PEAK OIL, DYING CITIES AND CITIES OF TOMORROW

Cities are energy consumers, not producers. They exist as they siphon large quantities of energy surpluses from their hinterlands. Their energy source has a predominant influence on their configuration. With the fossil fuel era coming to a close, and no viable alternative energy source visible on the horizon, cities as they exist today are unsustainable. Their future depends on whether they can reinvent themselves radically—reduce their energy consumption drastically to come closer to that of their hinterlands, and distribute energy equitably to all their residents. Cuba and transition towns in North nations have already begun to go down this road. Many similar initiatives are occurring in urban India also.

Peak Oil

Since 2008 the world capitalism/imperialism is going through a continuous crisis. Each year saw a couple of major international financial and/or political crisis. Last year several governments in West Asia and Europe fell. The Fukoshima disaster also exasperated the crisis. This year began with the Iran crisis, while the crisis in Europe and U.K. continues. The governments in France and Greek recently fell due to anti austerity sentiments. One of the main reasons for the crisis is 'Peak Oil', that is, the production of petroleum has peaked. Since 2005 there has been no increase in production of petroleum while the demand, particularly in China and India has been increasing continuously. This has led to what is called 'resource wars' and the wars in West Asia are essentially around controlling petrol and gas reserves.

So what exactly is ‘Peak Oil’- which is likely to lead to the end of the industrial era? At the present rate of consumption, all available oil will be used up within this century. But peak oil is not about when we run out of oil, but rather, when the production of oil starts to decline, and this has already happened. While expert opinions differ, most of them seem to agree that it is already behind us (2005 - 2008) and we are witnessing the effects in the global crash of capitalism!

Peak Oil crisis starts with rise in petroleum prices. For some time the figure of USD 100/- per barrel of crude has been considered to be the turning point. On November 21, 2007 oil price hit USD 99. In 2008 it reached USD 147, ushering in an economic crisis; a recession in North America, Europe and Japan. This economic crisis, as we know, is leading to a worldwide collapse of the system. Since then capitalism is beset with one after another global crises. After the housing crisis, there was the financial meltdown, then the debt crisis in Greece, Ireland, Italy, Spain and Portugal. More recently the mass movements in West Asia have once again sent the oil prices soaring upwards. Today with the prospect of Greece leaving the EU, Europe is heading towards a deeper crisis.

The empire is imploding and collapsing. Whether the collapse comes in a couple years or a decade is not predictable. There are too many fast changing variables, the most important being the people's struggle against it and the vision of an alternative society. But irrespective of the date, the world has to face either chaos or prepare for a transition to a society based on lower energy and equity. Such a society will have different forms in different parts of the world depending upon their history. Here we are considering the future of cities only.

Dying Cities

Cities exist because they siphon large quantities of energy surpluses from their hinterlands.  However, with the fossil fuel era coming to a close,  and no viable alternative energy source visible on the horizon, the cities as they exist today are unsustainable. Their future depends on whether they can reinvent themselves radically—reduce their energy consumption drastically to come closer to that of their hinterlands, and distribute energy equitably across all their residents.

The primary energy source in the cities today is fossil fuels, and there have been vast improvements in energy conversion and conveyance technologies.  European imperialism gave Europe an enormous amount surplus energy siphoned off from Asian and African colonies.  A part of this surplus energy was used to transform medieval cities into fossil fuel age cities.  Roads were widened for automobile use. Cities expanded laterally eating up farmland; and vertically to dizzying heights as cement concrete had the strength to do that.  Massive bridges allowed wide rivers to be crossed easily, and aeroplanes have reduced travel time between cities on different continents to less than a day.

There are two types of cities in the Industrial age.  The first type is located largely in Europe, North America and Australasia, where the transition from Medieval Age cities that are based on animate energy and biomass to Industrial age cities that are based on fossil fuels is largely complete in these cities.  Typical examples of Type 1 cities are: Berlin, San Francisco, Stockholm, Melbourne and Tokyo.  The second type of cities is in the developing countries in Asia, Africa and South America, where the transition is still in progress.  Rawalpindi, Bangkok, Tehran, Delhi, Sao Paulo are examples of Type 2 cities.

The cities in today's world, particularly in the developed world and in metro and mega cities of developing nations are becoming unsustainable. In the last hundred years they restructured themselves to suit to fossil fuel transport and economy - wider streets, suburbs and fossil fuel based energy. With the oil crisis they are falling apart.

What Needs to be Done

To avoid civilization collapse due to energy overdraw and conflict due to inequitable distribution of energy, two measures need to be adopted:

1.      Powering down fossil fuel/non-biomass energy consumption to about 40% of its current consumption , and in future relying on the sun for our energy needs.

2.      Moving towards energy equity.

Cities must re-invent themselves

Given the impending energy crisis, cities will not have the necessary energy surplus to sustain themselves.  They will not disappear overnight, but will perforce shrink.  If such a shrink is not to be chaotic, it is better to plan their shrink from now.  Some of the fundamental issues for cities will be:

1. Cities should plan their shrink so that they do not to exceed a population of 500,000.

2. Cities should distribute energy evenly across all its residents to avoid the risk of conflict between various sections of its residents.

