Circulating Victimhood: The Transnational Repertoires of Hindu National-Populism in Modi’s India

Circulating Victimhood: The Transnational Repertoires of Hindu National-Populism in Modi’s India

Christophe Jaffrelot

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Keywords: Hindu nationalism, India, victimization, communal violence, populism, diaspora, hate speeches

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We Hindus are under siege today and we do not know it!! That is what is truly alarming. Hindu society could be dismembered today without much protest since we have been lulled into complacency or have lost the capacity to think collectively as Hindus … For example, recently, we had a near disaster in Ayodhya: Pakistan-trained foreign terrorists slipped into India and traveled to Ayodhya to blow up the Ram [temple]. Their attempt was foiled by courageous policemen. But did the representative government of 870 million Hindus of India react in a meaningful way—that is did it retaliate to deter such attacks in the future? … No wonder, terrorists have continued to target and disrupt India, and Hindus are their focus.”[1]

A discourse of victimhood is inherent in any populist rhetoric: The politician who indulges in it has to persuade the people that, like them, he is on the receiving end, in order to get their votes. This repertoire fits in Cas Mudde’s definition of populism as a “thin-centered ideology that considers society to be ultimately separated into two homogenous and antagonistic camps, ‘the pure people’ versus ‘the corrupt elite.’”[2]

As a populist leader, Narendra Modi is no exception to this rule.[3] When he headed the government of the Indian state of Gujarat from 2001 to 2014, he gained popularity by portraying himself as a victim of India’s political elites, and in particular of the Nehru-Gandhi family, which at the time headed the ruling coalition in New Delhi.[4] Not only did he come from a fairly low caste in the Hindu social hierarchy, but his father belonged to the working class; he ran a stall on the platform of the small railway station in the Gujarat town where Modi was born, and the young Narendra served tea there—he was a chaiwala, or tea boy (like the hero of the 2008 film Slumdog Millionaire). The manner in which he projected himself as a plebeian and a self-made man illustrates Pierre Ostiguy’s definition of populism, whereby the leader succeeds in appearing as being “like me” and, at the same time, my “ego ideal” because of his charisma.[5]

But Modi is not just a populist, he is a national populist,[6] meaning the people he claims to embody and defend are not all Indians, but only the “sons of the soil” and, therefore, from the point of view of his ideology, the Hindus. The Muslim and Christian minorities are seen here as “fifth columnists” against whom the majority must be defended. Here the repertoire of victimhood is expressed from an ethno-religious point of view, not just from a social one. Modi-style Hindu nationalists believe that Hindus, although in the majority, are very vulnerable, not only because of their divisions into sects and castes (which they are doing their utmost to transcend),[7] but also because of the actions of Muslims and Christians, who are presented as threats because of their proselytism. This has been one of the main tropes of Hindu nationalism since the late 19^th century. In the 1910s–20s, it gave birth to the idea that Hindus were a “dying race”[8] who needed some organization (sangathan) to resist demographic decline due to conversion and to cope with the threat posed by Muslim militants.[9] A formal organization was created in 1925 by upper-caste ideologues and activists under the name of Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS: National Volunteers Association). It established branches across India and, after Partition, created student unions, labor unions, and a political party, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP: Indian People’s Party). Modi joined the RSS when he was eight years old—the organization recuits children to imbue them with its ideology when they are as young as possible—and he was dispatched to the BJP in the 1980s.

During that decade, the party exploited Hindus’ sense of vulnerability vis-à-vis Muslims on two major occasions. In 1981, some 1,000 members of the Scheduled Castes (formerly known as Untouchables) in the village of Meenakshipuram, in the district of Tirunelveli in Tamil Nadu, converted to Islam. The conversion was made under the auspices of Muslim League leaders, one of whom laid the foundation stone of a new mosque, too.[10] During the following months, thousands of members of the Scheduled Castes were converted to Islam in South India.[11] Research carried out by Abdul Malik Mujahid showed that those who were converted were mainly concerned with escaping from the hierarchy of castes that confined them to the lowest stratum in society.[12] Hindu nationalists used this episode to relaunch their discourse of victimhood.

More importantly the Supreme Court’s ruling in the “Shah Bano affair” in 1985 substantiated the Hindu nationalist claim that their community was now one of second-class citizens. Shah Bano had been the wife of a lawyer from Indore who married for a second time and separated from her according to Muslim customary law. Invoking Section 125 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, she sued him, and as a result established her right to alimony. When, in 1980, she had demanded a review of her allowance, her former husband appealed to the Supreme Court, pleading that, according to Sharia law, he was not obliged to continue payments to her after the iddat (a period of three months after the divorce). The Supreme Court dismissed the appeal, pointing out that Section 125 of the Code of Criminal Procedure applied to people of all faiths, and that the Quran itself required that a divorced wife should be paid an allowance.[13] The Supreme Court’s decision angered Muslim leaders, who coalesced in the All India Muslim Personal Law Board (AIMPLB), which organized a “Sharia protection week” in October 1985. Rajiv Gandhi, then the prime minister, promised that Section 125 of the Code of Criminal Procedure would be amended. Then, on February 27, 1986, the government introduced a Muslim Women (Protection of Rights on Divorce) Bill, whereby a Muslim man would not be obliged to pay alimony to his divorced wife beyond the term of iddat.

In the 1990s, the BJP rose to power in several states of the Indian Union and even in Delhi, at the helm of a coalition. Hindu nationalists started to exert a growing influence on politics and society. In 1992, in Ayodhya (Uttar Pradesh), Hindu activists destroyed the Babri Masjid, a 16th-century mosque which—they claimed—had been built on the birthplace of Lord Ram, and on the site of a Ram temple. Muslims were subsequently subjected to new forms of communal violence (e.g., the 1992 Bombay pogrom) and discrimination on the job market and in housing, resulting in a ghettoization process. Their socioeconomic decline was such that the Congress Party-led government of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, formed in 2004, decided to appoint what came to be known as the Sachar Committee (named after Rajinder Sachar, a retired judge) to study this phenomenon in 2005.

