Let me start with my standard disclaimer. I do not identify as a liberal, Hindutva nationalist, Marxist, socialist, capitalist, conservative, libertarian, Dravidian nationalist, sanghi, bhakt, libtard, sickular, raita, trad, or whatever other colorful socio-politico-economic labels people use. I prefer the label freethinker. To me nothing is beyond the reach of critical inquiry. Based on such inquiry, I am a huge supporter of the doctrine of universal human rights (e.g., see this ode I wrote) and of democratic constitutional rule of law rooted in logic, reason, civility, and kindness. I also reject kraterocracy and Social Darwinism as ultimately inimical to humanity.
This post is a sequel to my previous one on the ongoing historic pivot in Indian polity. So, what is new now? Well, as per many credible recent polls, India's PM Narendra Modi has emerged consistently as the most popular democractically elected leader in the world and the only one with routinely over 75% approval. For a comparison, that is over 2x as much as Biden, Sunak, and Macron! Naturally, going into the 2024 parliamentary elections, Modi and his BJP/NDA are the favorites to win power again. All this despite the seemingly endless biased partisan narratives and spin against Modi/BJP seen in the liberal media worldwide ("Hindu fascism!", "Hindu supremacy!", "democratic backsliding!", "majoritarianism!", "upper caste hegemony!", blah, blah). What exactly is going on?
In this article, I posit that the rise of Modi/BJP is not just due to some lazy "majoritarian" policies nor even just his "economic development" agenda but also because Modi has fundamentally transformed Hindutva itself to be more "inclusive" in the sense of the DEI term. This is a central reason for Modi's immense popularity. In fact, the meteoric rise of the BJP/NDA under Modi is a groundbreaking success case study of DEI efforts worldwide. It is not a co-incidence that BJP's arch-rival, INC, gave specific prominence to the term "inclusive" in their new alliance's acronym. I think they are afraid that Modi is successfully co-opting inclusivity, which used to be a key USP of INC's "big tent" polity!
If my above claim feels jarring to you, not to worry, it took me years to get the full picture of this gradual but tectonic shift too! :) As someone who has worked on DEI activities for long in academia (e.g., see this article or this one), I understand two crucial facts about DEI: (1) diversity has multiple axes; and (2) intersectionality matters too. Modi/BJP seem to have a clear grasp of these two facts too and have masterfully used them to drive wedges to "divide and conquer" their opponents' (past) votebanks and convert some, while also consolidating their own. Of course, this is feasible because Indian society has numerous axes of diversity. In this article, I highlight some major axes where this inclusive pivot of Hindutva under Modi has borne fruit for BJP (or is likely to soon), while leaving confounded liberals in muddled disarray.
Pivot Axis 1: Caste
Caste is one of the biggest axes of diversity in India that is baked into the Constitution itself, as I explained in my my previous article (Fault Line 5). So, let us start with the obvious: Modi is from Other Backward Class (OBC) himself. In and of itself, this is a profound departure for the BJP, which has historically been dominated by so-called "upper" and "middle" castes. A loose American ethnoracial analogy would be the Republicans being led by a non-White Hispanic/Latino man. Furthermore, BJP under Modi has been carefully apportioning internal political power to not just upper/middle castes but also to OBCs, Scheduled Castes (SCs), and Scheduled Tribes (STs) even as they espouse "meritocracy" for elections and policy matters. Naturally, they have kept gaining significant voteshare among these groups. This has largely defanged the long-running "divide and conquer" caste politics of many liberal/other parties.
Two telling examples come from recent big-ticket state elections in North/Central India (Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, and Chattisgarh). First, a major caste identitarian party with a stronghold in Bihar that was a key part of the INC's alliance recently tried to resuscitate 1990s-style "OBC quota politics" ahead of those state elections. But they ate humble pie after voters, including most OBCs, roundly ignored their divisive agenda. That party has since ditched the INC re-allied with the BJP! Second, when deciding CMs and Deputy CMs for the big states they won in, Modi/BJP have been quite clever and calculative in apportioning power among these major caste groups to keep their house united.