3. The difference in the per capita energy consumption of city and rural people should be narrowed significantly.

4. Cities must plan to configure themselves on the future energy source, i.e., solar energy.

5. Type 2 cities in South nations will never have the resources (energy and financial) to complete the transition to becoming Type 1 cities based on fossil fuels.  It is best to abandon the attempt to make that transition right away and  begin the transition to becoming solar cities. For example, plans to widen streets, to have a metro, build a new airport, bring more water from distant rivers etc. should be abandoned.

Cities of Tomorrow

Several hundred cities and rural communities all over the world are involved in local changes to meet such a situation. They have been known as ecological villages, transition towns and post carbon cities. In India too many urban initiatives are taking place.

This story, however, must begin with Cuba where many of the initiatives we are talking about took place about two decades ago.

Cuba

Cuba is where “Peak oil” hit in 1989—in an artificial manner—because there was no oil shortage then.  The Soviet Union had begun to collapse and Cuba's petroleum imports dried up.  US embargo against Cuba did not permit imports from other sources.

Cuba’s response is an inspiration to the rest of the world.  First, a nation-wide call was given to increase food production by restructuring agriculture.  It involved converting from conventional large-scale, high input monoculture systems to smaller scale, organic and semi-organic farming systems. The focus was on using low cost and environmentally safe inputs and relocating production closer to consumption centres to cut transport costs.

A spontaneous decentralized movement to set-up urban farms was born.  By 1994, more than 8,000 city farms were created in Havana alone.  Front lawns of municipal buildings were dug up to grow vegetables.  Offices and schools cultivated their own food.  Many of the gardeners were retired men.  Women played a larger role in agriculture in cities than they did in rural areas.  By 1998, an estimated 541,000 tons of food were produced in Havana.  Food quality improved as people had access to a greater variety of fresh fruits and vegetables.  Some neighbourhoods produced as much as 30% of their food.

The growth of urban agriculture was largely due to the State’s initiative.  New planning laws placed the highest priority on food production.  Licenses were granted to convert unused urban land into farms, and resources were made available to aspiring urban farmers. This helped in converting hundreds of vacant urban spaces into food producing plots.  Another successful device was the opening of farmers markets that allowed direct sale of farm produce by farmers to consumers.  Deregulation of prices combined with high demand for fresh farm produce in the cities allowed urban farmers to generate two to three times the income of rural farmers.

When oil supply stopped in 1990, transportation in Cuba ground to a near halt.  No cars ran; public conveyance collapsed; and the streets were empty. People walked. In the early-1990s, Cuba imported 2,00,000 bicycles from China.  Trucks were converted to buses by simply welding steps at the back and adding a skeletal frame of rods and a canopy. The concept was refined into the ‘Camellone’ (The Camel), Cuba’s mass transit bus. Built on a long chassis vehicle, it could accommodate 250 persons.  For shorter distances cycles and auto rickshaws were used.  In smaller towns, horse drawn or even mule drawn ‘cabs’ were used.  Car-pooling and ride sharing became common. Designated government officials in yellow uniforms had the right to pull over even government vehicles and seat people in need of transport.(1)

Transition Towns

Transition Towns is a more recent phenomenon. It is a grassroots network of communities that are working to build resilience in response to peak oil, climate destruction, and economic instability. Transition Towns is a brand for these environmental and social movements founded (in part) upon the principles of permaculture, based originally on Bill Mollison's seminal Permaculture, a Designers Manual published in 1988. The Transition Towns brand of permaculture uses David Holmgren’s 2003 book, Permaculture: Principles and Pathways Beyond Sustainability. These techniques were included in a student project overseen by permaculture teacher Rob Hopkins at the Kinsale Further Education College in Ireland. Two of his students, Louise Rooney and Catherine Dunne, set about developing the transition towns concept and took the far-reaching step of presenting it to Kinsale Town Council, resulting in the historic decision by councillors to adopt the plan and work towards energy independence. The term transition town was coined by Louise Rooney and Catherine Dunne. The Transition Towns movement is an example of socioeconomic localisation.

The idea was adapted and expanded through 2005, 2006 and beyond in Hopkins' hometown of Totnes where he is now based. The initiative spread quickly, and as of May 2010, there are over 400 communities recognized as official Transition Towns in the United Kingdom, Ireland, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, the United States, Italy, and Chile. The term transition towns has morphed into transition initiatives to reflect the range and type of communities involved - e.g. villages (Kinsale), neighbourhoods of cities (Portobello, Edinburgh), through council districts (Penwich) to cities and city boroughs (Brixton).

Central to the transition town movement is the idea that a life without oil could in fact be far more enjoyable and fulfilling than the present: "by shifting our mind-set we can actually recognise the coming post-cheap oil era as an opportunity rather than a threat, and design the future low carbon age to be thriving, resilient and abundant-somewhere much better to live than our current alienated consumer culture based on greed, war and the myth of perpetual growth."

An essential aspect of transition in many places is that the outer work of transition needs to be matched by inner transition. That is in order to move down the energy descent pathways effectively we need to rebuild our relations with our selves, with each other and with the "natural" worlds. That requires focusing on the heart and soul of transition.

A key concept within transition is the idea of a community-visioned, community-designed and community-implemented plan to proactively transition the community away from fossil fuels. The term "community" in this context includes all the key players-local people, local institutions, local agencies and the local council.

