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'The Abuse of Religion and Ecology: the Vishva Hindu Parishad And ‘The Abuse of Religion and Ecology: The Vishva Hindu Parishad and Tehri Dam’. Emma Mawdsley Worldviews (2005) 9 (1), pp.1-24 Department of Geography Birkbeck College, University of London Malet St, London WC1E 7HX [email protected] 1 Abstract A number of commentators have suggested various cautions and caveats about assuming a positive relationship between Hinduism and the environment. The main points of contention are the limitations of textual exegesis; the environmentally damaging consequences of some Hindu beliefs and practices; and questions over whether any religion provides an adequate or appropriate basis from which to address contemporary environmental challenges. This paper explores a rather different and very problematic relationship that is being drawn, by some, between Hinduism and the environment. It focuses on the recent involvement the Vishva Hindu Parishad (World Hindu Council) in protests against Tehri Dam. Neglecting the social and environmental problems that motivate other protestors, the VHP has sought to frame the dam as a communal issue - a threat by 'outsiders'/Muslims to the holy river Ganges, and ‘therefore’ to the Hindu religion, and ‘thus’ the nation. The paper argues that, in the context of an increasingly aggressive Hindu nationalism, environmental issues and movements are by no means immune from the dangerous and divisive religious politics that are being played out in contemporary India. Keywords: India; Hindu nationalism; environment; Tehri Dam; Ganges Introduction The relationship between religion and the environment is now a well- established subject of academic discussion (White 1967; Worldviews passim; Gottleib 1996; Daedelus 2001), and has attracted formal responses from all of the major world religions (WWF 1986). Hinduism1, the focus of this paper, has been the subject of particular attention - recent analyses include Prime (1992), Nelson (1998a), Baviskar (1999), James (1999), Chapple and Tucker (2000), and Narayanan (2001). Within these and other studies, three broad and over-lapping analytical approaches can be identified: (1) the exegesis of scriptures and historical texts to uncover metaphysical 1 Writing about 'Hinduism' in so short a paper is inevitably simplifying. Not only is it unmatched in its diversity of beliefs and practices across India and beyond, but religion, culture and social form inextricably permeate each other (for example, through the dynamic and varied notions and practices associated with caste). 2 and philosophical teachings on the environment, as well as indications of past attitudes and behaviours; (2) ethnographic explorations of particular social and cultural practices which relate to the environment; and (3) socio-political analyses of movements and organisations that actively mobilise religious values and beliefs in pursuit of various environmental goals. Although much of this work is broadly positive about the role religious belief can and sometimes does play in encouraging greater ecological sensitivity, some commentators rightfully express cautions and caveats. These include the limitations of textual analysis in elucidating actual values and behaviours, past and present (Pederson 1995; Nelson 2000; Patton 2000); the evidence that some elements of Hindu belief and practice can be at best neglectful and at worst positively damaging to the environment (Nelson 1998b; Alley 2000, 2002); and questions over whether religion or culture is an appropriate or sufficient frame through which to tackle the massive environmental problems confronting modern India (Nanda 2002; Tomalin 2002). This paper is concerned with another caution - of a different order and with a different set of implications - the abuse of religion and ecology in India through the mobilisation of 'green' issues in ways that are intended to promote the chauvinist agenda of Hindu nationalism. The context for this argument is the growth of Hindu nationalism in the Indian polity and society, and the increasing violence and discrimination against religious minorities and others in India. The paper starts with a quick overview of recent analyses of Hinduism and ecology, focussing on the problems mentioned above. It then turns to the rise of the Hindu Right in India, and outlines the way in which values and traditions of accommodation, plurality and syncretism are being suppressed by the increasing strength of a chauvinist, masculinist and violent religious nationalism. At the heart of the paper is a case study of the way in which the Vishva Hindu Parishad (World Hindu Council) has sought to communalise the issue of Tehri Dam, setting it within a framework of Muslim/outsider threats to the Hindu nation, while neglecting the social and environmental issues