erver.jvnc.net!yale.edu!yale!gumby!destroyer!cs.ubc.ca!fornax!mahajan
From: mahajan@cs.sfu.ca (Sanjeev Mahajan)
Subject: An article by Prof. Jayaraman
Organization: CSS, Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, B.C., Canada
Date: Wed, 20 Jan 1993 15:50:34 GMT

Here is a copy of an interesting article I received recently.
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{\large SCIENCE AND SECULARISM}\\
by T. Jayaraman\footnote{Dr. T. Jayaraman is a theoretical physicist at
the Institute of Mathematical Sciences, Madras; he has also done
research at the International Centre for Theoretical Physics, Trieste,
Italy and the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore.}
\end{center}

There is no need to recall here the details of the terrible happenings
at Ayodhya on December 6th, 1992 events aptly described as the
greatest blow to the Indian polity and to secularism in this nation
since the assassination of the Mahatma. Every secular-minded citizen
perhaps has his or her way of relating to the barbaric demolition of
the sixteenth century Babri Masjid and to the aftermath.  The
unchecked effort of the Hindutva forces over 24 hours to construct a
`temple' at the site of the demolished mosque; the wave of communal
conflict and violence that swept the country subsequently; the weak
response of the Central Government to the most criminal and blatant
violation of the Constitution and the rule of law; and the unrepentant
and triumphant crowing of the Hindu fundamentalist forces leading to
fresh demands from them on the mosque at Mathura and the Gyanvapi
mosque at Varanasi -- these must trigger in any rational,
secular-minded Indian the deepest foreboding.

Understandably, the immediate response to the situation in media
coverage and commentary, has been in terms of the political background
of these events and the political implications for the future. There
is no doubt that politics -- in this case, a cynical and cold-blooded
political mobilisation strategy and a pathetically inadequate response
-- provides the key to our understanding of what has happened.
However, to concentrate exclusively on the political aspect, would be
to miss the wider nature of the danger faced by our system and
society. Hindu fundamentalism has been mustering its forces on a
notably broad front; it has penetrated many sections of society with
its propaganda and has acquired apologists, spokespersons and
publicists in all walks of life. It has cultivated with a measure of
success intellectuals, journalists, lawyers, scientists; not always
those at the forefront of their professions but enough in number for
their voice and point of view to be heard everywhere.  There has been,
as many commentators have noted, a significant communalisation of
Indian society in the past decade.

These intellectual camp-followers of the forces of Hindutva have
sought to advance the fundamentalist point of view and create
confusion on a number of questions and in a variety of disciplines.
Understandably, history has been the battlefield of particularly
intensive struggle, after the BJP-RSS-VHP combine had zeroed in on the
Ramjanmabhoomi- Babri Masjid issue as its chosen route to power. Here,
too, the Hindutva forces have encountered their sharpest intellectual
challenge, with a broad coalition of historians exposing the
unscientific and untruthful nature of fundamentalist history at every
turn. In fact, India's finest historians, led by Romila Thapar,
Sarvepalli Gopal, Irfan Habib, R. S. Sharma, K. N.  Panikkar and Amiya
Kumar Bagchi, have done the nation proud by being at the forefront of
the struggle against the communal abuse of history.  But it is useful
and important to examine the role of Hindutva forces in other
disciplines as well and it is to the sciences that attention must be
turned.

The immediate reaction of any serious scientist or science worker to
the Ayodhya events is unmitigated horror at the sheer mediaevalism
exhibited there.  We live today in an age of global scientific and
technological interdependence. Six months ago, at Rio, the political
leadership of all nations gathered together in an effort to discuss
one of the key issues facing humanity, the problem of sustainable
ecological development. The world is preoccupied with protecting the
ozone layer; the computer revolution continues its headlong progress;
medicine and biology constantly open vast new areas of knowledge; but
in India, a horde of fanatics bent on redressing a `wrong' allegedly
committed some four centuries ago -- there is not a jot of
scientifically entertainable evidence that any temple existed at the
site where the Babri Masjid was built around 1528 -- occupy
centrestage.  In a nation which boasts the greatest mass of poverty in
the world and where development should preoccupy both Government and
citizen, the attention of both has been successfully diverted to the
bloody antics of the forces of Hindutva.

Yet the scientist cannot afford to shrug his or her shoulders. Hindu
fundamentalism is no longer a fringe phenomenon.  It is necessary to
take a closer look at what Hindutva has to offer for the scientist and
science in India, to examine the track-record of fundamentalism in
relation to science both in India and elsewhere. For in India today
the battle lines are drawn and one has to make a basic choice, to
stand on the side of secularism or to line up against it.  Is there a
freedom to choose between secularism and ``something else" and still
retain a genuine commitment to science? Is science value-neutral with
regard to secularism?