As of 2010, transition initiatives are generally including the global financial crisis as a third aspect beside peak oil and climate change. Initially, this has been linked to the creation of a series of local currencies in transition towns including the Totens pound, the Lewes pound, as well as the Brixton pound in London(2).

Urban India

India has an urban population of 300 million, greater than the population of USA, or for that matter, greater than any country except China. This urban Indian population lives in a total of 400 urban agglomerates. Of this urban population, more than half (180 million) lives in 35 cities that have a population greater than a million. The three metros/mega cities, Mumbai, Kolkata and Delhi have more than 10 million residents. Hyderabad and Bengaluru, have more than 5 million.

It will be easier to tackle the problems of 120 million people who live in 365 urban agglomerates of less than a million, and many of the success stories will first come from them. On the other hand, many groups and individuals in bigger cities are more aware and have resources to start alternatives. They can help groups and residents in smaller towns (3).

As we have said it is only in the metro and mega cities that restructuring to suit cheap fossil fuel has occurred in a significant way. Road widening, tarred roads, suburbia etc. has occurred in these cities. Here also it is not complete. Pockets of slums-as much as a third of the population living in them, which have small lanes continue to exist. So changes required to face a fossil fuel free societies are far easier in India and in other developing countries than in the developed countries. On the other hand public awareness on these issues is low and it is not able to influence the governments or even local bodies in terms of policies. So the changes that are occurring are on the basis of acute problems that people are facing due to the present crisis. These are: rain water harvesting, fuel (for cooking) and fuel efficient stoves, urban agriculture for perishable foods like vegetable and fruits which are becoming expensive due to transport costs, transport based on non-fossil fuels–bicycles, cycle rickshaws, horse, donkey, camel and bullock carts. Solid waste management is probably the only area where city wide policy intervention has been possible.

Roof top rain water harvesting has been the most widely discussed topic. Many state governments have passed laws making it compulsory and have published booklets to help people how to do it. Organisations like CSE in Delhi train people in it and have also carried out prestigious projects. However in terms of implementation it is still slow. It is the most promising area of activity for creation of green jobs and green entrepreneurship. Rain water harvesting is not limited to roof top alone. It involves tree planting in cities, restoring tank and ponds and in general what is called 'water shed management' which can apply to all the areas.

Fuel efficient stoves have been around since the 50s starting with Magan Chulha having a chimney and designed for 2 or 3 pots. There are others, which produce charcoal as a by-product or are based purely on charcoal as a fuel and finally there are solar box cookers. The problem is that they are a bit expensive and require knowledge and maintenance. People who can afford have other alternatives like gas or servants to cook for them. The real answer is to increase equality in society and have plentiful fuel wood by planting fuel wood trees. Charcoal produced from wood should become the main high density fuel for artisan/industrial use.

Urban garden movement too is catching up with relatively modern and affluent urban people who are becoming aware about health food. They mainly produce vegetables. There are e-groups, training programmes and books in most big cities. Several cities have started marketing local and organic products. Bangalore and Hyderabad have a fairly well established shops which also couple network places for kitchen gardens. Poor people, on the other hand,  do manage to grow whatever is possible. In smaller town where there is a bit more space and people are more linked to rural hinterland, this happens much more.

Bicycles and cycle rickshaws are making a genuine come back and a large number of towns are seeing not only revival, but also better equipment and better social organisations. On the other hand city planners are still governed by fossil fuel lobby and the convenience of private cars dominates (4) However some towns do have cycle lanes. Nanded in Maharashtra has lanes for cycle in several streets.

In Vellore in Tamilnadu a zero waste management programme has been successfully carried out. Several municipalities all over the country are trying it out. This coupled with anti-plastic movement is slowly changing the face of urban India. (5), (6).

Political Hurdles

As it is obvious from above, in India there is lack of awareness and political will on these ideas. Why is it so? These ideas require local solutions and are based on strengthening of local politics and of local bodies. In Indian polity they have always been weak and Indian polity in the last 60 years have not strengthened them. Most Indian politics-from extreme right to extreme left is about capturing central power and is not about grass root democracy. These ideas require anarchist inputs -ideas of opposing power in any form, local direct democracy and local self-management. We find them in the writing and works of anarchists in the urban movement.

 

Historical and Ideological Roots

Many of the ideas discussed above have roots dating back to a hundred year in the Anarchists movement. In urban planning, as Peter Hall say in 'Cities of Tomorrow', we must begin with Patrick Geddes (7). Patrick Geddes was pioneer in people centric urban planning and regional planning. 'Town planning is not mere place-planning, nor even work-planning. If it is to be successful it must be folk-planning.' It was he who introduced the 'Diagnostic Survey', 'Conservative Surgery' (as against demolition), planning for health and planning for open spaces and trees. He influenced town planners all over the world. Lewis Mumford and The Regional Planning Association of America and its journal 'The Survey' played an important part in spreading his ideas (8).

Patrick Geddes was in India between 1915-1919 and carried out some 60 town planning exercises. Fortunately a book about him, 'Patrick Geddes in India' has been reprinted in India and we have access to most of his ideas now (9).

