rpant_gabba
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Here is an article which debunks y...y-so-why-did-indian-media-report-the-opposite
Let me know if you have a good explanation for haplogroup marker study
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Contact the PP Team
"They will gather all your wealth and distribute it among those who have more children": PM Modi's reference to Muslims shows his true face
- Thread starter FearlessRoar
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Let me know if you have a good explanation for haplogroup marker study
rpant_gabba
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https://scroll.in/article/936872/tw...y-so-why-did-indian-media-report-the-oppositeIn a major challenge to the popular “Aryan Invasion” theory, an Indo-US team of researchers on Friday presented scientific evidence from the Harappan era to argue that such a large-scale migration from central Asia to India never happened.
The research – published in Cell, one of the world’s top journals – not only sets aside the Aryan migration theory but also notes that the hunter-gatherers of Southeast Asia changed into farming communities of their own and were the authors of the Harappan civilisation.
The evidence comes from the analysis of DNA samples extracted from the skeleton of a woman buried in Rakhigarhi four to five millenia ago.
the Birbal Sahani Institute of Paleobotany, Lucknow, and one of the co-authors of the study told DH.
Rai said the research also pointed towards an “Out of India” theory around 2500-3000 BCE. The evidence comes from a related study by the same set of researchers, published simultaneously in the journal Science on Friday.
The Rakhigarhi woman’s genome matched those of 11 other ancient people who lived in what is now Iran and Turkmenistan at sites known to have exchanged objects with the Indus Valley Civilisation. All 12 had a distinctive mix of ancestry, including a lineage related to Southeast Asian hunter-gatherers and an Iranian-related lineage specific to South Asia.
The Indus Valley Civilisation, which at its height from 2600 to 1900 BCE covered a large swath of northwestern South Asia, was one of the world’s first large-scale urban societies. But there are still many unanswered queries on the ancient Indian civilisation.
New DNA study challenges Aryan invasion theory
In a major challenge to the popular “Aryan Invasion” theory, an Indo-US team of researchers on Friday presented scientific evidence from the Harappan era to argue that such a large-scale migration from central Asia to India never happened.www.deccanherald.com
Vikram1989
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Pro left media will support aryan theory and other did not .so it's better to go with analysis on genetics. I will trust scientific analysis and a solid research will suppress any prejudice.we can wait that.
rpant_gabba
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So u r not a geneticist or have any bio background but trust one media report of a study.
How about ignoring media and discussing the science?
I’m all ears for your explanation of the haplogroup marker data in the Spencer wells study
Vikram1989
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Bro am not saying haplogroup studies or DNA analysis as wrong, in general aryan theory is that north Indian, south indian upper caster mainly brahmins are European. South indian lower caste people are native indian tribes who got scholled of educated. That's the premise of Dravidian school of thought, so as per haplogroup study this theory is thrown in to bin.They were never an native indian and every one is a migrant.
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rpant_gabba
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Agree.
What is clear is there has been migration during different periods. The earlier taking the southerly route, sticking cloase teh coast and later taking the northerly route.
Combined with social practices, this different migration time period have created two physically distinct groups in the south.
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All this aryan and dalit and dravidian chat is irrelevant to this thread.
Please stay On the topic of thread
Please stay On the topic of thread
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Four anti-Muslim claims dominating India’s election: What’s the truth?
India’s Hindu nationalists have peddled conspiracy theories about Muslims. Here are some facts about their claims.
Muslim women show the indelible ink marks on their fingers after casting votes at a women only booth during the first round of polling of India’s national election in Doda district, Jammu and Kashmir
In April, as India was preparing for the first phase of its mammoth seven-stage national election that will conclude with results on June 4, pollsters asked voters what issues they were most concerned about.
Jobs and inflation ranked the highest in their responses. But as Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) have tried to defend their decade-long record of governance in the face of criticism from the opposition led by the Congress party, they have also been accused by critics of promoting tropes that, for a long time, have been anti-Muslim dog whistles for the country’s far-right.
The opposition has accused Modi of hate speech against Muslims, and India’s election commission – the independent authority tasked with holding the country’s polls – has sent a warning to the BJP party chief about the PM’s comments. Election laws do not allow the overt use of religion to garner votes. But Modi has denied that he engaged in hate speech.