\section{Secularism Defined}
\indent

What is secularism?  Secularism as a modern political and
constitutional principle involves two basic propositions. The first is
that people belonging to different faiths and sections of society are
equal before the law, the Constitution and government policy.  The
second requirement is that there can be no mixing up of religion and
politics. It follows therefore that there can be no discrimination
against anyone on the basis of religion or faith nor is there room for
the hegemony of one religion or majoritarian religious sentiments and
aspirations. It is in this double sense -- no discrimination against
anyone on grounds of faith and separation of religion from politics --
that our Constitution, safeguards secularism, however imperfectly.

These political principles imply also the acceptance of a somewhat
more general principle: that the realm of validity of religion in the
public arena and society is necessarily limited.  Religion, being
above all a matter of personal faith, cannot be used as the basis of
settling questions of the real world, or of man in society.  While
individuals in society may base their values on particular religious
tenets, where such questions impinge on society as a whole the basis
of discussion and social consensus cannot be religion, much less one
particular religion. This larger principle does not conflict with the
historical fact that certain values in a society may have their
foundation in religion; these values are re-examined in a rational and
humane spirit before they are accepted as the values that govern the
functioning of a modern society, and new values indeed are created
that are necessary for modern times. Despite the weaknesses of actual
practice, elements of this understanding of secularism have been an
essential part of the accepted political values of modern Indian
society, leading, for instance, to the rejection of untouchability and
sati, to the formal rejection of caste, and to the institution of
affirmative action as a means of redressing socio-economic
inequalities.  It is this larger principle that is sought to be
challenged today by Hindutva; defending it lies, I believe, at the
heart of the struggle against fundamentalism and communalism.

\section{Why Science is Secular}
\indent

The relationship between science, or science and technology, and this
general principle of secularism may be examined at two levels: first
from the standpoint of the nature of the activity of science itself,
and secondly,(related to the first) from the standpoint of the
relationship between science and society; that is, the way in which
science is affected by social forces and the manner in which science
influences society.

A working definition of science is that it is a human activity
concerned with the organisation of facts about the material world into
universal concepts. It is an essential feature of modern science that
it deals only with the material world and that all explanations and
concepts refer only to the laws of the material world. It is necessary
that its predictions are testable against material facts and that its
conclusions are falsifiable. It is also explicitly recognised by
modern science that its explanations and theories are always subject
to change based on fresh facts. It recognises that the boundaries of
knowledge constantly change over time.

The point at issue here us was made sharply by the biologist J. B. S.
Haldane: ``My practice as a scientist is atheistic.  That is to say,
when I set up an experiment I assume that no god, angel, or devil is
going to interfere with its course\ldots" (as quoted in Halsted,
1984). The statement goes to the heart of the matter. Science does not
recognise any kind of faith as an explanation. The explanation for
material facts has necessarily to be found in the material world
itself. Where science cannot find an answer or explanation it limits
itself to noting its failure, for the present moment, recognising
always that an explanation will be found later.

It is this willingness to live with uncertainty or incomplete
knowledge that distinguishes science from religious faith; the latter
in which\-ever form, always asserts some component of complete
certainty. Scientific theories cannot be tested by appeal to the
Bible, the Koran, or the Vedas and the Upanishads (as the
fundamentalists belonging to the respective religions claim). Almost
by definition faith does not admit of testing, being a personal
experience or state of mind that is not repeatable by others in any
objective fashion. Nor does the personal character of faith admit of
falsification. All religions possess elements that are considered
absolute and immutable; theological changes are considered to be
corrections of imperfect human attempts to understand something that
is unchanging and fixed. The character of different religious faiths
vary but all of them contain in some form or the other elements that
make them non-science. The activity of modern science simply does not
recognise the intervention of these elements.

This is, of course, not to deny the complicated thought processes by
which the individual scientists develop their theories and methods.
Such processes have many inputs and are influenced by many factors in
society, socio-economic, political, cultural and ideological,
including religion. But the realm of operation of scientists'
scientific ideas is the real world and the laws they formulate are
those of the real world in explanation of real facts. It is not that a
Galileo or a Kepler lacked a cosmic vision of religious origin, but
when the facts confronted the visions they followed the way the facts
pointed to.  Even today, many scientists hold personal beliefs that
are sharply at variance with the irreligious character of science.
However their work as scientists is judged only by the criteria set by
science and not by criteria relating to their beliefs. ( However,
there seem to be limits to the toleration within the scientific
community of these `beliefs'. For example, a theoretical physicist or
biologist who practices astrology in his or her spare time is likely
to find his or her scientific reputation among peers discredited soon
enough.)  Modern science as an activity is therefore intrinsically
secular.  This basic understanding of modern scientific activity was
not achieved without a long historical battle, -- one that continues
even today in a variety of forms.

