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Scroll.in
3 days ago
- Politics
- Scroll.in
Abhishek Choudhary
Stories written by From the biography: How Atal Bihari Vajpayee tried to balance Pakistan, USA, Europe and China An excerpt from 'Believer's Dilemma: Vajpayee and the Hindu Right's Path to Power, 1977-2018', by Abhishek Choudhary. Abhishek Choudhary · 12 minutes ago In his early days in the RSS, Atal Bihari Vajpayee wanted minors to be banned from watching films An excerpt from 'Vajpayee: The Ascent of the Hindu Right, 1924-1977', by Abhishek Choudhary. Abhishek Choudhary · May 10, 2023 · 08:30 am
The Wire
4 days ago
- Politics
- The Wire
Decolonising Ourselves into a Hindu Rashtra
The Postcolonial Left has enabled the fire to spread by disabling a principled critique of Hinduism and Hindu nationalism that could have acted as a fire retardant. Illustration: Pariplab Chakraborty. The following is excerpted from Meera Nanda's book Postcolonial Theory and the Making of Hindu Nationalism: The Wages of Unreason, published by Routledge, 2025. This book tells the story of two strange bedfellows, the Postcolonial Left and the Hindu Right. It argues that the Postcolonial Left's relentless attacks on the 'epistemic violence' of Western norms of rationality and modernity are providing the conceptual vocabulary for the Hindu Right's project of 'decolonizing the Hindu mind.' The postcolonial project of creating an alternative modernity free from the 'imperialism' of Eurocentric concepts harks back to the late 19th century when Indian nationalists first began to 'provincialize' Europe and is widely shared by the contemporary Hindu Right. This book will show that far from an avant-garde progressive movement, postcolonialism in India bears a strong family resemblance, in context and content, with 'conservative revolutions' of the kind that brought down the Weimar Republic and prepared the grounds for the Nazi takeover. Postcolonial Theory and the Making of Hindu Nationalism: The Wages of Unreason, Meera Nanda, Routledge, 2025. For nearly five decades, a prominent segment of left-leaning intellectuals who speak for social justice and cultural rights of the marginalized have been waging a war against the ideal of secular modernity that India set upon at the time of Independence. They believe that India's experience of modernity is not organic because the elites running the show have accepted the colonial legacy of scientific reason and secularization as universally valid and universally desirable. Instead of universality, the critics find a deep difference, even incommensurability, between India and Europe. These intellectuals see the critique of colonial legacy as a precondition for creating a modernity that is authentically 'our own.' Our critics insist that Kant's directive of escaping the tutelage of all external authorities by daring to think for oneself — the famous Sapere Aude! 'Dare to use your own reason' — will not work for us in India in the manner it worked for Europe in the Age of Enlightenment. For the once colonized, the Kantian spirit of Sapere Aude! demands that we first escape the apprenticeship of our erstwhile colonial lords and masters before we can dare to think for ourselves. Thus, to live more authentically and chart our independent course in the modern world, they argue, we must rediscover the indigenous modes of living and thinking that are still alive among the non-modern masses who are marginalized and condescended to by the elites with colonized minds. To that end, this segment of the Indian Left has produced withering critiques of the 'Western' values enshrined in the Constitution, especially the commitment to secularism and the cultivation of a secular worldview. They see these values as cast-off clothes of Europe that don't fit Indians and turn them into pathetic mimic men. What unites these critics is a suspicion of the Enlightenment ideal of rational progress, something they see as a product of European history tainted by colonialism, Orientalism, and racism. We will refer to these critics of Indian modernity collectively as the Postcolonial Left. The rise to academic prominence of the Postcolonial Left through the last quarter of the 20th century coincided with the rapid rise of the Hindu Right. The same shock to the Indian polity — the imposition of the Emergency that lasted from 1975 to 1977 — that led many on the Left to rethink the trajectory of Indian modernity, also brought the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), the parent of the family of Hindu nationalist outfits, into the public sphere from which it had been banished after the murder of Mahatma Gandhi. The same turn away from state-led development to a neoliberal market economy that enabled a culturalist turn among 'Third World' intellectuals as they moved to the centers of learning in the 'First World,' also brought the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), a political front of the RSS, to the commanding heights of Indian politics. The BJP has adroitly welded neoliberal economic policies with a discourse of Hindu civilizational supremacy. We will refer to the 21st-century manifestation of Hindu nationalism as the Hindu Right. A deeply palingenetic, or revivalist, ultranationalism runs through the ideology of the Hindu Right. Like Swami Vivekananda and Sri Aurobindo, the late 19th-century pioneers of Indian nationalism, the contemporary Hindu Right seeks the rebirth of the ancient 'Vedic' civilizational virtues while embracing the technological and economic opportunities of 21st-century global capitalism. The rebirth of the Hindu nation in a formally secular nation-state demands a reformulation of the idea of India, which in turn demands purging it of alien impurities, Western as well as Islamic. How else, Hindu nationalists ask, can the ancient nation be restored to its original glory if its ruling ideas don't bear the mark of its primordial civilization? Western ideas and ideals that first came to India through colonialism have long been targets of Indian