Koenraad Elst
Overview
Koenraad Elst is a Belgian
Demographics of Belgium
This article is about the demographic features of the population of Belgium, including ethnicity, education level, health of the populace, economic status, religious affiliations and other aspects of the population...

  writer and orientalist
Oriental studies
Oriental studies is the academic field of study that embraces Near Eastern and Far Eastern societies and cultures, languages, peoples, history and archaeology; in recent years the subject has often been turned into the newer terms of Asian studies and Middle Eastern studies...

 (without institutional
Academic institution
Academic institution is an educational institution dedicated to education and research, which grants academic degrees. See also academy and university.- Types of academic institutions include :...

 affiliation).
He was an editor of the New Right
New Right
New Right is used in several countries as a descriptive term for various policies or groups that are right-wing. It has also been used to describe the emergence of Eastern European parties after the collapse of communism.-Australia:...

 Flemish nationalist journal Teksten, Kommentaren en Studies
TeKoS
TeKoS is a Belgian "Nieuw Rechts" publication. It is published by the DeltaFoundation .As with other Nouvelle Droite publications, the themes in TeKoS are related to European culture, European nationalism, anti-egalitarianism and ecologism...

 from 1992 to 1995, focusing on criticism of Islam
Criticism of Islam
Criticism of Islam has existed since Islam's formative stages. Early written criticism came from Christians, prior to the ninth century, many of whom viewed Islam as a radical Christian heresy...

, various other conservative and Flemish separatist publications such as Nucleus, 't Pallieterke
't Pallieterke
t Pallieterke is a satirical Flemish weekly. It is part of the Flemish movement and advocates Flemish independence. It is largely conservative in its editing, and although officially non-partisan, it is a close supporter of the far-right party Vlaams Belang....

, Secessie and The Brussels Journal
The Brussels Journal
The Brussels Journal is a conservative blog, founded by the Flemish journalist Paul Beliën. It was founded in 2005, and has both an English language section with various international contributions, and a Dutch section...

. Having authored fifteen English language books on topics related to Indian politics and communalism
Communalism (South Asia)
This article deals with the use of the word communalism in South Asia, as a name for a force separating different communities based on some form of social or sectarian discrimination...

, Elst is one of the most well-known western writers (along with François Gautier
François Gautier
François Gautier, born 1959 in Paris, is a writer and journalist based in India. He came to India at the age of 19 and spent his first eight years in the "international city" of Auroville India at the Sri Aurobindo Ashram in Pondicherry. He has been living in India since the 70's and is married to...

) to actively defend the Hindutva
Hindutva
Hindutva is the term used to describe movements advocating Hindu nationalism. Members of the movement are called Hindutvavādis.In India, an umbrella organization called the Sangh Parivar champions the concept of Hindutva...

 ideology.
Quotations

I am neither a Hindu nor a nationalist. And I don’t need to belong to those or to any specific ideological categories in order to use my eyes and ears.

From an interview with Dr. Ramesh Rao (2002, sulekha.com)

Conversely, banning this book would send a signal that the present establishment will do what it can to prevent Hinduism from rising up, from regaining self-confidence, from facing the challenge of hostile ideologies.

Freedom of expression - Secular Theocracy Versus Liberal Democracy (1998, edited by Sita Ram Goel) ISBN 81-85990-55-7

While one should always be vigilant for traces of totalitarianism in any ideology or movement, the obsession with fascism in the anti-Hindu rhetoric of the secularists is not the product of an analysis of the data, but of their own political compulsions.

As so often in Indo-Pakistani and Hindu-Muslim comparisons, the argument is reminiscent of the inequality between the contenders in the Cold War: you could demonstrate for disarmament in the West, but to demonstrate for this in the East Bloc (except if it were for unilateral disarmament by the Western “war-mongers”) would have put you in trouble.

The neologism âdivâsî constitutes one of the most successful disinformation campaigns in modern history.

In the West, secularism implies pinpricking religious fraud and arrogance, but in India, secularists are the most eloquent defenders of myth and theocracy.

Future historians will include the no-temple argument of the 1990s as a remarkable case study in their surveys of academic fraud and politicized scholarship. Category:Authors|Elst, Koenraad

 
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