Al Jazeera fact-checked four claims about Muslims – India’s largest religious minority, with a population of 200 million people – that have dominated the election discourse in recent days.
‘Those with more children’
What Modi said: During an election rally on April 21 in the western state of Rajasthan, Modi claimed that if the Congress party came to power, it would distribute the country’s wealth among Muslims. “When they were last in power, the Congress said that Muslims have the first right to the nation’s resources. What does that mean? If they come to power, that means they will collect all the wealth. And who will they give it to? Those who have more children. To infiltrators.”
Nearly a month later, when asked by a Network 18 reporter why he had used that language while speaking about Muslims on the stage in Rajasthan, the Indian prime minister denied he was referring to Muslims. “Why are you doing injustice to Muslims?” he said, saying that overpopulation prevails in poor families. “I never said Hindu or Muslim.”
But Modi has previously used the trope of Muslims having a particularly high reproductive rate. In 2002, after deadly anti-Muslim riots in the state of Gujarat, where he was chief minister at the time, he faced questions over his government’s failure to support relief camps for victims, which were mostly set up by non-profits and Muslim groups. In a campaign rally at the time, Modi had suggested that such relief camps could become “baby-producing centres”, and how for “some people”, that could mean a family of as many as 25 children.
The larger claim: The idea of a Muslim population explosion is central to a Hindu majoritarian conspiracy theory that suggests that the Muslim community is deliberately growing fast to overtake the Hindu population in the future.
It is not dissimilar to the “great replacement theory” in the West, a white nationalist conspiracy theory that says the immigration of people of colour will make white people a minority in Western countries. In India, the far-right refers to it as ‘population jihad‘.
After the prime minister’s Economic Advisory Committee released a report on May 7, suggesting that the share of Hindus in India’s population had declined by 7.8 percent between 1950 and 2015, and the Muslim share had grown by 43.2 percent, BJP leaders amplified suggestions that Hindus in the country would be in danger if the opposition came to power.
The facts: Critics have argued that the BJP’s claims make selective use of numbers to buttress a narrative of a demographic explosion, otherwise belied by the government’s own data. Overall, Muslims do have a higher birth rate than Hindus, but the gap between them is shrinking. The National Family Health Survey in India shows that Muslim women in India are facing the sharpest drop in total fertility rates in the three decades from 1992 to 2015. The total fertility rate for Muslims has dropped by 2.05 percent, compared with a 1.36 percent decline among Hindu women.
Fertility rates in India also vary widely by region. Nationally, the fertility rate is 2.36 percent for Muslims and 1.94 for Hindus. But in the north Indian state of Bihar, for instance, where 83 percent of the population is Hindu, the overall fertility rate is 3 percent – higher than the national average for both communities. Meanwhile, in the southern state of Kerala, where Hindus constitute 55 percent of the population and Muslims 27 percent, the overall fertility rate is 1.8.
‘Congress will snatch mangalsutras, give them to its vote bank’
What Modi said: In an April 23 speech, Modi also warned people that the Congress would take away the possessions – such as the bridal necklace, or mangalsutra – of Hindus and give it to its “vote bank”. Modi was widely understood to have been referring to Muslims. He has often accused the Congress of a “politics of appeasement” towards Muslims, which in the April 23 speech, he said he had exposed.
In the April 21 speech two days earlier, he referred to comments in 2006 by former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh of the Congress party to suggest if the opposition came to power, it would give Muslims the first rights to the nation’s resources.
The larger claim: Modi and the BJP have long alleged that the Congress favours Muslims over Hindus and that, through its decades of rule, the Congress – the party of Mahatma Gandhi that led the country’s freedom struggle – had “appeased” Muslims. In essence, the argument is that Muslims in India have been given privileged access to wealth and public benefits.
The facts: From education to health to income levels, Muslims are the most economically disadvantaged religious group in India. The government’s latest data suggests that while Muslims constitute 14 percent of the national population, they represent only 4.6 percent of students enrolled in higher education.
In June 2023, an Indian English daily, The Hindustan Times, analysed the government’s All India Debt and Investment Survey (AIDIS) and Periodic Labour Force Survey (PLFS) to show that Muslims are the poorest religious group in India.