I would like to end with a simple quote from Patrick Geddes: 'Town planning … should start by the development in youth of a civic consciousness, working up through a knowledge of the immediate locality and city to a larger and most general grasp of their problems. … There is, therefore, a great need of public co-operation; of an ever-increasing body of active citizens who will no longer leave all matters to official authority but work with the municipal representatives.'

 References and Notes

1.      Regaining Paradise: towards a fossil fuel free society by T. Vijayendra. See the chapter on 'Cuba without Isms'.

2.      Transition Towns 'From Wikipedia, the free encyclopaedia.'

3.      Regaining Paradise: towards a fossil fuel free society by T. Vijayendra. See the chapter on 'Urban Initiatives'.

4.    http://www.downtoearth.org.in/content/foot-pedal

5.      http://zerowastemanagement.org.in/index.php

6.       'Plastic bags bigger threat than atom bombs: Supreme Court', Deccan Herald, May 8, 2012.

7.      Cities of Tomorrow by Peter Hall, 1988, Basil Blackwell.

8.       The RPAA Manifesto. The Survey, Journal of RPAA, May 1, 1925.

9.       Patrick Geddes in India, 1947, Perry Lund Humphries, London and Bradford. Reprinted 2007, Select Books, Bangalore.

Words: 3418

May 29, 2012

BHIMSEN JOSHI and the North Indian Classical Music

With the death of Bhimsen Joshi an era of North Indian classical music has come to an end. This era dominated the last four decades of the 20th century and had luminaries like Kumar Gandharva, Amir Khan, Gangu Bai Hangal, Hirabai Barodekar, Begum Akhtar, Pannnalal Ghosh , Bismillah Khan, Vilayat Khan, Ali Akbar and Ravi Shankar.

Although I come from the same region and my father was a musician, and I have listened to Bhimsen Joshi since my early youth, this article is not meant to be a tribute to him. He had a large following and I am sure a large number of decent articles will appear. For me he had a wonderful voice and he will be remembered more for his bhajans in Kannada and Marathi than his renderings in the more 'classical' mode.

This article instead offers a few critical comments on the North Indian classical music and its place in Indian culture. In the late sixties P. C. Chatterjee (the then director of All India Radio, Calcutta) asked me, 'How does the Indian classical music reflect contemporary sensibilites?' He added that when he asked this question to the musicians themselves, it made no sense to them. I can understand it not making any sense to the musicians, but it surprises me that why this question has not been raised at all? Hereafter,  the word Indian music, refers to north Indian music only. Indian classical music does not reflect contemporary sensibilities as does art or writing. Why so? Classical music in the West reflected the triumph of the bourgeoisie, Napoleanic wars and so on. Can the  Indian classical music be actually called classical?

 Before we come to comment on it let us have a look at the terrain we are dealing with. Indians like to trace every thing back to the Vedas. However the living and continuous tradition of   this music dates after the Mutiny (The Indian War of Iindependence) of 1857. Many Indian princely states, having their wings clipped, patronised musicians. In as much as the Mutiny was mainly a north Indian affair, it is not surprising that six of these music gharanas (schools/traditions) found patronage in the small kingdoms in Deccan, in the border districts of today's north Karnataka and Maharashtra. Bhimsen Joshi also belonged to this region. These musicians rendered a refined version of the folk music. Later with the increase in competition they developed styles, some of which are quite unmusical to distinguish themselves. With the advent of railways they began to travel and had musical conferences in various Indian cities. These were patronised by 'patriotic' gentry.

 It was Bhatkhande who systemised the knowledge in the early decades of the 20th century. First he published two volumes of dialogues discussing aspects of each raga and the way they were rendered by different schools and trried to fix a standard. Later he published six volumes of 'Kramik Pustakmala' which was a proper course in Indian music and was taught in Benaras by Ratanjankar and others.

Bhatkhande and others by this time were part of the 'nationalist' discourse and taking pride in the 'great Indian traditions'. In Bengal the Brhamo Samaj used music in their assembalies and were probably the first to publish Indian notations in Devnagari script by 1880s. Rabindranath himself took lot of interest and a school of aesthetics and divinity through  music (you can reach God through great music!) came into being with Dilip Kumar Roy as its chief exponent.

 We must remember that in spite of the styles these gharanas developed it was still very musical and pleasing even to ordinary people, unlike the post independence, particularly the post 60s period to which Joshi belongs. In the 50s and even up to middle of sixties the musical conference tradition of the pre independence continued. 1967 changed all that.

We need harldy delve in to the details of sea change this period brought in India. It was the end of the Nehru era, or the euphoria of independence. Now on Indian people knew that a new ruling class has entrenched itself and they have to fight it.

 In music the classical music was driven to the drawing rooms of the rich and of course it went abroad. An affected sense of appreciation came in to being and musicians also began to perform to cater to this class and moved away from the larger middle class audience, although individually they nostalgically craved for it. Kiran  Seth in Delhi tried to revive interest in the children of these rich people in the universities by starting SPICMACY (Society for Promotion of Indian Classical Music Among Children and Youth). It was patronised by these classes but is more or less dead.

