NYC Letter: The Inscrutable East

Offered without comment.

India's Hindu nationalist movement, Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh ( or RSS; Hindi: राष्ट्रीय स्वयंसेवक संघ, English: National Volunteers' Organisation), is preparing to launch a soft drink whose signature ingredient is cow urine.

INDIA TO LAUNCH COW URINE AS SOFT DRINK

February 11, 2009 (Times Online) - The bovine brew is in the final stages of development by the Cow Protection Department of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh(RSS), India's biggest and oldest Hindu nationalist group, according to the man who makes it.

Om Prakash, the head of the department, said the drink – called "gau jal", or "cow water" in Sanskrit – was undergoing laboratory tests and would be launched "very soon, maybe by the end of this year". Mr. Prakash:

Don't worry, it won't smell like urine and will be tasty too. Its USP [scil., Unique Selling Proposition] will be that it's going to be very healthy. It won't be like carbonated drinks and would be devoid of any toxins.

The drink is the latest attempt by the RSS – which was founded in 1925 and now claims eight million members – to cleanse India of foreign influence and promote its ideology of Hindutva, or Hindu-ness.

... The movement has often been accused of using more violent methods, such as killing 67 Christians in the eastern state of Orissa last year, and assaulting women in a pub in Mangalore last month.

[Hat tip: Duncan]