The case for reclaiming Indian nationalism PRERNA SINGH 2019 may well be termed the year of wer about itself.1 The Modi govern- nationalism. Over the past twelve ment in India is representative of months the nationalist rhetoric of the present crop of right wing popu- leaders of the most populous states in list regimes in violently redrawing the world – Trump in the US, Putin in the boundaries of the nation to inter- Russia, Bolsonaro in Brazil, Xi Jingping sect with those of the ethnic majority, in China and of course Narendra Modi explicitly and egregiously excluding here in India – has only gained in ethnic minorities. Such exclusionary stridency. This wave of nationalism definitions of nationalism should be, appears to have confirmed its histori- and indeed are being bravely, vigor- cally notorious association with preju- ously resisted. Yet, in this essay I dice, xenophobia, racism, chauvinism argue that we must do so without giv- and conflict. ing up on the concept of nationalism Yet the problem is not so much itself.2 nationalism per se but the way in which 1. R. Bendix, Nation-Building and Citizen- the boundaries of national belonging ship: Studies of Our Changing Social are being drawn. Who belongs and Order. University of California Press, 23 Berkeley, 1964, p. 90; M. Walzer, Spheres who does not? This is the key question of Justice: A Defense of Pluralism and Equal- that any political community must ans- ity. Basic Books, New York, 1983, p. 55. SEMINAR 725 – January 2020 This is because in as much as nation encompassed believers of all highly debatable. Many commenta- nationalism is today, and has histori- religions (and non-believers), speakers tors have pointed out that votes for cally been associated with division and of all languages, members of all castes the BJP should not be interpreted as destruction, it can also be a powerful, and tribes, and residents of all parts an endorsement of Hindutva. Social constructive force. At its core nation- of the country.5 To be sure there were schemes such as the distribution of toi- alism is about ‘love’ that generates a at the time, competing, narrower lets and cooking gas, and the absence spirit of ‘fraternity’ and ‘unity’.3 As a visions of who was an Indian, such of a cohesive opposition, figured pro- shared overarching identity national- as that of Savarkar, but these did not minently in people’s decisions to ism can unify diverse ethnic groups. garner popular support. It was a plu- back the incumbent party. Further, the Further, nationalism can be an impor- ral, inclusive vision of India that was BJP has witnessed serious electoral tant driver of political, economic and shared across various strata of soci- reversals, most recently in the state social freedoms.4 ety and which was enshrined in the assembly elections in Maharashtra. The challenge, I argue, is, there- Constitution. Additional evidence for the fore, not just to resist the exclusionary shaky popular support for the BJP’s definitions of nationalism put for- exclusionary nationalism can be found ward by the ruling regime but equally Whether it is the attempt to exclude in the significant resistance to its poli- and critically, to fight to reclaim the Muslim immigrants as citizens through cies – whether it is the uproar against very idea of the Indian nation away the proposed Citizenship Amendment the Citizenship Amendment Bill, state- from the Hindu right. We cannot allow Bill, the National Register of Citizens, ments against the National Register of the language of nationalism to belong which threatens to render Muslims Citizens, or the refusal of detained exclusively to the Sangh Parivar. Ins- who might have been born and lived in Kashmiri political leaders to sign tead we must work to reclaim it and India for decades stateless if they release bonds.6 Such was the outrage return it to foundational inclusive don’t have the necessary documents, at Amit Shah’s alleged declaration understandings of who is an Indian. the revocation of the special status about the imposition of Hindi as a granted to Kashmir in Articles 370 and national language earlier this year that 35a, the rewriting of history textbooks, he was forced into the uncharacteris- Nations like all political communities or the condoning of violence against tic position of backing down and clari- have boundaries. The key question is minorities – it is this constitutionally fying that he had in fact sought only to – who is in and who is out. Most enshrined vision of the Indian nation encourage the learning of Hindi as a nations answer this question in their that the BJP is eroding and which must second language. constitutions, which specify who is thus, be opposed. Indeed, such resist- considered a member of the nation, ance is very much in place. Especially and who is not. The Indian Constitu- insofar as, despite its relentless and The