Apart from apportioning real power, the BJP also gets the importance of representational diversity in highly visible roles in society. No such role is bigger than the President of India. Their first nominee (2017-2022) was only the second Dalit/SC man to be President. Even more groundbreaking--and celebratory for me too on DEI grounds--was their second nominee (2022-now), the very first ST person and only the second woman to be President. The impact of all this can be seen in the substantial shift in SC/ST voting behavior. Clearly, many people from these (historically) marginalized groups feel empowered by Modi's DEI efforts.
Pivot Axis 2: Decolonization and Indigenous Identity:
This one needs more careful unpacking. The father of Hindutva, Veer Savarkar, originally conceptualized it as an ethnogeographic idea, not a narrow religious one, although many liberals/Marxists still misunderstand it as the latter. In fact, as I have written before, the term "Hindu" (from ancient Persian) itself literally just means "Indian"; ergo, "Hindutva" literally just means "Indianness". :) And Savarkar himself was an atheist even though he waxed eloquent about India being the "mother land, father land, and holy land" for all of its myriad indigenous Hindu religions. This is also why the Sangh Parivar claims most Indian Muslims/Christians themselves are "Hindu" too, albeit practicing "foreign" religions. What gives?
Having lived in the USA for 15 years now and having been to some indigenous "nations" here (Ho-Chunk, Navajo, etc.), it is clear to me that Hindutva is closer to their self-conception of "sovereignty" over their ancestral lands, an assertion of indigenous cultural rights, and a desire for decolonization of their sacred sites. Analogizing Hindutva with European-style "Fascism" just because they used similar English terms, attire, or rituals early on is inaccurate and malicious. Analogizing Hindutva with Islamism is also inaccurate because Islam is a monolithic universalist religion without ethnogeographic rootedness (although I've read assertions that Islam is inherently Arab-Supremacist), while there is no monolithic "Hinduism", let alone universalist. The analogy with Zionism is more accurate but only partially because most Hindus were not ethnically cleansed from their ancestral homeland like the Jews--except those from areas now called Pak/B'desh and from Kashmir. This is partly why Israel and India have become thick friends under Modi/BJP, one of the sharpest recent pivots in international relations!
With the above lens, it is clear that many allegedly "Islamophobic" policies of Modi/BJP are not actually anti-Islam/anti-Muslim but just decolonization efforts. For instance, renaming many cities, streets, etc. to undo imposed Arabization/Persianization is akin to liberals undoing imposed Anglicization/Francization before. The disputes over the Ayodhya, Kashi, and Mathura temple sites (the big three) on which Islamo-Supremacist imperial/colonial powers imposed mosques are analogous to the indigenous sacred sites in the Americas over which White-Christo-Supremacist imperial/colonial powers imposed cathedrals, e.g., like this one in Mexico. The zeal of the Hindutva activists who tore down the Babri mosque is analogous to the zeal of the Black activists who tore down many Confederate statues in the USA. People lost patience over these painful reminders of India's (resp. USA's) Islamo-Supremacist (resp. White-Christo-Supremacist) past. This is why the new Ayodhya Ram temple has such high emotive appeal to most Hindus--it is a cultural catharsis after centuries of injustice. Modi/BJP get this viscerally and capitalized on its symbolic power. This is also why I think it will help reconciliation efforts if the Muslim clergy in charge of the disputed sites in Kashi and Mathura voluntarily relocate those mosques and return those indigenous sacred lands to the respective Hindu clergy. To quote MLK Jr.: "True peace is not merely the absence of tension; it is the presence of justice."
