Comment by anon291
1 day ago
I disagree with the Modi and Hindutva project almost entirely, not only politically, but on a personal level coming from a minority community (Christian) in India. However, India is in what basically amounts to a perpetual state of war with Pakistan and has always been this way. India rarely agresses Pakistan and Pakistani terror groups do operate with seeming impunity in India (Pakistan doesn't even maintain a 'no-first-use' nuclear option, and is currently run by a military dictatorship... they're f'ing nuts). While all these actions are obviously crazy and in my opinion overbearing, people in the West don't understand how awful radical Islam is, especially of the South Asian variety. I'm not sure many Americans would react differently to the extremism of South Asian Islam to be honest.
To put it in perspective, many Indians (of all religions) died and fought in a bloody war to secure Bangladesh's (then East Pakistan's) freedom from what was a genocidal regime in West Pakistan. Decades later, the typical Bangladeshi muslim still hates Indians because any non-muslim Indian they consider 'Hindu', thus polytheist, and thus worthy of death. One thousand five hundred Indian soldiers died only for their neighbor to hate them in return for the 'crime' of not being born part of their religion. While Hindu nationalists are fucking insane, I honestly think many have been driven to it by the insanity of South Asian Islam.
Meanwhile, America has a relatively peaceful and cooperative neighbor (Mexico), which only has a crime problem on the border, and the average American seems ready to give up almost every civic right to deal with that. There are barely any terror attacks of note coming from these Mexican gangs, and congress has already ceded many constitutional rights (such as the right against unreasonable search and seizure) near the border zones. Anyway, imagine Mexicans hated everyone in America for the crime of being 'gringos' (even the non-whites) and that's basically what India has with all their neighbors.
If people in the west want India to liberalize, which we really should want to do, Western nations need to work on dismantling Pakistan and limiting Islamic extremism in the region.
Largely uncited and generalised exposition of Bangladeshi's misses other factors which could be involved in their decision towards distrust of India.
India's initial decisions need not be merely humanitarian but also political.
https://scroll.in/article/1081784/why-are-bangladeshis-turni.... This article explains that it's due to an increasingly unequal interactions as sowing distrust.
Explaining the Hindutva moment as a genuine counter reaction to anti-Hindu sentiment rather than a politically motivated movement seems to be misguided, even if not actively propogating the propaganda.
> Largely uncited and generalised exposition of Bangladeshi's misses other factors which could be involved in their decision towards distrust of India.
It's reasonable to distrust a neighboring country with distinct interest, even if they went to war for you, sure. You don't owe them anything.
Similarly, it's actually also normal for India to have concerns about illegal migration, similar to Europe, America, Australia, and Canada.
But the propaganda coming out of Bangladesh is purely religious in form, and it's pretty clear that that is the main reason why they dislike India. Pakistan literally slaughtered them and they're all bhai-bhai with them now.
The article cites the CAA as a reason for Bangladeshi distrust, except the data show that India is acting as a humanitarian in this disaster. Non-muslims are physically persecuted in both Bangladesh and Pakistan. Pakistan particularly is an apartheid state where non-Muslims have fewer political rights. Bangladesh is slightly better but violence against non-Muslims is rampant. People like to paint India as having high rates of religious violence, which is true, compared to America, but not true compared to Pakistan or Bangladesh. Pakistan regularly executes Christians for blasphemy. India doesn't. Non-Muslim refugees should qualify for extra protection from secular nations given the on-the-ground realities of South Asia. Literally the cited reason for the creation of Pakistan is that South Asian muslims constitute a distinct nation from every other religion in the subcontinent. Neither the Jews nor the Parsis nor the Christians ever made such an argument.
Well regardless, countries cannot get angry over other countries making immigration policy (and yes, this also applies to Indian migrants to America, blah blah blah)
> Explaining the Hindutva moment as a genuine counter reaction to anti-Hindu sentiment rather than a politically motivated movement seems to be misguided, even if not actively propogating the propaganda.
If you read about the history of Savarkar, then I think this is exactly what you see. He was kind of meh about everything until he witnessed anti-Hindu extremism from Muslims, and then went off his rocker. Before that, he was a relatively benign nationalist and humanitarian. Well anyway, more to the point of it really being just the Muslims, Savarkar was defended by an Indian Christian barrister.
Are you an American or South Asian, out of curiosity? I feel like Americans don't really have the ability translate South Asian politics. Not that I'm some expert, but I can report personal on-the-ground experiences.
