While the supreme court judgement, Hindutva: A Way of life, is awaiting  being reviewed by a larger bench, interpretation of hindutva as a religion, as a synonym for Hinduism is playing havoc in the society. On one hand the practitioners of communal agenda are using it for communal mobilization and on the other the foot soldiers Hindu Rashtra are stifling the democratic ethos at every available opportunity.
 
Recently (Oct.25, 2002) a Principal of a Vashi school, near Mumbai, was charged for the crime of understanding Hindutva as it is, a politics, a variant of Fascism, Religious Fascism to be more precise. The question set in his school was apt, Hindutva philosophy and its disastrous effect on secular India. But for the clear understanding of the school about this term, the local Shiv Sena volunteers complained and Principal was made to run for cover. As such this word has hogged the limelight for wrong reasons in recent past. Most of the communal actions have been deriving their legitimacy from this word and its supplement, Hindu Rashtra. The former denotes politics, while latter, its goal. And both words having
Hindu as an integral part of the construction give the impression as if both these have something to do with Hindu Religion. And it is this misconception, which helps in the mass mobilization for this politics.
 
Even the Supreme Court judgement, which came in handy to Sangh Parivar to have legitimacy for its politics is mercifully slated for a review. Even if Hindutva is a religion, which it is not, can any religion be called as a way of life? There are followers of same religion whose life has multiple inputs from non-religious aspects. Than there are followers of same religion whose way of life has nothing in common with each other. There can be umpteen examples for this in practically every religion and society. Then, can Hindutva be seen only as a substitute word for Hindu religion, which is asserted by the followers of this politics?
 
Just before having a look at Hindutva we can have a brief understanding of the word Hindu and Hinduism. Word Hindu began as a geographical description of people living in this area. Arabs who could not pronounce S, started using the word Hindu, for those living on this side of Sindhu (Indus). Over a period of time the religious traditions developing in this region started getting this name. These traditions were/are as varied as possible. From the most dominant Brahmanism to the humblest of this, Bhakti, all came in the gambit of Hinduism. Somewhere in the middle of the spectrum Charvak, Tantra, Shaiva, Siddhanta occupied the available ground. Brahmanism took its base from Vedas, Shrutis, and Smritis. The hallmark of this was the belief in caste system. It was exclusionary in its basic principal. While non-Brahminic Hindu traditions were open to all, universal. Here many religions based on the teachings of Prophets do have similar Universal content in their teaching.
 
The word Hindutva came in to being much later and its clearest articulation came in 'Who is a Hindu' by Savarkar. Savarkar articulated the goal of Hindu Rashtra and formulated the politics of Hindutva, "the
Aryans who settled in India at the dawn of history already formed a nation, now embodied in the Hindus... Hindus are bound together not only by the tie of the love they bear to a common fatherland and by the common blood that courses through their veins and keeps our hearts throbbing and  our affection warm but also by the tie of the common homage we pay to our  great civilization, our Hindu culture." (Savarkar; Who is Hindu,1923) Hindutva according to him rests on three pillars: geographical unity, racial features and common culture. This development of the concept of Hindutva came in succession to the construction of Brahminism as Hinduism and this Brahminical Hinduism then formed the base for Hindutva politics. Savarkar began to articulate the ideology of Hindu elite (zamindars, Brahmins, kings) by integrating Brahminical Hinduism with nationalism, calling it Hindutva, which showed the way for building the Hindu Rashtra.
 
This was the time when National movement was articulating Indian-ness as the core identity and the base of the movement. This was the time when most of the Indians rejected the Religion based nationalism, of Jinnah (Islamism, Pakistan) and Savarkar, Golwalkar (Hindutva, Hindu Rashtra). Interestingly most of the Muslims and Hindus did not support either the notion of Pakistan and Hindu Rashtra. These streams were marginal streams, supported mainly by elite. By the use of religion-based identity as the core of their political projects, these tendencies were able to mobilize middle sections of society, but that was insignificant.
 
The best way to perceive the difference between Hinduism and Hindutva is to see the contrasting profiles of Gandhi and most Indians on one side and Savarkar-Godse on the other. Gandhi expressed the sentiments of most of the Hindu Indians when he said, "in India for whose fashioning I have worked all my life, every man enjoys equality of status whatever his  religion is. ", "religion is not the test of nationality but is a personal matter between man and God", "religion is a personal affair of each
individual, it must not be mixed up with politics or national affairs"," I do not believe in state religion even though the whole community has one religion". And finally, "Religion and state would be separate. I swear by my religion, I will die for it. But it is my personal affair; the state has nothing to do with it. The state will look after your secular welfare, health, communications, foreign relations, currency and so on but not your  and my religion. That is everybody's personal concern "(Gandhi and Communal  Harmony, CSSS 1994,Mumbai).
 
While Jinnah harped on Islam based nation, Pakistan, Savarkar, Golwalkar and company harped on this being a Hindu Rashtra and so there being no question of Pakistan or secular India in this land. The overall support of Indian people to the Gandhi's project of Secular composite nationalism ensured the partial success of the goals of national movement, of driving away the British rule. Hindutva stream did get marginalized due to industrialization and secularization, which accompanied it, though not to
the full measure. The reaction to this "slow revolution" has been a revival of the politics of Hindutva. And this aggressive politics has subdued the basic agenda of Indian democracy, the basic goals of India's
freedom struggle, the goals of Liberty, Equality and Fraternity, which are being denigrated as being western values by the proponents of Hindutva politics.
 
The confusion about Hindutva and Hinduism is a deliberate one. It helps immensely to win over the gullible sections to the hysterical cry of Save Hindutva. It ensures that mass of the people does not care to look at the foundations of India, which is the Indian-ness and not Hindutva. This confusion gets expressed in various forms. When Mr. Vajpayee said that Vivekanand's Hindutva was different than the one being practiced by his fellow Swayamsvak, Modi, in Gujarat he exhibited the same confusion, as
Swami Vivekananda was unaware of the politics of Hindutva. Today the same confusion is deliberately put to use by most of the members of Sangh parivar, in their effort to consolidate their political base. Hindutva is no religion by any stretch of imagination. What Modi, Singhal and Thackeray practice is no religion, it is the Hindutva, a politics. The saints of VHP are a blot to Hindu saint tradition. The saints of the spiritual stature of Kabir, Tukaram and Gyaneshwar acted as bridges between different communities. They spread the message of love. Today the mobile wielding saints, traveling in air-conditioned Marutis, are the one's who spread hatred, something a saint cannot do by the basic definition of the word saint. But of course politics is not played by definitions. It operates on the principle of using all the mechanisms to grab power and thats what Hindutva is all about. The Vashi schoolteachers do need to be complimented for understanding it in a clear form. But of course they have to pay a price for being politically correct in times when Wrong is Right and vice versa. They have to pay a price for understanding the threats of rising religious fascism in the name of Hindutva since the same movement has 'succeeded' in selling the political word as a new word for a religion.
(Writer works for EKTA, Committee for Communal Harmony, Mumbai)