Kelly Mill Coalition, a Facebook Group of the residents of Cumming GA, reported the appearance of hate signs in the neighborhood of Atlanta suburbs. Dotbusters Gang targeted Hindus in New York and New Jersey in 1970s and 1980s. “No Bindi, No Hindus, No Indians!” That was the cry of the Dotbusters in the 1980s and it haunted the Hindu American Community for decades. https://cohna.org/cumming-ga-anti-hindu-signs/

On Day 3, Session 2, Shana Sippy, Assistant Professor of Religion, Centre College at Carleton College, Minnesota, said: “To say one is a Hindu is to signal that one is not something else. And while the very experience of belonging, which we know well, and appreciate can involve powerful affective experiences and feelings of love, it is also the same kind of thing that produces the hate that we see in Hindutva’s many forms. This is one of the greatest threats and challenges that Hindutva’s Hinduism poses to other forms of Hinduism. Hindutva’s Hinduism is rapacious. It professes radical inclusivity, desiring to subsume all other Hindus and Hinduism throughout the globe into its fold. In doing this, the rhetoric employed by Hindutva leaders often belies reality. It not only seeks to include those who identify as Hindu, but also all dharmic religions and those who, it argues, have been converted out – Sikhs, Jains, Buddhists, Dalit Christians – who have you. It is deceptive doublespeak, claims to be blind to caste, but as it's been illustrated throughout this conference, Hindutva’s Hinduism continually retrenches caste.” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0aoOvDGt6zg at 23:26

On Day 3, Session 2, Shana Sippy, Assistant Professor of Religion, Centre College at Carleton College, Minnesota, said: “As far as the idea with respect to Hindutva and Hinduism, I mean, I think, I'd like to think that we made it very clear, for us, Hinduism can take many forms, but we need to understand that Hindutva is – there is no Hindutva without Hinduism. Hindutva is inextricably linked to and is a form of Hinduism. And we do not think that there's any way to understand Hindutva, if you disaggregate it from that, and there's also absolutely no way to dismantle it, if you are going to kind of ignore the Hinduism of it.” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0aoOvDGt6zg at 1:10:19

On Day 3, Session 2, Sailaja Krishnamurti, Associate Professor, Religious Studies and Women & Gender Studies at Saint Mary's University, Halifax, said: “A person's identification with Hinduism can easily become an entryway into participation in Hindutva. In the diaspora, in particular, Hindu identity has become an important way of naming and comfortably inhabiting one's difference. Hinduism is seen as inseparable from traditions and families, food ways, languages, art forms and rituals.” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0aoOvDGt6zg at 24:39

On Day 3, Session 2, Dr. Raja Gopal Bhattar (Raja Bhattar), Assistant Provost and Executive Director of the Center for Identity + Inclusion at the University of Chicago, said: “I just thought pictures from Ganesh Chaturthi, the other day, where Ganesha was caught in yellow and red in the BJP colors. And so, it's Ganesha. And so, just the ways that religion and politics get intertwined is very much.” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0aoOvDGt6zg at 1:15:25

On Day 3, Session 1, Dheepa Sundaram, Assistant Professor, Hindu Studies, Critical Theory and Digital Religion at University of Denver, said: “So, what’s worse than being demonized, is being erased, in my view. And so, there is no space to trend an Adivasi hashtag. There is no space, for example, to trend when Durga Puja trends, #DurgaPuja, to trend #MahishasuraCasteOppression, which is a hashtag often promoted by Dalit groups during that time.” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mZLGr5qlwaY at 1:00:48

On Day 2, Session 1, P. Sivakami, a writer and an ex-IAS officer, said: “Hindutva: Antithesis of democracy. Hindutva’s manifestations, if unchecked, would cause serious damage to interest of all the people, though its projected image is against the Muslims or the terrorist groups among Muslims.” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aL7KYAI7wCU at 44:41

On Day 2, Session 1, Akanksha Mehta, Lecturer in Gender, Sexuality and Cultural Studies and the co-director of the Centre for Feminist Research at Goldsmiths, University of London, said: “Through these three locations (education, charity and fun), Hindutva women do three things. They build active discourses of violence that are gendered, caste based, sexed racialized and they distribute them far and wide. They participate in very specific everyday acts of violence, including physical violence and often encourage the men to do the same in order to become real Hindu men. They strengthen forms of structural violence that long precedes Modi and are endemic to the formation of the Indian nation-state that has been built on violence against Dalits, Bahujans, Adivasis, Muslims, Kashmiris and others. And of course, are endemic to Hinduism’s caste violence.” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aL7KYAI7wCU at 1:09:39

On Day 2, Session 1, P. Sivakami, a writer and an ex-IAS officer, said: “Whatever may Hindus say, actually, it does not make a difference that Hinduism is a danger to independence, equality and brotherhood. Thus, it is the enemy of democracy. We should make all out the efforts to stop the Hindu Raj from becoming a reality.” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aL7KYAI7wCU at 44:23

Sharing an image of his Gulf News article on the same topic, Ashok Swain, Professor of Peace and Conflict Research at Uppsala University, writes: "Hinduphobia is a myth! The term has been politically manufactured to silence the critics of Hindu supremacists."