Coming back to the questions that we raised about its relevence to contemprary sensibilities, the answer is that largely it does not reflect. The reason is that it was always mainly a performing art for the patrons and with increrasing alienation of the ruling classes from the people it too distanced itself from its folk origins and got in to musical gymnastics and frankly became quite unmusical a nd un melodius. As one musician put it , music without melody is 'sic'. I am afraid Bhimsen Joshi was no exception along with Ravi Shankar and almost all the others. How about the word classical?  In spite of Indian system of notations we do not have written composition like in the west.  So there will not be musicians rendering 'old' classics. What propbably will remain the method of instruction and the daily practice, the 'riaz'. I think the word classical does not apply to the Indian music except to say that there was a so called 'golden' era of gharanas. 

 And that era to which Bhimsen Joshi belonged has gone. I am afraid it will be quickly forgotten, except for  what it did to popular music particularly in the Hindi cinema but also in Bengali and other north Indian cinema and to theatre. It gave great lyrics sung in a melodius and meaningful style that has endeared to every one during those decades and today they still live in the albums and are heard every where. As an aside classical music also rendered itself very nicely to humorous music. The great Manna Dey singing play back fo Mahmood exploited it fully.

 Among these classical musicians, Bhimsen Joshi himself will be remembered for his 'lighter' renderings of devotional songs. Probably the lone survivor among the greats  from this era will be Begum Akthar and Bismillah Khan, who never gave in to the gymnastics that these greats went in to please the new class. They remained melodius and meaningful.

RELIGION AND POLITICS Understanding Contemporary Hindu Politics: Exploring a People's Project

Introduction

This is not meant to be a definitive essay on Hinduism. It does not deal with the theological, spiritual or ethical aspects of Hindu Religion. For readers who want to explore these aspects more they can start with the excellent monograph, eHinduismf by K. M. Sen. Acharya Kshiti Mohan Sen was at Shantiniketan with Tagore and was an authority on medieval Indian religion. His eMadhyajuger Sadhanaf is a classic contribution in this field.

This essay is meant mainly to remove a lot of confusion and vagueness that surrounds the term Hindu and Hinduism, and to understand the how and why of the mischief and violence carried out by the eSangh Parivarf in the name of Hinduism. The essay is addressed to the so called elaymanf, who has wisdom to understand but may not have access to technical and academic jargon.

Terminology

The political and social system we live today is called capitalism. It is a system based on exploitation of labour and natural resources by the bourgeoisie or the capitalist class. Since it is a complete social and political system, it affects every aspect of life including religion. The way it does is referred to as the project of the capital. As opposed to  this the working classes too struggle against it and struggle in various ways, including in the religious domain. This is referred as the project of the proletariat or the project of the people.

The word Hindu comes from the river Indus (Sindhu in Indian languages) and was used by medieval world of Arabs and Europeans to refer to people living east of the river. Hinduism is a relatively modern term and is an omnibus word referring to the religious practices, rituals, philosophical and theological ideas of these people. The word Hinduism or Hindu do not signify a homogeneous religion or people. The word Dharma does not mean religion. It means a set of duties and obligation according to one's station in life. This could be caste or that of husband, wife, father, son, teacher, student and so on. These were defined originally by Manu in Manusmriti or Dharmashastra around 200 BC. The word for religion in the Indian tradition is eSampradayaf and not eDharmaf.

Who are the Hindus?

More than 90% of the people called Hindu live in todayfs India. Nepal is the only other country that has a significant number of Hindus. There are a small number of Hindus scattered all over the world, particularly in the USA, UK, Canada, Fiji, Mauritius, British Guyana and East Africa.

Within India out of a population of 100 crores about 20 crores account for Muslims and Christians, 7 crores Tribals and 23 crores Scheduled Castes. These are round figures for convenience of tackling them. These 50 crores are, by most reckoning are not Hindus, though the Sangh Parivar would claim the SC/ST population of 30 crores as Hindus. The position of scheduled caste is ambiguous. Traditionally the were the shudra and panchamas, the lowest castes within the Hindu religion. Today there is a sense of revolt against  mainstream Hinduism and large scale conversion to other religions ( Christianity, Buddhism and Islam) have occurred. What is clear is that the ideology of the Sangh Parivar wants to keep them as slaves and second class citizens within the Hindu fold. These 50 odd crores Hindus live in todayfs political India. North East India and Kashmir have very few Hindus and Hindu Indians are treated as foreigners/exploiters/enemies by the majority of these people.

Inside Hinduism

As has been said above, Hinduism is a set of religious and spiritual practices comprising of many religions/sampradayas.

Hindus trace their origin to the Vedic period (1200 BC-600 BC), but the Hinduism as we know today dates from Arthashastra and Dharmashastra (or Manusmruti) around 200 BC. It got consolidated between 200 BC to 300 AD or so. Buddhism and Jainism dating from 500 BC were a big challenge which lasted up to 800 AD or so. Buddhism almost vanished from India but Jainism has survived as a small but powerful sect of traders. However their daily life is indistinguishable from other upper caste Hindus except for their vegetarianism and for all practical purposes it is treated as one of the Sampradayas of Hinduism.

Arthashatsra and Manusmruiti helped to consolidate the peasant society. Many tribal communities were probably forced to clear land for agriculture and later were absorbed in the Hindu society as the Shudras and Panchamas (untouchables). This was the Indian form of slavery which continued till independence in 1947. It was Ambedkar and the Hindu reformers who finally managed to abolish it legally through the Indian Constitution.