Historically science has been instinctively secular in the sense that
persons of science always learnt or borrowed from other persons of
science from other cultures. The history of science shows that even in
the ancient world, scientific learning travelled long distances,
breaching cultural and religious barriers. By the seventeenth and
eighteenth centuries, the internationalist character of science came
to be explicitly recognised. But the freeing of science from the
imposition of religious dogma, both in matters of scientific fact and
interpretation, was harder and more difficult. Many of the landmarks
of this struggle are well known: they include Galileo's battle with
the Catholic Church, characterised beautifully in a Brecht play, ``The
Life of Galileo"; the burning at the stake of Giordano Bruno; the
attack on the laboratory and house of Joseph Priestley; and, in the
more recent period, the bitter debates following the work of Darwin.

But it was not merely that science attempted to shake off or defend
itself from dogma. Science in instinctive self-preservation of its
growth and development actively aligned itself with the development of
a critical and rational spirit in society. Science was firmly linked
throughout the period of the Renaissance and the Industrial Revolution
with progressive economic and social thought . The developments of
science and technology continually challenged myths, superstitions and
prejudices.

By the beginning of this century, the imposition of religious dogma on
science in the developed world was becoming increasingly difficult and
today the battle is more or less won.  Rearguard actions by
fundamentalist forces still manifest themselves from time to time. In
the United States, where Darwin's theory of evolution began to be
seriously taught in schools in the 1950s, a shift in tactics has taken
place in the attack on evolutionary theory by religious
fundamentalists.  Immediately following the appearance of Darwin's
work evolutionary theory was challenged on the grounds that scientific
fact and interpretation did not accord with the literal interpretation
of the Bible. More recently, however, the attempt has been to elevate
a bogus theory named ``creation science" (essentially an amalgam of
half-baked science and Biblical lore) as a competitor to evolutionary
theory and to demand equal time for teaching this `theory' in schools.
This experience suggests that science can no longer be fought directly
and that fundamentalism needs at least the external trappings of
science to succeed. The same trend is evident in the emergence of
`Islamic science' and `Vedic science', to which we shall return in
more detail.

The historical record reveals that societies where the material and
ideological conditions have been such as to retard the development of
a rational and critical spirit, societies where dogma rules
inflexibly, have lagged behind in the development of science and
technology.  This is indisputably true of the modern period.  Nor is
the critical rational spirit essential to science associated with
calls to regain the glory of a mythical past. Nazism dealt a critical
blow to the exact sciences in Germany, where the efforts to eradicate
``Jewish science" were particularly virulent. Spanish society after
the Moors left, dominated by a rigid Catholic Church, lagged behind
the rest of Europe for centuries. Where, in contrast, social changes
led to the promotion and development of this critical spirit (for
instance, the October Revolution that led to the founding of the
Soviet Union), a tremendous leap forward in science and technology
became possible.  None of the countries where fundamentalism holds
sway in the developing world today are recognised as making rapid
strides in science and technology.


\section{The Case of Modern India}
\indent

In India, from about the middle of the last century, the introduction
of modern technology began significantly to affect the character of
Indian society. Industrialization and the consequent rise of
enterpreneurial and working classes began to make the first dents on
the caste system by the beginning of this century.  The essential link
between the introduction of science and the development of a rational
and critical spirit, began to be grasped from an early stage. Raja
Rammohun Roy, campaigner against sati, religious reformer and defender
of the freedom of the press was also a pioneer in the promotion of
modern science education. Science and technology and their impact on
society were seriously debated issues during the freedom struggle. The
Indian Science Congress provided a serious forum where the political
leadership of the freedom struggle could meet the leading figures of
science and technology in India. Apart from the purely material and
economic benefits of science and technology for the people, science
was seen as a positive agent for social transformation.  Of all those
at the helm of the freedom struggle, Jawaharlal Nehru, the secularist,
best understood the relationship between science and a secular
outlook. Recalling in 1962 the origins of his deep interest in
science, Nehru wrote: ``In later years \ldots I arrived again at
science, when I realised that science was of the very texture of life
\ldots Politics led me to economics, and this led me inevitably to
science and the scientific approach to all our problems and to life
itself. It is science alone that could solve these problems of hunger
and poverty."(Nehru quoted in Jaggi, 1984, p. 190). Again in the
Science Policy Resolution of 1958, drafted by Nehru and adopted by
Parliament, ``Science \ldots has not only radically altered man's
material environment, but what is of still deeper significance, it has
provided new tools of thought and has extended man's mental horizon.
It has thus influenced even the basic values of life, and has given to
civilization a new vitality and a new dynamism."(Nehru quoted in
Jaggi, 1984, p. 191)