By the early 2000s, the idea that Muslims were posing a threat to Hindus was no longer deemed widely credible, so the BJP turned to a different argument to convince the majority community that it was under threat. Modi showed the way in 2002, when he accused Pakistan of being responsible for transborder terrorism, a claim that had much resonance since, in 1993, a Bombay Muslim mafia don, Dawood Ibrahim, had used Pakistan-made explosives to terrorize the city in response to the abovementioned pogrom. More importantly, from 2000 to 2001, Pakistan-based jihadi groups, including Lashkar-e-Taiba and Jaish-e-Momhammed, had started to operate beyond Kashmir, as evident from terrorist attacks on the Delhi Red Fort and the Indian Parliament.

The first part of this article analyzes the ways in which Modi, as chief minister of Gujarat (2001–2014), redefined the supposed Muslim threat, presenting it as being due to the direct action of Pakistanis in Gujarat and to a joint terrorist effort by Pakistani and Indian Muslims. When he became prime minister in 2014, and even more forcefully during the 2019 and 2024 election campaigns, Modi continued to instrumentalize the Pakistani threat, while also accusing Bangladeshi migrants of targeting Hindus in general and Hindu women in particular. Beginning in 2024–2025, a third type of discourse of victimhood has been crystallizing in India, under the aegis of Modi, which focuses on the threat posed to Hindu minorities in different contexts: by Islamists in Bangladesh, and by white supremacists in the United States, where supporters of President Donald Trump have been accused of fostering “Hinduphobia.”

Resisting Neighboring Countries

The Hindu sentiment of vulnerability that the RSS and its subsidiaries have systematically exploited has been made more acute by Partition, the division of the former British Raj in South Asia that Hindu nationalists describe as the “vivisection of Mother India,” a sacred territory that traditionally included all the land south of the Himalayas. After 1947, not only was their “Hindustan” flanked by two Muslim-majority provinces (West and East Pakistan, which, after 1971, became the independent countries of Pakistan and Bangladesh, respectively), but about a tenth of the population of India was still Muslims, described by Hindu nationalists as “fifth columnists,”[14] in spite of the Indian patriotism that many of them have displayed, such as by serving in the army. As chief minister of Gujarat and later prime minister, Modi has dwelled on this combination of external and internal threats more than any Indian politician before him. This politics of fear has become a mainstay of his highly emoitional national-populist style.

The Politics of Fear in Modi’s Gujarat  

National-populist leaders, like any identity politics entrepreneurs, find it convenient to cultivate a sentiment of vulnerability among their compatriots or coreligionists in order to appear as their saviors, something social scientists have called the “politics of fear,” in particular after the 9/11 terrorist attacks in the United States.[15]

Modi accused Pakistan of posing a major threat to Gujarat in early 2002, less than six months after becoming chief minister of the state. Indeed, he attributed to Pakistan the burning, in the railway station of the Gujarati city of Godhra, of two cars of a train that was bringing Hindu militants back from Ayodhya, where they had tried—unsuccessfully—to build a temple on the rubble of the Babri Masjid: 56 people died in the train burning, including several children. After visiting Godhra on the same day, Modi pointed to a plot supposedly hatched by the Pakistani army, even though the local authorities had ruled out any idea of a premeditated conspiracy in view of the sequence of events. Modi, for his part, declared on television on the evening of the fire:

… not without a certain pathos in his voice, that the Godhra incident was a “pre-planned attack,” explicitly contradicting the [local] Collector’s statement released just a few hours earlier, also on TV, which had described the incident not as planned but as an “accident.” Senior members of the central government in New Delhi echoed Modi’s words, speculating that the “foreign hand” of the infamous Pakistani intelligence services (Inter-Services Intelligence) was involved.[16]

In the following weeks, an anti-Muslim pogrom launched by Hindu nationalist organizations resulted in the death of about 2,000 Muslims across Gujarat. Soon after, Modi dissolved the state assembly so as to trigger new elections—which were not due until 2003. During the campaign, he was promoted as the Hindu Hriday Samrat, the “Emperor of the Hindu Heart,” and he again denounced the Pakistani threat. He expressed his “government’s zero tolerance against ‘traders of death that are supported by Pakistan,’ power-hungry politicians and pseudo-secularists in Gujarat.”[17] He castigated Pakistan’s “semi-terrorism” and “warned of dire consequences and unimaginable destruction to Pakistan if it attempt[ed] an air attack on the state.”[18] On another occasion, he pointed out that, “Besides the proxy war in Jammu and Kashmir, Pakistan has perpetrated semi-terrorism in Gujarat and the beginning was made by Godhra carnage.”[19]

Terrorism became an even more relevant theme of his campaign after the Akshardham attack on September 24, 2002, when in Gandhinagar, the state capital, two men entered the Akshardham Swaminarayan temple with AK-56s and killed 28 people. The Modi government immediately declared that the terrorists were connected to Pakistan. The accused were eventually sentenced to death after an investigation and a trial proved they were linked to the Pakistan-based militant groups Lashkar-e-Taiba and Jaish-e-Mohammed.^[20] But they appealed the verdict and the Supreme Court quashed the judgement of the special Prevention of Terrorism Act (POTA) court and the Gujarat High Court, both of which had deliberated on the basis of evidence provided by the Gujarat police investigation.[21] Six of the accused who had been convicted of involvement in the attack were acquitted 11 years after being jailed, after the Supreme Court justices who examined the case file found it contained no evidence.[22] Nonetheless, at the time the attack had fostered polarization by exacerbating fear of Islamism and Pakistan among the Hindus of Gujarat.

This context explains the rhetorical attacks against Pervez Musharraf, then president of Pakistan, in Modi’s election campaign. For example, at a rally in Ahmedabad on October 1—which he dubbed “Anti-Terrorism Day”—he declared that “India will continue to refer to him as Mian Musharraf (Musharraf the Muslim). If the pseudo-secularists don’t like it, they can go and lick Musharraf’s boots. I dare him to send more terrorists to Gujarat, we are prepared this time. Arey mian, taari goli khuti jashe (Mian, your bullets will run out).”[23]

The instrumentalization of the Pakistani cum jihadi threat during the election campaign was intended to discredit the “pseudo-secularists,” an oblique manner of referring to the Congress Party, whose leaders were systematically accused of not protecting the Hindus enough. In December 2002, Modi’s BJP ended up winning the Gujarati election with a large majority (127 seats out of 182), most of its candidates being victorious in places where the communal violence had been the deadliest, polarizing the voters to a greater extent than in the rest of the state.[24]

Subsequently, from 2003 to 2007, Gujarat was the scene of a series of “fake encounters,”[25] during which the police claimed to have foiled a plot by a dozen terrorists allegedly sent from Pakistan to assassinate Modi. Investigations showed that these alleged assassination attempts were fabricated and that the so-called terrorists who had been eliminated were at best petty thugs. These recurring episodes enabled Modi to keep Gujaratis in a state of anxiety by cultivating a feeling of insecurity—which made the presence of a strongman at the head of the government all the more necessary.[26]

A Prime Minister Defending the Hindus against Pakistanis—and Bangladeshis

In 2014, the BJP won the general elections for the first time, thanks to Modi’s popularity,[27] but also by emphasizing the his achievements in Gujarat in terms of economic development. However, the new prime minister continued to accuse Pakistan of being behind terrorist violence in India and to project himself as the protector of the Hindus, especially during election campaigns. The 2019 campaign offers an instructive case study in this respect.