that concern the dam-affected people of the region, and which motivate the wider network of anti-dam activists. There are examples of organisations that genuinely seek to promote social and environmental justice in India through the mobilisation of various religious teachings and values (Roy 1993; Sullivan 1998; Haberman 2000). However this paper argues that in the context of an increasingly aggressive Hindu nationalism, environmental issues and movements are 3 by no means immune from the dangerous and divisive religious politics that are being played out in contemporary India. The arguments presented here draw on a wider research project of the last two to three years, which has focussed the environmental values and behaviours of India's middle classes (Mawdsley 2004). It also builds on earlier work in and around the area of Tehri Dam, from 1992-96, while researching the regional movement for a new federal State in this area. Environmental issues were an important element of the study (Mawdsley 1998), and during this time I lived for several months in a village in the dam’s proposed submergence zone. As well as talking to men and women in this and other villages, I interviewed several people associated with the anti-dam movement, and various supporters of the dam, locally and in the wider region.2 The work of Mukul Sharma (2001a, 2002) has been especially valuable in providing detail on the VHP and Tehri Dam, and I would like to formally record my debt to his analysis. Hinduism and ecology: cautions and caveats Approaches to the study of Hinduism and ecology tend to fall into three categories, although often with very considerable overlaps. The first focuses on the hermeneutic analysis of various religio-mythological and historical texts, such as the Vedas, the Upanishads, the Epics and many more, in order to elucidate various philosophical arguments and precepts concerning the environment, as well as indications of past behaviours (e.g. Dwivedi 1997; Mumme 1998; Sharma 1998; Dwivedi and Tiwari 1999; Rukmani 2000; Lutgendorf 2000). Second are the more ethnographically based analyses, which focus on (a) particular practices, such as the maintenance of sacred groves (Gadgil and Chandran 1992; Sinha 1995; Freeman 1999); (b) on specific issues, such as waste disposal (Chaplin 1997; Agarwal 2000); and (c) on the environmental associations and outcomes of the material expressions of Hinduism, such as caste (Chaplin 1997; Korom 1998) or rituals (Khanna 2000; 2 However, I should make it clear that that at this time I did not interview these people with the issue of Hindu nationalism in mind, but with regard to the struggles in the region over governance, development and the environment. 4 Nagarajan 2000). A third set of writings, ethnographic and socio-political, examine the ways in which particular organisations and movements have mobilised various Hindu idioms and beliefs in the pursuit of particular environmental goals. Examples include Swadhyaya in Gujarat (Roy 1993; Gupta 1999), and various groups encouraging the reforestation of the Braj region, a place special to devotees of Krishna (Sullivan 1998; Haberman 1994, 2000). Environment-livelihood movements, such as the Chipko struggles (Mawdsley 1998; Rangan 2000), and the Narmada Bachao Andolan (Baviskar 1995), to name but two of the better known, also fall into this category. Out of this wide, and often very rich literature, the best emphasises the importance of situating beliefs, practices and movements within local and regional and historical contexts; the sheer diversity of Hindu theological traditions, beliefs and practices; the intersections with issues of gender, class, caste and community; and their hybridisation with other religions and practices in and from the sub-continent, including Islam, Christianity, Buddhism, Jainism, sarna3 and so on (Nelson 1998b; Apffel-Marglin and Parajuli 2000; Jackson and Chattopadhyay 2001; Narayanan 2001). Many of these analyses question and complicate the popular assumption that Hinduism, like other 'eastern religions', necessarily encourages values and behaviours that are environmentally positive - an argument that is often set against a critical reading of Western philosophical and religious traditions in relation to the environment (White, 1967). First are the various limitations circumscribing the ‘ecological interpretation’ of historical and religious texts. Most scriptures, commentaries, poems, legal treatises and so on, reflect the views of their authors, who were usually elite, high caste, educated men. Although they provide a valuable source of material, interpretations of past environmental values or behaviours cannot be inferred simply by reference to Brahminic (or later Mughal) texts and treatises. They are most unlikely to have reflected
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