and Hindu nationalists. Following the long Hindu tradition of hierarchical inclusivism, Hindu nationalists don't oppose these ideas outright but subsume them under the presumed superiority of the holistic nature of Hindu dharma that denies any separation between the human, social, and natural realms from the divine. Thus key ideas of modernity — separating the secular sphere of governance from the claims of faith, recognizing the priority of rights-bearing individuals over the claims of the community, and honoring the separation of material nature from any kind of mind-stuff, whether a personal God or impersonal Intelligence — are deemed to be un-Hindu colonial intrusions which must be suitably reformulated, or 'spiritualized,' to conform to the imperatives of the integral, holistic worldview of Hindu dharma. In a tragic reversal, left-leaning intellectuals who once stood firm in defense of the secular humanist worldview that lies at the core of modernity, and was embraced by the framers of India's Constitution, have become its most vocal critics. Once some of India's best-known public intellectuals went native, so to speak, and later joined forces with poststructuralist currents in the metropolitan universities, words like secularism, science, development, and the Enlightenment would not be mentioned in academic discourse without scare quotes. These critics have expended enormous intellectual labor to debunk these ideas as imposing Eurocentric conceptual categories on the post-colonial world, thereby perpetuating 'mental colonialism.' The Left and the Right, thus, are united in their search for 'alternative modernities' that are no longer bound by the 'Western' model of modernity as a progressive decline of ignorance and blind faith, along with a growth of individualism and personal freedoms. The Left condemns this model of secularizing and liberalizing modernity as Eurocentric and looks for alternatives in the lifeworld of ordinary people who are, supposedly, untouched by modernity. The Right, meanwhile, declares the sacred traditions of Sanskritic Hinduism to be the source of a superior kind of modernity that delivers material goods without the Western 'vices' of individualism, materialism, and atheism. While the Postcolonial Left offers a total critique of modernity, the Right transvaluates the values of modernity and claims to find 'real' science, democracy, and secularism in our hoary ancient civilization. This has led to a paradoxical situation. In their public pronouncements, the Postcolonial Left and the Hindu Right see each other as mortal enemies, while surreptitiously using each other's conceptual vocabulary. For all its radicalism, the Postcolonial Left brings a distinctively Hindu sensibility to its critique of modernity, even as it castigates Hindu nationalism as just one more example of modernizing nation-statist ideology. The Hindu Right, meanwhile, makes full use of the arguments of postcolonial theory, while castigating the postcolonialist intellectuals as creatures of the Western academe who hew to its secularist worldview. The Hindu sensibilities of the Postcolonial Left are obvious, although unacknowledged. Even as the Postcolonial Left seeks to recover the religious lifeworld of the subaltern as an antidote to Enlightenment rationalism, it questions the 'Hindu' of Hindu nationalists as a colonial fabrication that superimposed a 'Semitic' conception of a monotheistic, Book-centered religion on the easy-going, polytheistic, ritual-centered religiosity that prevailed in India before colonialism, and still prevails among the masses. Yet, for all their skepticism about Hinduism as a 'religion' cast in a Christian mold, a distinctively Hindu sensibility constitutes the political unconscious of Indian postcolonial theorists. The non-modern traditions in whose name they confront 'colonial modernity' are all distinctly Hindu. The gods they invoke to battle the rationalists and secularists are straight out of the Puranas; the mythic mode of narrating the past they defend against secular historiography is Hindu; the religious 'tolerance' they valorize against the constitutional secularism is nothing but the hierarchical inclusiveness of Hinduism; the holistic modes of knowing they counterpose against the supposed reductionism of modern science are Hindu. Hinduism is the elephant romping through the postcolonial Ivory Tower that everyone pretends not to see. For its part, the Hindu Right sees itself as the true heir of Edward Said's critique of Orientalism. Indeed, a new generation of Hindu thinkers, who call themselves ' Bauddhika Kshatriyas,' or 'intellectual warriors,' has emerged that wants to proudly and unabashedly proclaim the superiority and universality of dharmic conceptions of divinity, nature, knowledge, and society, without seeking the West's approbation or fearing its opprobrium. To that end, they strategically appropriate the Saidian framework of postcolonial theory to 'provincialize' Europe from a dharmic perspective, and to whitewash Hinduism's peculiar institutions of caste, untouchability, and patriarchy as 'colonial constructions.' Even as they appropriate the postcolonial critiques of 'Western' modernity, they reject the anti-essentialism of all 'post'-marked theory as fashionable nonsense. Thus, in their public pronouncements, our 'intellectual warriors' decry the Postcolonial Left as too beholden to Western fads, while making full use of their writings. The Postcolonial Left and the Hindu Right, in sum, see themselves not as allies but as sworn enemies. But if one were to pause and ask — What is the vision of a future India that the two sides have to offer? What do they think must be done to get to this future? — the postcolonial position turns out to be not all that dissimilar from that of their 'enemies.' Both want an India that proudly embraces its indigenous cultural norms, and an India that boldly confronts the West with 'alternative universals' of Indian provenance. Both direct their ire at Eurocentric conceptual categories for preventing