On February 14, 2019, barely a few weeks before the beginning of the official campaign, a deadly attack in Pulwama (Jammu and Kashmir) attributed by India to a jihadi group based in Pakistan claimed the lives of 41 Indian Centre Reserve Police Force personnel. By way of response, Modi ordered air strikes to be conducted on Pakistani territory. A Jaish-e-Mohammed training camp was allegedly destroyed in Balakot—although opposition parties expressed their doubts. Ahead of the enforcement of the Election Commission’s Model Code of Conduct (MCC), which prohibits involving the army in electoral campaigns, the BJP campaigned massively, through all channels, using visuals associating Modi with the air strike and the military.[28] In a rally he held in Maharashtra, Modi told first-time voters:

Dedicate your first vote to the Air Force which undertook the air strike at Balakot, to those jawans (soldiers) who were martyred in Pulwama … Congress manifesto is full of anti-national thoughts. Whatever Congress says, Pakistan repeats. Congress wants talks with separatists, wants to lessen the presence of armed forces in Kashmir, wants to remove sedition law. Pakistan wants exactly the same … Voters should teach a fitting lesson to such parties who do not trust the armed forces.[29]

On March 17, Modi added the prefix “Chowkidar” (“watchman” or “sentinel”) to his Twitter handle name and made that label—also adopted by a large number of his followers, including Union ministers—a symbol of the BJP campaign. The #MainBhiChowkidar (“I’m also a Chowkidar”) thread was quickly popularized by throngs of digital activists. In his first campaign tweet, Modi wrote, “Your Chowkidar is standing firm & serving the nation. But I am not alone … today, every Indian is saying #MainBhiChowkidar.”[30] This motto echoed similar communication techniques used previously to achieve a fusion of the masses with their leader. In 2007, in Gujarat, Modi’s supporters wore Modi masks, for instance.

Canvassing in Balod district (Chhattisgarh), he declared, “When there is a strong government, there is surgical strike and air strike and the world listens.”[31] In Khargone (Madhya Pradesh), he urged voters to press the lotus button (the BJP’s symbol, which appears on Indian voting machines), as if they were “pressing the trigger to shoot terrorists in their chest.”[32] In Bihar, he went even further:

After the Pulwama terror attack, the brave sons of India displayed their valour … for the first time in Indian history, they entered the home of the terrorists to teach them a lesson … the whole world is discussing the attack, but these mahamilavati (“contaminated,” in reference to the opposition) are asking for proof [that the Balakot training camp had been destroyed] from Modi … these people should tell the country whether they have faith in the brave sons of India or Pakistan’s kupoot (bad son) … Are you people happy with what the ‘chowkidar’ has done for the country? Whatever remains to be done too will be completed by this chowkidar.[33]

Like during previous election campaigns in Gujarat, Modi instrumentalized the Pakistan threat to exploit a Hindu sense of vulnerability that remained palpable and to project himself as the protector of his community, in contrast to the Congress Party, which he accused of passivity in the past and whose skepiticism regarding the Balakot strike was, for Modi, shameful.

During the 2024 elections, the Pakistani threat was largely replaced by the Bangladeshi threat, with Modi resorting to a discourse of victimhood and a politics of fear that relied more on social and cultural dimensions, rather than the fear of terrorism. In all, according to Human Rights Watch, which analyzed 173 of Modi’s campaign speeches, 110 of them included language falling into the category of “hate speeches.”[34]  

The Islamophobic character of his remarks was first manifested in his strong references to Hindu nationalist obsessions. The first of these echoes Muslim invasions dating back to medieval times, and more precisely the Mughals’ rule. Modi, who likes to say that he is closing a thousand-year parenthesis during which foreigners dominated India, is playing on the fear and resentment still aroused by the memory of forced conversions and the destruction of temples for which Muslim invaders were allegedly responsible. Today, these intruders are no longer hordes of horsemen—as the BJP’s propaganda films showed them in anime films eventually banned by the Electoral Commission—but migrants, designated as Bangladeshis, to whom Modi attributes the same acts. Amit Shah, Modi’s right hand man who became home minister in 2019 called Bangladeshi migrants “termites” in 2018. Modi was more careful: he used the word “infiltrators ,” but Indians knew that he was referring to Bangladeshis. On May 14, 2024, at an election rally in Jharkhand, he thundered: “It has become difficult to follow our faith in Jharkhand today. The idols of our gods are being destroyed. Infiltrators with a jihadi mindset are ganging up and attacking, but the Jharkhand [Congress Party-led] government is looking away and is supporting them from afar. These infiltrators have threatened the security of our sisters and daughters.”[35]

At the end of this statement, a second theme emerges: the vulnerability of young Hindu women, whom Muslims supposedly covet and are even prepared to marry by force and convert. Modi took up this theme in another speech, also delivered in Jharkhand, in the middle of a tribal area, two weeks later:

In many areas today, the Adivasi [indigenous] population is rapidly declining while the number of infiltrators is increasing. Are the infiltrators not occupying Adivasi lands? Have our Adivasi daughters not been targeted by infiltrators? Our daughters’ safety is threatened, is it not? Their lives are in danger, they are being murdered, an Adivasi daughter is burned alive, another Adivasi daughter’s voice is taken away. Who are these people targeting Adivasi daughters?[36]

A third theme emerges here in the background: demographic fearmongering, twhich includes both the denunciation of “infiltrators” and the fear of Hindu women being targeted by Muslims. The fear of Hindus becoming a minority in India—which is irrational, given that their community represents nearly 80% of the population—has been manufactured and exploited by the BJP and its predecessors for decades.[37] Modi has exploited this by expressing alarm about the fertility of Muslim families, which he has attributed in particular to polygamy. In 2002, during his first election campaign, he used a slogan borrowed from Muslims: “Ham panch, hamare pachis” (“There are five of us”—meaning a husband and his four wives—”and we have twenty-five children”). In 2024, he revisited this excess, often referring to Muslims with the periphrase “those who have more children.”