Some analysts believe that Modi’s claim about former PM Singh assuring Muslims of the first right to national resources was a misrepresentation of what he had said. Singh, in his 2006 speech, had referred to prioritising the government’s responsibility to traditionally underprivileged castes, socially and economically backward communities, and religious minorities, particularly Muslims. Then, in a separate sentence, Singh had said: “They must have the first claim on resources.”
“When we listen to the entire speech of former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, we understand that he was not only talking about Muslims. He was talking about all deprived sections,” Siddarth Sarathe, a fact-checker from the Quint, an Indian media outlet, told Al Jazeera.
‘Congress will take away reservations’
What Modi said: During a rally in West Bengal state on May 12, Modi said the opposition Congress party was planning to take away job reservations from Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes and Other Backward Classes (OBCs) – underprivileged communities that are beneficiaries of Indian affirmative action policies – and give them to Muslims.
On May 21, he doubled down on the claim in another speech.
The larger claim: Modi and the BJP are accusing opposition parties of taking away affirmative action benefits meant for lower-caste Hindus and handing those over to Muslims.
The facts: The Indian government’s affirmative action programmes – reservations in jobs and education – are solely based on caste and socioeconomic criteria, not on religion. A Pew Research Center report from 2021 says that nearly all Indians, regardless of religion, identify with a caste. About 43 percent of Muslim respondents identified as part of the “Other/Most Backward” classes.
In state after state, governments across party lines have for decades offered caste-based reservations. And those belonging to traditionally underprivileged castes have been beneficiaries – whether Hindu, Muslim or from any other faith.
In fact, Modi himself boasted in 2022 of his track record in Gujarat, when he led the state.
“Among Muslims in Gujarat, there are 70 groups, who are OBC. When I was in Gujarat, they used to get benefits in the OBC category,” he said.
‘Love jihad’
What BJP says: Modi referred to this conspiracy theory in passing in a speech in April, but it is a favourite theme for the BJP and its allies. In the southern state of Karnataka, which voted in late April and early May, and where the BJP was voted out of power last year, BJP leaders have claimed that cases of ‘love jihad‘ have gone up since then.
The larger claim: But what is ‘love jihad’? The conspiracy theory that accuses Muslim men of deliberately luring Hindu women into converting to Islam. The theory has existed since the late 2000s, and prominent cases emerged in 2009 in Kerala and Karnataka.
The theory has been amplified by the BJP governments across the country, with several states introducing anti-conversion legislation and intensifying police crackdown on Muslim men and interfaith couples.
A Bollywood film titled Kerala Story released last year was also accused of peddling the ‘love jihad’ theory. The film, which was promoted by Modi, showed women and girls in southern Kerala state converting to Islam to be recruited into the ISIL (ISIS) armed group. It also claimed that 32,000 had disappeared from the state to join ISIL.
The facts: The ‘love jihad’ theory is not backed by facts or evidence, and Indian courts have ruled out that there was an organised conspiracy by Muslims to woo Hindu women and convert them to Islam. Bridge, a Georgetown University research project, has called it “widely debunked” in a factsheet.
The claims in Kerala Story were also challenged by both fact-checking groups and by local communities in Kerala. The filmmakers admitted that the figures used in the film were inauthentic and that only three women joined ISIL.
SOURCE: AL JAZEERA
India’s Hindu nationalists have peddled conspiracy theories about Muslims. Here are some facts about their claims.
Muslim women show the indelible ink marks on their fingers after casting votes at a women only booth during the first round of polling of India’s national election in Doda district, Jammu and Kashmir
In April, as India was preparing for the first phase of its mammoth seven-stage national election that will conclude with results on June 4, pollsters asked voters what issues they were most concerned about.
Jobs and inflation ranked the highest in their responses. But as Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) have tried to defend their decade-long record of governance in the face of criticism from the opposition led by the Congress party, they have also been accused by critics of promoting tropes that, for a long time, have been anti-Muslim dog whistles for the country’s far-right.
The opposition has accused Modi of hate speech against Muslims, and India’s election commission – the independent authority tasked with holding the country’s polls – has sent a warning to the BJP party chief about the PM’s comments. Election laws do not allow the overt use of religion to garner votes. But Modi has denied that he engaged in hate speech.