On Day 2, Session 1, P. Sivakami, a writer and an ex-IAS officer, said: “Finally, harboring that Hinduism per se is harmless and only Hindutva is the culprit will not do any good to the observants of the lofty ideals, democratic ideals.” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aL7KYAI7wCU at 56:24

On Day 2, Session 3, Dr. Kavita Sivaramakrishnan, Associate Professor in the Department of Socio Medical Sciences and Faculty Lead in the Center for History and Ethics of Public Health. at Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health, said: “Ayurveda has also, in this new fashion, facilitated a platform that is not only ideological, but it's also offered, and I'd like to stress this, this prospects really of global networks of capital. And what Modi, in a recent meeting, called wellness tourism, that really the current government has extolled and held forth by advancing claims about Ayurveda’s ancient history, its indigenous scientific genealogy, and by stressing really its alternative nature, it's alternative nature that's made out to be gentle, holistic, not reductive, and interventionist like biomedicine. It allows Hindu ideologues to refer to the wonder of cures and therapies, whether it's of cow urine and dung. At the same time, what it does, it really blunts or masks, the real violence of cow vigilante groups, and of caste and minority phobias. Ayurveda, therefore, becomes a kind of theater devoid of a certain kind of authentic meaning, which I think Ayurvedic practices do possess. And by performing this theater, in a way you're taking away from the sorts of pervasive violence that has become characteristic in terms of politics, but also public health.” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yQNI6UFbK70 at 26:42

On Day 2, Session 3, Professor Banu Subramaniam, a professor of women, gender and sexuality studies at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, said: “Trained as a biologist, my interest in Hindu nationalism emerged from my yearly visit to India over the last three decades. It became clear that to understand contemporary India, we must understand Hindutva and its particular and unique relationship with modern science. As I argue in my recent book “Holy Science: The Biopolitics of Hindu Nationalism”, at the heart of Hindu nationalism is not only a mythological, but an imagined Brahminical mytho-scientific corpus.” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yQNI6UFbK70 at 41:07

On Day 2, Session 1, Leena Manimekalai, a filmmaker and alumni of York University, Toronto, said: “Hindutva, on the whole, very simply, is nothing but femicide which is actively legitimized by state and Hindu nationalists. Within the project of Hindutva, toxic masculinity, misogyny, and targeting of women of religious minorities are not just reserved for assassins. They are routine and everyday tactics that are fundamental to divisive politics.” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aL7KYAI7wCU at 24:21

On Day 1, Session 3, Dr. Gajendran Ayyathurai, teacher and researcher at Centre for Modern Indian Studies, Göttingen University, Germany, said:“So, most interestingly, Johannes Bronkhorst, moves into talking about, suddenly in a Sanskrit book, talks about Nazism and makes the connection between Brahmins and Nazis. I was stunned when I read this. He says, the Brahmins’ behavior was not dissimilar to that of another group that was obsessed with the past: the National Socialist, the Nazis. And then he says, you know, Hitler, in 1937 opened – I am speaking to you from Germany, by the way – Hitler opened a museum in 1937. Hundreds of paintings were there, out of which, not one depicted urban industrial life of Germany which was thriving in the 1930s. So, Hitler was talking about ancient Greeks and connected with Germans and so on to whip up racism, right? So, in that sense, Johannes Bronkhorst, in that Sanskrit text, he connects Brahmins with the Nazis. We need to talk about that. And then Brahminical literature, clearly, talks about a world that no longer existed. So, it’s clearly a lie. That’s why he calls it as Brahminical literature propagating lie stories. He calls it “stories” that no longer existed, that may never in fact have existed, right? That’s how he argued. That was basically to perpetuate Brahminical wishes. So, my question is – have we ever dealt with Brahminism and the connection between Brahminism and Nazism in a lot more theoretical way. I also want to propose, probably Brahminism played a very crucial role in the evolution of Nazism itself. It’s not just Golwalkar imitated Nazis, it could be the other round.” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WpD7X91_wvw at 15:46

On Day 1, Session 3, Dr. Gajendran Ayyathurai, teacher and researcher at Centre for Modern Indian Studies, Göttingen University, Germany, said: “Please keep this in mind – civil society, social institution, the state. And they also control the academies. They produce Brahminical literature, right? One of them were Shastras, for instance. Very violent document. Eleven body parts can be taken out from an individual for challenging caste.” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WpD7X91_wvw at 15:09

On Day 1, Session 3, Dr. Gajendran Ayyathurai, teacher and researcher at Centre for Modern Indian Studies, Göttingen University, Germany, said: “These guys are corporate malignant Brahmins. I was like “God!” – Sundar Iyer and Ramana Kompella. These two guys have been accused in Cisco in the US for identifying a colleague and calling him an untouchable and restricting him. Now, my question is, how are these guys different from any of us? And of all the places, in the US, in California, they are identifying themselves as Brahmins. I would ask them – do they have different form of pride? And then, this Iyer, this last name is very interesting for me. I am going to get back to it. So, there is Amar Diwakar, who has written about these guys. Please read. That’s why I have given the website. So, these last names – Iyers, Kompella, Trivedis, Sharmas, Mukherjees and so on – they seem to be violent advocates of this kind of malignant Brahminism, which we need to talk about more” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WpD7X91_wvw at 13:48

On Day 1, Session 3, Dr. Gajendran Ayyathurai, teacher and researcher at Centre for Modern Indian Studies, Göttingen University, Germany, said: “For me, caste is pro-casteism. They are not different categories as some folks, you know, try to argue. For me, they are the same. The moment I or you or any one of you identify yourself as caste, you are a casteist. There cannot be a good caste and the bad caste, clearly." https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WpD7X91_wvw at 4:23