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Sangath, www.sangath.com, is looking to build a centre for services, training and research and seeks to buy approx 1500 to 2000 sq mtrs land betweeen Mapusa and Bambolim and surrounding rural areas. Please contact: [email protected] or [email protected] or ph+91-9881499458 http://lists.goanet.org/pipermail/goanet-goanet.org/2009-July/180028.html ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2009/7/27 Santosh Helekar <[email protected]>: > I think this is an unfair attack on the Goan historian > Priolkar. His book received favorable reviews by his > historian peers when it was first published. > They especially pointed out the fact that his > analysis was dispassionate, objective and restrained. > --- On Sun, 7/26/09, J. Colaco < jc> <[email protected]> wrote: >> The fact that he did not do so ....clearly leads me to >> believe that >> Priolkar was a zealot propagandist in the garb of a >> historian. The point isn't to "attack" the writer, but to understand the influences and ideologies that shaped and influenced his work. To pretend that any academic, scholar or writer is free from all ideology is unrealistic. Take a look at this work, which features Priolkar's *Inquisition* prominently: Hindu Pro-Zionism and Philo-Semitism A QUOTE: This work is dedicated to Hindu revolutionary, social reformer, rationalist, intellectual, political ideologue, and freedom fighter for Indian independence, Vinayak (Veer) D. Savarkar (1883-1966), an uncompromising supporter of the Zionist project. http://www.scribd.com/doc/9680428/Hindu-ProZionism-and-PhiloSemitism Of course, it is possible that Priolkar is not connected here, and his name has been mentioned by someone in connection with an ideology that doesn't even tie up with his perspective. Yet, Anant Kakba Priolkar figures in a list which includes the likes of Veer Savarkar, Sita Ram Goel, Ram Swarup, Koenraad Elst, David Frawley, Francois Gautier, Navaratna S Rajaram, Jay Dubashi, Arun Shourie ... among others. And a quote: In his 1961 book, The Goa Inquisition, A K Priolkar uses primary source reproduction to show the ravages that the Portuguese under the authority oft eh (sic) Inquisition, officially set up by the Roman Catholic Church to root-out heresy, did to Goa and other areas under the control of Portugal in India. Though the major destructive impact, both physical and cultural, was on the Hindus, there were also Jewish victims of the Goa Inquisition. Indeed in both Spain and Portugal from where the Inquisition had achieved the highest level of what might be called "respectability", anti-Semitism was a (sic) its very core, and even Jews converted to Christianity, as Koenraad Elst explains in his work, were not immune from relentless persecution. Leaving aside Priolkar for a moment, last night before going to bed, this was a rather recent article which I stumbled across in one of my to-read papers... and it seemed to throw up hints of answer to some other questions that one had in mind. This article, from the Economic and Politcal Weekly, talks about the second set of (1991) publishers of Priolkar's book, the Voice of India. It's an amazingly detailed article, and gives a whole lot of insights about a network that is otherwise tough to understand. Of course, their ideology and the connection with *The Goa Inquisition* or its author could be entirely concidental. Needless to say, Priolkar did much better the first time round (in 1961) when he got the Universities of Mumbai and Poona to be associated with bringing out *The Goa Inquisition*. Check this: Hindu Triumphalism and the Clash of Civilisations This essay examines the emergence of Hindu triumphalism which openly and unapologetically celebrates its conception of “superiority of Hinduism over the alleged depravity of Semitic monotheistic religions”, namely, Islam and Christianity. It focuses on the publishing house called Voice of India which has emerged as the most vocal source of Hindu triumphalism. It takes a closer look at who the VOI ideologues are, what they are saying, how they are making connections with the European New Right and how they are influencing the political culture of India. --Meera Nanda-- 11-07-2009 [SPECIAL ARTICLES] Issue : VOL 44 No. 28 July 11 - July 17, 2009 You can google for the text or search via http://epw.in/epw/user/curResult.jsp and it should be available for some days (old issues are taken offline by the EPW after four weeks, but available on Jstor). It is a most insightful essay by Meera Nanda, who has in the past been known for her critique of Sam Harris and his scientific skepticism. We'll probably understand more of this debate as diverse perspectives, points and counter-points emerge. FN