Al Jazeera fact-checked four claims about Muslims – India’s largest religious minority, with a population of 200 million people – that have dominated the election discourse in recent days.
‘Those with more children’
What Modi said: During an election rally on April 21 in the western state of Rajasthan, Modi claimed that if the Congress party came to power, it would distribute the country’s wealth among Muslims. “When they were last in power, the Congress said that Muslims have the first right to the nation’s resources. What does that mean? If they come to power, that means they will collect all the wealth. And who will they give it to? Those who have more children. To infiltrators.”
Nearly a month later, when asked by a Network 18 reporter why he had used that language while speaking about Muslims on the stage in Rajasthan, the Indian prime minister denied he was referring to Muslims. “Why are you doing injustice to Muslims?” he said, saying that overpopulation prevails in poor families. “I never said Hindu or Muslim.”
But Modi has previously used the trope of Muslims having a particularly high reproductive rate. In 2002, after deadly anti-Muslim riots in the state of Gujarat, where he was chief minister at the time, he faced questions over his government’s failure to support relief camps for victims, which were mostly set up by non-profits and Muslim groups. In a campaign rally at the time, Modi had suggested that such relief camps could become “baby-producing centres”, and how for “some people”, that could mean a family of as many as 25 children.
The larger claim: The idea of a Muslim population explosion is central to a Hindu majoritarian conspiracy theory that suggests that the Muslim community is deliberately growing fast to overtake the Hindu population in the future.
It is not dissimilar to the “great replacement theory” in the West, a white nationalist conspiracy theory that says the immigration of people of colour will make white people a minority in Western countries. In India, the far-right refers to it as ‘population jihad‘.
After the prime minister’s Economic Advisory Committee released a report on May 7, suggesting that the share of Hindus in India’s population had declined by 7.8 percent between 1950 and 2015, and the Muslim share had grown by 43.2 percent, BJP leaders amplified suggestions that Hindus in the country would be in danger if the opposition came to power.
The facts: Critics have argued that the BJP’s claims make selective use of numbers to buttress a narrative of a demographic explosion, otherwise belied by the government’s own data. Overall, Muslims do have a higher birth rate than Hindus, but the gap between them is shrinking. The National Family Health Survey in India shows that Muslim women in India are facing the sharpest drop in total fertility rates in the three decades from 1992 to 2015. The total fertility rate for Muslims has dropped by 2.05 percent, compared with a 1.36 percent decline among Hindu women.
Fertility rates in India also vary widely by region. Nationally, the fertility rate is 2.36 percent for Muslims and 1.94 for Hindus. But in the north Indian state of Bihar, for instance, where 83 percent of the population is Hindu, the overall fertility rate is 3 percent – higher than the national average for both communities. Meanwhile, in the southern state of Kerala, where Hindus constitute 55 percent of the population and Muslims 27 percent, the overall fertility rate is 1.8.
‘Congress will snatch mangalsutras, give them to its vote bank’
What Modi said: In an April 23 speech, Modi also warned people that the Congress would take away the possessions – such as the bridal necklace, or mangalsutra – of Hindus and give it to its “vote bank”. Modi was widely understood to have been referring to Muslims. He has often accused the Congress of a “politics of appeasement” towards Muslims, which in the April 23 speech, he said he had exposed.
In the April 21 speech two days earlier, he referred to comments in 2006 by former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh of the Congress party to suggest if the opposition came to power, it would give Muslims the first rights to the nation’s resources.
The larger claim: Modi and the BJP have long alleged that the Congress favours Muslims over Hindus and that, through its decades of rule, the Congress – the party of Mahatma Gandhi that led the country’s freedom struggle – had “appeased” Muslims. In essence, the argument is that Muslims in India have been given privileged access to wealth and public benefits.
The facts: From education to health to income levels, Muslims are the most economically disadvantaged religious group in India. The government’s latest data suggests that while Muslims constitute 14 percent of the national population, they represent only 4.6 percent of students enrolled in higher education.
In June 2023, an Indian English daily, The Hindustan Times, analysed the government’s All India Debt and Investment Survey (AIDIS) and Periodic Labour Force Survey (PLFS) to show that Muslims are the poorest religious group in India.
