Hanuman Prasad Poddar and the Gita Press - Revision history

Pdewan at 21:45, 5 September 2015

2015-09-05T21:45:25Z

Pdewan: /* Opposing birth control */

2015-09-05T21:26:50Z

‎Opposing birth control

Pdewan: /* On the Sarada Act (minimum age of marriage) */

2015-09-05T21:20:47Z

‎On the Sarada Act (minimum age of marriage)

Pdewan: Created page with "{| class="wikitable" |- |colspan="0"|
Mr Akshaya Mukul has researched the life and times of Mr Hanuman Prasad Poddar in detail in his book ''Gita P..."

2015-09-01T20:52:21Z

Created page with "{| class="wikitable" |- |colspan="0"|<div style="font-size:100%"> Mr Akshaya Mukul has researched the life and times of Mr Hanuman Prasad Poddar in detail in his book ''Gita P..."

Show changes

@@ Line 10: / Line 10: @@
 [[Category:Institutions |G ]]
-=A vehicle of Hinduism=
+=The Gita Press: A vehicle of Hinduism=
 ''' Print Tradition ''': '' How Gita Press shaped the orthodox challenge to the Hindu Code ''
@@ Line 28: / Line 28: @@
 As of last year, the business had sold 71.9 million copies of the Gita; 70 million copies of various works by the bhakti poet Goswami Tulsidas, including the Ramcharitmanas; and 19 million copies of the Puranas, Upanishads and other ancient scriptures. Then, there are its tracts and monographs on the duties of ideal Hindu women and children, of which 94.8 million copies have been sold so far, along with more than 65 million copies of stories from India’s mythic past, biographies of saints, and devotional songs.
 The birth and success of Kalyan and Gita Press existed within a triangle, the points of which were the flowering of Hindi and Hindu journals, Marwari munificence, and the blurring of the demarcation between religion and politics, especially in the United Provinces (roughly the present-day states of Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand). The first of these distinct but interconnected factors involved the consolidation of Hindi, in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, as the language of Hindus; and the rapid growth of its public sphere, in which journals, newspapers, publishing houses and public figures played an important role—with the colonial state keeping a sharp watch through its widespread machinery of informants and tough laws.
@@ Line 165: / Line 166: @@
 August 13, 2015 | [http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/gita-press-making-of-hindu-india-akshaya-mukul/1/458343.html Aakar Patel, ''India Today''] (The following vignettes from Mr Akshaya Mukul's book have been extracted from Mr Patel’s review.)
 Two publisher-businessmen-writers (also agony aunts for your spiritual problems) pushed the message of Hindu nationalism from their press. Of these two Marwari men, one was first attracted to Gandhi and then put off by his caste reforms. He, Hanuman Prasad Poddar, is clearly unhinged, having the sort of spiritual epiphanies that would have been seen as messianic in a monotheistic nation. These epiphanies do not make him gentle: Poddar is an enthusiastic supporter of keeping Dalits out of temples and rejects the idea of dining together with them.

@@ Line 109: / Line 109: @@
 Adapted by ([http://www.caravanmagazine.in/reporting-and-essays/print-tradition-gita-press-challenge-hindu-code#sthash.8uKh5HlX.dpuf Caravan] from '' Gita Press and the Making of Hindu India, ''  published in Aug 2015 by HarperCollins Publishers India.
-=Opposing birth control=
+==Opposing birth control==
 ''' How the Gita Press opposed birth control to shore up the Hindu population '''
@@ Line 159: / Line 159: @@
 '' Excerpted by [http://scroll.in/article/750775/how-the-gita-press-opposed-birth-control-to-shore-up-the-hindu-population Scroll.in] with permission from '' Gita Press and the Making of Hindu India, '' Akshaya Mukul, HarperCollins India. ''

@@ Line 38: / Line 38: @@
 Poddar was more concerned with spirituality than politics; at times, he even felt the business of running a press frustrated his spiritual aims. However, in the years preceding the independence of India, disillusioned with what he called the anti-Hindu policies of the first Congress government, Poddar made a clear choice to openly support, even get actively involved in, the politics and struggles of Hindu nationalist groups and, later, political parties such as the Jana Sangh. When Hindu nationalist groups began what the political scientist Christophe Jaffrelot described as “using ethno-religious appeals to build up agitational movements,” Kalyan became a propaganda vehicle to disseminate their worldviews. The increasingly polarised position of the Gita Press, and its growing importance to the Hindu nationalist cause, can be traced through several such agitational movements, including the opposition to the Hindu Code Bill and other social reforms that sought to reconcile Hindu practices with the rights to equality guaranteed by the nascent constitution of the Indian state.
 ==On the Sarada Act (minimum age of marriage) ==
 IN 1929, when the British Indian government passed the Sarada Act, which fixed the minimum age of marriage for girls as 14 and for boys as 18, Kalyan remained silent on the subject. Hanuman Prasad Poddar, who edited Kalyan until his death in 1971, and whose writing still dominates its current issues, was opposed to the law but chose to keep his anger out of the pages of the magazine. He wrote, in a letter to Gita Press’s founder Jaydayal Goyandka, “I am a big opponent of this law not only because it relates to the age of girls but due to its interference in religious matters. There is a need to get this law revoked so that in future no need is felt to legislate on such matters. To break the law and go to jail is the only way out. I think opposing the legislation from a social and religious perspective would not help. The law has to be opposed politically.”
 But, he further stated, “Kalyan should not get involved in this. Instead, it should concentrate on propagating humanity, ideal behaviour and devotion to gods. Today, Kalyan’s message is spread among thousands of government employees. The moment we turn political they will move away from the journal. It is not about losing subscribers but principles.” Less than two decades later, however, as Hindu nationalism grew more vocal, these principles changed as well.
 ==On modernising Hindu laws (on marriage and inheritance )==
 In 1941, the colonial government appointed a Hindu Law Committee to advocate the formation of a Hindu law code. The committee was revived in 1944, to prepare a draft Hindu Code Bill, aimed at modernising the laws of Hindu marriage and inheritance. The political scientist BD Graham, in his 1990 book on the origins of the Jan Sangh, summarised its aims: extending “the rights of Hindu women by enforcing monogamy, recognizing the principle of inheritance through a daughter, and giving a woman complete rather than limited control of her property.” The Hindu Code Bill incensed orthodox Hindus, who saw it as an affront to their religion in the name of social reform. As a grand coalition of myriad orthodox elements emerged, Kalyan became an important voice in the campaign against the bill, not only educating its readers but also exhorting them to protest.

Hanuman Prasad Poddar and the Gita Press - Revision history

Pdewan at 21:45, 5 September 2015

Pdewan: /* Opposing birth control */

Pdewan: /* On the Sarada Act (minimum age of marriage) */

Pdewan: Created page with "{| class="wikitable" |- |colspan="0"| Mr Akshaya Mukul has researched the life and times of Mr Hanuman Prasad Poddar in detail in his book ''Gita P..."

Pdewan: Created page with "{| class="wikitable" |- |colspan="0"|
Mr Akshaya Mukul has researched the life and times of Mr Hanuman Prasad Poddar in detail in his book ''Gita P..."