India: writer's revolt over Hindutva terror | World War 4 Report

21.10.15

India: writer's revolt over Hindutva terror | World War 4 Report: The protests began after the Aug. 30 murder of 77-year-old writer and scholar MM Kalburgi by two unidentified assailants at his home in the southern state of Karnataka. A rationalist and critic of Hindutva, Kalburgi was also a leading figure in the Kannada-language cultural and literary revival. But this was only one emblamatic case. In February, Communist Party of India leader Govind Pansare was killed when two unknown assailants fired at him and his wife in front of their house in Kolhapur, Maharashtra. He was the author of Shivaji Kon Hota, a controversial biography of Shivaji, 17th-century founder of the the Maratha Empire, which was seen as an affront by Hindu nationalists in the state. Narendra Dabholkar, leader of Maharashtra-based Andhashraddha Nirmoolan Samiti—an organization established to combat superstition—was killed in August 2013, with no arests in the case to date.