This is not the place for a critical examination of the achievements
and problems of science and technology in India. But it is worth
noting some major weaknesses which are relevant to our discussion.
The weakening over time of the drive for self-reliance has resulted in
a gradual downgrading of research and dissipation of enthusiasm,
especially in technology. Another factor retarding the growth of
science has been the sheer mass of illiteracy in our society; present
trends virtually guarantee that India will begin the twenty-first
century with half the world's population of illiterates. The
inadequacies of the education system include its weak emphasis on
creativity and originality, its failure to promote a critical spirit,
and its overemphasis on scholasticism and bookish knowledge to the
detriment of purposeful experimentation.  Obscurantism, superstition
and prejudice mar the functioning of scientific agencies; grants for
`research' into the production of rain by yagnas is a significant
example. When a total solar eclipse took place in India a few years
ago, many scientists reflected the irrational and superstitious
response of large sections of the population.  While the current state
of science and technology in the country provides us a base for
further progress, the structure is still quite fragile. To make
matters worse at this juncture, the overall funding for research and
universities is being cut savagely.

\section{Hindutva vs Science}
\indent

How does Hindutva stand in relation to science and technology in
India?  We have argued above that experience shows that all
fundamentalism is basically inimical to scientific advance.  Science
and fundamentalism cannot coexist. There is not a single example in
the contemporary world of a theocratic, non-secular state in which
science and technology have made worthwhile strides. In such
societies, bold, creative thinking, uninhibited experimentation,
freedom of intellectual pursuit and expression are seriously retarded.
This reality is brought out in the short track record of Hindutva vis
a vis science in India.  \section{Kar Sevak Archaeology} \indent

We referred earlier to the discipline of history being at the
forefront of the fight for secularism at the intellectual level. Among
the social sciences, the discipline of archaeology, which works within
the broad framework of history, is one of those that come closest to
the natural sciences; for this reason, the Hindutva track record on
archaeology merits careful scrutiny by all scientists. The supposed
``emergence" of artifacts from a wall of the masjid during its
demolition, the strange story of an art historian without film in her
cameras who was an eyewitness to this event, the subsequent effort to
photograph the artifacts after they were dumped in a pit elsewhere,
the hailing of these artifacts as fresh ``evidence" and the brazen
demand that they form part of the examination of the question of
whether a ``temple" stood earlier on the site of the masjid are the
culmination of a long campaign of sheer perversion of the science of
archaeology. The science of archaeology places great emphasis on the
study of artifacts in situ as much as possible, their subsequent
removal being done with all care and with all possible record of their
original position. The evaluation of such evidence proceeds
subsequently with attention to physical details; dovetailing the
evidence with what is known of the relevant general history of the
period to which it belongs, and the past history of archaeological
excavations at the site.

The recent antics (backed by strong-arm methods) are part of an
on-going science fraud by ``kar sevak" archaeologists who have sold
their science down the river. A major excavation at the so-called
``Ramjanmabhoomi mound" was by Prof. B. B. Lal, Director-General of
the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI), in the 1970s. He found
absolutely no evidence of any temple at at that site and published his
results in the official ASI publication. These findings have been
corroborated by K. V.  Soundararajan, former Additional
Director-General of the ASI, who has confirmed that there were no
indications of human habitation of the Babri Masjid mound between the
11th and 15th centuries. Subsequently, the ``kar sevaks" made a
``startling discovery", unearthing some pieces of sculpture ``located
in a large pit," when ``the ground near the Ramjanmabhoomi was being
levelled through a PWD-type dig." These findings are then published in
a pamphlet that claimed that evidence had been discovered for a temple
at Ayodhya between the 10th and 12th century A.D. As expert historians
and archaeologists(Champakalakshmi, Ratnagar and Shrimali, 1992) were
quick to point out, the objects were not unearthed in a careful
scientific excavation; the ``experts" examined the objects later and
not in situ, and none of the standard archaeological practices
associated with excavations from a pit appeared to have been honoured.
The photographs in the pamphlet were clearly set up, and it was not
even clear that there was a pit in the archaeological sense of the
term.  The ``kar sevak" archaeologists also managed to muddle up the
order of the Dasavathara as they laboured to make the `artifacts' fit
the fraud.

Hindutva archaeology is science fraud and mob vandalism, aided by a
stable of ``experts" to lend a veneer of academic respectability.
Note here the practice of denigrating specialists (of archaeology in
this case): those who agree with them are fielded as spokespersons,
while the rest are roundly abused.  On other occasions, the charade of
establishing scientific `proof' is abandoned and the existence of the
Ram temple at the site is asserted to be a matter of faith, not
evidence.  What conclusion is a scientist to draw from ``kar sevak"
archaeology except that we are witnessing the most violent
obscurantist and fraudulent attack on science seen in this country in
the post-independence period?

