Failure to Launch: Women and Hindu Nationalist Politics in Colonial India

Abstract

What role does the participation of women play in the political success or failure of radical right-wing religious movements? This study examines the participation of women in the politics of the radical Hindu right in India – known as Hindu nationalism – in its formative years at the turn of the twentieth century. I rely on interpretive empirical methods of archival research and close reading of major texts and speeches, papers, and party documents to find that the first political party of Hindu nationalism – the All-India Hindu Mahasabha – failed or neglected to mobilize and incorporate women in its activities. This failure was among the reasons for the failure of the Mahasabha as a political party, and the early failure of Hindu nationalism as a political enterprise. This is a mistake that its contemporary counterpart, the Bharatiya Janata Party, has not repeated. These findings suggest that the contemporary political success of radical religious nationalism in India derives in part from its relative success in incorporating the participation of women as compared to its historical predecessors.