Between the 2019 and 2024 elections, Modi’s discourse on the Muslim threat shifted from Pakistan as a country to the influx of Bangladeshi immigrants. However, the latter did not appear as dangerous to most voters, and this politics of fear failed to generate the same massive public support as it did in the 2019 campaign, which partly explains the electoral erosion of the BJP (it got 240 seats in 2024, against 303 in 2019).

Fighting Hinduphobia across the Globe

In 2024–2025, the Hindu nationalist discourse of victimhood changed again, regaining some of its emotional intensity. It now focused on attacks on Hindus where they were a minority, both in Bangladesh and in the West. Hindu nationalists have always denounced the manner in which their coreligionists have been treated in Pakistan—and to a lesser extent, in Bangladesh—where they have indeed faced persecution.[38] But their mobilization in 2024 was unprecedented because of its transnational dimension, which gained momentum in 2025, when the diaspora echoed a new discourse of victimhood and resistance to “Hinduphobia”—a concept largely propagated in the West.

Defending the Hindus from Bangladesh

Following Sheikh Hasina’s resignation as prime minister of Bangladesh in August 2024, anti-Hindu violence erupted across Bangladesh. There were at least three reasons for this: (1) The BJP in New Delhi had granted political asylum to Hasina—one of Modi’s few supporters among foreign governments in South Asia—while the new government in Dacca wanted to bring her to justice; (2) the Hindu minority had been a traditional supporter of Hasina and her party, the Awami League;[39] and (3) among the political forces now influential in Dacca was the Jama’at-i-Islami, a fundamentalist party.

The attacks on Hindus in the days following Hasina’s departure targeted temples, shops, and individuals. Between August 5 and 20, more than 1,000 incidents were reported across Bangladesh. In several cases, according to what was a very balanced UN report, the victims were targeted because they had supported the Awami League, not because they were Hindus.[40]

In India, Hindu nationalists and the media in thrall to the government gave an anti-Hindu slant to this violence, however.[41] In December 2024, RSS General Secretary Dattatreya Hosabale, the second-in-command of the organization, declared:

Atrocities committed against Hindus and other religious minorities in Bangladesh by Islamic extremists, including attacks, killings, looting, arson, and inhumane persecution of women, are alarming. RSS calls upon the Bangladesh gov[ernmen]t to immediately stop atrocities on Hindus and release the Chinmoy Krishna Das.[42] Out of helplessness due to killings, loot, and attacks by Islamic extremists, Hindus raised their voice peacefully. To suppress their voice, a new phase of injustice and oppression has emerged. Instead of taking appropriate steps to stop the crime against minorities, the Bangladesh gov[ernmen]t has remained a mute spectator.[43]

In his address to the nation on August 15, which solemnly marked the anniversary of independence from Great Britain, Modi—just 10 days after Hasina’s resignation—had already spoken out in defense of the Hindus of Bangladesh: “140 crore (1,4 billion) Indians worried about the safety of the Hindus, the minorities in Bangladesh.”[44] Minister of Foreign Affairs Subrahmanyam Jaishankar also gave many TV interviews on the issue.[45]

In addition, Modi asked the United States to protect the Hindus of Bangladesh.[46] This move adds an international dimension to our subject: It is no longer just a question of Modi playing on the sense of vulnerability among Hindus for domestic political ends, but also of using this perception of victimization to strengthen ties with allies in other countries. It is interesting to take stock of those who responded positively to Modi’s invitation. Trump, during his election 2024 campaign, on November 1, tweeted: “I strongly condemn the barbaric violence against Hindus, Christians, and other minorities who are getting attacked and looted by mobs in Bangladesh, which remains in a total state of chaos.”[47] Two U.S. congressmen, Shri Thanedar and Raja Krishnamoorthi (both members of the Democratic Party), urged the U.S. government to intervene in response to the violence against the Hindus of Bangladesh.[48] Meanwhile, the leader of the Canadian Conservative Party, Pierre Poilièvre, who was also campaigning, declared: “We are very concerned about the hundreds killed and thousands injured during student-led protests and horrified by the subsequent violence against religious minorities, including Hindus and Christians, who are being senselessly targeted by violent mobs.”[49] Also in Canada, Liberal Party MP Chandra Arya expressed deep concern for the violence against religious minorities, including Hindus, Buddhists, and Christians.[50]

In the United Kingdom, on December 4, 2024, Bob Blackman, a Conservative Party MP, said in the House of Commons:

Hindus are suffering with their houses being burned and their businesses ransacked. Priests have been arrested, and I understand that two more were arrested over the weekend, and 63 monks have been denied access to the country. The clear issue is an attempt at the ethnic cleansing of Hindus from Bangladesh. We want to hear not just words of piety, but absolute condemnation of what is going on. Religious minorities are being deliberately persecuted because of their religion.[51]

Another Conservative Party MP, Priti Patel, along with Labour Party MP Barry Gardiner, also raised the issue of the Hindus of Bangladesh in the House of Commons. Similarly, Geert Wilders, leader of the far-right Party for Freedom, the largest party in the Netherlands’ parliament, wrote on X: “The violence against Hindus in Bangladesh is horrific. They are being killed and their houses and temples burnt by barbaric Islamic mobs. This must be stopped immediately!”[52] All these international statements were amplified in the Indian media. They are indicative of two related phenomena.

Firstly, they testify to the emergence of a global sense of victimization targeting Muslims as responsible for the persecution of both Hindus and Christians, since none of the personalities mentioned above has been moved to issue public statements about the crimes suffered by Muslims in India or Gaza. For the members of this Hindu national-populist international, Muslims can only be aggressors, not victims. Secondly, these speeches also attest to the influence acquired by the Hindu diaspora in countries such as the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom, where it is increasingly supportive of the Republican[53] and Conservative parties,[54] respectively. The formation of genuine ethnic lobbies is all the more evident given that the Hindu community now has links with official bodies, notably through members of national legislatures, especially in the United States and the United Kingdom.

