Valentine's Day may be over, but there are still stories to tell - including stories about Hindu nationalists in India who vehemently object to anyone in that country celebrating Valentine's Day. I reported last week about threats issued against lovers who appear to be celebrating and noted that those weren't idle threats.

The Globe and Mail reports:

“You are trying to transplant something absolutely western in the name of being modern,” said Sheshadri Chari, a national executive leader of Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee's Bharatiya Janata Party. “There are certain social values dear to us. What is acceptable to an American audience might not be acceptable to an Indian audience,” Mr. Chari said. “Will you like it if your parents hold hands and walk on the beach?”

[S]mall groups of Hindu activists in some Indian cities went around neighbourhoods and shopping malls, smashing restaurant windowpanes, tearing up greeting cards and even burning effigies of St. Valentine. Television channels showed young women and their dates being forced to go home, and males being pushed around, beaten and mocked on the roads by youths wearing headscarves coloured saffron, an important hue in Hinduism

What's the big deal? According to sociologist Nivedita Menon said Hindi nationalists are "afraid of love, because it is subversive, because it does not see whether your lover is from the same religion, or caste, or even sex." Love threatens to undermine social norm which, in turn, are their basis for power. Isn't that often the case with fundamentalists?

Read More:

• Religious Intolerance & Bigotry
• Religion in India
• Religious Tensions in India