Of course, one nuance in all this decolonization stuff is that Urdu, used by many Indian Muslims, is a mix of Hindi and Persian, epitomizing Indo-Islamic syncretism. It is linguistically impossible to "decolonize" it--it will revert to just Hindi. :) As such, most urban Hindi speakers nowadays actually use Hinglish, analogous to Urdu. It is also absurd to call much of Indo-Islamic iconography, artwork, monuments, etc. as "not indigenous" when they were made in India for Indians by mostly Indians, even if those Indians practiced a foreign religion and had foriegn aesthetic influences. Modi/BJP must end their cultural xenophobia and grasp this aspect of inclusivity more going forward. And of course, let me re-emphasize the irony here: the term "Hindu" itself is not indigenous but an exonym coined by those same pesky Persians! :)
Pivot Axis 3: Religion
This is the most surprising axis for me, given how the BJP is often painted as "Anti-Muslim" and "Anti-Christian". The facts on the ground tell a different story than lazy liberal media narratives: the BJP is (somewhat successfully) driving wedges in those groups! A credible recent poll shows that the BJP's approval rating among Muslims is now at 36%, its highest ever. And 1/6th of Muslims want Modi himself to remain PM! Last I checked, nowhere near that many German Jews approved of Hitler's government after 9 years of his rule. :) So, I find it ludicrous that so many people still delusionally cry (faux) "fascism!" instead of seeing reality for what it is. The BJP also abolished the medieval triple talaq to help Muslim women, driving gender as a wedge among Muslims. The BJP is also driving caste as a wedge among Muslims with their clever outreach to so-called Pasmanda Muslims, collectively "middle" and "lower" caste Muslims. Many liberals do not even know about South Asian Muslim casteism and how SC/ST converts to Islam still face discrimination and/or marginalization within the Indian Muslim community. It remains to be seen if all this "outreach" will pan out substantially for Modi/BJP in May 2024 though. Of course, none of this detracts from the fact that violent hate crimes against some Muslim groups by Hindutva extremists have gone up. Modi/BJP must do more to invest in better domestic intelligence and policing to prevent hate crimes, while also condemning such violence.
As for Christians, some facts: 2 of 3 of India's only Christian-majority states (Meghalaya and Nagaland) and 2 more where Christians are a plurality (Manipur and Arunachal Pradesh) are now governed by the BJP and/or its NDA allies. Even in Kerala, a state that consistently alternates between liberals and Marxists and which has the largest Christian population in India, many Christians are switching to the BJP! Surely not all these people and states are absolute fools to be voting for an "Anti-Christian" party? :)
As for Sikhs, I see a correlation-causation subtlety: most Sikhs live in Punjab and many have economic discontents against Modi/BJP over the recent attempted reforms on farm produce sales. But I have not seen any credible claims against Modi/BJP of "Anti-Sikh" policies, just "anti-farmer" with many Punjabi farmers happening to be Sikhs. Of course, hyperbole among Khalistani separatists/extremists in Canada, USA, UK, Australia, etc. is a separate but related issue. They want to capitalize on the anti-BJP discontents in Punjab to resuscitate their movement, but they are detested by most Sikhs and/or Punjabis in India itself. That leaves 4 other tiny religious minorities: Buddhists, Jains, Zoroastrians, and Bahais. I have not seen any credible evidence of any discontents among them against Modi/BJP.
Pivot Axis 4: Region and Language
The BJP has long had a hilariously sticky stereotype: the "Hindi - Hindu - Hindustan / North Indian party"! :) In fact, many BJP leaders remain Hindi-Supremacist zealots, seeking to impose Hindi on all of India's 100s of ethnolinguistic groups as a link language to replace English. But many such groups reject Hindi and prefer English, which is more economically useful even though both those languages are "alien" to their culture, especially, Indian Tamils. Modi, who is not a Hindavi himself but a Gujarati, has mostly washed away those stereotypes. Continuing with an earlier point about India's Northeast, here is a whopping fact: 7 of 8 states there are now governed by the BJP and/or its NDA allies! This pivot has happened in part due to fears over border security and illegal migration from Bangladesh and Myanmar, issues on which Modi/BJP seem to have more credibility than their opponents.
