Hindu society is often blamed that they don’t have any Unity amongst themselves and that they don’t care about their culture and heritage. And people who claim to be proud Hindus on social media, even for them their Hindutva starts with BJP and ends with it. When these so-called social media Hindus ridicule the masses and put all the blame of anything happening wrong with the Hindu society on the society itself, blaming society for lack of unity, it becomes important to discuss this issue. For a very long time we have been hearing  that Hindus don’t have any unity, but does this call for unity make any sense without any objective. Till this date after independence and especially after the rise of Bharatiya Janata Party, the Hindu unity is only limited to the poll booths and after casting their votes this Hindu unity goes back to hibernation and comes again after election dates are announced. I am going to put forward some arguments regarding this Hindu Unity, Sanatan identity, and its objective. The time period being, 1947 to present.

Due to years of Colonial rule, the Sanatan culture was destroyed and harmed to its roots and this damaged the very character of the Hindu society. And after independence, the consciousness of Sanatanis, instead of taking the path of revival was thrown in a dark room by the politicians who themselves were on the path of ‘disastrous appeasement politics’. From education to faith- all was controlled by a State that was not willing to set free the bird called Sanatan Dharma from the cage of administrative exploitation and coercion. After some time, the Hindu character, which was suppressed for decades was now waiting for the right moment to explode and then came the Shri Ram Mandir movement where we see Hindus fighting for their right to worship. And due to this movement, a political party revived which became the flag bearer of Hindu interests. Everything was fine until that time. But when society’s Dharmik consciousness is being used and controlled for political interests, it becomes dangerous for both the society and nation. I am not saying here at all that BJP has not done anything positive for the Bhartiya Hindu society. But no one can deny the misuse of the Hindu identity by the political parties for their own self interests. So, what happens is when a society is destroyed from within for hundreds of years and then suppressed even after independence, when someone awakens their identity he/she becomes a ‘Messiah’ for them. The consequence- for a large number of Hindus, their Dharma starts with BJP and ends with BJP.

And now comes the second part- the objective. The problem with the society is that they call for ‘unity’ and then get caught in the dilemma of deciding objectives. And then the situation becomes very difficult to handle where everyone has different issues in such a diverse society. Especially in a Civilization where there is not a single commanding scripture like the Abrahamic religions, our biggest strength is our way of thinking, our outlook towards life and nature which we derive from our scriptures. For establishing unity, our approach should be the opposite: society should come together for a common goal.

Here comes our next question: why don’t we know the reason to unite? why our so-called unity is limited to only electoral politics? You cannot unite when you don’t know the reason to unite. The Hindu society’s lack of clarity is due to many reasons stretching from atrocities on them by foreign invaders, European colonization to Government’s utter incompetence in reviving the Dharmik traditions and knowledge. And when a society suffers from lack of clarity, it leads to catastrophes when someone promises us our past Glory, we give him/her the complete authority of the culture, traditions, and rituals. Now that the Saviour of the society decides upon the culture and knowledge systems, he/she starts considering himself/herself as the authority in those matters where the concerned leader hardly possesses any knowledge. It is just an observation, neither any attempt to ridicule nor discredit those who work politically for Hindu interests.

But you cannot expect a miracle from a society which has suffered so many atrocities since hundreds of years. It will take time for changes to be brought about. And we can see that the changes are visible. This can be substantiated with the rise in the number of people for whom Sanatan Dharma is not limited to electoral politics. And with the passage of time, the Hindu society will overcome the ‘servant-mindset’ that it is not capable of deciding upon it’s own culture and traditions. And then, we can achieve our ultimate goal- a mentally decolonised Bhartiya Hindu society. The future of Sanatan Dharma simultaneously appears to be full of hope and despair.

And indeed it is going to be a very long process. For instance, Masses will not demand for liberation of Temples before they themselves are aware of the importance of temples, that goes way beyond the faith. Since laws can be altered easily but thoughts cannot, this process has to take place as ‘down to top’. The government is not the ultimate messenger of Devlok. It’s just a reflection and an administrative representation of our society. A society’s outlook determines the behaviour of the government. From an individual, to his/her family, then community, then society, then the National institutions. It is a very-very long and gradual process, but we as individuals cannot stop the journey just because we have to cover a very long distance.

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