the full flowering of India's native genius. Both seek to decolonize and indigenize science and social theory. Both sides are singing the same song with the same refrain: Down with Eurocentrism! Decolonize Now! Swaraj in Ideas! The Argument: What the Book Says and Does Not Say The central argument of this book is that the Postcolonial Left and the Hindu Right belong to the family of 'conservative revolutions' against Enlightenment rationalism and liberalism on behalf of indigenous traditions. Intellectuals who first called themselves 'conservative revolutionaries' were a loose group of intellectuals who were bitterly opposed to the Weimar Republic, Germany's first constitutional democracy, and hastened its demise at the hands of the Nazis. They condemned the rational foundations of modern liberalism and socialism as culturally alien to German Volkisch traditions and sought a 'Third Way' rooted in Germanic values. Their attempt to reawaken the German Volksgeist would provide a blueprint for the National Socialism of the Nazi party. The kernel of thought on which this book is based is simple: India is facing a Weimar moment, and its intellectual landscape bears a comparison, in context and substance, to the Weimar Republic before it fell to the Nazis. The short and spectacular life of the embattled Weimar Republic can illuminate the dilemmas and challenges facing India's faltering democracy. The role the conservative revolutionaries played in the downfall of the Republic can illuminate the dangers of the intellectual assault on modernity from the Left and the Right wings of postcolonial studies. In the chapters that follow, I juxtapose the intellectual history of India with the revolution against the Enlightenment in Germany between the two world wars. The mantle of conservative revolutionaries in India rightfully belongs to the neo-Hindu founding fathers of modern India — notably, Mahatma Gandhi, Swami Vivekananda, and Sri Aurobindo — who bought into the Orientalist and Romanticist conceptions of India as an idyllic, spiritual nation of perennial wisdom. They were not hostile to non-Hindu minorities as the openly Islamophobic parties like the Hindu Mahasabha or the RSS were and are. (Germany's conservative revolutionaries, too, were not openly anti-Semitic. Their nationalism was more cultural than racialist.) Nevertheless, they saw India as an essentially Hindu nation whose 'soul' lay in its spirituality and its holistic communitarian way of life. When they were not openly hostile to parliamentary democracy, industry, capitalism, and socialism, as in the case of Gandhi, they succeeded in hybridizing modern ideals of individual rights and scientific rationalism with the 'timeless' spiritual traditions of Hinduism, while welcoming the technological innovations of the West. The Postcolonial Left, this book will show, has met the conservative, neo-Hindu currents of Indian nationalism halfway by stigmatizing as colonial and Eurocentric the same ideas of individualism, rationalism, and secularism that the former deem too 'materialistic' for Hindu 'spirituality' and therefore unsuitable for India. By indicting the conceptual categories of modern ways of knowing and living as inflicting 'epistemic violence' on the worldview and traditions of India, the Postcolonial Left has issued a blank check to those clamoring for a return to the Great Hindu Civilization. Postcolonial assault on modernity in the name of recuperating the people's traditions bears striking similarities with that of the conservative revolutionaries of the Weimar period. The following three similarities will be highlighted and substantiated in the body of this work: One, the Postcolonial Left in India emerged from the same kind of cultural despair that sparked the conservative backlash against modernity in the Weimar Republic. In both cases, despair over social displacements and cultural changes caused by the rapid growth of industrial capitalism and a relatively young and insecure democracy led concerned intellectuals to seek a radical escape from the very idea of modernity. In both cases, the West — the French Revolution in the case of Germany, and the legacy of the British Raj in the case of India — was seen as destroying something precious in their respective nations. In both cases, public intellectuals served as cultural middlemen who repackaged old cultural traditions of 'the people,' the volk, as alternatives to liberal democracy, socialism, and Marxism and delivered them to the far Right. Two, like the conservative revolutionaries in the Weimar Republic, Indian postcolonial theorists, from the Left as well as from the Right, target the Enlightenment tradition as an alien imposition and reject the internationalism of science as a myth. Conservative revolutionaries like Oswald Spengler, the author of Weimar's best-selling book, The Decline of the West, argued for civilizationally distinct sciences. The Nazis used the Spenglerian rhetoric of different-sciences-for-different-people to celebrate 'Aryan science' for ideological purposes while investing heavily in science-driven industry, advanced weaponry, and industrial-scale murders. Likewise, the postcolonial devaluation of scientific objectivity in the name of the cultural construction of scientific facts, and the rejection of the universality of science as a mask of Eurocentricity, has opened the door wide to cultural relativism and nativism. The culturalist critique of post-Enlightenment modes of reasoning enables the Hindu Right to institutionalize outdated 'Indian knowledge systems' at all levels of education, in the name of mental decolonization. Just as the Weimar conservatives gave intellectual respectability to the ideologically correct 'Aryan science,' the postcolonial attacks on scientific rationality are providing the grounds for 'Vedic science.' Finally, and most alarmingly, the postcolonial romance of the virtuous, non-modern cultures victimized by Western conceptual categories fuels a sense of India's victimhood and exceptionalism at the same time. Just