To be a modern Hindu is surely one of the most interesting fates on theplanet. It's a circus act of revulsion at each new report of unacceptablebehaviour in the name of Hindu tradition, and yet keeping personal faithbright and burnished. The modern Hindus. a people carrying unimaginablebaggage. Deep historical anger, at the destruction of our temples and therelentless preachments against their our faith. Deep shame or deep fury,that so many Hindus were discriminated against by our own people. Deep guiltabout that historical anger, that we can't seem to let go of the past asfully as we know we should with the resentful tag, how come only we aresupposed to forget and forgive? Followed by the brutal honesty of thethought, who's we? I am not that (in savage parody of Tat tvam asi).But heckling so hard everywhere that they crowd us back against asaffron-painted wall are Lefties and nastiks, telling us how to think astotalitarian and unendurable as any imperialist or fundamentalist. But withsuch a strongly humanist Constitution on our side, it wounds our self-imageto read of places like the Shani-Shingnapur shrine in Ahmednagar.This temple to the most dreaded of our deities bans women from itsprecincts. There is no logical reason for this ban. The Bajrang Dalactivists who allegedly fought on behalf of conservative locals cited Shanias a "bachelor deity, like Hanuman". This is rank stupidity, as we all know.Every temple (a South Indian one, at least) has a shrine to the Navagraha ornine planets and nowhere is Shani left unpropitiated by women. So it'scompletely illogical to say that in Shingnapur alone, he suddenly decideshe's a brahmachari who fears naari jaat.Ironic, really, for Ahmednagar's only claim to fame is Chand Bibi, the bravequeen who died fighting the imperial armies of no less than Padshah Akbar.I've always felt she never got her due in national memory, like ourdeservedly well-beloved Lakshmi Bai, whom every schoolchild knows throughSubhadra Kumari Chauhan's wonderful poem Jhansi ki Rani.It was the Andhashraddha Nirmulan Samiti (ANS), led by Dr Dhabolkar, DrShreeram Lagoo, Pushpa Bhave and co, which marched againstShani-Shingnapur's discriminatory practice and ended in preventive custody.Perhaps and this is just a suggestion, from a genuinely curious observerthey could try a more investigative approach. Outright confrontation merelyoffends traditionalists when it comes from unbelievers. So why not delveinto the history of that shrine in relation to the history of that region?Ahmednagar was once a hub of Deccan politics. Perhaps the menfolk simplyneeded a secret and secure place to discuss political and military strategy.What safer haven for groups of men to meet without provoking suspicion, thana temple banned to chattering women?Perhaps the women knew, and loyally let the men get on with it. And, ashappens with depressing regularity, chances are that the original purposewas outlived, but the ban continued for reasons of expediency that onlylocal historians might know.I could be way off the mark. But I imagine many of us would like to knowwhat really happened in Shingnapur once upon a time. The political reasonsmay go back even further than the Marathas. If this were so, Ahmednagarwould hit the national news again for the right reasons and the ANS wouldmake a quantum leap in image as a genuine well-wisher of the people. Supposethere's no such story: why, then, there still has to be convincing reason.Because God would never ban anybody. I guess we all know that, even theBajrang Dal.Faith Line will now appear every Monday and Thursday