The daily life of the Shudras and Panchamas is closer to the tribals because of this history. Their gods and goddesses are not the normal Hindu deities like Brahma, Vishnu, Shiva, Rama and Krishna. Nor are their festivals same as Diwali, Dussera, Holi, Ugadi etc. Even in the 20th century some tribals became scheduled castes and some scheduled castes went to the forests to become tribals. This probably kept on happening for the last 2000 years. That is the reason why these communities are viewed outside Hinduism. The political leaders of these communities also do not see a future within Hinduism and conversions to Buddhism, Islam and Christianity keep on occurring much to the ire of the Sangha Parivar.

Hinduism: An Upper Caste Phenomenon

Even today two thirds of India lives in rural areas and here is where the Hindu religion and castes system plays a major role. Daniel Thorner once described rural Indian caste system in terms of Malik, Kisan and Mazdoor, thus identifying the class aspect of the caste system. The Maliks were of course the upper castes of Brahmins, Kshatriyas, Vaishyas and Kayasthas. The Kisan castes were the vast majority of what are known today as backward castes whereas the Shudras and the Panchamas made of the Mazdoor or the agricultural labour class as well as castes dealing with dead animals etc.

Hinduism is mainly a signifier of the upper castes, known as OCs (Other Castes -Brahmins, Kshatriyas, Vaishyas, Kayasthas) and BCs (Backward castes– peasant castes, artisan castes and their sub castes.) Let us have a closer look at it.

The highly articulated Advaita (of Shankaracharya) and Dvaita (of Madhwacharya) sampradayas are restricted to Brahmins. Like the Jains, though small in numbers, they have access to much greater power. Among these three so called great theologians, only Ramanujacharya of Vishishtadvaita has a bigger constituency in the name of Vaishnavism. Apart from Brahmins many traders, peasants castes are also Vaishnavas although their priests are normally Brahmins. The Sagun tradition of Bhakti of Chaitanya in Orissa and Bengal, other Vaishnavas of Braj, Gujarat, Western M.P., and Rajasthan etc. belong to it.

The BCs have a dual religious allegiance. The peasant caste subscribe to mainstream Hinduism, often Vaishnavism, whereas the artisan castes subscribe to the Nirgun tradition of the Bhakti movement. There are regional differences too. Deccan, for example, is not a very productive regions and has relatively poorer peasants. Here, therefore peasants too tend to belong to the Nirgun traditions. Most of the twentieth century peasant movement involved the peasant caste and today they are ruling groups in many of the regional states whereas the centre is still dominated by the OCs.

The Shudras and the Panchamas do not belong to any of these traditions and as we have said above there is tendency  to leave Hinduism for other religions, although the Sangh Parivar tries very hard to keep them in the Hindu fold. Their political aspirations and its articulation is a relatively modern phenomenon, Ambedkar being the most famous of them.

The Small Tradition

The small tradition to which lower castes (mainly the BCs) Hindus belong, is called small not because of number of people involved, but because they are in small local groups, unlike the egreatf tradition which is highly articulate, powerful and tends to have an all India face. This tradition in the North is that of nirgun bhakti saints, the most famous of them being Kabir. Theologically they maintain that between God and man there is no need of intermediary like the Pandit or the Mulla. They do not have rich temples or expensive religious rituals. Typically the artisan castes are the followers and their saints also came from these castes. In India the Muslim Sufi tradition is very similar and most of the converts to Islam came from the artisan castes. This small tradition tended to oppose the division between man and man based on caste and birth and generally had a more egalitarian approach. They used simple language and have contributed to the emergence of modern Indian languages in a big way. This tradition has different names in different parts of India and in many places it is close to the Sufis.

The small tradition left to itself could have contributed to the emergence of a modern egalitarian society, something like Protestantism in Europe. However this was not to be. Colonialism intervened and the development of the Indian society took a different route. It is only today with the birth of poor peoplefs movement that this tradition is receiving more attention.

The Modern Period – The Apologist Hindu - The Reformist Era

Colonialism presented a dilemma to the Hindu upper castes. The Christian missionaries criticised the Hindu religion and society severely for its cruelty to lower castes, practice of untouchability, its differentiation between different people, its Gods in the images of animals and made of stone images etc. Islam too had criticised Hinduism on similar premises and managed to convert a section of the artisan castes.

The first response of the Hindu upper castes was to convert to Christianity. Second was to reform it to suit to modern times. Thus Brhamo Samaj and Arya Samaj and many similar organisations came up. But they did not turn to the small traditions of the lower castes for egalitarian inputs but instead went to eAncient Indiaf. Why?

The colonialists colluded with the upper castes to create this eGlory that was Indf. This was achieved by William Jones in his famous inaugural address to the Asiatic Society in Calcutta. In it he showed the similarity between Sanskrit, Persian, Greek and Latin. Thus Ancient India had an affinity to the White man. Nay it even taught the white man!

This achieved two purposes for the colonialist. It brought the upper castes into their side and it created the Hindu Muslim divide. For, it created a discourse which blamed the Muslim for all the ills of  Hindu Society. The slavery of the poor remained relatively untouched.

Of course many reformists were patriots and they also contributed to anti colonial movement, but the reformist movement lacked the support of the poor. It remained an upper caste movement.