as the volkisch romance of the Weimar's radical conservatives proved useful for the Nazis, the nostalgic indigenism of postcolonial theorists is feeding the flames of Hindu supremacy that could spell disaster for India's religious minorities. As an old-fashioned Enlightenment secular humanist who proudly locates herself on the side of universal norms of reason and human flourishing, I have watched in anguish how the Postcolonial Left has shredded the ideals we rationalists hold dear. I fear that in their eagerness to embrace native conceptual categories as if they were incommensurable with mainstream exact sciences and social theory, postcolonial intellectuals have betrayed their vocation as intellectuals to speak for the ideals of universal humanity. Through the ages, Indian thinkers — from the Lokayatas of antiquity, through our own Enlightenment thinkers, notably, Ambedkar, Periyar, Nehru, M.N. Roy, and Narendra Dabholkar, and countless unsung women and men fighting the powers of patriarchs and panchayats in our midst — have challenged their cultural particularities against a conception of human flourishing that transcends these particularities. Postcolonial theorists, on the other hand, have dragged the very idea of universal human good before the tribunal of cultural differences. Whereas it is the time-honored responsibility of intellectuals to 'speak the truth, and expose lies,' to quote the plain words of Noam Chomsky, our post-marked intellectuals have made it their mission to expose the very idea of objective truth as a mere ruse of power. What motivated me to write this book is not just my deep and abiding philosophical disagreements with the enemies of the Enlightenment, but my growing concern that their critique of reason and modernity is merging, without a residue, with the reactionary, revivalist modernism of the Hindu Right. I am alarmed when I see the stalwarts of postcolonial and decolonial theory — Edward Said, Gayatri Spivak, Dipesh Chakrabarty, Ashis Nandy, Nicholas Dirks, Walter Mignolo, and Anibal Quijano —respectfully cited in the Hindu Right literature. I am alarmed when tirades against 'mental decolonization' make their way from the Ivory Tower into the halls of government, as happened when the Modi administration made decolonization the guiding principle of the National Education Policy of 2020. Looking beyond India, I am alarmed when the European Right passes itself off as an anti-colonial movement defending European civilization against immigrants and the homogenizing influences of globalization, or when Alexander Dugin, the Russian ultranationalist, speaks the language of decoloniality. I am equally alarmed when theorists of decoloniality embrace authoritarian states like Russia, China, and Iran (and India, too) as mascots of de-westernization and civilizational 'plurivarsalism.' Above all, I am concerned about the kind of cultural values and ways of knowing that are being promoted for our salvation, and if these values are adequate for creating a society that respects rational thought, human equality, and individual freedoms. At the heart of this book lies my concern that under the cover of radical-sounding rhetoric of 'decolonization,' and making India the world's guru, ways of knowing that have been superseded by modern science, and cultural values that belong to the premodern world of integral communities organized on the principles of hierarchy, deference, and duties are being glorified and institutionalized. Let me clearly state what the convergence of the Left with conservative revolutionaries of the Right that I describe in this book does not imply. I am not suggesting that Hindutva's assault on the idea of India as a modern secular state would not have happened if it were not for the unremitting barrage of anti-Western and anti-modernist high theory emanating from the postcolonial battalions from the Left of the political spectrum. The Hindu Right does not need any assistance from the Left on this count. On the contrary, a toxic, resentful Occidentalism, coupled with an overweening sense of Hindu superiority, has defined the mainstream of Indian nationalism, and not just its Hindu nationalist avatars, from its beginnings in the 19th century. Indeed, much of what postcolonial theorists have to say about India's cultural incommensurability with the West is commonplace in the writings of the canonical anti-colonial thinkers, including Gandhi, Vivekananda, Aurobindo, and even Tagore, who positioned himself as an ambassador of Indian spirituality even though he rejected the idea of nationalism. As I argue in this book, postcolonial theory is merely a footnote to the neo-Hindu revivalist strains of anti-colonial nationalism. In other words, I am not suggesting that the Postcolonial Left single-handedly lit the fires of Hindu chauvinism. What I am claiming is that it has enabled the fire to spread by disabling a principled critique of Hinduism and Hindu nationalism that could have acted as a fire retardant. By recklessly propagating the cult of indigeneity, the high priests of postcolonial theory have succeeded in tilting the intellectual-political center of gravity toward a politics of nostalgia and revival, which is the natural terrain of the Right. Consequently, there is now a void where there should have been a strong, principled, secular-democratic front against Hindutva's onslaught on all that was once decent and promising in the idea of India. Meera Nanda taught the history of science at the Indian Institute of Science Education and Research for over a decade. She participated in the 'Science Wars' in defense of science against its social constructivist critics and has written extensively on the appropriation of modern science by Hindu apologists in India. Her previous books include Prophets Facing Backward: Postmodern Critiques of Science and Hindu Nationalism (2004) and A Field Guide to Post-truth India (2024). She lives in Connecticut. The Wire is now on WhatsApp. Follow our channel for sharp analysis and opinions on the latest developments.
