India is...a bit of a worry

Spotted in Gulf News:

Malayalam actress and fashion designer Poornima Indrajith and award-winning music composer Shaan Rahman, who have been at the forefront of Kerala flood rescue efforts, on Monday slammed haters who were spreading bigotry and hate in the wake of mass destruction.

While the majority of civilians and officials have stepped up to help the rain-ravaged Kerala to return to normalcy, there is a section of people on social media who displayed bigotry by claiming that the South Indian state had invited the floods due to their beef-eating habits.

Another hate-spewing comment was that an Indian deity was showing its fury on the state, when a section of its residents demanded that women be allowed in the temple that housed the idol.

More broadly, from a recent editorial piece from the ANU based  East Asia Forum:

Modern Hindu nationalism is not mere traditionalism, says Arun Swamy. The Hindu nationalists seek not so much to preserve existing social hierarchies in Hindu cultures as they do to rewrite social orders fascistically to the benefit of Hindu populations. The Modi government appears to be actively pursuing ‘history rewriting’ and ‘historic romanticism’ agendas and has appointed what seems to be a historical revision committee to ‘prove that today’s Hindus are directly descended from the land’s first inhabitants and make the case that ancient Hindu scriptures are fact not myth’. Other concerns include Modi’s pick for Uttar Pradesh chief minister, a Hindu priest who has incited violence against Muslims, and legislative developments in BJP-controlled states that presume guilt until proven innocent in cases of cow slaughter and urge the enforcement of archaic laws against cattle slaughter (even in Muslim-majority communities).

‘The Hindu nationalist rhetoric was played down (at least by Modi)’, as Adeney explains, ‘in favour of a development narrative. He put himself forward as a normal man, contrasting his humble origins with the “little princeling” Rahul Gandhi, presumed to be prime minister-designate of the Congress though never officially named as such’. The long-term electoral project of the BJP is rather to showcase right wing majoritarianism as the natural force synonymous with the welfare and development of India — hence perhaps that choice of chief minister in Uttar Pradesh.

Events since 2014 raise the question of whether the BJP is the new dominant party of Indian politics. It has captured a raft of state legislatures, and although it did not manage to win a majority in the recent state election in Karnataka, it did win the largest number of seats.