Does Hindutva have a concept roughly equivalent to Sharia and do they push for it to be included in the constitution?

Question

In many countries with a Muslim majority the constitution mentions at least Islam or both that and Sharia. And inclusion of the latter is often a plank of some Islamist parties e.g.

Contrary to Egypt, there is no provision in Tunisia making of the Sharia a formal source of legislation. In the 1959 Constitution, Article 1 provided: ‘Tunisia is a free, independent and sovereign state; its religion is Islam, its language is Arabic and its regime is the Republic’. [...]

Under the pressure of its opponents and because of its political pragmatism, the Islamist party Ennahda, which lead the government since the 2011 elections, renounced making any mention of Sharia in the Constitution. It does not mean, however, that Ennahda renounced its project of the Islamic moralization of the society, but as in the Erdoğan’s Turkey, it prefers to substitute to symbolic moves a more gradualist approach using the de facto acceptance of Sharia as a source of legislation and case-law.

So, I'd like to know: what (if any) is the equivalent of Sharia in the Hindutva political movement? And do they push for an overt inclusion e.g. in the constitution, or do they follow a gradualist/stealth approach?

Answer 1

The Hindu equivalent of Sharia is Dharmaśāstra. Treatises on dharma are referred to as Dharmaśāstra, a category of law and conduct-related Sanskrit writings. These scriptures mostly draw their inspiration from Puranas, unlike Dharmaśāstra, which is based on Vedas. There are many diverse and opposing Dharmaśāstras, with estimates ranging from 18 to about 100. Each of these texts, which have numerous variations, has its roots in Dharmasutra writings from the first millennium BCE, which came from Kalpa studies in the Vedic period.

It seems that the RSS, a Hindu militant organization, wanted Dharmaśāstra to be implemented in the constitution of India in 1949.

In 2017, the Sangh Parivar commissioned a new research on Manusmriti which is one of the five canonical texts in Dharmasastra (see also, and also). Sangh Parivar is an umbrella term used to describe several political and militant groups that were spawned from RSS. Please, note that the ruling party BJP is a part of Sangh Parivar.

In 2018, a pro-Hindu outfit called Hindu Charter was seen demanding the amendment of the Indian constitution.

By 2022, some eminent Hindu scholars have drafted a Hindu Constitution(see also).

Answer 2

Hindutva groups are not united, there are many such groups, they have different beliefs, some beliefs are common and there are many uncommon beliefs. They lobby for common beliefs, and get it implemented through centre.

As far as I know, no one from any group beliefs A to Z of their scriptures. They use common sense.

Then again, Hindutva can not be very strict because of diversity. A Gujarati might not eat meat. He might want to even ban sell of chicken or fish within 1 km radius from a temple. But a Bengali will not want that. He needs fish, especially Hilsa fish. Manipuri Hindus love pork. Assamese Hindus love duck and pigeon. And some of them eat buffaloes too. A tribal Tripuri Hindu eats even beef. But they follow Hindutva, isn't it?

Hindutva is more Indianism instead of Hinduism. In fact a Christian leader from Nagaland who hails from BJP is a follower of Hindutva. To him, respect Hindu religion. He expects mainland Indians to respect people of North East. He is proud of Naga regiment of the Indian army. Those guys wanted to eat Pakistanis during a war. I think it was sarcastic. Anyways they were known as head hunters and would chill the spine of the enemies. Anyways. Jokes later.

Hindutva believing people and the ones who didn't before independence worshipped a diety called "Bharat Mata". As you understand, it's romanticism. Goddess form of India, portrayed by someone. We would even say "Bharat Mata ki Jai" (Long Live Mother India".

Once in a while, some groups pop up who would want a stricter form of Hindutva. They have limited followers. But most don't, I think. Sharia is well defined, Hindutva isn't. Some details and related information is there in another answer of mine in a related question

---

Coming to the question,

Does Hindutva have a concept roughly equivalent to Sharia and do they push for it to be included in the constitution?

Yes, the rule of the land. The Constitution. For Hindutva following Indians it is the Constitution of India. For Hindutva following Americans, it is the Constitution of the USA.