News18
5 days ago
- Politics
- News18
Book reveals Israeli ministers covert 1977 talks with Desai, Vajpayee
New Delhi, Jul 18 (PTI) Then Israeli foreign minister Moshe Dayan came to India in 1977 on a clandestine visit, in disguise and under a false name, to meet prime minister Morarji Desai and his counterpart Atal Bihari Vajpayee in a failed attempt to establish diplomatic ties between the two countries, says a new book. The Israeli minister failed in his mission and left empty-handed. Visibly annoyed by the outcome, Dayan declined the parting gift of antique Indian silverware offered by his hosts, Abhishek Choudhary writes in 'Believer's Dilemma: Vajpayee and the Hindu Right's Path to Power". He flew out 'mocking India's poverty, cursing its rulers' moral cowardice", says the book that uncovers a little-known episode in India-Israel ties. The 'awkward meeting", the author notes, was a sign that for all its ambitions, the Janata government did not have the mandate or confidence to revamp India's foreign policy. Dayan's covert visit to India was 'top secret" as Desai feared it would lead to the collapse of the Janata government if made public. The meeting, held at a 'poorly furnished government house" in New Delhi, was so discreet that Vajpayee got to know of it only after Dayan landed. Even foreign secretary Jagat Mehta wasn't told anything. 'On the afternoon of 14 August, Israeli foreign minister, Moshe Dayan, alighted in New Delhi. He was travelling under a fake name and had disguised himself with dark glasses and a large straw hat. He was put up at a private residence in south Delhi's Safdarjung Enclave," reads the book, a sequel to Chaudhary's award-winning bestseller 'Vajpayee: The Ascent of the Hindu Right". The purpose of his visit: 'to advance talks on establishing diplomatic relations between India and Israel". India recognised Israel in 1950 but established full diplomatic relations with the country on January 29, 1992. 'As a founding member of the Non-Aligned Movement, India had some clout among the non-aligned nations. At the very least, Dayan was hoping to receive India's backing for the Israel-Egypt peace plans in the NAM, neutralizing India's longstanding support to the Arabs," the book adds. 'At India's request, the meeting was kept top secret. No other cabinet minister, not even Foreign Secretary Mehta, got a whiff of it. Morarji Desai thought that if the news of Dayan's visit became public, the Janata government would collapse," it claims. Janata Party, a political alliance formed in 1977 by various opposition groups, came into power in 1977 defeating Indira Gandhi's Congress after the Emergency period. Desai, who became the first non-Congress prime minister of India, remained in the office for 856 days — serving till 1979. Vajpayee, despite his long standing support for formal ties with Israel, appeared visibly uneasy during the meeting with Dayan. According to Desai — who shared the episode months later with Indian diplomat I.K. Gujral, then India's ambassador to the USSR — Vajpayee was 'terrified" about the implications of the encounter and was told 'not to worry". Desai, however, remained steadfast in rejecting Dayan's overtures. While acknowledging that India had recognised Israel in 1950, Desai made it clear that full diplomatic relations could only be considered 'only after peace came to the region". He reiterated India's longstanding support for a Palestinian state and resisted even minimal gestures, such as opening an Israeli consulate in Delhi. 'Both Vajpayee and Desai argued that such a step would be misinterpreted, leading to 'unnecessary complications in diplomatic relations with West Asia'… He (Desai) suggested Dayan meet Vajpayee during the conferences in the US and Europe but refused to risk sending his foreign minister, formally or secretly, to his country," the book recounts. Following the establishment of diplomatic relations in 1992, an embassy opened in New Delhi, and the consulate in Mumbai — operational since 1953 — became a consulate-general. 'Believer's Dilemma", priced at Rs 999, is described by publishing house PanMacmillan India as a political history of contemporary India covering the crucial period between 1978–2018 — 'a transformative 40-year span that saw the Hindu Right move from the fringes into the corridors of power". PTI MG MIN MIN (This story has not been edited by News18 staff and is published from a syndicated news agency feed - PTI) view comments First Published: July 18, 2025, 17:00 IST Disclaimer: Comments reflect users' views, not News18's. Please keep discussions respectful and constructive. Abusive, defamatory, or illegal comments will be removed. News18 may disable any comment at its discretion. By posting, you agree to our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy.
