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November 17, 2014

India: Vedic Science Nonsense Popular Among Top Leaders of the BJP

Open Magazine, 23, March 2013

Hartosh Singh Bal turned from the difficulty of doing mathematics to the ease of writing on politics. Unlike mathematics all this requires is being less wrong than most others who dwell on the subject. He is the Political Editor of Open.

Rajnath Uncovers Vedic Roots of Quantum Mechanics
The BJP President’s speech at the party National Council meet, where he outlined India’s contribution to modern science, was as worrying as it was hilarious

“It is being said that this discovery (of the Higgs Boson) may bring the biggest change in human life in the 21st century... The word ‘Boson’ in the name of this particle is taken from the name of Satyendra Nath Bose. It is said about SN Bose that he always used to be in a state of meditation and used to solve scientific problems with alacrity. Famous scientist Neil Bohr had also accepted this capacity of Bose,” said Singh
“It is being said that this discovery (of the Higgs Boson) may bring the biggest change in human life in the 21st century... The word ‘Boson’ in the name of this particle is taken from the name of Satyendra Nath Bose. It is said about SN Bose that he always used to be in a state of meditation and used to solve scientific problems with alacrity. Famous scientist Neil Bohr had also accepted this capacity of Bose,” said Singh

‘India First’ announced Narendra Modi, and those looking for excuses to support him fell in line, hailing this nationalistic definition of secularism. The only question worth asking in this context—what kind of India we would want to put first—went unanswered. A pity, because an answer would go some way in explaining why, despite this corrupt and largely dysfunctional Congress Government, a Modi-led or even a BJP-led alliance is not a palatable alternative.

The BJP’s tenure in power from 1999 to 2004, even if we set aside the violence in Gujarat, was a clear indication of the dangers of the party’s ideology. Murli Manohar Joshi, as Minister for Human Resources Development, worked to make astrology a part of India’s university curriculum; ‘Vedic mathematics’, a grab bag of schoolboy tricks invented in the 1960s with no provenance in the Vedas, was encouraged, and the healing powers of cow urine were promoted.

This remarkably blinkered and narrow-minded vision still has implications for almost every aspect of Indian intellectual and social life. While the possible return of the BJP will have much to do with the failure of the current Congress-led alliance, the real danger is that the party will see this as an endorsement of its Hindutva worldview.

If evidence were needed that the party continues to espouse this vision, it was available at the recent meeting of the party’s National Council. Like Murli Manohar Joshi, BJP President Rajnath Singh too was at some point of time employed at a college to teach Physics and seems to deal in the same absurdities. Not many commentators seem to have paid heed to Rajnath Singh’s speech, which still occupies pride of place on the BJP website, but his vision of how India could lead the world this century is worth a relook. Considering that he was Agriculture Minister in the Vajpayee Government and will be a powerful figure in any BJP-led formation at the Centre, it also makes for worrying if hilarious reading.

FULL TEXT HERE: http://www.openthemagazine.com/article/voices/rajnath-uncovers-vedic-roots-of-quantum-mechanics