You werethefirst amongthe intellectualswho warned
aboutthe ascendancyof fascismin the countryin the
contextof the demolitionof the BabriMasjid.Your
lecture,laterpublishedas an essay,“Fascismand
NationalCulture:ReadingGramsciin the Daysof
Hindutva”,was an excellenttext on the rise of Hindutva
fascismin India.In that you wrotethat “everycountry
gets the fascismit deserves”.DoesIndiaget its own
fascismnow?
Yes,thatwasmy initialreaction, andI didusethe
term“fascism” at thattimeratherfrequently. ButI intro-
ducedmanycaveatsverysoonafterthatinitial moment.I
stillbelievethatthedestructionof the
BabriMasjidwasa fascistspectacleand
thattheRSShasmany classically fas-
cistcharacteristics,butI do make a
distinctionbetweentheRSSandits
masspolitical front, theBJP,whichis
historicallya veryunique party. We
needveryprecisedialecticaloperations
to understandthe structuralnovelty of
thispartybeforeputtingan easylabel
on it. My lecture/essay thatyoureferto
wasalsowritten verysoon afterthe Ay-
odhyademolition. Butit wasnot on the
“theriseof Hindutvafascism” as you
putit. Rather,it wasa reflection from
insideIndia,at a particular moment of
crisis,on a particular problemthat
Gramsci hadposedfor himself.As of
1920,theItalianLeftwasincompar-
ablystrongerthanthe rathersmall and
disorganisedfascistformation.Three
yearslater,[Benito]Mussoliniwasin
power,andby 1926his powerhadbe-
comeabsolute, withthe Leftdecimated
as a politicalforce,wellbeforethe Nazis
cameto powerin Germany.In thiscon-
text,Gramsci asked himself:whatis it
in ourhistoryandsociety, what wasin
the bourgeoisnationalismof ourcoun-
try whichhas led to sucheasyvictoryfor
fascismandsucheasydefeatof the
Left?Verylargepartsof thePrison
Notebooksarea reflectionon Italian
history, on the specialplaceof the Vat-
icanin thathistory, on the peculiarities
of the RisorgimentoandItalian unific-
ation,on thestuntednatureof the
Italianbourgeoisieandits industrial
cities,on popularfiction,andso on, so
as to grasppatternsof popularcon-
sciousness.I triedto raisesimilarsorts
of questionsabout India.Theproblem
withthatessayis thattoo muchof it is
basedon analogical thinking, whichis a
veryinferiorformof thinking.Soon
afterthatI wrotea verylongessayon
Italianfascism,whichI likebetter.
WhenI wrotethateverycountrygetsthefascismit
deserves, I hadin mindthegreatdifference between
GermanyandItaly,betweenItalyor GermanyandSpain,
andso on, whichthenimpliesthatif andwhenfascism
comesto Indiait willbe a productof our ownhistoryand
society, quitedifferentfromanyother.Youaskmeif
fascismis comingto India now.Theanswer is “No”.
NeithertheIndian bourgeoisienortheRSSneedsfas-
cism.In interwarEurope,varietiesof fascismcamein
countries wheretheworking-class movementwasvery
powerfulanda communist revolutionwasverypossible.
No suchsituationobtainsin India.Communalviolence,
no matterhowuglyor punctual, is not
fascism.Do the RSSandseveralof its
non-parliamentary frontshavesome
fascistattributes?Yes,theydo. Butso
do dozensof movementsandpartiesof
the FarRightall overthe globe.A fas-
ciststreakhasbeen a partof capitalist
politicssinceabout the 1880s,but very
fewstatesor politicalpartiescanbe
calledfascistin the strictsense.LOW-INTENSITYDEMOCRACYYou say that right-wingforcessuchas
the SanghParivardo not need to fully
smashand abolishthe liberalpolitical
frameworkin India.Instead,they can
workwithinit and makeuse of it. Is
our democratictraditionand liberal
politicalset-upstrongenoughto keep
us a liberaldemocraticparliamentary
systemwithoutcrumblingunder
right-wingtotalitariantendencies?
Changingsomeaspects of the Con-
stitution is not the same thingas
smashingtheliberal order.TheU.S.
Constitution includes manyamend-
ments.Thereareparliamentary pro-
ceduresfor introducingnewelements
in a Constitution.Youor I mayor may
notlikethosechanges,butso longas
those parliamentaryprocedures are
observed,the liberalorderremainsin-
tact.YoumustunderstandthatI am a
greatdefender of democracy,but I dis-
likeliberalism.I haveactuallypub-
lished an essay denouncing the
liberalisation of democracy. A very
frightening development overthe past
five yearshasbeenthe extentto which
theBJPhasbeenableto elicitgreat
compliance fromkey sectorsof the lib-
eralordersuchas thejudiciary,the
ElectionCommissionand, of course,
the greatmajority of the electronic me-
dia,thedominantTVchannels,etc.
Wehavealwayshada low-intensityKARLMARX.Marxismis a
dynamicknowledge,always
updatingitself, renewingitself,
because the material worldis
always caught up in the
whirlwinds of change.THEHINDUARCHIVESMAOZEDONG,in 1966. He
developedhis revolutionaryforce
not in industrialcities but in the
agrarian hinterlands.AP