Vishva Hindu Parishad

(“World Hindu Organization,” hereafter
VHP) Modern Hindu religious organization affiliated with the Rashtriya
Svayamsevak Sangh (RSS), a conservative Hindu organization whose express
purpose is to provide the leadership
cadre for a revitalized Hindu India. The
VHP was formed in 1964, when RSS leader
Madhav Sadashiv Golwalkar met in
Bombay with a group of Hindu religious
leaders. Their immediate concern was
the upcoming visit of Pope Paul VI to
India, which they interpreted as a concealed attempt to convert Hindus to
Christianity, and resolved to oppose by
forming an organization dedicated to
the propagation of Hinduism. For the
next fifteen years, the VHP focused its
attention on countering Christian missionary efforts in northeastern India,
with little fanfare and little impact on
the public consciousness.
A watershed in the VHP’s public image
came in 1982, following the conversion
of some untouchables to Islam in the
Tamil Nadu village of Minakshipuram.
The VHP used this much-publicized
event as evidence that Hindu identity
was endangered and countered it by
launching a series of innovative public
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Vishva Hindu Parishad
actions, first in Tamil Nadu, but later
extending throughout the entire nation.
The VHP’s renewed activity corresponded
with a more activist bent in its parent
organization, the RSS, as well as the decision by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP),
a political organization that is also an RSS
affiliate, to assume a more militantly
Hindu identity. Many of the VHP’s
national campaigns coincided with
national or state elections, and many of
these centered on the campaign to build
a temple to the god Rama in the city of
Ayodhya, at the site claimed to be
Rama’s birthplace. The site on which
they proposed to build the temple was
occupied by a Muslim mosque, the
Babri Masjid, which the VHP claimed
had been built only after tearing down
the original Rama temple. This temple
campaign thus carried powerful images
of past oppression, as well as the
assertiveness of a renascent Hindu identity. The VHP’s activism has enormously
boosted the BJP’s political fortunes, and
helped make it the dominant political
party through much of northern India.
The VHP’s activism has generated
sharply contrasting emotions throughout India. Proponents point to its long
record of social service and its role in
helping strengthen and define a modern Hindu identity. Detractors point to
its disregard for the niceties of law,
which was epitomized by the destruction of the Babri Masjid in December
1992, its often vitriolic anti-Muslim
rhetoric, and its ultimate control by the
RSS, despite its separate institutional
identity. Other critics have censured
the VHP for attempting to declare certain “required” Hindu rites as antithetical to the Hindu tradition and for
attempting to define and control the
nature of “Hinduism.” Other critics
question the organization’s claim to
speak for all Hindus, noting that its real
power lies in the hands of brahmins and
other privileged classes; these critics see
the VHP as an organization designed to
conceal its true purpose, the maintenance of upper-class influence and privilege. For further information see Walter
K. Andersen and Shridhar D. Damle, The
Brotherhood in Saffron, 1987; James
Warner Björkman, Fundamentalism,
Revivalists, and Violence in South Asia,
1988; Tapan Basu et al., Khaki Shorts and
Saffron Flags, 1993; Lise McKean, Divine
Enterprise, 1996; and Christophe Jaffrelot,
The Hindu Nationalist Movement in
India, 1996.