But paradoxically, two of the most important of the transnational allies listed above, Trump and Vice President J.D. Vance, in 2025, turned out to betray their Hindu supporters, and even foster Hinduphobia.

Fighting Hinduphobia in the West

The word “Hinduphobia” was coined by Rajiv Malhotra, a U.S.-based Hindu businessman-turned-activist, who used it first in 2016 in a book called Academic Hinduphobia: A Critique of Wendy Doniger’s Erotic School of Indology, in which he denounced the lack of respect for Hinduism that Prof. Doniger was displaying in her writings. This notion continued to be refered to in the United States more than anywhere else in the following years, but was not very widespread until the 2020s. In 2022, the Boston University chapter of the Hindu Student Council, the students’ union of the Hindu Sevak Sangh (the name for the RSS outside of India) organized a conference in which Hinduphobia was defined as “a set of antagonistic, destructive, and derogatory attitudes and behaviors towards Sanatana Dharma (Hinduism) and Hindus that may manifest as prejudice, fear, or hatred.”[55]

In the mid-2020s, the notion of “Hinduphobia” has gained a wider acceptance in the context of the growing assertiveness of white supremacism after Trump’s second electoral victory. While the Hindu nationalists of the Indian diaspora in the United States had supported Trump fully during his campaign (as had Modi,) they were quickly antagonized by several factors.

Immediately after taking office, Trump ordered the deportation of illegal immigrants in larger numbers than before, and in 2025, more than 3,260 Indians were sent back to India. While the fight against illegal immigration was not contested in India and in the diaspora, the fact that the first batch of the deported had their hands cuffed and their ankles tied during their very long flight was interpreted as a form of persecution.[56] In addition, a Trump-imposed increase in the cost of U.S. H-1B visas (with fees jumpeing from $1,500 to $100,000[57]) created still more resentment, since as of 2024, Indians represented more than 70% of such visa holders.[58] However, the most discussed incident on social media was the remark by Vance that he hoped that one day his Hindu wife would be also moved by the gospel and would “see it the same way” as he did. This statement was seen by many Hindus as an attempt at converting her and created an uproar. Vance reasoned that these criticisms reflected “anti-Christian bigotry.”[59]

In this context, in India as well as in the diaspora, Hindu nationalists denounced white racism and claimed that their community was increasingly the victim of discrimination. Hindu associations in the United States and Canada, which traditionally played the role of lobbies and advocacy groups, began to focus more on Hinduphobia. They started to list all the attacks their community was subjected to. A branch of the RSS in Canada, the Vishva Hindu Parishad, for instance, issued a very alarmed statement in 2023:

Hindu community worldwide is a peace loving, progressive and inclusive community which believes in the value of “Vasudeva Kutumbakam” (meaning “the world is one family”). The community is known for its pluralistic and peaceful coexistence values but the community itself is feeling unsafe, insecure, and frightened of being a target of Hinduphobia, discrimination, prejudice, stereotyping, public threats, hate or bias motivated crimes, hate propaganda, violence, and acts of vandalism. It feels disappointed with the lack of action from their Canadian government.

A general survey conducted of the Hindu Canadian community supports the unprecedented level of fear Canadian Hindus are living within the community. Survey results indicate 89% of the respondents are worried about their family, community’s safety, and security after Pannun’s public threats to the Hindu community.[60]

Pannun—Gurpatwant Singh Pannun—is a Sikh activist who had just declared that Hindus should leave Canada, a country where, according to the VHP, Hindus were threatened as much by the Sikh diaspora as by white supremacists. Interestingly, this organization alleged that Hindus were also in danger because of some district school boards’ attempts “to recognize caste based oppression,”[61] which reflects the upper-caste character of the VHP and of the Hindu nationalist movement at large.

In North America, Hindu associations created Hinduphobia trackers, which updated the list of anti-Hindu incidents on a daily basis. The Hindu Amedrican Federation is a case in point. It paid particular attention to desecration of places of worship, to show that Hindu temples were subjected to all kinds of attacks, including insulting graffiti, hate speech, derogatory remarks in the classroom, and ridiculing of the Hindu religion in the media, including in television advertisements.[62] Most Hindu associations argued that Hinduphobia was on the rise and that the authorities had to pass legislation to control it. In 2025, Georgia became the first state in the United States to pass a bill to that end, in which Hinduphobia was defined as a “set of antagonistic, destructive, and derogatory attitudes and behaviors toward Hinduism.”[63]

In November 2024, Modi and Jaishankar protested against attacks on Hindu temples in Canada by supporters of the Khalistan movement (Khalistan is the  separate state some Sikh militants have been demanding since the 1980s), with the Indian foreign minister describing them as “unacceptable”[64] and the Indian media largely echoing his and Modi’s statements. In a post on X, Modi declared:

I strongly condemn the deliberate attack on a Hindu temple in Canada. Equally appalling are the cowardly attempts to intimidate our diplomats. Such acts of violence will never weaken India’s resolve. We expect the Canadian government to ensure justice and uphold the rule of law.[65]

Hindu nationalists in India echoed the sentiment of vulnerability that the diaspora expressed, and the Modi government was all the more sensitive to this development as Trump had imposed 50% tariffs on Indian exports in 2025[66] and initiated a rapprochement with Pakistan, whose leaders have been recognized by Trump as mediators between the United States and Iran in their 2026 war.[67]

Conclusion

National-populists, as a rule, claim that their people are in danger in order to project themselves as saviors. Modi has articulated this discourse by capitalizing on the traditional Hindu nationalist repertoire of victimhood that crystallised in the early 20^th century in response to an alleged “Muslim threat.” However, he has introduced three new dimensions in order to make the very notion of the Hindu vulnerability more credible, a change that was made necessary by the weakening of the Muslim other.

First, as chief minister of Gujarat, he designated Pakistan as responsible for terrorist attacks affecting his state and India at large. While these accusations were made plausible by the actual support that Pakistani jihadists received from Pakistani officials,[68] they did not rely on any evidence in that particular case.[69] Second, as prime minister of India, Modi not only targeted Pakistan but also Bangladeshi migrants. Third, the BJP has focused on Hindus being victimized in countries where they were in the minority, such as Bangladesh after the fall of Sheikh Hasina and the United States after the rise to power of Trump.

