But the point is, while one cannot blame the Muslim propagandists for painting a rosy picture of the religion they try to sell, we now see eminent hi… - Koenraad Elst

When the freedom movement started thinking in terms of a future independent state, then conceived according to the prevailing model of the nation-state, it became aware of the need for national symbols. For the flag, quite sensibly, it toyed with the idea of reusing Shivaji’s saffron flag, as uniformly orange as Moammar al-Qadhafi’s Libyan flag was uniformly green. But a movement courting Muslims for support preferred to keep this crystal-clear symbol at a distance. But the Congress chose the tricolour, a communal flag of a composite culture with orange on top standing for Hinduism and green at the bottom for Islam, an embodiment of Swami Vivekananda’s success formula: ‘Vedantic brain and Islamic body.’ Like with the green colour in more recent political flags, Hindus need not stick to the communal interpretation of the Muslims and Nehruvians: Long before Islam existed, green was already around and had a natural meaning: opulence, prosperity, as well as nature. Likewise, orange forever remains the colour of fire, of tapas (‘heat’, asceticism), of spirituality.

By the way, notice my term: a “self-identifying Hindu”. As the case of Malhotra has amply exemplified, it suffices to stand up as a Hindu, or to own up Hinduism, in order to be dubbed “Hindu Rightist”, “Hindutva ideologue”, as well as “fanatic”. “rookie” and all the fair names Hindus have been called by Prof. Truschke’s august school of thought. To them, the acceptable Hindu, or what Malhotra calls a “sepoy”, is one who never identifies as a Hindu, but rather as “Indian” (or better, “Bengali”, “Malayali” etc.), “low-caste”, and ideologically “secularist”. The exception is when countering criticism from self-identified Hindus, for then, he is expected to say: “But me too, I am a Hindu!” That way, he can fulfil his main task: as long as there are Hindus, he must deny them the right to speak on behalf of Hinduism and to give it a presence at the conversation between worldviews.

Tribals are emphatically called “not Hindu” in Christian and “South-Asianist” publications, but when they misbehave and kill Christians or Muslims, they suddenly get transformed into “Hindu rioters”. So, picking and choosing which manipulated meaning best serves their case is common among Hindu-bashers.