Fil Yu. S. The Hindu Westernized Elites of Northern
India (1858–1921). Kiev: A. Krymsky Institute of Oriental Studies of the
Ukrainian Academy of Sciences, 2018. 220 p. (in Ukrainian)
SUMMARY
The book is devoted to the Hindu elites in North
India during the period of 1858–1921 from the time of Government of India Act
1858 till Indian National Congress session in Ahmedabad when satyagraha tactic
turned from private initiative of Gandhi to officially accepted national
politics. From that time a new period of westernization which has many
anti-Western displays was started.
The monograph reveals the main particularities of
forming westernized elites among Hindus in the region and their ideology. Using
such methodological instruments as “traditionalist – modernist” gradation
of the response on Western culture proposed by Indian historian B. Parekh,
the instrument of division westernization on 4 phases (imitative, assimilative,
asseverative, creative), the civilization approach by Arnold J. Toynbee and by
S. Hantington (three options for a developing nation: rejectionism,
reformism, kemalism), author analyse the political, economical, ideological
background of the Hindus elites and their responses to Western challenges.
The analysis of the formation of westernized Hindu
elites includes institutional and personal levels. The first one is dealing
with modern political and socio-religious institutions in colonial North India,
the second one demonstrates the attitude of the leading politicians of Punjab
and North-Western Provinces towards the different questions concerning India’s
encounter with Western culture.
The research argues that the range of economical,
political and demographical factors defined the particularities of the process
of formation and westernization of Hindu elites in North India. Among them
are the dominant status of Hindu culture in North-Western provinces and it’s
minor status in Punjab; the loosing of Hindu political power in 13th century in
Punjab, the fact of strong Mughal culture in North India and discriminative
policy toward Hindus of Shia Mughal rulers in the Oudh state. Western education
as the main precondition of forming the new for that time political elites had
some particularities. The Oriental line of education (Persian, Urdu, Sanskrit
languages and literature) in Allahabad and Punjab Universities were much more
popular than in presidential universities. Students had much more interest to
Western science then literature.
Political development of Punjab and North-Western
Provinces gradually tended to the separate political representation of Hindus
in the local government. The first Hindu political party – Hindu Mahasabha
– emerged here.
The Western religious challenge received particular
response from politicians in North India: Christianity was rejected and the
Bengali “creative” model of response in the form of Brahmo samaj was
inappropriate in the region. Instead the organization of defence type –
Arya samaj and Radhasoami faith – was influential.
The analysis of biographies and memoirs of five of
the most influential politicians of Northern India – Motilal Nehru, Madan
Mohan Malavia, Tej Bahadur Sapru, Bishan Narain Dar and Lala Lajpat Rai shows
that all of them were deeply rooted in traditional culture through their
traditional families, primary education and teachers. Being westernized, they
were not suspended between two cultures and always found the strategies to lead
to agreement inconsistent elements of Western and Hindu culture. They were also
the integral part of their own society mostly through political activism.
There are two nationalist ideologies among
politicians in North India – Hindu and Indian. Both of them represent political
nationalism according to which secular state was the main base for Indian
nation. The westernization in the religious sphere on personal level showed
that the majority of the five representatives of educated Indians were critical
modernists in socio-religious issues – the caste system should not be rejected
fully but should be reformed.