In North America, this repertoire of victimhood relied on the notion of “Hinduphobia.” According to scholar Nandini Sundar, Hindu advocacy groups use this concept in a very similar manner to that of antisemitism by Jewish organisations. This parallel reflects an attempt by the Hindu nationalist movement to emulate the communication—as well as military strategies—of Israel, a country whose situation is presented as very similar to that of India. Like some Zionist ideologues, the promoters of Hindutva consider that their sacred land is encircled by Muslim enemies and that they need to mobilize their nation to resist such threats.[70] Isreal indeed supported India more strongly than any other country during the 2025 India-Pakistan war. The Modi government expected other national-populist leaders to take a similar position, yet the attitude of the Trump administration, reflected especially in its visa and tariffs policies, has been seen as unfriendly. BJP leaders have come to realize that their national-populist partners are also ethno-nationalists who defend their interests first.

The fact that members of the BJP the were taken by surprise is rather ironic, like the very manner in which they continue to present Hindus as victims but fail to admit that their community and the Modi government have been oppressing minorities in India. There may be some logic behind this contradiction, however. Claiming that Hindus are victims is the only way Hindu nationalists have found to legitimize the victimization of minorities portrayed by the BJP as oppressors—if not today in India, elsewhere in the world, like in Bangladesh, and at least in the past, hence repeated references to the persecution of Hindus by the Mughals and other conquerors.

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[1] Subramanian Swamy, Hindus under Siege: The Way Out (New Delhi: Har-Anand, 2006), 28; emphasis in original. The plot referred to in this quote is not mentioned anywhere else, neither by the Indian state nor by Hindu nationalists.

[2] Cas Mudde, “Populism: An Ideational Approach,” In Cristóbal Rovira Kaltwasser, Paul A. Taggart, Paulina Ochoa Espejo, and Pierre Ostiguy, eds. The Oxford Handbook of Populism, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017), 29-47; Cas Mudde and Cristóbal Rovira Kaltwasser, Populism: A Very Short Introduction, (New York: Oxford University Press, 2017), 6.

[3] I have scrutinized Modi’s brand of populism elsewhere. SeeChristophe Jaffrelot, Modi’s India – Hindu Nationalism and the Rise of Ethnic Democracy, (Princeton Nj.: Princeton University Press, 2021. 

[4] See Christophe Jaffrelot, Gujarat under Modi. Laboratory of today’s India, (Hurst Publishers: London, 2024).

[5] Pierre Ostiguy, “Populism: A Socio-Cultural Approach,” In Cristóbal Rovira Kaltwasser, Paul A. Taggart, Paulina Ochoa Espejo, and Pierre Ostiguy, eds. The Oxford Handbook of Populism, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017), 74.

[6] Gino Germani, Authoritarianism, Fascism and National Populism, (New Brunswick, N.J.: Transactions Books, 1978).

[7] For a detailed analysis of this strategy of identity-building, see Christophe Jaffrelot, The Hindu Nationalist Movement and Indian Politics, 1925 to the 1990s, (Penguin Books India: New Delhi, 1996), 582.

[8] See the famous book by Shraddhananda Sanyasi, Hindu Sangathan [Hindu organization]—Saviour of the dying race, (Delhi: Arjun Press, 1926), 140–1.

[9] In the early 1920s, Indian Muslims adept of pan-islamism mobilized against the abolition of the Constantinople califate and their “Khilafat movement” resulted in riots which affected Hindus.

[10] George Mathew, “Politicisation of religion-Conversion to Islam in Tamil Nadu,” Economic and Political Weekly 17, no. 25 (June 19, 1982): 1031; Office of the Director for SC/ST, Government of India, Madras, “A report on the mass conversion of harijans of Meenakshipuram, Terkasi Taluk, Tiruneveli District into Islam,” Sunday, November 9, 1982, 16–25.

[11] It is not possible to give a precise assessment of the number of converts. According to Abdul Malik Mujahid it ranged from 2,000 to 22,000. See Abdul Malik Mujahid, Conversion to Islam—Untouchables’ strategy for protest in India, (Anima Books: Chambersburg, PA, 1988), 9. To these conversions were added threats to abandon Hinduism if the condition of the Scheduled Castes was not ameliorated.

[12] Ibid., 51, 69, and 89. See also Mohammed A. Kalam, “Why the Harijan convert to Islam views reservations with reservation,” South Asia Research 4, no. 2, (November 1984), 157.

[13] Chief Justice Dhananjaya Y. Chandrachud, “The Judgement,” in Asghar Ali Engineer (ed.), The Shah Bano controversy, (Hyderabad: Orient Longman, 1987), 23–34.

[14] Hindu nationalists refer routinely to the notion of “fifth columnists.” See, for instance, Upananda Brahmachari, “Enough is enough. Finish the Fifth Columns from our Motherland right now,” Struggle for Hindu existence, January 14, 2013, https://hinduexistence.org/2013/01/14/enough-is-enough-finish-the-fifth-column-from-our-motherland-right-now/.

[15] On the politics of fear, see, Haleh Afshar, “The politics of fear: What does it mean to those who are otherized and feared?,” Ethnic and Racial Studies 36, no. 1 (2013): 9–27; David L. Althiede, “Notes towards a politics of fear,” Journal for Crime, Conflict and the Media 1, no. 1 (2003): 37–54; David L. Althiede, “Terrorism and the politics of fear,” Cultural Studies Critical Methodologies 6, no. 4 (2006): 415–439, https://doi.org/10.1177/1532708605285733;  and Al Gore, “The politics of fear,” Social research 71, no. 4 (2004): 779–798, https://doi.org/10.1353/sor.2004.0040.

[16] Parvis Ghassem-Fachandi, Pogrom in Gujarat: Hindu Nationalism and Anti-Muslim Violence in India, (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2012), 59. One month later, Narendra Modi reiterated this interpretation in a long interview with the Times of India in which he said that “the attack on the Sabarmati Express” was “a deep-rooted conspiracy and a pre-planned, cold-blooded attack.” Interview with Narendra Modi by S. Balakrishnan, “Peace has returned to Gujarat, claims Modi,” Times of India, March 29, 2002, http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/ahmedabad/Peace-has-returned-to-Gujarat-claims-Modi/articleshow/5307572.cms (last accessed November 8, 2013). The idea that the Godhra attack was “premeditated” was also expressed in the report that the Gujarat state government submitted to the National Human Rights Commission after this body had sent it a notice on March 1, 2002 asking for “the protection of human rights of the people in the state of Gujarat irrespective of their religion.” See National Human Rights Commission (India), Proceedings in Suo Motu Case No. 150/6/2001–2002, May 1, 2002 (New Delhi: National Human Rights Commission, 2002); See also Javed Anand and Teesta Setalvad eds. “Inferno,” Communalism Combat 8, no. 76, (March-April 2002): 12, Archived at https://web.archive.org/web/20160322130547/http://sabrang.com/cc/archive/comapril2002.pdf.  

