Rajaram's bull

[Sudalaimuthu Palaniappan]

In a posting on Aug.3, 2000, Luis Gonzalez-Reimann said, "Much of the current
attack on "Western" Indology seems to be part of a strategy that aims at
defending Brahminical traditions and institutions against a perceived
menacing threat."

In this connection, the following may be of interest.

In his book, "Aryan Invasion of India" (1993), Rajaram says the following:

<<Just as the French had always sought to keep the German people divided, the
British saw a divided India as offering the best hope for the survival of
their Indian Empire. They also knew that the Brahmins were the only people
who as a group commanded the respect of all the communities across the length
and breadth of India. In this concern, English missionaries with their
proselytizing interests found common cause with the government. And this was
soon to be joined by other European missionaries also studying Sanskrit. When
we look at the roster of Indologists of the period, it is surprising how many
of them came from a church background. The very strong anti-Brahmin bias that
dominates much of nineteenth writing on India, and even today, must be
attributed at least in part to the political and missionary interests of the
era. Though the Brahmin community of the period was hardly free from blame,
it was not the unmitigated evil that the British authorities and missionaries
portrayed it to be. If it was conservative and reactionary like the Japanese
samurai, it also took the lead in the social, educational and cultural
reforms in the nineteenth century known as Indian Renaissance. The British
saw the Brahmins as a threat while missionaries saw them as obstacles.>>  (p.
25)

                                    (to be continued)

Regards
S. Palaniappan