COMMENTARY

The Politics of Ghar Wapsi

Manjari Katju

This article argues that the

Hindutva drive to reconvert
Muslims and Christians to
Hinduism is essentially about
shoring up the numerical strength
and political power of the Hindu
community and has little
connection to religious
persuasion. Converting minorities
to Hinduism has always been an
intrinsically violent affair and is
linked to the notion of India being
a homeland only of the Hindus.

Manjari Katju (mkatju@gmail.com) teaches

Political Science at the University of Hyderabad.
Economic & Political Weekly

EPW

january 3, 2015

he recent vigour that the Sangh

Parivar and especially the Vishva
Hindu Parishad (VHP) have displayed in their reconversion or ghar
wapsi (literally, returning home)
drives reveal once again the enthusiasm
within the groups affiliated to the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) about
the change of regime in India. They feel
that since the Bharatiya Janata Party
(BJP) government is their government,
they have every right to openly operationalise the Hindutva programmes with
gusto. It is quite obvious that they believe that the popular mandate is in support of Hindutva or the Hindu nationalist ideology, which visualises Hindus as
constituting a macho and virile community that defines the nation and would
stand up to protect Bharat Mata (Mother
India) against the ferocious other.
However, they also feel that the number
of Hindus is going down and if nothing
is done about it, this other would take
over the Hindus motherland.
This other, constituting mainly the
Muslims and the Christians, is seen as

vol l no 1

growing in numerical strength and one

of the ways in which it is doing so is
through conversions. Thus, violence
against and intimidation of Muslims and
the Christians by the Sangh Parivar,
along with programmes directed at
them such as ghar wapsi are part of the
same script. They are expressions of
Hindu power in Hindus homeland.
The message from the Sangh Parivar is
clear, that it has won state power and
now it has to demonstrate its power over
the social space with the same vigour
and brute display of force both physical
and verbal. This also means that it has
taken upon itself to undo the wrongs
which it sees as heaped over the Hindus.
Freedom of Religion
The fundamental right of freedom of
religion has always been a source of
political insecurity for the Sangh Parivar.
More than religion it is political considerations that have directed the Parivars
outlook on freedom of religion. This
right is seen as a privilege granted by
a secular Constitution to minorities
mainly, Muslim and Christian to expand their ranks. That is why organisations such as the VHP demand that
the freedom of religion granted by the
Constitution be amended by banning
conversions. The very birth of the VHP in
21

COMMENTARY

1964, as a member of the RSS family, was

for the purpose of protecting and preser
ving Hindu dharma and containing the
supposed growth of Christianity and
Islam. One of the ways in which this was
visualised was by stopping the drift of
people considered on the margins of the
Hindu faith to Christianity and Islam,
and then reversing this drift. For instance,
the embracing of Christianity by people
living in some of the north-eastern states
of India was seen as a political threat.
The belief within the RSS was that these
parts where people had embraced Chris
tianity would try to break away from
Akhand Bharat (literally united India
but implies Greater India), much in the
nature of Muslim Pakistan breaking away
earlier, and threaten the integrity of the
country. The VHP was thereby floated to
work among communities seen to be on
the religious-geographical margins of the
Hindu community and prevent this break
up. One of the guiding principles on which
it was founded was (Tarte 1989-90),
The VHP should make efforts to make the age
old Hindu dharma compatible with the present
requirements of society so that it is able to
face the challenges of the modern world.

The VHP thus tried to modernise

and reshape Hindu dharma. It followed
in the footsteps of the Arya Samaj and
worked for the ecclesiastical expansion
of Hinduism in independent India. It took
up ritual purification or shuddhikaran
(Sikand and Katju 1994) for absorption
of social groups into the Hindu fold.
Likewise, it went against the core princi
ples of Sanatan Dharma by moving away
from the tenet of religion by birth and
to one of religion through assimilation
and absorption. This belief was closely
related to the obsession with numbers
and in turn, as I mentioned earlier, with
political power.
The efforts to bring people to the
Hindu fold were intensified after the
Meenakshipuram conversions in 1981
when a group of dalits converted to
Islam to escape caste oppression. The
belief within the RSS, and thus the VHP,
was that the number of Hindus was
dwindling because they are being
lured by minority religions, and if this
is allowed unchecked it would result in
the loss of political power to the other.
According to the leadership of the VHP,
Christianity and Islam had plans to

make Hindus a minority in India in the

next 30 years; and, that they want to es
tablish their rule in India and completely
destroy Hindu culture.1 Thus, efforts
had to be made by the Parivar to check
Christianity and Islam and this had to be
supplemented by taking up proselytisa
tion by Hindus themselves and shore up
Hindu numbers. The outlook of the Pari
var was that from a religion which is
fenced-in by its competitors, Hinduism
should become, or at least be seen as, a
religion that is expanding. Conversions
were seen as one of the primary ways for
this expansion.
The VHP in its campaigns emphasised
checking religious conversions of Hin
dus, the reconversion to Hinduism of
those outside and the building of strong
samaskaras (religio-cultural practices)
among the Hindus.2 It called upon its
members to build a strong Hindu organi
sation at the village and mohalla level
and a consistent movement for cultural
awakening. It also laid stress on the
expansion of welfare services to the
masses and the propagation of social
harmony. It took it upon itself to warn
people of the illusionist propagation by

