[dzibead]

According to a recent article in The Telegraph, Indian business students - who have apparently collectively lost their minds - are snapping up copies of Hitler's Mein Kampf, because they see it as some kind of self-improvement and management guide.   Yes, and it all worked out so well for Adolf, didn't it?  Here's the article:
http://www.telegraph...Mein-Kampf.html

[priya]

Shocking.    I think the next book on their list should be The Scourge of the Swastika to even more enhance their management and self-improvement skills.

From the article:

.........."Senior academics cite the mutual influence of India and Hitler's Nazis on one another. Mahatma Gandhi corresponded with the Fuhrer, pro-Independence leader Subhas Chandra Bose's Indian National Army allied with Hitler's Germany and Japan during the Second World War, and the Nazis drew on Hindu symbolism for their Swastika motif and ideas of Aryan supremacy."..........

I was aware of the Swastika symbolism, but not Gandhiji and Hitler, and other aspects mentioned in the article.

[atula]

well...this is really something...it seems they may be looking for what NOT to do in life from that book rather than what to do.

[cyberhippie]

It's always been a popular book in India, don't forget Adolf was fighting the bloody Britishers. Bose himself asked for help in ridding India of the Britishers, had that happened me may have lived to regret it.

[cyberhippie]

Priya Gandhi Ji wrote to Hitler to try and convince him to follow a path of non violence, when he did so, he did not have the benefit of the historical hindsight we now have about the man.

I have to say I'm a tad suspicious of that article.

[iwanttogoback]

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Yes, and it all worked out so well for Adolf, didn't it?

absolutely.

i think cy's point is an important one to keep in mind.

[Shiver me Timbers]

I've encountered many people from outside Europe and North America who don't necessarily view Hitler as the bogeyman we do in the West. I get the feeling that for many, he is seen as just another European leader amongst many, and one who stood up to some powers that are quite unpopular now. I'll never forget in Iran, I was travelling with two German Jehovah's Witnesses I'd met, we got talking to bunch of young guys my own age - on learning the German's nationality, the cockiest one said 'So what do you think about Hitler? He was a great guy, right?'. Cue a very awkward silence and some pink German faces.

[john.sw]

I was taken to see a chap in Cochin who has a collection of Royal Enfields.

He seemed like a nice enough fellow, was hospitable and had two young children... and several portraits of Chancellor Hitler on his living room wall!

[dzibead]

priya, if you do some Googling there's quite a bit of info out there re: the INA, Frei Hind, and Subhas Chandra Bose (as well as Bose's connections with the Japanese during the war).  Even Paul Scott's "Raj Quartet" touches on it (and if you haven't read this, I recommend it - the 1980's TV mini-series The Jewel in the Crown was based on it.)  

Remember the old maxim: the enemy of my enemy is my friend.  I think India's freedom fighters were not particularly interested in Nazism or Japanese imperialist ambitions as such, but were looking for leverage against British colonial rule.  As for Conor's point about how Hitler is viewed outside North America and Western Europe, even the "saintly" Tibetans didn't condemn Hitler during WWII but toyed with whether it would make sense to align themselves more with him than with with the Allies.  

That said, a contemporary fascination with Mein Kampf seems puzzling in light of what is now readily known about Hitler and Nazism, and the book itself is filled with so much repugnant stuff I can't imagine anyone looking to it for guidance about anything except what NOT to do!

[kavindra]

Indians are generally not particularly informed about European history during 1920s-40s or holocaust.

I will start with a personal story: I myself grew up in India and studied up to post-graduate level (albeit in Engineering) without being well informed about what Hitler was really up to - other than fighting the Brits that I was perfectly cool about. Having learned a tad more, I think back about the ignorant and seemingly callous attitude I must have had in those early years. But, it was entirely a function of not having even heard of holocaust (and you'd admit that kind of changes the assessment).

I suspect that the same type of ignorance is behind the statistic / phenomenon you have observed.

[dzibead]

Sometimes young people (often the victims of historical ignorance, unfortunately) also seem to find Hitler and other nightmarish figures like this oddly "cool".  In my university days, Mao was all the rage.  Students were wearing Mao buttons and Mao jackets and Mao caps and were running around quoting from The Little Red book.  People had no earthly idea what was really going on China. As far as they were concerned, the Cultural Revolution was no different from the "sex-drugs-and-rock 'n roll revolution" going on in the West!    Ironically enough, these people are part of the same demographic that now drives around with "Free Tibet" bumper stickers on their cars.

[iwanttogoback]

thank you kavindra, your insight makes a lot of sense to me. most of us know little about life and history outside our own little hemispheres.

dzi, i have to admit to going through a stage of thinking that mao was cool, but i was a teenager at the time, and this was well before i really understood (or many of us knew) what life in china was really like.  i think it's not only to do with how much history you understand, it really is a function of maturity as well.

[kavindra]

You are welcome. Indeed, the Mao "cool" was precisely what I was referring to.

I must admit, I was initially incredulous about holocaust as it was not anything I could have imagined or relate to. So, it took me some time to realize that it was a reality. Now, having informed myself through countless books, films, lectures and so on - and even having had the privileged of having had serious dialog with a wonderful holocaust survivor - I am much better informed and sensitive to the implications, parallels and the lessons one must draw from it.

That noted, I wonder if some of that (the incredibly grotesque and organized nature and lack of exposure to that history) is behind the reason why it is less well understood outside of the Western world. That coupled with what Israel has been up to is perhaps what is behind folks like ahmadinejad believing and/or finding receptive audience. And, the right response is education and dialog rather than lectures and disgust.

[iwanttogoback]

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And, the right response is education and dialog rather than lectures and disgust.

absolutely.

[Hyderabadi]

To be honest, I know some folks who (used to?) hero worship Saddam Hussain + Sons & Gang, etc., in Hyderabad. Then, MOABs etc and such happened.

To date there are some, I'm sure, who have other heroes not liked by the rest of us.