[17] “Modi blasts Pak terrorism, urges people to stand united,” Asian Age, May 29, 2002, 9.

[18] ‘Modi accuses Pakistan of spreading ‘semi-terrorism’,’’ Asian Age, May 25, 2002, 3.

[19] “Pakistan responsible for Gujarat unrest: Modi,” Times of India (Ahmedabad edn), June 9, 2002, 4.

[20] Manas Dasguta, “Death sentence for Akshardham temple attack convicts upheld,” The Hindu, June 2, 2010, http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/death-sentence-for-akshardham-temple-attack-convicts-upheld/article443455.ece (last accessed 8 Nov. 2013).

[21] Sanjeev Bhatt considered that “Akshardham was an engineered attack.” Interview with Sanjeev Bhatt in Ahmedabad on February 24, 2012. Bhatt, whose testimony about the 2002 pogrom had implicated the chief minister and other ministers, as mentioned above, was sentenced to life in 2019 in a 1990 case of custodial death.

[22] “Dham attack case: three years after SC rejects probe, new arrest,” Indian Express, November 5, 2017, http://indianexpress.com/article/india/akshardham-attack-case-three-years-after-sc-rejects-probe-new-arrest-4922689/ (last accessed 19 March 2018).

[23] Cited in Darshan Desai, “That missing healing touch,” Outlook India, October 14, 2002, https://www.outlookindia.com/magazine/story/that-missing-healing-touch/217544 (last accessed September 26, 2020).

[24] Raheel Dhattiwala and Michael Biggs, “The political logic of ethnic violence: the anti-Muslim pogrom in Gujarat, 2002,” Policy and Society 40, no. 4 (2012): 505–6, https://doi.org/10.1177/0032329212461125; Aseem Prakash, “Re-imagination of the state and Gujarat’s electoral verdict,” Economic and Political Weekly 38, no. 16 (April 2003): 1604–5, Sanjay Kumar, ‘Gujarat Assembly elections 2002: analysing the verdict’, Economic and Political Weekly, 38, no. 4 (January 2003): 272, https://www.jstor.org/stable/4413119.

[25] See the definition given by Jagannathan and Rai: “A police encounter is a term used in India as a shorthand for dubious police actions resulting in the killing of person(s) whom police allege to be criminal(s), but where police narratives of exchange of firing and self-defence appear to be prima facie unbelievable.” Srinath Jagannathan, Rajnish Rai, and Christophe Jaffrelot, “Fear and Violence as Organizational Strategies: The Possibility of a Derridean Lens to Analyze Extra‑judicial Police Violence,” Journal of Business Ethics, no. 175 (October 2020): 465-484, https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-020-04655-6.

[26] Christophe Jaffrelot, “Narendra Modi and the Police in India: National Populism, Politics of Fear, Victimization, and Cultural Policing,” in Anthony W. Pereira (ed.), Right-wing populism in Latin America and Beyond, (New York: Routledge, 2023), 172-195; Jagannathan, Rai, and Jaffrelot, “Fear and Violence as Organizational Strategies.”

[27] On Modi’s 2014 campaign, see Christophe Jaffrelot, “The Modi-centric BJP 2014 election campaign: New techniques and old tactics,” Contemporary South Asia 23, no. 2 (June 2015): 151 – 166, https://doi.org/10.1080/09584935.2015.1027662.

[28] “PM Narendra Modi: Guided by Modi hate, Opposition hating India,” The Indian Express, March 2, 2019 https://indianexpress.com/elections/pm-narendra-modi-guided-by-modi-hate-opposition-hating-india-5607565/ (Last accessed September 30, 2020).

[29] Alok Deshpande, “I-T raids have exposed the real chor, Narendra Modi tells in Maharashtra’s Latur,” The Hindu, April 9, 2019, https://www.thehindu.com/elections/lok-sabha-2019/i-t-raids-have-exposed-the-real-chor-narendra-modi-tells-in-maharashtras-latur/article26779958.ece (Last accessed October 1, 2020).

[30] “Narendra Modi adds Chowkidar to his Twitter handle name,” The Hindu, March 17, 2019, (https://www.thehindu.com/elections/lok-sabha-2019/narendra-modi-adds-chowkidar-to-his-twitter-handle-name/article26561703.ece, (Last accessed October 1, 2020).

[31] Ritesh Mishra, “Congress contesting LS polls to give free hand to terrorists, says PM Modi,” Hindustan Times, April 6, 2019, https://www.hindustantimes.com/lok-sabha-elections/congress-contesting-ls-polls-to-give-free-hand-to-terrorists-says-pm-modi/story-plKzfy6Xl4mtAVAZHTjBxK.html (Last accessed October 1, 2020).

[32] Milind Ghatwai, “Madhya Pradesh: You vote for Lotus, you are pressing trigger to kill terrorists, says PM Modi,” The Indian Express, May 18, 2019, https://indianexpress.com/elections/madhya-pradesh-you-vote-for-lotus-you-are-pressing-trigger-to-kill-terrorists-says-pm-modi-5734452/, (Last accessed October 1, 2020).

[33] “This ‘chowkidar’ will complete what remains to be done: Modi,” The Hindu, April 2, 2019 http://www.thehindu.com/elections/lok-sabha-2019/a-contaminated-alliance-narendra-modi/article26714346.ece, (Last accessed October 1, 2020).

[34] “India: Hate Speech Fueled Modi’s Election Campaign,” Human Rights Watch, August 14, 2024, https://www.hrw.org/news/2024/08/14/india-hate-speech-fueled-modis-election-campaign. Human Rights Watch defines hate speeches as advocacy that constitutes incitement to violence or discrimination, Dinah PoKempner, “New Twists on Old Offenses: Hate Speech and Blasphemy,” A Shrinking Realm: Freedom of Expression since 9/11, Human Rights Watch, World Report 2007, accessed June 2, 2026, https://www.hrw.org/legacy/wr2k7/essays/shrinking/bak/3.htm.