Women and Work

Edited by

Padmini Swaminathan
The notion of work and employment for women is complex. In India, fewer women participate in employment compared
to men. While economic factors determine mens participation in employment, womens participation depends on
diverse reasons and is often rooted in a complex interplay of economic, cultural, social and personal factors.
The introduction talks of the oppression faced by wage-earning women due to patriarchal norms and capitalist relations
of production, while demonstrating how policies and programmes based on national income accounts and labour force
surveys seriously disadvantage women.
This volume analyses the concept of work, the economic contribution of women, and the consequences of gendering
of work, while focusing on women engaged in varied work in different parts of India, living and working in dismal
conditions, and earning paltry incomes.

Authors:
Maithreyi Krishnaraj Maria Mies Bina Agarwal Prem Chowdhry Ujvala Rajadhyaksha, Swati Smita Joan P Mencher, K Saradamoni Devaki
Jain Indira Hirway Deepita Chakravarty, Ishita Chakravarty Uma Kothari J Jeyaranjan, Padmini Swaminathan Meena Gopal Millie Nihila
Forum against Oppression of Women Srilatha Batliwala Miriam Sharma, Urmila Vanjani J Jeyaranjan

Pp xii + 394 ISBN 978-81-250-4777-3 2012 Rs 645

Orient Blackswan Pvt Ltd

www.orientblackswan.com
MumbaiChennaiNew DelhiKolkataBangaloreBhubaneshwarErnakulamGuwahatiJaipurLucknowPatnaChandigarhHyderabad
Contact: info@orientblackswan.com
22

january 3, 2015 vol l no 1 EPW Economic & Political Weekly

COMMENTARY

irreligious conspirators and temptations

offered by them.3
Paravartan or Ghar Wapsi
The VHP named the process of conversions (to Hinduism), or what it calls
reconversion, parivartan or ghar wapsi.
One can see that some of these arguments, especially about the numbers of
Hindus, find a constant refrain even now
among the VHP. In the words of VHP
leader Pravin Togadia (Mumbai Mirror
2014), the VHP
is committed to ensuring the population of
Hindus in the country doesnt fall below the
current level of 82%we wont let their population decline from 82% to 42% because
then their property and women will not
remain safe.

He further said the whole world was

once inhabited by Hindus and that his
organisation will strive to increase the
population of Hindu in India from 82%
to 100%.
The VHP has always opposed conversions of Hindus to other religions. It has
advocated legal restraints on such conversions because it sees them as luring
away of people through material inducements, which it terms forced conversion. However, it has actively promoted
conversions to Hinduism of those who
supposedly drifted to Islam and Christianity or are being lured to these faiths.
Such reconversions are easy to attempt
by the VHP because of the vulnerability
of those who are subjected to it. As such
they are also an easy way to assert power
at the social level.
It needs to be recalled that the ghar
wapsi attempts of the Sangh Parivar had
gathered force even in the late 1990s when
the BJP was ascending and won power
under Atal Bihari Vajpayee. The VHP and
Bajrang Dal had accelerated their campaigns both in the tribal and urban areas.
Reconversion drives in Gujarat, Madhya
Pradesh and Orissa (now Odisha) had
intensified and were accompanied by violence against the Christian institutions
and missionaries. The Dangs, Jhabua
and Sarguja districts were constantly in
the news for violence unleashed on
Christian priests and nuns. Leaflets were
circulated in the Dangs calling upon
Hindus to wipe out Christians from
Economic & Political Weekly

