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In my dissertation, I seek to address specifically this question of the relationship of the vacanas, (Kannada language poetic sayings of the twelfth-century devotees of God Siva, who offer a critique of South Asian civilizational practices from within) to the Vīraśaiva-Lingayat community. I do this through an ethno-history of the Vīraśaiva and Lingayat narratives of the self. Towards this end, I analyze three moments in history—the twelfth-century vacana movement itself and its two moments of appropriation, one in the fifteenth-century city of Vijayanagar and the other in twentieth-century south India, to create Vīraśaiva and Lingayat community identities. I argue that the vacanas provide frameworks for the Vīraśaiva and Lingayat narratives of the self, enabling the community to accommodate many other social groups and religious traditions and thus enlarge its social base. However, it is not clear whether the 12th century vacana movement constitutes, as claimed by Lingayats, the historical originary moment of the Vīraśaiva—Lingayat community. Hence, I examine the absolute proprietary claims of the modern Lingayat community over vacanas, for vacanas have always been available to and been used by the entire society, especially the lower classes until the present. Now, Lingayats contest any alternative reading of the vacanas, claim that their community is in fact the actualization of the vacana ideals and offer their narrative of the self as a historical narrative. Hence while historicizing the Lingayat accounts, I recognize that history is a source of anxiety for Lingayats; I also seek demonstrate the multiple sources of the Vīraśaiva-Lingayat self and reflect on the processes through which selves and communities are constituted in pre-modern and modern South Asia. In particular, my dissertation reflects on the status and role of history in fashioning collective selves in modern South Asia and on the necessity as well as possibility of producing alternative narratives in the context of a Lingayat insistence on the validity of their accounts. Hence, along with epistemological concerns, my study of the vacana movement and the Lingayat community keeps at the core those ethical and political considerations, which may enable us to achieve a degree of accommodation and plurality.

Udupi Rajagopalacharya Ananthamurthy was that supreme storyteller, popular teacher, generous mentor of young writers and fierce public intellectual who transcended each of those descriptions. [...]despite his Brahminical upbringing, Ananthamurthy's radical sensibilities, especially his understanding of caste, had been shaped by Ram Manohar Lohia's writings.

A cricketer, entrepreneur, fashion designer and cricket administrator, Wodeyar, found most success in politics.

Even the hot button issue of the past eight months, the dispute over the sharing of Cauvery river water, didn't become anything other than a stock talking point for every political party and every political leader.

In that sense, the fundamental poll dynamic of the 2013 elections was set long before polling day, and the challenge for the Congress was to manage the elections efficiently. [...]when political analysts and the media highlighted the infighting within the Congress and the confusion over ticket distribution, it served to introduce an element of uncertainty about the results and inject some excitement into what would have been a dry narrative about the Congress's inevitable victory. In the intensely competitive political environment of the past decade, star campaigners - be it national leaders like Rahul Gandhi or state leaders like Siddaramaiah - do not possess such mass appeal. [...]the Congress doesn't possess the nimbleness to recruit winnable candidates, which is a skill both the BJP and the JD(S) have demonstrated over the past decade.

Unlike the Congress and the JD(S), the BJP in Karnataka was nimble enough to recognise this emerging political culture. [...]the gateway to the south wasn't opened by ideological purity or its Hindutva agenda. B.S. Yeddyurappa was the ideal conduit for facilitating this expansion. [...]he consolidated Lingayat votes for the BJP and recruited leaders from the Congress.\\n

[...]he sold the manuscripts of his novels to an American university (Boston University), thus showing no regard for Indian institutions or researchers; further, his heirs were selling his house to the government at market price, instead of gifting it.