8 - Rethinking Knowledge with Action: V. D. Savarkar, the Bhagavad Gita and Histories of Warfare

Summary

Why… mourn for the past? My power and intelligence would have been as nought, if I had feared and trembled in the hour of my trial, like Arjuna on the battlefield of Kurekshetra. I did not fail in my duty—in my Dharma.

V. D. Savarkar, My Transportation for Life (1927)

Introduction

On 7 July 1937, Vinayak Damodar Savarkar delivered a speech entitled “Ek hi dharm-pustak nahin, yeh achcha hai!” (“There Is No One Religious Book: This Is Good!”). Savarkar's central argument was that the Bhagavad Gita should not be considered the singular or monolithic text for the creation of the Hindu nation. He explained that the Gita was a seminal work, but that it needed to be read alongside other books that constituted the diverse literary traditions within Hinduism. Savarkar's claim for textual pluralism was a direct response to contemporary arguments that Hindus needed to elevate the Gita to the status of the Bible in Christianity or the Koran in Islam as a way to strengthen the foundation of Hinduism in the making of modern India. In the short speech, Savarkar simply presents his argument about the Gita, rather than providing a commentary on the text. To what extent the speech had an influence on the interpretation of and debates around the Gita remains unclear. Nor is it known if the speech had an impact on the direction of Hindu nationalism, especially since Savarkar was elected president of the All-India Hindu Mahasabha on 30 December 1937.