Being Different: An Indian Challenge to Western Universalism is a 2011 book by Rajiv Malhotra, an Indian-American author, philanthropist and public speaker, published by HarperCollins.

Malhotra explains that in Being Different, 'Dharma' is used to indicate a family of spiritual traditions originating in India which today are manifested as Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism and Sikhism.

Malhotra explains how history-centrism or lack of it has implications for religious absolutist exclusivity vs. flexible pluralism: Abrahamic religions claim that we can resolve the human condition only by following the lineage of prophets arising from the Middle East.

By contrast, the dharmic traditions – Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism and Sikhism -- do not rely on history in the same absolutist and exclusive way.

[6] While the former is characterized by a "top-down" essentialism embracing everything a priori, the latter is a "bottom-up" approach acknowledging the dependent co-origination of alternative views of the human and the divine, the body and the mind, and the self and society.

Dharma philosophical systems are highly systematized in their approach to understanding ultimate reality and in carefully addressing what one can know through various means of knowledge.

A key myth shared by all the dharma traditions – the 'churning of the milky ocean,' or samudra-manthan – shows the eternal struggle between two poles.

Malhotra explains that In the fashionable search for sameness in all religions, Holy Spirit in Christianity is often equated with Shakti or kundalini in Hinduism.

[web 10]Malhotra gives example of a list of Sanskrit non-translatables and goes on to provide key differences in their original meaning and the most common translated word in English.

For example,[8] Malhotra claims that refuting Western Universalism is one of the most important objectives of his book, the conscious effort from American and European individuals to make the rest of the world fit into the template provided by these civilizations.

He claims that all people and culture are forced into the various schemes put forward to bring this about and asserts that modern laws, regulation, conventions and common practices are formed, whether consciously or not with Western Universalism in mind.

Malhotra says Hegel presented, "The Weltgeist or World Spirit is, in effect the protagonist of this history, and the West is extraordinary because it is destined to lead this journey while all other civilizations must follow or perish."

[9] Malhotra alleges "He (Hegel) laboriously criticizes Sanskrit and Indian civilization, arguing with European Indologists with the aim of assimilating some ideas (such as absolute idealism) into his own philosophy) while postulating India as the inferior other in order to construct his theory of the West.

For example, Hegel argues it is better for Africans to remain enslaved until they pass through a process of maturation that culminates in their total conversion to Christianity.

Malhotra also writes that, after Hegel's death his sweeping Eurocentric accounts of history was extrapolated which culminates at the Aryan identity.

Malhtora states, Hegel's theory of history has led to liberal Western supremacy, which hides behind the notion of providing the 'universals'.

[17] A special issue of the International Journal of Hindu Studies was dedicated to discussing Being Different,[18] and included articles by Nicholas F. Gier,[19] Shrinivas Tilak,[6] Gerald James Larson,[20] Rita M. Gross, [21] Robert A. Yelle,[22] and Cleo McNelly Kearns,[23] as well as a nearly 40-page response by Malhotra.

[25] According to Gross, Malhotra has located "one of the most urgent tasks for human survival", namely the ability to accommodate diversity without judging one culture over another as superior or inferior.

According to Tilak, Malhotra "gives voice to Indic subjects who have been silenced or transformed by nineteenth century and contemporary Indological filters.

According to Larson, Malhotra ignores the differences, to arrive at an "integral unity" "that is little more than a Neo-Vedanta or Neo-Hindu reading of the Bhagavad Gita documented with numerous citations from Aurobindo."

Larson calls this the "Brahmin imaginary",[note 3] the standard Brahmanical view of Indic religion and philosophy in its Neo-Hindu understanding.

According to Yelle, Malhotra presents a thoroughly homogenized ideal of Hinduism, based on a limited choice of aspects from Vedanta philosophy and Yoga.