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This thesis, for the most part, is a discussion of the Indian press discussing the policies of the Government of India. I believe that, within the limits set by its sources, it is an attempt at a comprehensive understanding of the Indian press in the 1870's. We have so far only a very few general statements of the subject and as they cover a much longer period, they are necessarily sketchy. There are a few articles dealing with particular aspects of the subject, but they are necessarily incomplete. In dealing with this subject, I have derived great benefit from my study of what are called Part B Proceedings of the Government of India, now preserved at New Delhi. These records were not considered important enough to be sent to London, but they give details of circulation, editorship etc. of the Indian papers which are new and unexplored. Together with that I have studied the 'native newspaper reports' compiled by government translators, which give a total picture of the Indian press. This series of documentation has also not been used intensively by researchers so far. In addition to these two kinds of records, I have tried to understand the implementation and effects of official policy by examining the relevant volumes of proceedings, private papers, local reports, especially those kept now in Calcutta, and old sets of newspapers preserved in India and England. It has been my attempt to show that a study of the Indian press in the 1870's helps us in an important way to understand this missing decade of Indian history. There were no exciting events in this period, but there was an important process. The government by a flow of legislation touched Indian life at different levels over wider areas than before. The local, regional societies, spread over the subcontinent were stirred up. Although there were considerable variations in the reactions, there was a new awareness among Indians of the government, and in a certain sense a new feeling of common purpose. This was something broader and less articulate than nationalism; it was something more political and precise than the cultural discussion of the earlier decades of the century. I have tried to understand this diffuse phenomenon, by examining the public discussions round official policy which came to a definable focus in the decade. Thus the attempt to persist with the income tax provoked a unified outburst in India. The Indian and the Anglo-Indian press were at one and there was support for them from sections of the British press as well. It has been said that the Indian zamindar and the British planter were the people behind this agitation but the documentation shows that ordinary people were affected just as much and resented this new imposition. A second theme for discussion was the expansion of municipal government. The Government of India was concerned not merely with better sanitation but also with new methods of raising local taxes. In certain areas like Bombay and Calcutta, the Indian public attempted to turn this to political advantage but from much of the country the reaction was once again of resentment against a new attempt on the purse of the ratepayer. A third theme which was concerned with revenue was the controversy regarding the import duties on cotton. These duties which were thought to be protecting the infant Indian textile industry and earning good revenue for the Government of India were removed at the instance of Manchester. Public reactions in India were sharp and the country rallied to the mill-owners of Bombay. These mill-owners however retained their unimpeded progress to prosperity, and were unaffected by the change. A fourth major controversy in this decade came over wftat was called the Baroda affair. The Gaekwar of Baroda, an altogether unworthy ruler, attempted to poison, or so it was alleged, the British Resident at his court. He was tried by a judicial commission, and deposed. This caused intense annoyance to the public which had little doubt that the G-aekwar was worthless, but would not have him removed because he was an Indian prince. A fifth topic for discussion was provided by the criminal procedure bill of 1873. Through this the government attempted to tighten up its administration of justice. Most men in India however saw in it a reinforcement of the police and the magistrate who were their natural antagonists. In this lively debate the Indian public reassessed as it were the whole system of justice and found it wanting. Lastly by passing the vernacular press act in 1878 the government attempted to control the Indian language papers. For the first time it acknowledged how seriously it was taking the criticisms in the Indian press. This in turn obliged the Indian papers to take stock of the situation, and see how far they had strayed from the earlier discussions of culture. The stage was thus set for the tensions of the nationalist decades.

The study of the relationship between Hindu nationalism and Hindu activist traditions of seva (selfless service) has been principally organised into three approaches: firstly, the instrumentalist deployment of the practice, secondly, the political appropriation of traditions of seva, and thirdly, that these related associational spaces are internally homogenous and distinct from alternative ‘legitimate’ religious arenas. These frameworks largely reflect approaches to Hindu nationalism which place emphasis on its forms of political statecraft and relationship to spectacular violence. These approaches raise manifold concerns. This thesis retheorizes the relationship between Hindu nationalism and seva with reference to primary and secondary sources, together with field research in the seva projects of the Vanavasi Kalyan Kendra (VKK), a Hindu nationalist association. Through deploying a reworked understanding of Fraser’s (1990) approach to associational space and Butler’s (1993, 2007) theorisation of performative acts and subject formation, this thesis contributes to rethinking Hindu nationalism and seva. I demonstrate firstly that the colonial encounter worked to produce a series of social imaginaries which were drawn upon to transform traditions of seva. Through their articulation in shared religious languages, practices of seva were productive of porously structured Hindu activist spaces in which the tradition was contested with regard to ‘radical’ and ‘orthodox’ orientations to Hinduism’s boundaries. Increasingly, articulations of seva which invoked a sangathanist ‘orthodoxy’ came to gain hegemony in Hindu activist arenas. This influenced the early and irregular Hindu nationalist practices of seva. Fractures in Hindu nationalist articulations developed as a result of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh’s (RSS) sangathanist organisational idioms, allowing the association to inscribe its practices with pro-active meanings. In the post-independence period the alternative arenas of Hindu nationalist seva projects expanded greatly, a point evident in the degrees of dialogue between the Sangh and the sarvodaya movement. The importance of porous associational boundaries is further demonstrated through noting how engagement in visibilized arenas of popular Hindu religiosity worked to both broaden the fields of reference and vernacularize Hindu nationalist practices of seva. With reference to field research, I demonstrate that central to the expansion of the VKK’s arenas of service into spaces associated with Ayurvedic care is the incorporation of both refocused and transgressive practices. In the educational projects of the VKK, I note how seva works to inscribe daily practices of hygiene, the singing of bhajans and daily assemblies with Hindu nationalist meanings, and so works to regulate conduct through the formation of an ‘ethical Hindu self’. However, arenas of seva are also a location where we can witness subjects negotiating power. I demonstrate this through examining how participants in the VKK’s rural development projects rearticulate Othering practices of seva, with actors using the discourse to position themselves as active subjects, break gendered restrictions on public space, and advance an ‘ethically Hindu’ grounded claim on development and critique of power. This work illustrates that far from being of inconsequence to the circulation of Hindu nationalist identities, alternative arenas of seva operate as spaces where discourses are performatively enacted, refocused, transgressed and rearticulated. These acts contribute to the consolidation and disturbance of Hindu nationalist subject formations.