\section{``Vedic Mathematics''}
\indent

Additional insights into the Hindutva perspective on science are
provided by the track record of the four states captured by the BJP in
the 1991 elections: U. P., M. P., Rajasthan and Himachal Pradesh. All
four BJP state Governments introduced Vedic mathematics into the
school syllabus and intended to do the same in the syllabi of
engineering colleges and polytechnics. Strangely, the sneaking of
pseudo-science into publicly funded education triggered very little
debate in Indian scientific circles.

What is this `Vedic Mathematics'? It is somewhat difficult to define
as the very terminology is used only by a small set of authors and a
handful of mathematicians. The purveyors of `Vedic Mathematics' are
agreed, however, that the landmark work in this ``discipline" is the
text ``Vedic Mathematics," written by Jagadguru Swami Sri Bharathi
Krishna Tirthaji Maharaja, Sankaracharya of Govardhan Matha, Puri (he
died in 1960) and published in 1965 (Jagadguru, 1965).  It is
instructive to examine this `text' in some detail. The title page has
the interesting sub-title ``Sixteen Simple Mathematical Formulae from
the Vedas (For one-line answers to all Mathematical Problems)."
Passing through diverse prefatory remarks by various personalities
(none of whom is a mathematician), we come to the author's preface,
arranged in numbered paragraphs.  After explaining the meaning of the
word `Veda'(paragraph 2), the author continues in the following vein
(paragraph 3) :`` In other words, it connotes and implies that our
ancient Indian Vedic lore should be all-round complete and perfect and
able to throw the fullest necessary light on all matters which any
aspiring seeker after knowledge can possibly seek to be enlightened
on." In para 9 the reader learns that : ``And we were agreeably
astonished and intensely gratified to find that exceedingly tough
mathematical problems (which the mathematically most advanced present
day Western scientific world had spent huge lots of time , energy and
money on and which even now it solves with the utmost difficulty
\ldots) can be easily and readily solved with the help of these
ultra-easy Vedic Sutras \ldots\ contained in the Parisista (the
Appendix-portion) of the Atharvaveda in a few simple steps and by
methods which can be conscientiously described as mere mental
arithmetic". Having informed us in that he has regularly lectured on
the subject at Nagpur University (paragraph 11), the author unfolds
his `revolutionary' findings in Para 14 (vi):`` As regards the time
required by the students for mastering the whole course of Vedic
mathematics as applied to all its branches, we need merely state from
our actual experience that 8 months (or 12 months) at an average rate
of 2 or 3 hours per day should suffice for completing the whole course
of mathematical studies on these Vedic lines instead of 15 or 20 years
required according to the existing systems of the Indian and also of
foreign universities."

After all this introduction we find inside the book mathematics of the
middle and high school level, where the emphasis is throughout on a
series of tricks (whose origins are explained) to solve various
problems: for example, faster ways of dividing, multiplying and
factorising numbers, and ways of dealing with problems in conics .
Some readers may find the book diverting; some of the methods
described may be actually be useful somewhere in school teaching
(though this needs detailed investigation).  The real issue, however,
is not so much the level of the contents as the additional
philosophical baggage that is provided.  How are we to take the
assertion that the ``Vedas" provide the answers to all questions of
mathematics?  Is there any scientific sense in which a particular body
of knowledge can be said to contain the answer to all questions of
mathematics?  The contents of the book seem far-removed from this
goal; comprising as they do elementary mathematics; the list provided,
of the subjects intended to be dealt with by the author in later
volumes (which were never published) does not rise above this level.
In fact, mathematics from the high school level onwards indisputably
requires material that cannot be provided by the `Vedic' (or for that
matter `Islamic', `Greek', or `Babylonian'). Modern mathematical
teaching requires considerable input that cannot be traced back to
antiquity.  The book seeks constantly to prove the superiority of
various methods to those used in the ``Western" methods, the reference
point often being English texts long fallen out of use, presumably
dating to the author's youth.  Nor is the book of any use in studying
the history of mathematics in India; the book is simply unequal to the
task.

What, in fact, is ``Vedic" about the mathematics in the book? Some of
the examples cited are already well known to historians and adequately
described elsewhere.  As for the appendices to the Atharvaveda, the
alleged source of the Vedic mathematical riches described in the book,
they appear to be totally non-existent. No authoritative edition of
the text of the Atharvaveda contains the appendices referred to. The
game is given away in the General Editor's Foreword, where it is noted
that these ``appendices" are not part of the established texts but
should be regarded as new and the `discovery' of the author himself!
The General Editor also notes that the style of language makes it
clear that the `appendices' are the author's own discovery and that
the book should be judged on its own merits - where of course the book
fails miserably.

