Unconventional, fearless, outspoken - three words
aptly describe historian and retired professor, DN Jha. A specialist in
ancient Indian history, Jha whose first name Dwijendra means “the holiest
of Brahmins” committed cardinal sin by busting the myth that the cow is
sacrosanct and inviolable and that Vedic Indians did not eat its flesh.
In his book Holy Cow—Beef in Indian Dietary Conditions, Jha presented irrefutable evidence of beef-eating practices of Hindus of all classes from the Vedic times till the 19th century. The VHP cadres burnt copies of the book, some fundamentalists vandalised Jha’s residence in the Delhi University campus, attacked him and threatened him over the phone. Jha lived under police protection for a little over two years and geared up for a long legal battle as the Jain Seva Sangh obtained a ban on the book from the Hyderabad Civil Court in 2001. Jha’s lawyers won the case in the spring of 2002.
With a new preface and a more provocative title, Jha’s book ‘The Myth of the Holy Cow’ was published by Verso in Britain and the United States. The Indian edition published by Navayana Publishing has a 23-page extract from BR Ambedkar’s 1948 work ‘The Untouchables: Who Were They and Why they Became Untouchables’, the relevance of which cannot be ignored in the current political discourse on cow protection and Dalit atrocities.