Even more fascinating is the aggressive outreach done by Modi himself in wooing the states of South India. It is India's most developed region on average; so, BJP's "development" agenda has little novel appeal. Tamil Nadu and Kerala in particular also have a strong thread of atheism and secularism in polity; so, BJP's "Hindutva" agenda falls flat. Although BJP did become a major player in Karnataka over the last 20 years, the rest of South India continues to fascinate, flummox, and frustrate Modi/BJP. :) But they are doubling down. They dug up of the ancient symbol of rajadharma among Tamil kings, the Sengol, and installed it in Parliament. They gave a central role in that ceremony to Tamil Shaivite adheenams, unique in being led by non-Brahmin clergy, followed by a multi-faith prayer ceremony. The Kashi-Tamil Sangamam is also part of such outreach. South Indian temple music featured prominently in the inauguration of both the new Parliament and the new Ayodhya temple. None of these seem Earth-shattering in isolation. But collectively, they paint a radical new picture of the BJP under Modi: they have evolved to be inclusive on India's immense linguistic and regional diversity. It remains to be seen if all this will persuade South Indian voters substantially in May 2024 and beyond.
Pivot Axis 5: Women and LGBTQI+ People
I already mentioned the point about BJP's support for Muslim women earlier. But well beyond that, the BJP has surpassed the INC among all women. What is going on? It seems Modi's high-profile focus on day-to-day quality of life issues, as well as women-specific welfare schemes, appeals a lot to many women, especially from rural and/or lower-income groups. For instance, Modi's focus on home sanitation and toilets, derided by some urban elitist liberals as "pedestrian," actually matters a lot for rural women's personal safety against sexual assault. Likewise, Modi's obsessive focus on cleanliness as a matter of personal responsibility for men too also appeals to women who bear the brunt of unpaid domestic labor.
As for LGBTQI+ people, the BJP is curiously not so homophobic/biphobic/transphobic for an allegedly "rightwing" party in a developing nation. Contrast it with the abysmally cruel situation in the Middle East and Africa. In fact, the Sangh Parivar is internally divided, e.g., even the RSS head supports LGBTQI+ rights! I think a big part of the reason is that LGBTQI+ themes are pervasive in Hindu/Indian culture and history. The Supreme Court's landmark 2018 verdict on decriminalizing homosexuality happened under Modi's watch. After the earlier landmark 2014 verdict on trans/third gender rights, their situation has improved dramatically. Intersex rights have also taken giant leaps. But "LGB" rights still lag behind, the opposite of many Western democracies where "LGB" rights are ahead of "TI" rights. In fact, the BJP-led government opposed same-sex marriage in the Supreme Court recently, and the court agreed with their claim that Parliament has sole prerogative on this matter. Nevertheless, they agreed to implement a committee to ensure maritally-implied civil rights to same-sex couples too in keeping with the Constitution's Right to Equality. Alas, most laws on marriage, divorce, inheritance, adoption, etc. are a confused mess in India due to archaic and anti-secular religious laws. There is a pressing need to outlaw such religious laws and usher in the Uniform Civil Code (UCC), as advised in the Constitution itself, as befits a modern secular nation. The BJP has consistently advocated for the UCC, a necessary stepping stone toward full equality for all women and/or LGBTQI+ people.
