Lajpat Rai beyond the Hindutva construct

Vanya Bhargav's book on Lajpat Rai, depicting him as someone who envisioned the nation differently at various times while always believing in inclusivity, renders it significant in today's context

Being Hindu, Being Indian: Lala Lajpat Rai’s Ideas of Nationhood

Author: Vanya Vaidehi Bhargav

Publisher: Penguin

Pages: 748

Price: Rs 1,299

For many Indians, Lala Lajpat Rai remains one pillar of the nationalist triumvirate Lal-Bal-Pal — Lala Lajpat Rai, Bal Gangadhar Tilak, and Bipin Chandra Pal. Fewer Indians would think of the Lala, or Lajpat Rai, as the person whose death, after being brutally assaulted while protesting the arrival of Simon Commission in Lahore, was the trigger for Bhagat Singh to seek revenge and thereafter walk to the gallows.

Even fewer Indians, including this reviewer, would have wondered for long why the radical Singh,