> Neither the Jews nor the Parsis nor the Christians ever made such an argument.
The argument that Jews need their own state specifically in the area between Lebanon, Egypt, and Syria is integral to Israel’s politics and history.
1 reply →
> a relatively benign nationalist
Are you a European, out of curiosity? I feel like South Asians don’t really have the ability to translate European history. Not that I’m some expert, but we can report good on-the-ground experiences about "relatively benign nationalism" and where it leads.
2 replies →
You are collapsing different propositions into one:
There is anti-Hindu persecution in Bangladesh and Pakistan. Therefore Bangladeshi distrust of India is mainly religious. Therefore Hindutva is essentially a defensive reaction rather than a political movement.
I accept the first proposition. The others do not follow from it.
Bangladesh has entirely intelligible state-to-state grievances with India, unresolved Teesta water sharing, killings at the border, Indian political rhetoric portraying Bangladeshis as demographic threats, economic asymmetry and India’s perceived support for Sheikh Hasina and none of that makes Islamist propaganda imaginary. It means your claim that religion is the main explanation requires evidence rather than assertion. AP, among others, identifies both Teesta and lethal border enforcement as serious bilateral disputes [0].
India’s enormous contribution in 1971 also does not place Bangladesh under permanent political obligation. Bangladeshis fought the liberation war and India provided strategic assistance. Countries can remain grateful for historical aid while opposing a neighbour’s present policies. And Bangladesh has hardly forgotten Pakistan’s crimes: in 2025 it was still formally demanding an apology and financial settlement from Pakistan over 1971 [1]. That is rather different from your “bhai-bhai now” potrayal.
Similarly, describing the CAA as humanitarian does not answer the objection. A true persecution-based refugee law would ask whether an applicant was persecuted. The CAA instead adds to the broader co-relation over actual criteria they need to look for and preselects six religion [2], excluding groups such as persecuted Ahmadis and non-theists. Making religion the statutory filter is the part being criticised.
The portrayal of Savarkar as a benign humanitarian who simply snapped in response to Muslim extremism is not rationalising the fact after the incident. His 1923 Hindutva formulation made India’s status as both fatherland and holy land a criterion of national belonging, thereby excluding Muslims and Christians from the Hindu nation. That is an articulated political ideology, and not a reflex to witnessing extremism.
> "A HINDU means a person who regards this land of BHARATVARSHA, from the Indus to the Seas as his Father-Land as well as his Holy-Land that is the cradle land of his religion."
> Many a Mohammedan community in Kashmir and other parts of India as well as the Christians in South India observe our caste rules to such an extent as to marry generally within the pale of their castes alone; yet, it is clear that though their original Hindu blood is thus almost unaffected by an alien adulteration, yet they cannot be called Hindus in the sense in which that term is actually understood, because, we Hindus are bound together not only by the tie of the love we bear to a common.
From: https://archive.org/stream/essentials-of-hindutva-veer-savar...
I'm not sure how Christians persecuted Sarvakar to cause him to not consider them worthy of belonging here. Although their rhetoric has indeed not been anti-Christian later given we are a minority.
> Not that I'm some expert, but I can report personal on-the-ground experiences.
Your claim that Jews “never made such an argument” makes the selectiveness more apparent. Zionism was organised as a Jewish political movement advocating a Jewish homeland and eventually a Jewish state in Palestine [3]. This does not make Zionism, Hindutva and the Muslim League identical movements, but it disproves the universal claim made. Were you to narrow it after the correction to “Jews specifically within India”, that would move the goalposts. Different minorities, occupying different demographic and political positions, unsurprisingly did not all develop identical political movements. Their differing outcomes do not prove that Muslim political mobilisation was uniquely theological while every other form of nationalism was historically intelligible. Hindu nationalism is granted an historical defence that it's adherents were provoked and driven towards it by Muslim extremism. Bangladeshi and Muslim politics, meanwhile, are stripped of political context and reduced to religion. If historical insecurity and persecution are relevant when explaining Hindutva, then border killings, water disputes, political interference and support for an authoritarian government are also relevant when explaining Bangladeshi distrust. You cannot treat context as explanatory when it excuses your side and as irrelevant when it complicates your account of the other.
