for the sake of
political self-assertion, will not awaken India. Swaraj as the
fulfillment of the ancient life of India under modern conditions,
the return of the Satyayuga (era of truth) of national greatness,
the resumption by her of her great role of teacher and guide,
self-liberation of the people for the final fulfillment of the
Vedantic ideal in politics, this is the true Swaraj for India."
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| About Hindu Nationalism: The First Phase |