BJP regime’s recasting of Indian tion gives an unequivocally inclusive aggressive peddling, it is unclear nationalism as Hindu nationalism answer to this question of who belongs. how much popular support the BJP’s violates foundational, constitutionally In deliberate rejection of the exclusionary recasting of Indian natio- enshrined conceptualizations of who is two-nation theory, and the creation nalism enjoys. Indian and must be resisted. Further, of Pakistan on religious lines, the Even though the BJP has been it rests on precarious popular founda- foundational boundaries of the Indian decisively elected to a second succes- tions and is already being vigorously sive term in office, its attempt to 2. P. Singh, ‘Nationalism Can Have its 6. S. Karmakar, ‘CAB Protest: Three Killed, Good Points. Really’, The Washington Post, impose an exclusionary definition of Assam Remains Volatile’, The Deccan Her- 26 January 2018. an Indian is a primarily top-down pro- ald, 12 December 2019, https://www. 3. B. Anderson, Imagined Communities: ject. It is driven by the systematic, deccanherald.com/national/cab-protest-three- Reflections on the Origin and Spread of sinister machinations of the highest killed-assam-remains-volatile-784985.html; Nationalism. Verso, London, New York, 1991, echelons of the party. The intensity and ‘Chorus Against “Divisive” Bill and NRC’, pp. 7, 141, 143; J.S. Mill, Considerations on The Telegraph, 11 December 2019, https:// Representative Government. Longmans, extent of support that this grossly cir- www.telegraphindia.com/india/chorus- Green, and Co., London, 1875; E. Renan, cumscribed version of Indian nation- against-citizenship-amendment-bill-and-nrc/ ‘What is a Nation?’, in S. Woolf (ed.), Nation- hood enjoys within the populace is cid/1725874; P. Ashiq, ‘J&K leaders refuse to 24 alism in Europe: From 1815 to the Present. sign Release Bonds’, The Hindu, 26 Novem- Routledge, London, (1882) 2002. 5. M. Tudor, The Promise of Power: The Ori- ber 2019, https://www.thehindu.com/news/ 4. A. Sen, Development as Freedom. Oxford gins of Democracy in India and Autocracy in national/other-states/jk-leaders-refuse-to- University Press, Oxford, 2001. Pakistan. Cambridge University Press, 2013. sign-release-bonds/article30079167.ece. SEMINAR 725 – January 2020 contested. If that much is clear, what community. They are the key units for ments in social identity theory have con- is less clear is what should come in administrating, and providing justice sistently and robustly demonstrated its stead? For most scholars and com- around social and economic issues, and that once people feel part of a group, mentators the answer would be no for providing voice and accountability their affect toward that group and its more nationalism. to the people.10 members becomes more positive.14 Nations are clearly here to stay. Liberal nationalist scholars have des- Identification with, and allegiance to cribed this as the ‘deep and important This response is certainly understand- nations is here to stay. To hope that the obligations [that] flow from identity and able. The present tide of exclusionary decline of Hindu nationalism will open relatedness’.15 The crux of the argu- nationalism has brought up memories up to a post-national future is unreal- ment is the power of what Yael Tamir of the division and destruction wrought istic. It might also be undesirable. This has termed ‘The Magic Pronoun: by it in the past. Many scholars have is because to give up on nationalism is “My”.’16 The obligations owed to those gone so far as to say that the last analo- to give up on a potent force that has we consider as our own are different gous global surge of nationalism was enormous constructive potential. from and more wide-ranging than those in the 1930s and 1940s in the years pre- we owe others. A sense of belonging ceding the Second World War. Writ- together leads to the transcending of ing in this context, Albert Einstein had A n instructive way to understand purely reciprocal compromise, on which famously described nationalism as the this constructive potential of national- interpersonal relationships, in general, ‘measles of mankind’. Rabindranath ism is to approach it in social psycho- might be said to be loosely premised, Tagore had referred to it as ‘a great logical terms as a group identity.11 As and triggers prosocial behaviour. Inter- menace’. Earning further epithets of a group identity, nations answer both estingly, these positive behavioural ‘evil’,7 ‘the pathology of modern deve- a basic biological need for group liv- effects for group identity have been lopmental history,8 and as ‘the starkest ing, and a psychological need for com- found to occur consistently even when political shame of the twentieth cen- munity as a source of validation and the basis for group identification was tury,9 who would not wish for an esteem.