Some analysts believe that Modi’s claim about former PM Singh assuring Muslims of the first right to national resources was a misrepresentation of what he had said. Singh, in his 2006 speech, had referred to prioritising the government’s responsibility to traditionally underprivileged castes, socially and economically backward communities, and religious minorities, particularly Muslims. Then, in a separate sentence, Singh had said: “They must have the first claim on resources.”
“When we listen to the entire speech of former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, we understand that he was not only talking about Muslims. He was talking about all deprived sections,” Siddarth Sarathe, a fact-checker from the Quint, an Indian media outlet, told Al Jazeera.
‘Congress will take away reservations’
What Modi said: During a rally in West Bengal state on May 12, Modi said the opposition Congress party was planning to take away job reservations from Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes and Other Backward Classes (OBCs) – underprivileged communities that are beneficiaries of Indian affirmative action policies – and give them to Muslims.
On May 21, he doubled down on the claim in another speech.
The larger claim: Modi and the BJP are accusing opposition parties of taking away affirmative action benefits meant for lower-caste Hindus and handing those over to Muslims.
The facts: The Indian government’s affirmative action programmes – reservations in jobs and education – are solely based on caste and socioeconomic criteria, not on religion. A Pew Research Center report from 2021 says that nearly all Indians, regardless of religion, identify with a caste. About 43 percent of Muslim respondents identified as part of the “Other/Most Backward” classes.
In state after state, governments across party lines have for decades offered caste-based reservations. And those belonging to traditionally underprivileged castes have been beneficiaries – whether Hindu, Muslim or from any other faith.
In fact, Modi himself boasted in 2022 of his track record in Gujarat, when he led the state.
“Among Muslims in Gujarat, there are 70 groups, who are OBC. When I was in Gujarat, they used to get benefits in the OBC category,” he said.
‘Love jihad’
What BJP says: Modi referred to this conspiracy theory in passing in a speech in April, but it is a favourite theme for the BJP and its allies. In the southern state of Karnataka, which voted in late April and early May, and where the BJP was voted out of power last year, BJP leaders have claimed that cases of ‘love jihad‘ have gone up since then.
The larger claim: But what is ‘love jihad’? The conspiracy theory that accuses Muslim men of deliberately luring Hindu women into converting to Islam. The theory has existed since the late 2000s, and prominent cases emerged in 2009 in Kerala and Karnataka.
The theory has been amplified by the BJP governments across the country, with several states introducing anti-conversion legislation and intensifying police crackdown on Muslim men and interfaith couples.
A Bollywood film titled Kerala Story released last year was also accused of peddling the ‘love jihad’ theory. The film, which was promoted by Modi, showed women and girls in southern Kerala state converting to Islam to be recruited into the ISIL (ISIS) armed group. It also claimed that 32,000 had disappeared from the state to join ISIL.
The facts: The ‘love jihad’ theory is not backed by facts or evidence, and Indian courts have ruled out that there was an organised conspiracy by Muslims to woo Hindu women and convert them to Islam. Bridge, a Georgetown University research project, has called it “widely debunked” in a factsheet.
The claims in Kerala Story were also challenged by both fact-checking groups and by local communities in Kerala. The filmmakers admitted that the figures used in the film were inauthentic and that only three women joined ISIL.
SOURCE: AL JAZEERA
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Darker days lay ahead for opposition, minorities after India’s election
For many commentators, an unequivocal victory for Narendra Modi and his Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is the foregone conclusion of the ongoing Indian general elections. They insist that the question is not if Modi will win but by how much in terms of seats and votes.
Yet, despite this seeming certainty regarding the outcome of these elections, the ruling party and its leader have appeared jittery. And after the winner is declared, I worry, darker and more repressive days may follow.
The Indian elections are indeed a big deal. A total of 543 seats in the lower house are up for grabs for 2600 registered political parties. With 969 million eligible voters, it is also the world’s largest election. The Election Commission of India (ECI) has 15 million people employed to monitor and facilitate the elections. Polling has also been spread across 44 days. In this period, incumbent Prime Minister Modi, in search for a third term, has reportedly attended over 200 public events and given 80 interviews.