Despite its absurd claims and transparently bogus status, Jagad\-guru
Swami's book became the focus of a National Workshop on Vedic
Mathematics held at Jaipur in March 1988 by the Rashtriya Veda Vidya
Pratishthan and various other Government bodies and Universities. The
proceedings were published as ``Issues in Vedic Mathematics''(Khare,
1991).  The seminar enjoyed the official patronage of the Ministry of
Human Resource Development and the objectives of the seminar were
spelt out in a letter to all participants by the Special Secretary,
Department of Education.  The papers presented at the seminar scarcely
rise above the level of the book that inspired them. There is much
talk of applying the ``Vedic" methods to developing algorithms for
computers (some participants opt out and claim that these methods
render calculators and computers redundant) and some of the articles
indeed are, to put it charitably, nonsense from any scientific
viewpoint. The seminar ends with recommendations to the Government: a
second seminar to be held on VM, in which traditional and modern
mathematicians are to study the introduction of VM at different
levels; a committee to study the introduction of VM in schools;
research in VM; multimedia strategies for awareness of VM; the Dept.
of Electronics to be sounded out on VM applications to computer
technology. One interesting whistle-blowing paper (Shukla, 1991, p.31)
brings to light the fact that the Sankaracharya's book is not based on
what is in the Vedas.

Clearly the BJP-led Governments rushed in where others have feared to
tread and introduced this material in the schools.  Any doubts about
their reasons for doing so were dispelled by the BJP Education
Minister of Uttar Pradesh at a workshop in Allahabad in April 1992,
where he declared that ``whatever is very ancient for India, that
precisely is most modern for the world."(see Seminarist, 1992) The
efforts of Hindutva in respect of the exact sciences would indeed be
laughable were it not for the potential for serious damage at the
school level.

\section{Textbooks and the `Aryan' Thesis}
\indent

Further evidence of the Hindutva attitude to the pursuit of truth and
scientific rigour is available in the history textbooks foisted on
students in the four erstwhile BJP-ruled states.  Take the case of the
compulsory textbook for first-year graduate students titled "Bharat ki
Sanskritik Virasat" introduced in Madhya Pradesh. Essentially a primer
of the Hindutva brand of culture, it determinedly pushes the
pseudo-thesis that the Aryans did not migrate to the Indian
sub-continent from outside but were `indigenous'. This is very much in
line with the absolutist assertions made by `Guru' M. S. Golwalkar,
the RSS's second supremo and its most important ideologue, in his 1939
work, ``We: or Our Nationhood defined'', which the Hindutva camp is
doing its best to cover up today. Rejecting theories that held that
the `Aryans' migrated to India, Golwalkar asserts: `` Hypothesis is
not truth. Out of the heap of hypotheses we reject all and positively
maintain that we Hindus came into this land from nowhere, but are
indigenous children of the soil always, from times immemorial and are
natural masters of the country. Here we compiled our inimitable Vedas,
reasoned out our Philosophy of the Absolute -- the last word on the
subject, built our sciences and arts and crafts..."(Golwalkar, 1939,
p.  8-9). The equation of `Hindu' and `Aryan'-- `` the Hindu i.e.
Aryan race" (Golwalkar, 1939, p.6) is central to Golwalkar's thesis
about national identity as expounded in this chillingly explicit work.

The anti-scientific character of this thesis has been exposed by
India's leading historians, among them Dr. Romila Thapar (an excellent
article is available in \underline{Seminar}; see Thapar, 1992).
Historians point out that term Aryan should be applied, scientifically
speaking, only to a language. The language of the Rig Veda for
instance is Old Indo-Aryan. The links between this language and Old
Avestan indicates a movement from West Asia to India by Aryan
speakers. The evidence ``does not support the notion that India was
the homeland of the Aryan-speaking people" (Thapar, 1992, p. 22).
Further, Vedic Sanskrit and its dialect variations provide evidence of
further geographical movement from the north-west into the Ganga
valley. The Aryan speakers did not maintain any racial purity, so that
what really spread was not a body of racially pure Aryans, but rather
the use of the language Old Indo-Aryan. Dr. Romila Thapar goes on to
discuss the implications of such pseudo-theses for developing a
justification of upper caste domination. There are other dimensions to
the pushing of this pseudo-thesis, especially the linking up with the
fascistic vision of Golwalkar on national identity and the place of
minorities, above all Muslims. Revealingly, Golwalkar was attracted to
Nazi Germany's handling of the `minorities' problem: ``To keep up the
purity of the Race and it culture, Germany shocked the world by her
purging the country of the semitic Races-the Jews. Race pride at its
highest has been manifested here. Germany has also shown how wellnigh
impossible it is for Races and cultures, having differences going to
the root, to be assimilated into one united whole, a good lesson for
us in Hindustan to learn and profit by."  (Golwalkar, 1939, p.35).