EPW

january 3, 2015

the district (Venkatesan 1999). Graham

Staines and his two small sons were
burnt alive in Odisha by persons allegedly linked to VHPs offshoot, the Bajrang
Dal, in one of the most gruesome instances
of Hindu right-wing violence. The then
prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee,
after repeated attacks on Christians in
the Dangs district, finally did criticise
such attacks but then watered it down
by adding that reconversion could not be
stopped so long as conversions (meaning, of Hindus to Christianity and Islam)
did not end (Venkatesan 1999).
Violence Unleashed by Ghar Wapsi
In most instances, as seen above, the act
of ghar wapsi has unleashed violence
and suffering on the targeted group as
well as on the minority communities in
the region. This clearly indicates that
ghar wapsi is not a simple act of conversion or reconversion but has a politicalideological intent behind it. Religious
violence in Kandhamal district in Odisha
in the first decade of this century
is another instance of this conversionrelated violence. Kandhamal is a predominantly tribal district where the VHP
has been active for long. It has made
efforts to Hinduise the Kandha tribal
community since the 1960s and has
succeeded to quite an extent. The target
of the VHP has been the Christian minority
who belong to a community known as
Pana dalits. Communal tensions have
occurred between the Hinduised tribals
(who speak the Kui language) and
the Chrisitan Pana dalits. These tensions
intensified in December 2007 when
Christian institutions were attacked.
This was followed by more violence
against the Christians beginning in August 2008 following the murder of the
controversial VHP leader Swami Laxmananda Saraswati who worked in that
area. There is fairly strong evidence to
link the VHP and Bajrang Dal with the
attacks on the Christians in Kandhamal.
The violence unleashed on Christian
churches and missionaries in tribal areas
was a way of creating fear to prevent
others from adopting Christianity.
Threatening language is useful to scare
people from practising Christianity.
These threats are one of the ways of
vol l no 1

pushing de-Christianisation.4 This sort

of polarisation and the violence that has
followed in the wake of the VHP and
Bajrang Dal activities have previously
been unknown in the tribal areas. The
Bajrang Dal, which looks upon itself as a
vigilante force and, in fact, performs the
role of sociocultural policing with the
community has taken upon itself not to
allow mass conversions (to Christianity).5
Like in the late 1990s, ghar wapsi has
been intensified after the formation of
government by the BJP under Prime
Minister Narendra Modi. If physical
violence has, as yet, been muted, verbal
aggression and intimidation has been
prominent in the present-day drives
by the VHP, Bajrang Dal and their associate groups.
Some Features of Ghar Wapsi
The way the Sangh Parivar has gone
about accomplishing ghar wapsi has
certain distinctive features. First, it is the
communities on the borders of the HinduMuslim or Hindu-Christian fault lines
that have been the target. These communities, for instance, the Cheeta-Merat
Rajputs or the Maul-e-Salaam Muslims
or the dalit Christians follow both Hindu
and Muslim/Christian practices. In many
instances they celebrate both the Hindu
and the Muslim or Christian festivals.
The VHPs attempt to reconvert these
communities involves getting them to
give up Muslim or Christian practices
like burying their dead, giving up nikah
and circumcision, replacing the cross
with Hindu idols, giving up church prayers, etc. This ghar wapsi is largely a deIslamisation or de-Christianisation rather than imbuing the reconverts with
Hindu spiritual or shastric knowledge
(for details see Sikand and Katju 1994).
In many instances of conversions in
the last few months, the neo-converts
have stressed that they never left the
Hindu religion. This is because they
never gave up one or the other religion.
They simultaneously adhered to the
tenets of both religious faiths following
what one might call a dual religiosity.
Practising such religiosity implies that
these communities have not been trapped by rigidities of religious identity. It
also implies that in everyday life this
23

COMMENTARY

duality has helped in carrying on with

practical matters.
Second, the groups targeted for reconversions are economically hard-up and
often destitute. Rarely do we see the
privileged, well-to-do social groups converting to a religion of their choice for
spiritual solace. For the poor, however,
conversion is often a strategy for securing welfare benefits and job or perhaps
to deflect active social discriminations,
as the recent conversions in Agra district,
where a community of poor ragpickers
became the target of reconversions, illustrates so well (BBC News India 2014
and Mishra 2014). They were promised
ration cards, Aadhaar cards and school
admission for their children for going
through the ghar wapsi rituals. It is also
easier to intimidate the poor and marginalised into coming back home; the
fear factor was clearly evident in the
conversions at Agra where the whole
area where ghar wapsi was performed
was enveloped in fear.
This bring us to the third feature of
ghar wapsi. These VHP-organised programmes are almost always group conversions and not about individuals making choices (Sikand and Katju 1994).
Those on the social margins of the Hindu caste-system moved out of its fold to
escape caste-oppression. It were not just
economic or material factors, if at all,
which motivated them but also the desire for a life of dignity and the hope of
social equality. In other words, oppressed groups moved out of the Hindu fold
to escape economic and social depravity.
Historically, the Hindu nationalist organisations have focused on these very
groups for ghar wapsi.
The Sangh leadership admits that
caste oppression made these oppressed
sections move to different religions.
However, as the experience of the past
many decades suggests that rather than
address the caste issue, it has attempted
to bring them back mainly through the
promise of material gratification. The
endogamous cohesiveness of jati groups
makes group conversions that much
more possible. Also, preoccupation with
numbers has made the VHP focus on
groups rather than individuals. The
spectacle that a group conversion
24