It would be easy to say that what we are witnessing is a celebration of democracy. But numbers can be deceptive.
For a few years now India has witnessed a steady democratic downturn. Media and press freedoms have been suppressed and there is little to speak of in terms of journalistic independence in the mainstream. Often dubbed as Godi media – a play on Modi’s name and the word for “lapdogs” – it is not uncommon for mainstream journalism to operate as an arm of the BJP propaganda machinery. Critical journalists have also been targeted by the PM’s cadres as well as federal economic and investigative agencies. In 2024, Reporters without Borders declared the Indian media to be in an “unofficial state of emergency”. The rights of minority groups have also been systematically under attack. Punitive measures have included arbitrary detention and arrests, public floggings and the demolition of homes, businesses and places of worship.
All of these measures helped the Modi-led Hindu nationalists become a hegemonic force in Indian politics long before the elections. Yet, in the lead-up to these elections, they have seemed unsure of their standing. But why?
Commentators have noted that despite no one doubting that Modi will win the elections, the jingoism around him as a leader embarking on a third term has been noticeably lacklustre. As the elections proceeded this has been reflected in the slightly low voter turnout. The BJP’s self-image as a “corruption slayer” took a beating in late March when the Supreme Court-led disclosers of the Electoral Bonds scheme – a highly secretive “election funding” program introduced by the Modi government in the 2017 Finance Bill – revealed that the BJP was its largest beneficiary. The opposition has called the scheme “the world’s largest extortion racket” run by the prime minister himself.
There also seems to be a lack of marquee election issues to galvanise voters. Greatly hyped electoral promises like the construction of the Ram temple in Ayodhya on top of the ruins of Babri Masjid that was destroyed by a Hindu mob in 1992 and the revocation of the constitutional guaranteed special status for the state of Jammu and Kashmir have already been fulfilled. Attention has turned to “bread-and-butter issues” and the performance of the ruling party on “economic growth, job creation, and poverty alleviation” has been less than stellar. Nearly 800 million people remain dependent on government rations. Unemployment rate among 20–24-year-olds hovers around 50 percent. India today is also more unequal than it was under British colonial rule. Under Modi, the top one percent’s income and wealth shares reached 22.6 percent and 40.1 percent respectively. The income share of India’s top one percent is now among the “highest in the world”, above South Africa, Brazil and the United States.
Nervous about how these issues would affect the ruling party’s election prospects, the government has been uncompromising.
The ruling BJP party has more money than all the other political parties combined. Yet, when the Congress, India’s largest opposition party, attempted to attract small, individual donations, the government weaponised the Income Tax Department and froze the party’s bank account. Tax authorities have also confiscated $14m from the party.
Former party chief Rahul Gandhi said the Congress was unable to campaign before the elections. “We can’t support our workers, and our candidates and leaders can’t travel by air or train,” he told reporters. “This is a criminal action on the Congress party done by the prime minister and the home minister,” he added. “The idea that India is a democracy is a lie. There is no democracy in India today,”
Less than a month before the start of the elections, Delhi Chief Minister and leader of Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) Arvind Kejriwal was arrested by the federal financial crimes agency on “graft allegations” in relation to Delhi’s liquor policy. Members of the party have said that this was a politically motivated move and done to prevent him from campaigning. The senior AAP leader and Delhi’s finance leader Atishi said, “This was a way to steal elections.”
The BJP has also endeavoured to remind the electorate of its “origin story” – namely its Islamophobic ethos and aspirations. Modi usually lets others in the BJP cadre engage in overtly Islamophobic rhetoric, while he himself maintains the aura of a stoic spiritual leader. Yet, this time around he has felt the need to take on the Islamophobia mantle. On the campaign trail, he has regularly used communal language and called Muslims “infiltrators [with] large families”. Without any evidence, Modi has claimed that under Congress rule Muslims “have first right over resources”. He warned that the opposition party would gather all the wealth of Hindus and redistribute it among the “infiltrators”. Modi also warned Hindu women that the opposition party would take away their gold and “redistribute it to Muslims”. During a public rally in Khargone, Madhya Pradesh, Modi also said that Congress was committing “vote Jihad” by uniting Muslims against him.