Answer 3

This is not really an answer, but simply an important point which I think is worth mentioning to add to @user366312's answer. The thing is that the RSS and BJP while have more or less common origin story, they have almost nothing to do with each in the common day. BJP does go by the mask of Hindtuva but their policies and principles are often against the tenants of RSS.

There is a significant range of economic ideologies within the party. In the 1980s, like the Jana Sangh, it reflected the thinking of the RSS and its affiliates. It supported swadeshi (the promotion of indigenous industries and products) and a protectionist export policy.

During the 1996 elections, the BJP shifted its stance away from protectionism and towards globalisation; its election manifesto recommended increasing foreign investment in priority sectors, while restricting it in others. When the party was in power in 1998, it shifted its policy even further in favour of globalisation. The tenure of the NDA saw an unprecedented influx of foreign companies in India.[137] This was criticised by the left parties and the BJP's affiliates (the RSS and the Swadeshi Jagran Manch). The communist parties said that the BJP was attempting to appease the World Bank and the United States government through its neoliberal policies. Similarly, the RSS stated that the BJP was not being true to its swadeshi ideology.

Also RSS itself has been changing it's idea to suit modern taste, here is a quote from one of the founding fathers on RSS to showcase that:

The non-Hindu people of Hindustan must either adopt Hindu culture and languages, must learn and respect and hold in reverence the Hindu religion, must entertain no idea but of those of glorification of the Hindu race and culture ... in a word they must cease to be foreigners; or may stay in the country, wholly subordinated to the Hindu nation, claiming nothing, deserving no privileges, far less any preferential treatment—not even citizens' rights.

Yet much later, there came also Muslim and Christian wings for RSS albeit they had to partake in the Hindu activites to stay in the group.

Source

Answer 4

Hopefully I can offer a broader framework in which this and such questions can be situated.

A religion generally has something that may be called its primary revelatory material or scripture and around that a larger traditional material that forms and changes over years. The pecular feature of the Abrahamic religions is that they have a single-point charismatic founder. But with respect to the religions of the world this is more exception than rule. Even for Judaism its hard to determine whether it starts with Moses, or Abraham or Adam. It may be more useful to say that historically Judaism starts with Moses, ethnologically with Abraham (Issac, Jacob=Israel) metaphysically with Adam. In that respect Hinduism is closer to Judaism than to Christianity or Islam in not having a clear single starting point.

The broad framework in which this fits for Hinduism but even others is the distinction of shruti and smriti. Literally shruti means heard, smriti means remembered. The implication is that shruti transmits divine revelation with no distorting human factors. The ones who can do this exact transmission are by definition rishis. Smriti is a much larger corpus and admits of mixtures and distortions. But the actual details of the tradition are recorded here.

Note: When one realizes that Hinduism is a religion but that the Abrahamic framing is not adequate, this Sanjeev Sanyal interview is recommended.

Category	Hindu classif.	Hindu eg.	Jewish	Islamic	Christian
Revelation	Shruti	Vedas Upanishad	Torah	Koran	Gospels
Tradition	Smriti	Epics¹ Manu etc	Talmud	Hadith	New Test²

¹ Some scholars make a 3-way classification: shruti, smriti and itihasa ie epics though this is less frequent
² More correctly it would be texts like the Philokalia. But this is an eastern Orthodox example. What it is for Catholics etc is less clear (to me)

Coming to the more central part of your question. If I may take the liberty of re-framing it: [Given that westerners fear the spread of shariah law and by implication of extreme 'radical' Islam]:

Is there something likewise to be feared in radical nationalisitc Hinduism?

The short answer: Shariah follows from Hadith. Hadith means tradition. Its not shariah that is to be feared. It is radicalization.

Ultimately it is not even radicalization but gross distortions hiding under the radical hood. ie demogogues who shout so vociferously that one is frightened into silence and submission by volume not reasoning. Unfortunately such types are found in all societies/cultures/religions and so also their destabilising influences.

Here is a good article on how the violent bigoted element is transplanted from Abrahamic to eastern soil to produce a false entity: Abrahamic Hindutva.

[The other answer gives details of Manusmriti, threat of a Hindu constitution etc... so I wont repeat. I could fill out more specific details if desired]