6 Special reportIndia The EconomistOctober 26th 2019
2 the group assigned him to work in one of
the newer members of the Hindutva “fam-
ily”, the bjp.
The party was a big success. It captured
power in Gujarat in 1995 and made Mr Modi
the state’s chief minister in 2001 before ele-
vating him to its national leadership in- He not only led the bjpto two thump-
ing general-election victories, but in the
capable fists of his chief henchman from
Gujarat, Amit Shah, the party has expanded
its membership to 180m people (making it
the world’s largest political party) and, with
its allies, stormed to power in 18 out of the
29 state assemblies.
During Mr Modi’s first term, hardline
Hindus complained that their agenda was
not vigorously pursued. His government
did move gently on such touchstone Hin-
dutva issues as the building of a Ram temple atop a demolished
mosque in Ayodhya, and demands to stamp Indian rule more firm-
ly onto the restive, Muslim-majority state of Jammu & Kashmir.
Quietly, however, it carried out a wholesale turnover of personnel
that has transformed key institutions. In effect, Mr Modi has im-
planted a new, rss-friendly nomenklatura nationwide, ranging
from Yogi Adityanath, a far-right Hindu priest who is now chief
minister of Uttar Pradesh, India’s most populous state, to the pli-
ant heads of state universities, friendly judges, army officers,
boards of state-owned firms and bosses of private news networks.
In his own office, say former bureaucrats, Mr Modi’s preference
for “hard work” over fancy degrees has often meant rewarding loy-
alty over competence. The previous Con-
gress government frequently ignored ad-
vice, says Puja Mehra, author of a book that
laments lost economic opportunities un-
der both governments. Mr Modi’s simply
got rid of dissenting advisers. The director
of a think-tank concurs. “His inner circle
don’t listen to anybody with an indepen-
dent mind. They say, ‘first agree with me’,”
he says. “Our civil-service culture is at-
tuned to anticipating what the big man
wants. And what Modi wants is control.”
So far in his second term, Mr Modi’s
team has shown less circumspection about
its Hindutva agenda. Ram Madhav, a bjp
leader, penned a post-election op-ed that
hinted at more aggressive purges. The
party’s new mandate, he wrote, is a rejec-
tion of “the pseudo-secular/liberal cartels
that held a disproportionate sway and stranglehold over the intel-
lectual and policy establishment of the country”. In a second term,
he insisted, “the remnants of that cartel need to be discarded from
the country’s academic, cultural and intellectual landscape.”
Mr Modi’s move in August to tear down seven decades of com-
plex constitutional niceties that had afforded the Muslim-major-
ity Indian state of Jammu & Kashmir ostensible autonomy was a
shock, but one that plenty of opponents had foreseen. The move
split the territory in two, placed both parts under direct rule from
Delhi and clamped 7.5m people under a virtual blockade. With the
issue of the Ram temple having reached India’s supreme court, a
bjpminister in Uttar Pradesh crowed that it would soon be built
because “the judiciary is ours”.
Apparently not concerned that a campaign in the state of As-
sam to check nationality credentials has labelled nearly 2m resi-
dents as foreigners, Mr Modi’s government is building prisons to
hold them, and says it plans to expand the exercise across the
country. Amid Hindutva complaints that many of the supposed in-
truders are Hindu, the government plans a law that, in a worrying
challenge to the secular constitution, will accept refugees from
nearby states as long as they are not Muslim. In the meantime Mr
Shah, the home minister, has used the bjplock on parliament to
force through laws that reinforce powers of arbitrary arrest and
weaken public oversight.
The prime minister has, to a large extent, already achieved a
long-standing goal of Hindu nationalists, by cutting across caste
and ethnic boundaries to forge an unusual degree of unity among
Hindus. But in doing so he has deepened yet another of India’s di-
vides. For decades the country’s underlying debate has been about
whether to be strong by embracing diversity as a nation of citizens
with equal rights or by fashioning India as a Hindu state.
Many, perhaps even most, of his own voters may not have in-
tended it, but Mr Modi’s election victory has settled that debate in
favour of Hindutva. And Mr Modi may not have intended it, but at
street level the shifting balance can be seen in cruder form, as Hin-
du vigilante groups violently enforce bans against the slaughter of
cows, or simply harass people who too obviously belong to the
world’s largest minority, India’s 190m Muslims.
The underlying message is that either Muslims submit, or they
fight and we crush them, says Harsh Mander, who runs a group
working with victims of communal violence. He fears the country
has rejected ideals of kindness and consensus in favour of self-
righteous force. “When there were riots in Delhi after Partition,
Mahatma Gandhi said he would not leave the city until there is not
a single Muslim child who would feel afraid here,” he says. “And
look where we are now.” 7Changing of the guardSource:TrivediCentreforPoliticalDataIndia, dominant parties’ vote share in national
elections and seat share in Lok Sabha, %0204060801984 89 91 96 98 99 2004 09 14 19Voteshare Congress
Seat share CongressBJP
BJPKashmir burning