Pivot Axis 6: Economics, Environment, and Climate Change
This is perhaps the most nuanced axis, mainly because it is inaccurate to call the BJP a purely "rightwing" party--the fact is they are further to the "left" of even most Democrats in the USA on many economic policies! :) For instance, Modi/BJP has kept expanding federal investment in public higher education, which helps inclusivity for more first-generation and/or rural college students. There has also been a quiet revolution in the digital economy and mobile payments, dramatically reducing barriers to participation in the modern economy by lower-income and/or rural people. Modi personally aggressively promotes many green tech initiatives and anti-climate change efforts. In fact, a telling recent policy move reveals his worldview: right after inaugurating the new Ayodhya Ram temple, he got "inspired" by Ram's solar dynasty lineage to launch a massive new solar panel initiative for millions of households. More generally, he is at ease weaving ancient Hindu ethical/cultural concepts, such as Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam (respect for all life and nature), with modern efforts to combat human-caused climate change. The BJP is also amping up nuclear energy in the mix to reduce India's carbon emissions, a necessity given its ongoing rapid economic growth. They also prudently continue past consensus-based foreign policies (started by the INC) on asserting India's right to put poverty alleviation first and stand up for climate justice for developing nations against bullying by developed nations.
Concluding Remarks
I have voted in elections only once in my life so far, in the 2009 Indian parliamentary elections, after which I moved to the USA. Who did I vote for? An inspiring independent candidate named Sarathbabu. He placed only fifth, but his real-life story is the stuff of film legends. Born into a poor Dalit/SC family with 4 other kids, raised by a gritty single mother after her husband died, helping his mom sell food on the streets to pay the bills, working hard on his education, and ultimately earning his place at the transformative IIM Ahmedabad. He availed of India's famous quota system created to uplift some (historically) marginalized groups. By sheer hard work and by building the right networks, he became a highly successful entrepreneur, founding his own catering company that fed the likes of Infosys. He had declared his descendents will not avail of the SC quota anymore because it had fulfilled its purpose and that they must work to be competitive in the free market of talent. Sarathbabu's trajectory is the truest essence of what the pathbreaking lead architect of India's Constitution, Dr. Ambedkar, also a Dalit himself, had envisioned for India's quota system--before it got debased by casteist votebank politics.
In Modi, I can now see some of that same ethos of grit, drive, and success against all odds. Born into a poor OBC family, selling tea on the streets to pay the bills, joining a then small-fry political party, working hard to become Gujarat's many-terms CM, and ultimately earning the trust of the largest set of voters in the world's largest democracy. Seeing this analogy now is an ironic pivot for me personally too. Why? Back in 2009, I compared different parties/ideologies to weigh who to vote for. I rejected 3 major options--INC, DMK, and ADMK--mainly due to their lack of meritocratic inner-party democracy, high corruption, nepotistic dynasty obsession (INC and DMK), and INC's failure to deliver full justice on the Anti-Sikh pogroms by their own partymen. But I also rejected the BJP, mainly due to their rationalization of violent hate crimes by Hindutva extremists and their then accommodation of Modi, who as CM failed to stop the tragic days-long Hindu-Muslim bloodshed in Godhra by not imposing martial law quickly. Of course, he was ultimately acquitted by the Supreme Court of any violation of law. I guess only Modi will know the full truth of why he did (not do) what he did (not do), answerable only to his conscience.
Nevertheless, it is abundantly clear to me now that Modi has long since vastly outgrown the shadow of Godhra. He is now a force to reckon with for not just his political opponents at home but also for all major world powers, an unprecedented feat in independent India's history. He has been recognized with a stunning array of high international honors, including from France, Russia, USA, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and even Palestine! Modi is not some mere "populist" or "majoritarian" politician nor is he "Islamophobic." In a decade, he has assiduously risen to a level that may soon match the mighty Indira Gandhi, India's greatest PM ever in my view, all things considered. In fact, Modi looks like the second coming of a curious mix of Indira Gandhi, Veer Savarkar, and Mahatma Gandhi himself due to the way he has transformed Hindutva in his own image to be more inclusive, authentic, decisive, unapologetic, and a nimble election-winning force, while also promoting personal austerity, peace in a war-weary world, and a cultivating a sage-like persona. So, good luck to all parties as May 2024 nears, especially to the non-NDA parties who will really need it in the face of this new juggernaut of Indian polity! :)