The Hindu
10-07-2025
- Politics
- The Hindu
Assam's Political Apathy and the Rise of Authoritarian Nationalism
Published : Jul 10, 2025 14:43 IST - 5 MINS READ Last weekend, I went to Assam, regarded by TV anchors as a faraway corner, for a family event. For a brief while, I was on a different planet, blissfully unaware of politics. I forgot about the manipulation of voters' rolls in Bihar, where a crucial State election is within sight, and was clueless about Elon Musk wanting to start a new political party in America (a trend that should not be pooh-poohed by traditional political machinery). It was a magical existence, without a care for political developments in these turbulent times that our species is hurtling through. I admit: my own political awareness was, like an old single-engine aircraft, slow in starting. The first time I witnessed anything political was during the Bangladesh liberation war, when our north Bihar was blacked out every night, and we ran to my grandmother's roof to watch aircraft pass over. I had no idea what was going on. Similarly, a few weeks after we arrived in New York (NY) in 1974, my father made me watch Richard Nixon's televised resignation. Again, I had no idea why. However, life in the US awakened my political consciousness. I saw, as soon as I got there, that Whites hated Blacks; and both hated Indians (and other immigrants, no doubt). Hatred of immigrants has always existed. Immigrants, on the other hand, are pusillanimous; they don't want to be distracted from their main aim of plucking dollars from American money trees. So, the adult attitude was to avert one's eyes from racist behaviour and get on with life. Racism is based on an absurd ignorance: in 1979-80, when Iranian student revolutionaries took hostages at the US embassy in Tehran, the Greek-Americans, Italian-Americans, and others who populated Queens, NY, would shout at me to 'free the hostages, give us oil', and other reductionist babble. Also Read | What the Hindu Right sees in Israel Racism is ingrained in society: my 7th-grade social studies teacher used to say that 'some people' wanted to ship all the Blacks back to Africa. Today's politics follows a continuum from decades past. (Isn't it a fact that Indira Gandhi opened Pandora's Box out of which Prime Minister Narendra Modi emerged?) We used to think former US President Ronald Reagan was a shameless racist, but four decades later, people seem to be shocked that US President Donald Trump is a shameless racist. Politics and conscientiousness Once it entered my consciousness, politics was there to stay. It should be so for each of us. Politics is about the right choice; about how we navigate our place in society, about how society allocates resources, and about how our grievances on resource allocation are addressed. Politics is the intersection of all levels, classes, groups, and sections. Unfortunately, some disdain politics, because of either their comfy privilege or their abject poverty. Others prefer petty politics of the office or family. Indian politics, my yoga-master says, is basically everyone pulling each other down 'by their ears'. Last weekend, however, my political consciousness was in suspended animation. I did not even think about this column. And nothing changed. I was charmed by the sprawling yet small-town Guwahati, its lanes displaying its character—unlike the bland, homogenising big city infrastructure projects that seem to complicate problems rather than solve them. (Garbage collection in Gurgaon happens not due to political action but social media pressure.) Here, the green hills are soothing, and the Naga bamboo chili pork is filling. The local Chief Minister (CM) is trying to make his mark with one major infrastructure project after another, though one must agree that the highway along a section of the Brahmaputra is impressive. However, his execrable politics are merely abusing his opponent's wife as a foreign spy. No surprise there; Garry Kasparov this week tweeted Umberto Eco's 'Features of Fascism' and among its 14 rules is number 7, the obsession with a plot, 'possibly an international one'. Yet, I fear that the CM will get re-elected repeatedly: one, because of the lack of competitive politics; and two, because politics seems such a distant reality from which Assamese voters are detached. They might not be too outraged, because the Assamese have for decades been frustrated with outsiders. Eco's rule 5 is Fear of difference: 'The first appeal of a fascist movement (or a prematurely fascist movement) is an appeal against the intruders'. They were angry with the Bengalis since the 19th century. In the 1960s, this became anger with the Bangladeshis. The BJP smoothly transitioned it to islamophobia from the 1990s to the 2000s, and this even though more than a few Assamese Hindus have had good interpersonal relations with Assamese Muslims. Assam has long been a fertile ground for fascism, and with the BJP having successfully tapped into this long-standing social frustration, it is an uphill climb for challengers, made more so by political apathy. Also Read | Democracy's temporal tyranny It is the same for the country as a whole; the absence of politics and the apathy of voters towards politics