🇮🇳 Hindu Fascism or National Renaissance?

How 10 Years of Modi Rule Has Reshaped Indian Democracy

📚 Book Review: The Great Regression by Rahul Bhatia
Translated by Yang Jin-sung | Published by Geulhangari | ₩32,000

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🔥 A Decade of Transformation—or Erosion?

When Narendra Modi swept into power in 2014, he was hailed as a symbol of decisive leadership and economic reform. But 10 years on, his legacy is no longer just about development—it is about ideological radicalization, religious majoritarianism, and the erosion of democratic norms in the world’s largest democracy.

In The Great Regression: How Indian Democracy Collapsed, journalist Rahul Bhatia presents a searing account of India’s transformation under the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the influence of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS)—a paramilitary Hindu nationalist organization founded in 1925.

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🕉️ RSS and the Rise of Hindu Nationalism

The RSS began as a fringe movement seeking a Hindu-centric national identity. Under Modi, it has effectively entered the political mainstream, becoming the ideological backbone of the BJP.

According to Bhatia:

• Secularism and multiculturalism are derided as Western corruption.

• Hindu cultural supremacy is no longer implied—it is openly asserted.

• India’s constitutional commitment to pluralism is being systematically dismantled.

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🧾 The Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA): Benevolent Reform or Muslim Exclusion?

The 2019 Citizenship Amendment Act was introduced as a humanitarian policy to offer citizenship to persecuted minorities from Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Bangladesh. However, Muslims were explicitly excluded, rendering nearly 2 million people stateless—many of them lifelong residents of India.

This exclusionary law triggered:

• Nationwide protests

• The 2020 Delhi riots, which left 53 dead

• Global condemnation for violating religious neutrality

Bhatia’s firsthand reportage from riot zones reveals how violence was tacitly enabled, if not directly facilitated, by political indifference and police inaction.

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📰 Controlled Media, Silenced Voices

Bhatia also exposes how Modi’s government:

• Tamed independent media by framing dissent as anti-national

• Imprisoned or surveilled journalists and civil rights activists

• Weakened judicial independence and bureaucratic accountability

India, once touted as a democratic beacon in the Global South, now appears increasingly authoritarian—with Hindu nationalism as both ideology and governance model.

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🏛️ A Fascist Turn?

Many political scientists and critics have begun labeling this trajectory as “Hindu fascism”—a term long debated but now difficult to ignore.

Bhatia’s book gained international recognition, selected as one of 2024’s Best Books by outlets like The New York Times and NPR. What makes it stand out is not only its journalistic rigor but its empathy for victims and clarity of structural critique.

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⚖️ Final Thought: The Price of National Pride

What price does a nation pay for majoritarian pride? For India, the cost appears to be:

• A fractured civil society

• A silenced press

• A judiciary under siege

• And the loss of its democratic soul

Whether you view Modi’s India as a resurgence of Hindu identity or a regression into theocratic nationalism, The Great Regression is essential reading for understanding India’s fragile future.