Why the Hindu nationalist is a shoddy scholar

It is not surprising that Rajiv Malhotra has been accused of plagiarism (by Richard Fox Young of Princeton Theological Seminary).

I think it points to a general shoddiness that pervades whatever I have seen of his work - some extracts, including the controversial passages to which Young has drawn attention, and some articles from a few years ago.

It is absurd to dismiss intellectual rigour as a "Western" invention; that would be like saying creativity, intelligence, or the ability to conduct robust research and write well are "Western" inventions.

The defence that Malhotra has offered only seems to make his case worse. It shows that he is not interested in serious inquiry or scholarly examination of an issue but merely has a political axe to grind and a somewhat infantile polemical agenda.

There is certainly a section of Indians, NRI and otherwise, who have either an utter misunderstanding of - or contempt for - the humanities. Their belief is that anyone can undertake the study of history or religion, and that these subjects should be studied and taught to propagate the idea of Hindu glory and achievement.

That seems to mirror the thinking underlying some of the appointments by the human resource development (HRD) ministry. As both Pratap Bhanu Mehta and Amartya Sen have pointed out, the politicisation of education is not restricted to this government alone. We have many fine institutions, rich traditions of scholarship, and cultures of critical inquiry, which have withstood onslaughts.

However, there seems to be a concerted attack on the autonomy of educational institutions, which does not bode well for the state of education in India. Malhotra is a symptom of a much wider and complex obsession with science and technology among Indians. This harks backs to the colonial period, and Nehru's romantic idea of science as a secular religion has much to do with it - funny, since right-wing technocrats tend to loathe Nehru. That said, I would caution against easy generalisations about people from a science or technology background being predisposed to certain views.The problem essentially is such. While there were indigenous traditions of scientific learning in India, the formal study of science and technology is associated with British colonial rule. Engineering as a formal discipline was introduced in India by the British. This creates a problem for the technocratic nationalists who rant about the imposition of Western colonial knowledge on Indians.

As a reaction, they insist that all scientific and technological knowledge is already contained in Hindu texts. They also tend to blame the humanities for obscuring the true greatness of Hindu civilisation, accusing the liberal arts of colonising the mindset of Indians. The irony is that, in the process, they replicate a fairly classic colonial narrative about a fallen ancient Hindu glory which the British claimed they were reviving. All this is well analysed in scholarship on the history of Indian science, such as Gyan Prakash's Another Reason (2004), as well as the vast body of work on Hindu nationalism.

So there's definitely a targeting of scholars and institutions perceived to be Left and pro-Congress - which the Right conflates and treats as equivalent. That said, the Congress did have a culture of sycophancy as well. Ram Guha writes about this in his book of essays, Patriots and Partisans. A lot of posts were given to Congress toadies and Gandhi family apologists.

And certainly institutions and individuals should be criticised for a lack of accountability and waste regardless of who makes the criticism.

(As told to Angshukanta Chakraborty)