16 SOCIAL SCIENTIST carried connotations of racial equality, which the rising Indian middle classes readily appreciated. At the hands of Tilak, the Aryan theory of race became a manifesto of Hindu revivalism. In the first of his efforts at Vedic interpretation, Orion, Tilak argued that amongst all the Aryan peoples, only those in India had preserved all the great traditions of the race, 'with a super religious fidelity and scrupulousness'.29 In his later work. The Arctic Home in the Vedas, Tilak went even further, celebrating the 'vitality and superiority' of the Aryan races, *as disclosed by their conquest, by extermination or assimilation, of the non-Aryan races, with whom they came in contact.'30 Lajpat Rai too was deeply committed to the Aryan theory of race as a basis for defining Indian nationhood. 'Arya' he pointed out, is the first known appellation used for the people of India. He conceded a certain difficulty proceeding from here to a definition of nationality, since 'Arya' was in his perception no more than a racial description. But no matter, Lajpat Rai found sufficient traces of the spirit of nationality 'in the passages in which the Rishi ordained all Aryas to combine against the attacks of Dasyus, Chandalas and Miechhas'.31 Both Lokmanya Tilak and Lala Lajpat Rai are comfortable with the recognition that the Aryan cultural incursion into India involved an element of conquest. They go to the extent of glorifying the 'extermination* of non-conforming races, and when not that, their 'assimilation' into the Aryan hegemony. Characteristically, this viewpoint was totally insensitive to those who may have been at the receiving end of this process. The Aryan theory of race was, in this respect, a two-edged sword, which could as well have been used against the Hindu nationalist position.32 And such an anticipatory rejoinder had indeed been prepared by the great Marathi visionary and social reformer, Jyotirao Phule, at least two decades ahead of Tilak's Vedic excursus. DISSENTING VOICES WITHIN THE 'HINDU' FOLD Phule's pathbreaking social reform work is well known, and this alone entitles him to a far greater position in the history of the Indian awakening than has been accorded to him.33 The reasons for his neglect are fairly clear: Phule spoke for the lower orders who were beyond the pale of the ritualistic Hindu hierarchy. He could not easily be accommodated within the discourse of Hindu nationalism which was then seeking to establish its influence, under the leadership of the upper castes. Further, like Ambedkar after him, Phule risked incurring some of the odium of being seen as a collaborator of the British empire, because he saw little merit in agitating for greater political autonomy, when that in his perception only broadened the space for the play of Hindu upper caste interests.