Would the Hindutva groups involved in the California textbook controversy set up phony Dalit websites?
They would and they just have, and it is one of the biggest Hindutva scams ever. The anti-Witzel and anti-Harvard hate campaign is just the tip of the iceberg: Now the Dalits are a prime target.
- First the California campaign run by the Vedic Foundation (VF) and Hindu Education Foundation (HEF), aided by the Hindu American Foundation (HAF), tried to strip references to Dalits out of California textbooks; indeed, the retired Hindutva academic recommended by the Department of Education to vet their own proposed edits, claimed in recent edit notes ascribed to him by the Hindutva press that "Dalit is a Marxist term"…; See here at http://tinyurl.com/86bsm
- When the Dalits complained to the California Board of Education, the Dalits were accused by well-known Hindutvavadis Kalavai Venkat and Koenraad Elst and others on the main Hindutva List (IndianCivilization) as being pawns of Christian missionaries. (Point of fact, not that it should matter: not one of the Dalits who spoke before the Board of Education on January 12th was a Christian.) — And now, sinking to new depths, Hindutva activists are pretending to be Dalits.
- The phony Dalit website set up in the middle of the California campaign is run by a Hindutva activist in Texas who runs a long list of other Hindutva sites, some quite notorious (discussed with links below).
Those sites include Hindutva-run anti-Christian and anti-missionary sites; anti-Muslim sites; *fake* Christian sites aimed at Muslims; and at least three phony Human Rights sites.
The phony Human Rights websites are especially interesting, since they feature people or groups diirectly involved in the California textbook campaign, including Yvette Rosser, who works with the Vedic Foundation, and the Hindu American Foundation. (All this is in Internet cache, so if they change this stuff will just post the cache versions.)
But let’s start with the story of the phony Dalit site — of "Hindutva Wolves in Dalit Clothing", or to use the alternate title proposed by a clever Indian friend, "Little Saffron Riding Hood".
The story began late afternoon yesterday, when I received the following email. The email came after all the publicity surrounding the global distribution by Google of the Dalit video over the last few days:
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=3966452794541360953
The email made it clear that it was sent in response to events in California.
> From: Dalit Human Rights <E-mail Protected>
> Date: Fri Jan 20, 2006 4:33:13 PM US/Pacific
> To: E-mail Protected
> Subject: Dalit Human Rights
>
> Dear Dr. Farmer,
>
> We are very impressed by your efforts to accurately portray the plight of the Dalits in the California syllabus. We would very much appreciate if you could promote our website on your site and discussion lists. Please let us know if > there are any additional ways > in which we can work together.
>
> Regards,
>
> The team at Dalit Human Rights (DHR)
> www.dalithumanrights.com