On June 4, Modi will most likely be declared the winner. But a victory will not make the ruling party or its leader any less anxious about its hold over Indian politics. As it has done in the lead-up to the elections, it is likely that BJP and Modi will continue their efforts to further entrench Hindu nationalist hegemony and dominance. Unfortunately, in an already declining democracy, this would mean more repressive measures and possibly the suppression of all remaining avenues of protest and opposition to Hindu nationalist hegemony.
ALJAZEERA
For many commentators, an unequivocal victory for Narendra Modi and his Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is the foregone conclusion of the ongoing Indian general elections. They insist that the question is not if Modi will win but by how much in terms of seats and votes.
Yet, despite this seeming certainty regarding the outcome of these elections, the ruling party and its leader have appeared jittery. And after the winner is declared, I worry, darker and more repressive days may follow.
The Indian elections are indeed a big deal. A total of 543 seats in the lower house are up for grabs for 2600 registered political parties. With 969 million eligible voters, it is also the world’s largest election. The Election Commission of India (ECI) has 15 million people employed to monitor and facilitate the elections. Polling has also been spread across 44 days. In this period, incumbent Prime Minister Modi, in search for a third term, has reportedly attended over 200 public events and given 80 interviews.
It would be easy to say that what we are witnessing is a celebration of democracy. But numbers can be deceptive.
For a few years now India has witnessed a steady democratic downturn. Media and press freedoms have been suppressed and there is little to speak of in terms of journalistic independence in the mainstream. Often dubbed as Godi media – a play on Modi’s name and the word for “lapdogs” – it is not uncommon for mainstream journalism to operate as an arm of the BJP propaganda machinery. Critical journalists have also been targeted by the PM’s cadres as well as federal economic and investigative agencies. In 2024, Reporters without Borders declared the Indian media to be in an “unofficial state of emergency”. The rights of minority groups have also been systematically under attack. Punitive measures have included arbitrary detention and arrests, public floggings and the demolition of homes, businesses and places of worship.
All of these measures helped the Modi-led Hindu nationalists become a hegemonic force in Indian politics long before the elections. Yet, in the lead-up to these elections, they have seemed unsure of their standing. But why?
Commentators have noted that despite no one doubting that Modi will win the elections, the jingoism around him as a leader embarking on a third term has been noticeably lacklustre. As the elections proceeded this has been reflected in the slightly low voter turnout. The BJP’s self-image as a “corruption slayer” took a beating in late March when the Supreme Court-led disclosers of the Electoral Bonds scheme – a highly secretive “election funding” program introduced by the Modi government in the 2017 Finance Bill – revealed that the BJP was its largest beneficiary. The opposition has called the scheme “the world’s largest extortion racket” run by the prime minister himself.
There also seems to be a lack of marquee election issues to galvanise voters. Greatly hyped electoral promises like the construction of the Ram temple in Ayodhya on top of the ruins of Babri Masjid that was destroyed by a Hindu mob in 1992 and the revocation of the constitutional guaranteed special status for the state of Jammu and Kashmir have already been fulfilled. Attention has turned to “bread-and-butter issues” and the performance of the ruling party on “economic growth, job creation, and poverty alleviation” has been less than stellar. Nearly 800 million people remain dependent on government rations. Unemployment rate among 20–24-year-olds hovers around 50 percent. India today is also more unequal than it was under British colonial rule. Under Modi, the top one percent’s income and wealth shares reached 22.6 percent and 40.1 percent respectively. The income share of India’s top one percent is now among the “highest in the world”, above South Africa, Brazil and the United States.
Nervous about how these issues would affect the ruling party’s election prospects, the government has been uncompromising.
The ruling BJP party has more money than all the other political parties combined. Yet, when the Congress, India’s largest opposition party, attempted to attract small, individual donations, the government weaponised the Income Tax Department and froze the party’s bank account. Tax authorities have also confiscated $14m from the party.