Likewise, saying that Americans cannot understand Islamist extremism is rhetorical but not grounded. The United States was the target of the September 11 attacks, and the 9/11 Commission documented al-Qaeda’s development, declaration of war against the United States and execution of those attacks [4]. That does not make every American an expert on Islamism, but that is exactly the point: neither nationality nor proximity automatically establishes expertise. Asking where someone comes from rather than answering their evidence is a genetic fallacy, evaluating a claim through its origin instead of its reasoning. The special pleading lies in treating your own South Asian identity as evidence while treating somebody else’s identity as grounds for disqualification.
So asking whether someone is American, South Asian or Indian Christian does not resolve anything. A person outside India can misunderstand India, and a person within India can be misinformed about it. The relevant question is still whether the account is supported by evidence. Personal experience may provide useful evidence, but it cannot substitute for demonstrating causation. “I have been there” is not evidence that every Bangladeshi grievance is secretly religious.
Your appeal to on-the-ground experience is also less helpful than you suggest. The student protests in India provide a fairly direct example. Indian television did not report the same events from a same point, a review found that Republic, News18, ABP and DD News largely changed the protesters’ actual demands with narratives about conspiracies, Pakistan, Nepal and national security, while police violence against protesters nearly disappeared from their coverage [5] while AP seemed to have a much coverage of the police violence, and the HRW [6], [7].
[0]: https://apnews.com/article/india-bangladesh-energy-developme... [1]: https://apnews.com/article/bangladesh-pakistan-relations-has... [2]: https://www.ohchr.org/en/press-briefing-notes/2019/12/press-... [3]: https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/postwar-re... [4]: https://www.9-11commission.gov/report/ [5]: https://www.newslaundry.com/2026/07/21/nepal-reference-pak-l... [6]: https://apnews.com/article/india-cockroach-protests-memes-sa... [7]: https://www.hrw.org/news/2026/07/23/india-excessive-force-us...
[dead]
[dead]
I find it telling you blame India's lack of modernization on Pakistan. A reflection of the times.
Maybe dismantle the caste system first. You need a civil rights movement.
This is India's biggest hurdle but it seems too ingrained in the society. All peoples should have the same opportunity, but the structure of power in India likes the way things are.
Next work on how you treat women.
Hmm... I said nothing of modernization; I was talking about Indias police state tendencies. These are orthogonal issues. Indians lack of economic development is due to severely lacking general government funded education and over regulation.
As countries such as Norway and China show, you can have development with or without a police state. The issues have nothing to do with each other
>people in the West don't understand how awful radical Islam is
Do you remember that time two dozen or so years ago when a couple buildings collapsed in NYC? After some planes rammed into them?
And that is relatively benign compared to the constant barrage of foiled or successful terror attacks that India faces. Also, no one really cared when America went forward with a giant war of aggression against those people America labeled possible perpetrators
> India is in what basically amounts to a perpetual state of war with Pakistan and has always been this way.
You mean, since India and Pakistan were invented 79 years ago?
I wonder what is it with this denial of the existence of India prior to 1947. If people were specific and said that they were referring to the Republic of India as the successor state to British-controlled India, then it would at least make some sense. Otherwise it sounds completely insane.
If India was invented 79 years ago, then you need to explain the various East India companies established in the 1600s, and all the references to India and the Indians by the Romans and the Greeks and the Persians and the Chinese before the Abrahamization of Europe. Europeans were literally looking for ways to India and ran into the West Indies and North America by accident.
There was no unified political entity prior to 1947---technically, 26 January 1950---because it took that long for Sardal Patel's program of political unification of sovereign princely states to conclude, so that the now-unified political entity would govern itself under common constitutional, and common law, with democratic universal franchise.
The East India Company, and then the British Raj, held power because they were able to broker deals with opposing (and warring) princely states and kingdoms. They used contractual leverage to make those sub-sub-regions keep each other in check.
The British Raj was a kingdom of kingdoms, in addition to being a protectorate. These are literal legal facts [0].
The word Hindu is literally an exonym. A name given to a people by foreigners. Our very collective identity was conferred upon us by outsiders.
[0] Obligatory Wikipedia... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Raj#British_India_and_...
In its Interpretation Act 1889, the British Parliament adopted the following definitions in Section 18:
Who agreed to the legal terms? The rulers of the sovereign princely states and kingdoms.
6 replies →
Yes. Since these two nations came into being they have been in what is basically a state of war. That is what perpetual means.
[dead]
its amazing you are actually getting downvoted for speaking facts
I upvoted that comment because it's obvious tin foil hat "oooh look at the boogeyman" speech. That fact along with its critique contributes to the discourse on HN.