We shouln"t expect anything better from Indian Publishers, be it Penguin or any other. They are all spineless. What is still worse, the reaction of the academic community hardly carries any weight. We have seen this in the case of Courtright' book on Ganesh, Laine's book on Shivaji, Ramanujan essay on the Ramayana; examples can be multiplied. In many cases the academics don't even react as I experienced in my own case. They swear by freedom of expression, but the freedom of X becomes superior to the freedom of Y.
I am familiar with WendyDoniger's writings which are undoubtedly refreshing and thought provoking and when I read her Hinduism book (Penguin India) I had a feeling that the Sangh Parivar may come out openly against it any time. I will not be surprised if the Parivar repeats performance in the case of her book ON HINDUISM published by the Aleph company last year.
Isn't it possible that the Penguin authors mobilise scholars from diferent fields and send a petition-on line to the Publisher. If Peguin does not agree to put the book back into circulation, at least the Penguin authors withdraw their books from them or at least decide not to publish with them in future. This is what some scholars, I am told, did with with Motilal Banarsidass in the case of Courtright's book.
D N Jha
Former Professor and Chair
Department of History
University of Delhi
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