\section{`Islamic Science' in Pakistan}
\indent

If all these steps taken down the Hindutva road present but a preview,
where does the road of full-blown fundamentalism take science and
technology?  To answer the question a brief look at mathematics and
physics in Pakistan is sufficient. In an essay on ``Ideological
Problems of Science in Pakistan," the Pakistani physicist Prof.
Pervez Hoodbhoy (see Khan, 1985) presents a graphic picture of the
collapse of attempts made in the 60s and 70s to build science in
Pakistan. By the 1980s the Department of Physics at Quaid-i-Azam
University, which a decade or two earlier was an active centre of
research in theoretical physics, had lost its founder and a number of
other scientists, who were dismissed or resigned.  Mathematics,
according to the author, has ceased to exist as a research discipline
in Pakistan and a prize committee for young mathematicians was unable
to find a single applicant with a record of original publications. An
admissions test for entrance to graduate studies at MIT (U.S.A) was
not cleared by a single student, most falling significantly below the
minimum required. In contrast, a decade ago several students would
have made the grade.  Chemistry and biology are perhaps slightly
better placed, but research is confined to one or two centres. Serious
scientists work under overwhelming odds in such circumstances; good or
outstanding scientific work done is despite the milieu. ``Islamic
Science," whose proponents claim that the Koran contains all possible
science, makes constant inroads into positions of power in educational
and R\&D institutions, and obscurantism has been elevated to a
position of dignity. The author cites a number of examples of the
non-science that is produced as a result. A senior scientist of the
Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission, committed to `Islamic science',
argues that Koranic evidence supports the existence of {\it{jinns}} as
fiery beings possessing unlimited energy, and that this energy can be
used as fuel. Another author proposes that atomic charges are carved
out of `spiritual forces' and `not simply the blind electromagnetic
forces that the materialists would make us believe.'

Prof. Hoodbhoy concludes: ``Indeed, the reaction against science as an
instrument of reason, whether applied to social matters or even
natural phenomena, appears to intensify with increasing technological
dependence on the West\ldots. However, one clear consequence has been
the tremendous elevation in importance of the transnational
corporation, the most important purveyor of modern technology. The
import of technology makes possible the simultaneous coexistence of
mediaevalism with the space age." The relevance of these words for
India is too close for comfort.

\section{The Challenge Before Indian Science}
\indent

These are matters that should cause serious concern within the
scientific community in India. But do they?  The latest outrage, the
institution of an award for astrology at the annual Indian Science
Congress and its official defence by no less than a member of the
Planning Commission, should be cause enough. And, in fact, the first
award has been given to the president of an occult foundation.
Professional scientists have protested but they have not been able to
block the move. It is hard to imagine a major conclave of scientists
in a developed country not breaking into pandemonium over such an
affront to science and scientists, but this is India under the shadow
of Hindutva. Seen against the specific background of Ayodhya, the
incident assumes even more menacing overtones. More shocking is the
case of a physicist at the Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur, who
went to Ayodhya as a kar sevak in December 1992 and returned, with a
piece of the rubble, to resume his duties in the service of science at
one of India's S\&T institutions.

We have referred above to the many weaknesses of the science and
technology infrastructure in India. These weaknesses are intimately
connected with the overall social and economic crisis of Indian
society today. If, as is widely recognised, the current Hindu
fundamentalist wave is a right-wing reactionary response to the
crisis, science and technology can hardly expect to remain immune to
the influence of fundamentalism. Our scientific and technological
institutions are not strong enough to withstand a sustained onslaught
which is politically powered; it takes but a few years to dismantle
active centres of research and teaching. And in the long run, give or
take a few years, there would be a systematic dismantling of science
and technology in this country.  The direct links that Hindutva
pseudo-science has with the less publicised fascist face of the Sangh
parivar, suggest that if Hindutva triumphs, science and technology
will be made subservient to its original dream of a pseudo-Hindu
fascist state ( as elaborated by Golwalkar in 1939).  If these words
seem unduly alarmist, we need to remember that the current grim
political situation, if forecast or projected back in the mid-1980s,
would have been dismissed as unimaginable in India.