Vivekananda and the Birth of Assertive Hinduism

By the turn of the century the upper caste Hinduism began to regain some confidence. A lot of texts were translated in to English because of the efforts of scholars like Max Mueller in Germany, Asiatic Society and support of some princely states like Mysore, Travancore, and Baroda.

In this atmosphere Vivekananda appeared. He was a young man with some unusual skills. First he had tremendous energy to propagate the cause. He was a very skilled promoter and good administrator. All this came useful after his return from Chicago where he attended the world conference of religion. On its own his performance was not very different from other representatives, including the one from the Buddhist from Sri Lanka. However one newspaper reported it very enthusiastically and Vivekananda used the report very effectively in India to promote himself and the Ramakrishna Mission. Upper caste Hindu society was ready to receive this foreign certificate to its greatness. To boot Vivekananda also brought a white woman (Sister Nivedita) as his disciple. The latter became a must for every greatf man in India. Aurobindo had his Mother Gandhi had his Mira Ben and Tagore had Marrjorie Sykes. Gandhi borrowed her from Tagore for training his Basic Education teachers. Although they were called sister and mother, the upper caste Hindu India saw this as the spiritual conquest of the West with war booties and wallowed in this recognition of  its glory from the white men and women.

Vivekananda gave Hinduism an all India image and made it in to a religion. Neither of which is the nature of Hinduism. As we had said earlier Hinduism is not a religion. It is a set of several religions (sampradayas), many of which have deep contradictions with each other. Theologically Vivekananda identified Hinduism with Advaita of Shankaracharya (8th century AD). Within the Indian tradition, as we have noted above, Advaita was a small unimportant sect and was heavily criticised in the theological debates of medieval India, often accused of borrowing from Buddhism and passing it off as the correct interpretation of Vedas, Gita and Brahmasutra Bhashya. However it suited the imperial design of one great India because Shankaracharya was supposed to have set up places of pilgrimages in the four corners of India viz. in North (Badrinath), East (Puri), West (Dwaraka) and  South (Rameshwaram).

Vivekananda also gave it a Christian Mission kind of character in the form of Ramakrishna Matha/Mission. It is modelled on Jesuits of Catholic Christianity with its celibate priests, schools, colleges and hospitals and more recently with its erural developmentf programmes. Over time it developed all the ills of the Catholic Church. That is, its high handed authoritarianism, corruption – both material and moral, enormous wealth, landed property and real estate.

Post Independence : The Rise of the Aggressive Hinduism

Such an assertive, imperialf image of India that Vivekananda created, inspired Hindu chauvinists right from Sarvarkar, Golvalkar to Advani and Bajpai. The present generation of leaders like Modi and his ilk use this kind of Hinduism to achieve political power only. The Sangha Parivar also publishes and sells a lot of literature about Vivekananda. They fought for the land at Kanyakumari, which was a joint place of spiritual worship for both Christians and Hindus and where Vivkenanda spent some time (as did many spiritual leader of Hindu and Christian community) created a Vivekananda memorial. Their agenda is to use the different images of Muslims and Christian to portray them as danger to Hinduism, create a hate propaganda and carry out mass killings whenever they can get away with it.

What is the basis of this aggressive Hinduism? Aggressive Hinduism aims primarily to achieve political power in post independence India through elections. Not all upper class Hindus support it nor do the really religious people support it. But most of them do not oppose it either. And for these communal forces it is enough if they are not opposed. The discourse they use is that Hinduism is threatened by conversions and reservation policies. Hinduism is threatened by the Muslims, Christians and SC/ST population because of their aspirations to acquire education, sharing power etc. The aim of the Sangh Parivar politics is that these communities should stay as second class citizens and be available as slaves and workers to the mainstream upper caste Hindus. This of course strikes a sympathetic chord in the hearts of many upper caste Hindus, many of whom have power and wealth in the present society.

There is of course a real basis for perception of this threat. It was Ambedkar who first said, eI am born as a Hindu, but I will not die as a Hinduf. For centuries Hinduism faced this threat because of its practice of inhuman slavery towards lower castes. First a large section of the artisan converted to Islam and later a large section of tribals and scheduled communities converted to Christianity. While part of the Hindu society did respond to it through reform of the Hindu society and abolishing untouchability and creating reservation policy through the Indian constitution, many did not accept it in their hearts.

This battle raged through out post independence India. It took an ugly shape in 1975 when reservation did not get abolished as envisioned in the Constitution anti reservation agitation shook the country. Mandal commission in 1977 added fuel by prescribing reservation to backward classes also. Finally the crisis came to head with the demolition of the Babri Masjid in 1992. The Hindu fascist threw its challenge and battle lines were clearly drawn. The Sangh Pariwar gave a message that the Muslims, Christians can exist in India only as second class citizens, obedient to the upper caste Hindu society. If you condemn the demolition of the Babri Masjid, you are opposing this agenda and vice versa.

