In Defence of Liberal Hinduism: Tharoor's Why I am a Hindu

The politics of religion forces one to re-evaluate faith. At least, it did for me. You are born a Hindu,
you grow up conditioned in the traditions of the religion, follow the rituals almost unthinkingly. And then
there comes a time when you feel you can’t defend it in the world anymore. Not when you see terrible
things committed in its name, not when you realize the contradictions within it (the caste-ism and
sexism, for example), not when you start to despise at least some of the people who proudly claim it.
Your liberal soul revolts.

Yet you want to defend it. Because there really is so much to love about it. Those rituals, for one - the
ones you cannot do without, the ones that center you - the lighting of the lamp every morning, the
reciting of the shlokas you learnt as a child, the visits to temples where you can almost feel the power
of the idols that have been prayed to, for centuries. And then what about the sheer beauty of the idols
and the architecture? And the joi-de-vivre of the epic stories you grew up hearing? The familiarity of
your favourite gods and goddesses, beings who are almost part of your family?  What about a
philosophy of the religion, one that you know vaguely, but one that makes some sense in this screwed
up world - a philosophy that preaches a universal soul, and looking inward to find oneness with it? Oh,
there really is so much to love about it.

Shashi Tharoor, in his book, Why I am a Hindu tries to reclaim all that, defending Hinduism against the
ones who preach a narrower version, an illiberal one, one that goes by the name of Hindutva. Part of
his book looks at the history and the philosophies and the route to today’s version of the religion.
Reading that part, you want to go back to the basics, re-learn Sanskrit, read the Vedas and the
Puranas and the Upanishads. You want to read Ramakrishna Parahamsa and Swami Vivekanand,
Radhakrishnan and Aurobindo. Because all of them just seem so interesting - as literature and as
philosophy, as reformers and explainers of a religion. You know there are parts that will contradict
each other, that there is a terribly regressive Manusmriti, but that there is also beautiful poetry, hugely
entertaining fables and philosophies for the modern soul. Tharoor does not shy away from the
contradictions - yet his take on them is the weakest part of the book. Because honestly, not even the
erudition of a Tharoor can explain away those.

He then goes on to chronicle the rise of political Hinduism and the Hindutva brigade. You read about
Savarkar and Golwalkar and your heart starts to sink. This is the most painful part of the book, and
you can feel the welling up of despair as you see how much destruction this pair has caused to the
fabric of a religion and a nation. He is soft on Deen Dayal Upadhyay and his Integral Humanism, but
is quite merciless on the others.

The last part is meant to be a call to arms, a totem pole for the liberal Hindu, a refusal to cede ground
to rabidness and the ‘Semitization’ of his religion. Here he is passionate and intense, and the ardour
is inspiring. Deep in your heart, you want to believe that we can do that - that we can reclaim the
vastness of our faith, we can shame those who choose to narrow it to a holy book and a few gods,
that we can prove to enough people our faith is ‘eclectic and non-doctrinaire’ and that it is the perfect
one for a plural society, since it never has to put down another religion to uplift our own. Deep down,
you want to believe we can. Deep down, you are not entirely sure we really can.