ensures that Modi, or his hand-picked successor, will have a smooth ride. For an apolitical society best suits the right-wing. Part of the regime's success in depoliticising society is its constant barrage of premiership-as-entertainment (Prime Minister in fancy dress, collecting esoteric awards), war as theatre, and immigrant/Muslim demonisation as gladiatorial blood sport. Our PM's collection of medals from miscellaneous countries is only outdone by Trump's collection of Nobel Prize nominations. (Perhaps Modi should also be a nominator, having adopted flattery-as-foreign-policy.) The moral content of our politics today matters less than the fact that we take sides. And if only a few people are vocal, that's enough for the powers that be: Eco's rule 13 speaks of a TV or internet populism 'in which the emotional response of a selected group of citizens can be presented and accepted as vox populi'. If you were to pluck a philosopher from any time or any culture, they would survey our apolitical planet with its macro-chaos and micro-numbness and each come to the same conclusion: that politics has failed, and most of us have chosen the wrong side. Aditya Sinha is a writer living on the outskirts of Delhi.
Al Jazeera
04-07-2025
- Politics
- Al Jazeera
Zohran Mamdani's New York primary win sparks the ire of Modi's supporters
If he wins the general election in November, Zohran Mamdani could become New York City's first South Asian mayor and the first of Indian origin. But the same identity that makes him a trailblazer in United States politics has also exposed him to public outcry in India and within its diaspora. Ever since Mamdani achieved a thumping win in the Democratic mayoral primary on June 24, his campaign has weathered a flood of vitriol – some of it coming from the Hindu right. Experts say the attacks are a reflection of the tensions that have arisen between supporters of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and critics of the human rights abuses under his leadership, particularly against religious minorities. A number of those attacks have fixated on Mamdani's religion: The 33-year-old is Muslim. Some commenters have accused the mayoral hopeful of being a 'jihadi' and 'Islamist'. Others have called him anti-Hindu and anti-India. Kayla Bassett, the director of research at the Center for the Study of Organized Hate (CSOH), a Washington-based think tank, believes the attacks against Mamdani are a vehicle to attack the Muslim community more broadly. 'This isn't just about one individual,' she said. 'It's about promoting a narrative that casts Muslims as inherently suspect or un-American.' Backlash from Modi's party That narrative could potentially have consequences for Mamdani's campaign, as he works to increase his support among New York voters. Mamdani will face competition in November from more established names in politics. He is expected to face incumbent mayor Eric Adams in the final vote. His rival in the Democratic primary, former Governor Andrew Cuomo, has also not yet ruled out an independent run. The mayoral hopeful has vocally denounced human rights abuses, including in places like Gaza and India. That unabashed stance has not only earned him criticism from his rival candidates but also from overseas. Members of Modi's Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), for example, have been among the voices slamming Mamdani's remarks and questioning his fitness for the mayor's seat. BJP Member of Parliament Kangana Ranaut posted on social media, for example, that Mamdani 'sounds more Pakistani than Indian'. 'Whatever happened to his Hindu identity or bloodline,' she asked, pointing to the Hindu roots of his mother, director Mira Nair. 'Now he is ready to wipe out Hinduism.' Soon after Mamdani's primary win, a prominent pro-BJP news channel in India, Aaj Tak, also aired a segment claiming that he had received funding from organisations that promote an 'anti-India' agenda. It also warned of a growing Muslim population in New York City, an assertion it coupled with footage of women wearing hijabs. But some of the backlash has come from sources closer to home. A New Jersey-based group named Indian Americans for Cuomo spent $3,570 for a plane to fly a banner over New York City with the message: 'Save NYC from Global Intifada. Reject Mamdani.' A critic of human rights abuses Much of the pushback can be linked to Mamdani's vocal criticism of Hindu nationalism and Modi in particular. In 2020, Mamdani participated in a Times Square demonstration against a temple built on the site of the Babri mosque in Ayodhya that was destroyed by Hindu extremists in 1992. He called out the BJP's participation in and normalisation of that violence. 'I am here today to protest against the BJP government in India and the demolition of the Babri masjid,' he said. Then, in 2023, Mamdani read aloud notes from an imprisoned Indian activist ahead of Modi's visit to New York City. That activist, Umar Khalid, has been imprisoned since 2020 without trial on terrorism charges after making speeches criticising Modi's government. More recently, during a town hall for mayoral candidates in May, Mamdani was asked if he would meet with Modi if the prime minister were to visit the city again. Mamdani said he wouldn't. 