What does a serious and genuine commitment to science and technology
mean in the current context? In a perceptive essay Jacob Bronowski
(Bronowski, 1977) argues that science is not a value-neutral human
activity. ``The activity of science is directed to seek the truth
(about the material world), and it is judged by the criterion of being
true to facts. We can practice science only if we value the truth"
(Bronowski, 1977, p.212).  Without truth, science is not possible.
This truth is not immutable for we find descriptions of nature only up
to a certain coarseness, a certain tolerance. And this in turn implies
that science values dissent, for without dissent there would be no
challenge of the established concepts and no progress. And the right
to dissent needs to be safe guarded. Science values independence of
thought because it is a necessary condition of dissent and originality
because it is the tool with which the new is discovered. These values
are essential to modern science and science needs a society that
recognises these as social values. The right of free and critical
enquiry that is implied by these values is one of the abiding things
that science has given to society.

We have referred before to the importance of the critical and rational
spirit in society for science to flourish. It bears emphasis that it
is in assisting in the task of expanding the realm of operation of
free and critical enquiry in society that science and scientists
fulfill their social responsibility. It is this perception, affirmed
and grasped at the mass level, that has led to the remarkable
phenomenon of popular science movements that seek to empower the
people through the transmission of the knowledge of science and the
scientific method. Hindutva, and the obscurantism, science fraud and
pseudo-science it inflicts on society at the political, and therefore,
mass level, work precisely in the opposite way. From the standpoint of
science and its values, Hindutva must be judged to be a serious threat
indeed.

A commitment to science is a positive commitment to secularism.  The
historian K. N. Panikkar has referred (see Panikkar, 1991) to the
necessity of expanding the secular space in society, of seizing the
initiative from communalism and promoting a positive campaign for
secularism. Science belongs firmly to this secular space; if it does
not, we cannot conceive of another pursuit, another activity, which
does. Hindutva cannot easily challenge the popular perception of the
need for science and technology as an integral part of development.
This perception can be used to promote a powerful campaign that links
secularism firmly with science, that demonstrates that science is
impossible without the development of a critical spirit. In the
ultimate analysis, the development of science and of the spirit of
free and critical enquiry can make a major contribution to eradicating
the blight of communalism that is upon India.  

\begin{flushleft} {\bf References} \end{flushleft} 
\begin{itemize} 
\item[] Bronowski, J.,
{\it A Sense of the Future}, M.I.T.  Press, Cambridge (U. S. A.),
1977.  
\item[] Champakalakshmi, R., Frontline, Nov. 6, 1992.  
\item[] Golwalkar, M. S., {\it We or Our Nationhood defined}, Bharat
Publications, 1939.  
\item[] Halstead, Beverly L.,`` Evolution -- The
Fossils Say Yes!'' in the book {\it Science and Creationism} ed. by
Ashley Montagu, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1984.  
\item[] Jagadguru, Swami Sri Bharati Krsna Tirthaji Maharaja, {\it Vedic
Mathematics}, Motilal Banarasidass, New Delhi, 1965.  
\item[] Jaggi, O. P. , {\it Impact of Science and Technology in Modern 
India}, Atma Ram and Sons, New Delhi, 1984.  
\item[] Khan, Asghar, ed. {\it Islam,
Politics and the State} Zed Books, London, 1985.  
\item[] Khare, H.
C., ed. {\it Issues in Vedic Mathe\-matics}, Rashtriya Veda Vidya
Pratishthan and Motilal Banarasidass Pub., New Delhi, 1991.  
\item[] Panikkar, K. N., {\it Communalism in India} , People's Publishing
House, New Delhi, 1991. 
\item[] Ratnagar, S., Frontline, Nov. 6,
1992. 
\item[] Seminarist, ``State Sponsored Communalization'' in {\it
Seminar}, no. 400, Dec. 1992. 
\item[] Shrimali, K. M., Frontline,
Nov. 6, 1992. 
\item[] Shukla, K. S. , ``Vedic Mathematics: the
Deceptive Title of Swamiji's Book" in Khare, op.cit.  
\item[] Thapar,
Romila, ``The Perennial Aryans'' in {\it Seminar}, no.400, Dec.1992.
\end{itemize} 
\begin{flushleft} {\bf Additional Reading} \end{flushleft} 
\begin{itemize} 
\item[] Andersen, W. and Damle,
Sridhar D., {\it The Brother\-hood in Saffron: The Rashtriya
Swayamsevak Sangh and Hindu Revivalism}, Vistaar Publications, New
Delhi, 1987.  
\item[] Baxter, Craig, {\it The Jana Sangh: A Biography
of an Indian Political Party}, University of Pennsylvania Press,
Philadelphia, 1969.  
\item[] Bernal, J.D., {\it The Social Function of
Science}, M. I. T.  Press, Cambridge (U. S. A.), 1967.  
\item[] Broad,
W. and Nicholas, W., {\it Betrayers of the Truth: Fraud and Deceit in
Science}, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1982.  
\item[] Gardner, M. {\it } 
\item[] Graham, B. D., {\it Hindu Nationalism and Indian
Politics}, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1990.  \end{itemize}
\end{document}
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