Gender, religion and anti-feminism in Hindu right wing writings: Notes from a nineteenth century Indian woman-patriot's text ‘Essays in the Service of a Nation’

SynopsisThe disturbing rise of communalism (politicised religious identities which underscores antagonism between groups of people) has been studied by social scientists and historians who have focused on men's roles and male-led organisations in the creation of right-wing Hindu ideologies in the twentieth century, but have overlooked the possibility that communal ideas could have appealed to women too. Feminist scholars studying twentieth-century women's participation in right wing movements have noted the lack of a historical study of the women's component of the Indian right. This study redresses the lacunae by focusing on Lakshmibai Dravid, a late nineteenth-century Indian woman-patriot and her Marathi treatise Deshseva Nibandhmala [Essays in the Service of a Nation] to comprehend how and why women came to be pioneers of the Hindu right. I argue that Lakshmibai Dravid contributed to the creation of a right-wing polemic by utilising an anti-feminist position through the perspective of ‘service to the nation’.