creates makes it far more attractive than

stray conversions of individuals here
and there.
Where Is Religion?
It is revealing to ask: where does religion
stand in the drive for ghar wapsi? For the
Sangh Parivar conversion to Hinduism is
about display of community strength in
their imaginary competition for power
with other religious communities. In
other words, for the Hindutva ideologues converting people to Hindu dharma and making a public display, it is not
about Hindu dharmik enlightenment or
spiritual development but rather, it is
about a show of strength at least this is
what the evidence suggests. On the other
hand, for those who are rounded up for
ghar wapsi, the motivating factor is the
promise of everyday material well-being. They agree to convert for jobs, medical facilities, housing, etc, and not because they find the values or devotional
practices of the Hindu religion attractive. In fact, in their lives of everyday
drudgery, they should not be expected to
compare the relative spiritual merits of
diverse belief systems and make choices
based on these comparisons. Conversion
for the poor and oppressed then is not
about religion but about getting better
access to resources and rights and religion is a utilitarian route to such an
option. If not these, then the reason for
conversion by the vulnerable sections is
intimidation; in the given political context in the country this is possible perhaps only by the workers of the Sangh
Parivar. The weak and vulnerable have
no choice but to convert in the face of
threats and intimidation used by VHP,
etc. The point is religion or religious
values are again absent in this whole
exercise of ghar wapsi except as a facade.
It is necessary to pose the following
questions to the RSS and its affiliates
(those running the Government of India
and those organising these conversion
drives): If the whole logic of reconversions is to bring back the lower castes
who earlier moved out of the Hindu fold
to escape social oppression and humiliation, does it not make more sense to
work towards improving their economic
well-being and dignity; to work towards

loosening the hierarchies and stratifications that blight their daily lives at the
local level, rather than subjecting them
to a set of rituals under the garb of ghar
wapsi and then abandoning them to the
same fate of poverty and humiliation?
Moreover, if the country has voted the
BJP, the electoral front of the Sangh
Parivar, to power with such a strong
majority, what is this insecurity about
numbers and power which bothers them
even now?
Notes
1

Vishva Hindu Parishad Dharma Prasar Yojana

(Vishva Hindu Parishad Dharma propagation
programme), Vanavasi Kalyan Kendra, Sonbhadra
(UP), Vishva Hindu Parishad publication, 1992: 112.
Ibid, p 111.
Ibid, p 112.
Bhavdeep Kang et al (1999) report that Budhra
Dukhbadia of Subir village who became a
Christian 25 years ago received threats from
the village headman and his associates to
become a Hindu.
See interview with Surendra Jain of the
Bajrang Dal, Outlook, 8 February 1999, p 20.

2
3
4

References
BBC News India (2014): Indian Agra Muslims Fear
Conversions to Hinduism, 11 December, seen
at http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-30429118, accessed on 24 December.
Kang, Bhavdeep et al (1999): Pilgrims Progress
Revisited, Outlook, 25 January, p 22.
Mumbai Mirror (2014): Wont Let Hindus Decline
in India: Togadia, 23 December, p 13.
Mishra, Ishita (2014): RSS Re-converts 200 Agra
Muslims, Says More in Line, The Times of
India, 9 December, http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/agra/RSS-re-converts-200-AgraMuslims-says-more-in-line/articleshow/45419
338.cms, accessed on 24 December.
Sikand, Yoginder and Manjari Katju (1994): Mass
Conversions to Hinduism among Indian
Muslims, Economic & Political Weekly, XXIX (34):
2214-19.
Tarte, Narayan Rao (1989-90): Vishva Hindu
Parishad Ki Kalpana (Formation of Vishva
Hindu Parishad), Hindu Vishva, Silver Jubilee
Issue, 14-15 (Hindi edition).
Venkatesan, V (1999): Communalism: A Hate
Campaign in Gujarat, Frontline, 16-29 January,
http://www.frontline.in/static/html/fl16 02/
16021070.htm, accessed on 26 December 2014.

Permission for Reproduction of

Articles Published in EPW
No article published in EPW or part thereof
should be reproduced in any form without
prior permission of the author(s).
A soft/hard copy of the author(s) approval
should be sent to EPW.
In cases where the email address of the
author has not been published along with
the articles, EPW can be contacted for help.

january 3, 2015

vol l no 1

EPW

Economic & Political Weekly