Rest of India stood aghast and helpless at this naked flexing of muscles. Why helpless? Because the ruling classes were following a similar agenda in a secular and religious discourse since 1984. On one hand Rajiv Gandhi appeased Hindus by opening the locked gates of the makeshift temple at Ayodhya in the Babri masjid premises, changed the Indian Constitution to appease the Muslim clergy in the Shah Bano case, on the other hand he helped Anderson of Union Carbide to escape from India and prepared grounds for neo liberal policies or what came to be known as liberalisation, privatisation and globalisation. This policy actually came into being in a full scale through Narsimha Rao and Man Mohan Sigh in 1991. Hence Narsimha Raofs government stood frozen, time stopped, while the masjid was being demolished over several hours. All the parliamentary parties had joined this agenda ever since the Bhopal gas leak. They had declared a war on the working classes since then. What bothered them was election politics, how to stay in power. So they the esecularf parties began to woo Muslim clergy and political parties and the Sangh Pariwar rightly dubbed them as pseudo secularists and Muslim appeasers.

India Today

Today the agenda of neo liberal policies has overshadowed the communal agenda as can seen by the response to the Court judgement on the Ayodhya issue. Even the communal forces, once they have got power in Gujarat, Karnataka, and Chhatisgarh etc. are busy in pursuing these policies, although they keep the communal agenda alive. These neo liberal policies have resulted in:

1. Enormous creation of wealth

2. The rich have become richer and the poor have become poorer. However a creamy layer has emerged from each section of the middle and poor classes.

3. Incredible levels of corruption.

4. Ecological disaster

5. Enormous rise of conflicts.

With the global recession all these are reaching crisis proportions and the Indian society may be on the verge of collapse.

However the Indian poor, Muslims and Christians continue to face the twin attacks of the Hindu right and the attack of the neo liberal policies. Here we will only consider a meaning full response to the religious question.

Reviving the Small Tradition

The small tradition or the anti authoritarian trend in religion carries the seeds of democracy and secularism. This is the role Protestantism played in European renaissance. As has been said above in India,  it has been suppressed by capitalism under colonial conditions. The present crisis gives an opportunity to revive and make it a tool for liberation of the poor.

Politically it was Ambedkar who tapped the potential of buddhism for dalit liberation. However even before Ambedkar, Acharya Dhramand Kosambi, Rahul Sankrityayan, Bhadant Anand Kausalyayan and other Buddhists had realised this potential. Rahul sankrityayan personified this kind of blending of communist and Buddhist and rationalist ideas coming together.

After the emergency, by 1977 a new  political/ideological common platform started emerging. The rationalist movement in parts of India is joining the Buddhist and other dalit and religious groups like Kabir panthis and creating a lot of litreature and activites represnting the small traditions. This has the sort of role that communist litreature has for cadre education. In fact they also use communist litreature for this purpose.

 Culturally the small traditions of Hindus and Muslim in India have lived peacefully together for centuries. Sufi majars are visited by both Hindu and Muslim. Acharya Kshiti Mohan Sen has recorded this tradition in his eHindu Muslim Jukta Sadhanaf. In as much as the Hindu right is attacking all the poor both economically and on religious front, it opens a possibility of coming together of these anti authoritarian religious tendencies. There is possibility of genuine secular forces helping this tendency as has been witnessed in the Kabir festival in Bangalore last year. As this article is being written in Hyderabad, we had a performance about Lal Deg, the Sufi woman poet from Kashmir and today (31. 10. 2010) Mujaffar Ali is performing with Abida Parveen. As a follow up of Kabir festival in Bangalore Sindhi sufi poets are being presented next month and so on. The theatre movement in India has a long tradition of this kind of work. Some trade union activists and some dalit activists are also exploring these possibilities. Time alone will tell the future of these efforts. However one can make an observation that many of these efforts are addressed to a secular and national audience and not to local and regional. As such they too carry a enationalf flavour which we have been criticising above.

Mean while the sentiments of the man in the street irrespective of religion and class appear to be:

24.              The function of religion should be only to satisfy spiritual, moral and cultural need of human beings.

     2. Religion should not be used for political purpose.

3.                  There should be limits and regulation of public space and resources to be used by religions

4.                  Religions should not be authoritarian, should not generate hate to other religions or hate towards people who are irreligious and atheists.

The challenge is to unite all these with a political struggle of the poor for liberation, equality and peace. Some observation in this regard are:

1.                  This struggle is possible mainly at a regional level, using local language and culture. This at a positive level means using local peoplefs religious festivals, such as Jatras, Urs or mass pilgrimage walks in Deccan like Warkaris. One should however note the capitalism has penetrated many of these festivals and it needs  to be combated. Only local traders with local wares should be allowed. Multinationals, particularly of electronic gizmos – mobiles, Ipod and clones, bottled water and soft drinks, plastics etc. can be banned. This can be done by local organising committees. They can also be enriched by secular independent inputs, like secular interpretations of these traditions.

2.                  At a negative level, the so called national or imperial festivals like Ganesh Puja and Durga Puja, Diwali, Dussera, Holi etc., can be boycotted, and controlled by not allowing forced collections, use of public tanks and rivers to dump the idols, control of loudspeakers, use of roads for erecting pandals etc. Similarly pilgrimages to Tirupati, Sabrimalai, and the four great traditional places of Badri, Puri, Dwaraka and Rameshwaram should be discouraged as they all have become capitalist money grabbing institutions.

3. Essentially these efforts can be a part of anti capitalist anti - consumerist movement.