Former party chief Rahul Gandhi said the Congress was unable to campaign before the elections. “We can’t support our workers, and our candidates and leaders can’t travel by air or train,” he told reporters. “This is a criminal action on the Congress party done by the prime minister and the home minister,” he added. “The idea that India is a democracy is a lie. There is no democracy in India today,”
Less than a month before the start of the elections, Delhi Chief Minister and leader of Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) Arvind Kejriwal was arrested by the federal financial crimes agency on “graft allegations” in relation to Delhi’s liquor policy. Members of the party have said that this was a politically motivated move and done to prevent him from campaigning. The senior AAP leader and Delhi’s finance leader Atishi said, “This was a way to steal elections.”
The BJP has also endeavoured to remind the electorate of its “origin story” – namely its Islamophobic ethos and aspirations. Modi usually lets others in the BJP cadre engage in overtly Islamophobic rhetoric, while he himself maintains the aura of a stoic spiritual leader. Yet, this time around he has felt the need to take on the Islamophobia mantle. On the campaign trail, he has regularly used communal language and called Muslims “infiltrators [with] large families”. Without any evidence, Modi has claimed that under Congress rule Muslims “have first right over resources”. He warned that the opposition party would gather all the wealth of Hindus and redistribute it among the “infiltrators”. Modi also warned Hindu women that the opposition party would take away their gold and “redistribute it to Muslims”. During a public rally in Khargone, Madhya Pradesh, Modi also said that Congress was committing “vote Jihad” by uniting Muslims against him.
On June 4, Modi will most likely be declared the winner. But a victory will not make the ruling party or its leader any less anxious about its hold over Indian politics. As it has done in the lead-up to the elections, it is likely that BJP and Modi will continue their efforts to further entrench Hindu nationalist hegemony and dominance. Unfortunately, in an already declining democracy, this would mean more repressive measures and possibly the suppression of all remaining avenues of protest and opposition to Hindu nationalist hegemony.
ALJAZEERA
Interesting thread. Modi used the term 'infiltrators' for illegal Bangladeshis and rohingyas. However, the reality is Indian urban societies are providing employment to.these so called infiltrators. Men work as drivers and women work as domestic help. Everybody knows they are bangladeshis but they also embrace them as they are cheap labor. Government turns a blind eye because these people aren't violent and indulge in honest labor. West Bengal is the port of entry and the CM uses these people as vote banks.
Does BJP hate Muslims? I think BJP thinks hindus hate Muslims and hence there is a common factor to seek votes. The reality is most hindus don't care. In urban areas even though residential.areas are segregated, there is daily cordial interaction between Muslims and hindus in schools, colleges and work places. Infact it's even embarrassing for many hindus to hear these comments from politicians before elections.
As far as demographics go, hindus aren't 80 percent population as many claim. They are around 60 percent. There are many christians with hindu names and claim to be hindu so they qualify for affirmative action/reservations under the SC/ST quota. The real demography is 60 pc hindus, 25 pc muslim and 10 pc Christian. Out of this 60 pc hindu, around 35 to 40 percent vote for BJP. 8 pc of Muslims used to vote for BJP but this election it has come down to 2 pc because of this crazy rhetoric.
Anyway, in India people vote for freebies. The reason congress gained as many seats as it did is because of a promise to give 1 lakh to every poor woman and to unemployed youth. It would have probably bankrupted India. I'm pretty sure the freebie race will heat up in the next election cycle as well.
Does BJP hate Muslims? I think BJP thinks hindus hate Muslims and hence there is a common factor to seek votes. The reality is most hindus don't care. In urban areas even though residential.areas are segregated, there is daily cordial interaction between Muslims and hindus in schools, colleges and work places. Infact it's even embarrassing for many hindus to hear these comments from politicians before elections.
As far as demographics go, hindus aren't 80 percent population as many claim. They are around 60 percent. There are many christians with hindu names and claim to be hindu so they qualify for affirmative action/reservations under the SC/ST quota. The real demography is 60 pc hindus, 25 pc muslim and 10 pc Christian. Out of this 60 pc hindu, around 35 to 40 percent vote for BJP. 8 pc of Muslims used to vote for BJP but this election it has come down to 2 pc because of this crazy rhetoric.
Anyway, in India people vote for freebies. The reason congress gained as many seats as it did is because of a promise to give 1 lakh to every poor woman and to unemployed youth. It would have probably bankrupted India. I'm pretty sure the freebie race will heat up in the next election cycle as well.
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