BENGALURU: “Savarkar held the view that the cow is only a bullock’s mother, and while there is no record of him eating it, he was not averse to eating beef,” said Vaibhav Purandare, the writer of Savarkar: The True Story of The Father of Hindutva, on Sunday, at the Bangalore Literature Festival. Purandare said that Savarkar’s position was rather complicated on the issue of cow protection as he was of the opinion that if one deliberately killed cows to spite Hindus then it was a problem. “However, he believed that if it was just for the sake of eating because you like it, then it is okay,” added the writer.
What would Savarkar think about the NRC in the context of his perspective of pitrabhoomi and punyabhoomi? Purandare affirmed that he excluded Muslims from the idea of Indianhood and developed a slight change on his stand on Christians. However, Purandare said that Savarkar considered people from the Khoja and Bhori sects as patriotic.
Pointing out the misappropriation of Savarkar, Purandare said that it was is wrong to see him as a Hindutva ideologue or a revolutionary freedom fighter. “He changed his stand throughout his life. One thing constant about Savarkar was change,” he said.
On Nehru
Historian and litterateur Ramchandra Guha said that Nehru was the most inclusive of Indians after Mahatma Gandhi.“He was a Hindu who reached out to Muslims and was a North Indian who understood and respected South Indian languages and culture,” said the writer. Guha lauded Gandhi’s choice of Nehru as his successor and pointed out Nehru’s progressive stand on women.