Blavatsky and Indian Politics: A. O. Hume, Besant

A.O. Hume father of Indian National Congress : Madras Miscelany:
The Father of the Congress – S. Muthia
 “Leading India into this new age was the Indian National Congress founded 130 years ago after the seeds for it were sown at a Theosophical Society Convention in Madras in 1884 when Col. Olcott and A.O. Hume called for the founding of an Indian political party to speak for the people of India. With Hume travelling throughout India to champion this suggestion and helping organize the first Indian National Congress convention in Bombay on December 28-30, 1885, he became known as the ‘Father of the Indian National Congress.’”
http://www.thehindu.com/features/metroplus/society/madras-miscellany/article6818726.ece
see also Hume on Blavatsky: http://www.blavatskyarchives.com/hume1884.htm

Article on Annie Besant’s entrepreurial activities in India:
From Besant to Vasantha - Sriram V.
“The foundation stone for the Vasantha Press was laid in 1908, and it became functional a short while later. In 1914, Mrs Besant acquired the Madras Standard, a daily, and renamed it New India. The paper, which electrified the freedom movement with its demand for Home Rule, was initially brought out from the Vasantha Press.
http://www.thehindu.com/features/metroplus/society/hidden-histories-from-besant-to-vasantha/article8916950.ece

Article on long-standing Bengaluru lodge and charitable organisation founded in 1909 : http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/magazines/panache/date-with-history-bengaluru-has-a-hidden-history-of-universal-brotherhood/articleshow/51437441.cms

Article on Indian anthropological history notes Blavatsky's influence:
Muller postulated the migration of the Aryans from the north-west into India while Olcott and Blavatsky asserted that the Aryans were indigenous to India. In their view the Aryan culture was the cradle of civilisation, and had spread from India to the West and other parts of the world. Like them, Dayanand Saraswati, who founded the Arya Samaj in 1875, also considered the Aryans as indigenous to India, and the Vedas as the repository of all knowledge and wisdom. Incidentally, the Arya Samaj merged with the Theosophical Society, which also was founded in 1875. Although this merger did not last long, the two parties never seem to have differed on the Aryan question.
http://thewire.in/21359/how-hindutva-historiography-is-rooted-in-the-colonial-view-of-indian-history/

 

Prof. Gauri Viswanathan, Department of English and Comparative Literature, Columbia University gave a lecture at McGill University on March 24, 2016 entitled Theosophy, Translation, and the Mediation of Hinduism. It was about Blavatsky and Ghandi’s influence on India. Overall, it was a positive outlook of Blavatsky and she is working on a book about Blavatsky.

https://www.mcgill.ca/channels/event/theosophy-translation-and-mediation-hinduism-258338

Her last article on Blavatsky was “Anna Kingsford: The Release of the Suffering Soul" in  Monism: Science, Philosophy, Religion, and the History of a Worldview, 2012.
https://books.google.ca/books?id=LWXIAAAAQBAJ&pg=PA106&lpg=PA106&dq=Viswanathan+anna+kingsford&source=bl&ots=j5vKZQG0C3&sig=ZG_61dDQmkZtsmvwqLoE-BQ6wug&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwign8v5mIHPAhWF2B4KHeLRAJcQ6AEIITAC#v=onepage&q=Viswanathan%20anna%20kingsford&f=false

She is also part of a major academic research project The Enchanted Modernities International Network:
“The Enchanted Modernities International Network will bring together scholars who are experts in the visual arts, music and sound, and literature from all over the world to explore what the visual, material and performing arts can tell us about the relationships between theosophy, modernity and mysticism c. 1875-1960.”
https://www.leverhulme.ac.uk/awards-made/awards-focus/enchanted-modernities-theosophy-modernism-and-arts-c-1875-1960\

A recent piece from The Hindu by Elina Abakarova:
August 12 was the 185th birth anniversary of one of the most extraordinary women of the 19th Century, Helena Petrovna Blavatskaya, better known across the world as Madame Blavatsky. The founder of the Theosophical Society this writer, poet, philosopher and traveller was also a brilliant pianist, a fine artist and a linguist. Due to her incomprehensible nature, activities and knowledge, she was called a sphinx. The mix of legend and fact that shrouds her life does not detract from her powerful influence over modern spiritual thought.
http://www.thehindu.com/features/friday-review/the-messenger-of-light/article9002691.ece