Author: Sandhya Jain
Publication: Organiser
Date: July 9, 2006
URL: http://www.organiser.org/dynamic/modules.php?name=Content&pa=showpage&pid=138&page=9
Introduction: Titled as the United Hindu Dharma
Samsthan (UHDS), a group of lay persons living mostly in America are urging
all the major Hindu acharyas to join them and execute their plan for the reinvigoration
of Hindu society. With little regard for religious sanctity or hierarchy,
they have simply lumped a number of well-known Acharyas and traditional mathams
together.
Two recent initiatives by Hindus living abroad
raise fundamental questions about who has the right (adhikaar) to speak for
the Hindu community in India and in the various countries where Hindus have
settled, often for generations. The question is pertinent because in the Vedic
tradition, the celestial island on which the territory of Bharat lies is the
sole dharmic punyabhoomi and karmabhoomi. The oblations to the ancestors (shraad)
can only be performed here, and here alone can the debts (rnas) to gods, teachers,
family and society (humanity) be discharged.
As the Vedic homeland, Indian Hindus obviously
enjoy the principal right to reinterpret or regenerate dharma according to
the needs of the times (yuga). However, in keeping with the spirit of the
times, the various Hindu communities abroad have the right (which implies
also the duty, because adhikaar encompasses both) to articulate their special
problems in their non-Hindu environments and to find solutions to the same.
They do not, however, have the right to superimpose their views upon India's
Hindus, who are still living in the dharmic punyabhoomi and are grappling
with the civilizational challenges to the survival of Hindu dharma in their
own hinterland. In this context, the First Hindu Mandir Executives Conference
(HMEC), representing 57 temples from over 20 states of America, Canada and
the Caribbean Islands, in Atlanta last week is a welcome development. It is
heartening that beside temple executives, the delegate-devotees included physicians,
scientists, businesspersons, homemakers and engineers, with an abiding commitment
to the community's spiritual and social ethos. The Hindu Mandirs of the Americas
reiterated their unity concurrent with allegiances to myriad panthas (path),
sampradaya (tradition), or country of origin.
The group emphasised service to humanity (sewa),
symbolised in an annual Hindu Seva Divas, whereby the Mandirs will organise
community service activities in their respective local areas. The Hindu Mandirs
in Americas has also shown concern about the educational needs of Hindu children,
expressing anxiety over the deficiencies and gross distortions in American
school textbooks on the Hindu dharma, its culture and traditions, causing
humiliation to the youth. All school districts will now be approached in an
organised manner to rectify this intellectual discrimination against the Hindu
community, and this aspect of the deliberations were probably the most positive
aspect of the meeting. Held under the auspices of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad
of America, the temple authorities decried the rising vandalism (hate crimes),
destruction and desecration of Hindu Mandirs throughout the world.
The HMEC meeting however, is in sharp contrast
to a current attempt by some foreigners (including non-Hindus) and their Hindu
friends to appropriate the agency of the entire Hindu society in India and
subordinate Hindu dharma-gurus to their agenda on the pretext of facing the
contemporary dangers to Hindu dharma. Titled as the United Hindu Dharma Samsthan
(UHDS), a group of lay persons living mostly in America are urging all the
major Hindu acharyas to join them and execute their plan for the reinvigoration
of Hindu society.
With little regard for religious sanctity
or hierarchy, they have simply lumped a number of well-known acharyas and
traditional mathams together, and dictated an agenda which involves the swamis'
meeting two-three times every year, instead of once in two-three years! The
audacity of this diktat has not occurred to any of the sponsors even after
gentle remonstrance from some well-meaning souls.
Instead, they have rushed in where angels
fear to tread, lamenting that it will "take a long time to unite Hindus."
If that is true, who has authorised them to outsource our burden to the White
Man? Appropriating this authority, the United Hindu Dharma Samsthan is seeking
100,000 signatures on a petition to "force many reluctant swamis to join
UHDS." And reflecting the mentality of monotheistic faiths, the UHDS
proposes to have a "Pramukh Swamy" who will represent all Hindu
swamis for a revolving term of one or two years. As though the idea of a Revolving
Hindu Pope was not enough, our American friends also propose a corporate-style
"chief executive officer for the Pramukh Swamy of UHDS." A well-known
politician has been offered the post; on what basis, it is difficult to say.
The sponsors of this new spiritual-corporate
entity have tended to brush aside information that India already has a Hindu
Dharma Acharya Sabha (HDAS), which is the apex body of Hindu Dharma and is
being supported by the heads of various Sampradayas, and is steadily extending
its reach over all of spiritual India. Their determination to create an A.O.
Hume type of Hindu Vatican of America must logically, therefore, have a political
agenda and also probably some kind of Western backing.
The whole tenor of the petition is offensive.
It states: "We dream of a day when the Hindu gurus and swamis unite under
one umbrella to protect Dharma. Time has come, now or perhaps never. Each
group and guru will retain their leadership and autonomy of the pantha-s or
matam-s but will meet periodically, at least three times a year to review
the situation and issue dharma proclamations and edicts, much like Ashoka's
s'aasanas. Such proclamations will be firm guidelines for dharmic action for
hundreds of millions of Hindus all over the world, coming as they do from
the voice of the great gurus speaking with a unity of purpose-Dharma rakshana."
In short, a Secular Oligarchy will dictate
an agenda to the great gurus of the Hindu tradition, and impose it upon the
millions of world-wide Hindus who revere the sants. The real danger of the
move lies in the persistent attempt to mould Hindu dharma into a monotheistic
mould, which will facilitate a later-day cannibalisation by the Western Christian
tradition, because if you end Hindu diversity, India will be up for grabs.
It needs to be rebuffed in no uncertain terms.