'This is a war criminal,' he replied. Mamdani pointed to Modi's leadership in the Indian state of Gujarat during a period of religious riots in 2002. Modi has been criticised for turning a blind eye to the violence, which killed more than a thousand people, many of them Muslim. In the aftermath, Modi was denied a US visa for 'severe violations of religious freedom'. 'Narendra Modi helped to orchestrate what was a mass slaughter of Muslims in Gujarat, to the extent that we don't even believe that there are Gujarati Muslims any more,' Mamdani told the town hall. 'When I tell someone that I am, it's a shock to them that that's even the case.' Barriers of class and religion It's that 'fearless' and consistent criticism of Modi that has made Mamdani the target of outrage from the Hindu right, according to Rohit Chopra, a communications professor at Santa Clara University. 'Among the Hindu right, there is a project of the political management of the memory of 2002. There's this silence around Modi being denied a visa to enter the US,' said Chopra. The professor also said class fragmentation among Hindu Americans may also fuel scepticism towards Mamdani. Hindu Americans are a relatively privileged minority in terms of socioeconomic status: The Pew Research Center estimates that 44 percent Asian American Hindus enjoy a family income of more than $150,000, and six in 10 have obtained postgraduate degrees. That relative prosperity, Chopra said, can translate into social barriers. 'They don't necessarily even identify with other Hindu Americans who may come from very different kinds of class backgrounds – people who might be working as cab drivers, or dishwashers, or other blue-collar jobs,' he explained. Meanwhile, Suchitra Vijayan, a New York City-based writer and the founder of the digital magazine Polis Project, has noticed that many lines of attack against Mamdani centre on his identity. 'Mamdani is an elected leader who is unabashedly Muslim,' she said. She pointed out that other Muslim politicians, including US Congress members Rashida Tlaib and Ilhan Omar, have sparked similar backlash for reproaching Modi over the Gujarat violence. But Mamdani's family ties to the region make the scrutiny all the more intense. 'In Mamdani's case, he's Muslim, he's African, but also his father is of Gujarati descent and has openly spoken about the pogrom in Gujarat,' Vijayan said. A 'seismic' victory Despite the online backlash, experts and local organisers believe Mamdani's campaign can mobilise Indian American voters and other members of the South Asian diaspora who traditionally lean Democratic. The Pew Research Center estimates that there are 710,000 Indians and Indian Americans living in the New York City area, the most of any metropolitan centre in the US. Preliminary results from June's mayoral primary show that Mamdani scored big in neighbourhoods with strong Asian populations, like Little Bangladesh, Jackson Heights and Parkchester. A final tally of the ranked-choice ballots was released earlier this week, on July 1, showing Mamdani trounced his closest rival, Cuomo, 56 percent to 44. 'I've heard his win described as 'seismic',' said Arvind Rajagopal, a professor of media studies at New York University. 'He can speak not only Spanish but Hindi, Urdu, and passable Bangla. A candidate with this level of depth and breadth is rare in recent times.' Rajagopal added that Mamdani's decision to own his Muslim identity became an asset for him on the campaign trail, particularly in the current political climate. With President Donald Trump in office for a second term, many voters are bracing for the anti-Muslim rhetoric and policies that accompanied his first four years in the White House. Back then, Trump called for a 'total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States', saying they represented an 'influx of hatred' and 'danger'. 'The moment of Trump is something that Mamdani answers perfectly,' Rajagopal said. He called Mamdani's success 'a big reality check for the Hindu right'. Whatever backlash Mamdani is facing from Hindu groups, Jagpreet Singh is sceptical about its influence over New York City. 'I can assure you – it's not coming from within the city,' said Singh, the political director of DRUM Beats, a sister organisation to the social justice organisation Desis Rising Up and Moving. That group was among the first in the city to endorse Mamdani's candidacy for mayor. Since early in his campaign, Singh pointed out that Mamdani has reached out to Hindu working-class communities 'in an authentic way'. This included visiting the Durga Temple and Nepalese Cultural Center in Ridgewood and speaking at events in the Guyanese and Trinidadian Hindu communities, Singh pointed out. During his time as a state assembly member, Mamdani also pushed for legislation that would recognise Diwali – the Hindu festival of lights – as a state holiday. At a Diwali celebration last year, Singh said Mamdani 'took part in lighting of the diyas, spoke on stage, and talked about his mother's background as being somebody who is of Hindu faith'. To Singh, the message was clear. South Asian groups in New York City, including Hindu Americans, 'have adopted him as their own'.