[35] Narendra Modi, “Text of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Speech at Public Meeting in Koderma, Jharkhand,” NarendraModi.in, May 14, 2024, https://www.narendramodi.in/hi/text-of-prime-minister-narendra-modis-speech-at-public-meeting-in-koderma-jharkhand-582407.

[36] Narendra Modi, “Text of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Speech at Public Meeting in Dumka, Jharkhand,” NarendraModi.in, May 28, 2024,  https://www.narendramodi.in/hi/text-of-prime-minister-narendra-modi-s-speech-at-public-meeting-in-dumka-jharkhand-582904.

[37] In 2006, Subramanian Swamy, a BJP MP, wrote: “Hindus are facing a terrible pincer; Islamic fast population growth and illegal migration, in conjunction with Christian money-induced conversion activities” (Subramanian Swamy, Hindus under Siege: The Way Out (New Delhi: Har-Anand, 2006), 37.

[38] Christophe Jaffrelot, The Pakistan Paradox. Instability and Resilience, (Oxford University Press: London, 2015).

[39] “Communal violence: 1068 houses and business establishments attacked,” Prothomalo, September 12, 2024, https://en.prothomalo.com/bangladesh/97chuvmupe. Several investigative journalists also attributed this violence to political vendettas, personal rivalries or members of organised crime. “35 untoward incidents related to Durga Puja in Bangladesh since October 1; 17 arrested: police,” Deccan Herald, October 12, 2024, https://www.deccanherald.com/world/35-untoward-incidents-related-to-durga-puja-in-bangladesh-since-october-1-17-arrested-police-3229694; Aaqib Md Shatil, “Claims of sectarian motives in nine Hindu deaths falter under scrutiny,” Netra news, October 30, 2024, https://netra.news/2024/little-evidence-of-communal-motives-in-9-hindu-mens-deaths/. 

[40] Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), Human Rights Violations and Abuses Related to the Protests of July and August 2024 in Bangladesh, (Geneva: United Nations, 2025),https://www.ohchr.org/sites/default/files/documents/countries/bangladesh/ohchr-fftb-hr-violations-bd.pdf.  

[41] See Sushim Mukul, “UN report exposes Yunus on attacks on Hindus in Bangladesh,” India Today, February 13, 2025, https://www.indiatoday.in/world/story/un-human-rights-report-exposes-muhammad-yunus-attacks-on-hindu-minority-bangladesh-2679359-2025-02-13.

[42] Chinmoy Krishna Das, a Hindu priest from Dhaka, was arrested by police after Hasina’s flight. He was released on bail six months later.

[43] Shishir Arya, “RSS terms atrocities on Hindus in Bangladesh inhuman, tells Modi govt to act,” The Times of India, December 1, 2024 https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/nagpur/rss-condemns-atrocities-on-hindus-in-bangladesh-urges-modi-government-action/articleshow/115851947.cms.

[44] Samiran Mishra, “‘140 Crore Indians Worried About Safety Of Hindus In Bangladesh’: PM Modi,” NDTV, August 15, 2025, https://www.ndtv.com/india-news/140-crore-indians-worried-about-safety-of-hindus-in-bangladesh-pm-modi-6341273.

[45] See, for instance NewsX, “S. Jaishankar Speaks on Atrocities Against Hindus in Bangladesh,” YouTube, posted circa January 2026, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dO_sUEPHKUM.

[46] Shekhar Gupta, “PM Modi wants US to protect Hindus in Bangladesh. Hasina’s debacle must not be India’s,” The Print, August 31, 2024, https://theprint.in/national-interest/pm-modi-wants-us-to-protect-hindus-in-bangladesh-hasinas-debacle-must-not-be-indias/2246353/.

[47] “Trump condemns ‘attacks on minorities’ in Bangladesh,” Prothomalo, November 1, 2024,https://en.prothomalo.com/bangladesh/6o2cvb1kwb.  

[48] “2 Indian-American Lawmakers Urge US To Help End ‘Coordinated Attacks’ On Hindus In Bangladesh,” NDTV World, August 10, 2024, https://www.ndtv.com/world-news/indian-american-lawmaker-urges-us-to-bring-end-to-coordinated-attacks-on-hindus-in-bangladesh-6307104.

[49] Pierre Poilievre, “Statement from Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre on the Situation in Bangladesh,” Conservative Party of Canada, August 9, 2024, https://www.conservative.ca/statement-from-conservative-leader-pierre-poilievre-on-the-situation-in-bangladesh/.

[50] Dipanjan Roy Chaudhury, “Indian origin Canadian MP raises issue of violence against Bangladeshi minorities,” The Economic Times, September 17, 2024 https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/international/world-news/indian-origin-canadian-mp-raises-issue-of-violence-against-bangladeshi-minorities/articleshow/113434173.cms?from=mdr.  

[51] “UK MPs Raise Concern Over ‘Ethnic Cleansing Of Hindus’ In Bangladesh,” NDTV World, December 4, 2024, https://www.ndtv.com/world-news/uk-mps-raise-concern-over-ethnic-cleansing-of-hindus-in-bangladesh-7165943. See also V. Thapa, “UK MP Bob Blackman Condemns Attack On Hindus In Bangladesh, Raises Concern Over Attempts To Ban ISKCON,” News 24, November 29, 2024, https://news24online.com/world/uk-mp-bob-blackman-condemns-attack-on-hindus-in-bangladesh-raises-concern-over-attempts-to-ban-iskcon/393870/.

[52] Geert Wilders (@geertwilderspvv), “The violence against Hindus in Bangladesh is horrific. They are being killed and their houses and temples are burnt by barbaric Islamic mobs. This must be stopped immediately!,” X (formerly Twitter), August 6, 2024, https://x.com/geertwilderspvv/status/1820698367766179900.

[53] In the United States, a majority of Hindu voters continue to support the Democratic Party, but their number is declining. Sumitra Badrinathan, Devesh Kapur, and Milan Vaishnav, “Indian Americans at the Ballot Box: Results From the 2024 Indian American Attitudes Survey,” The Carnegie Endowment for international Peace, October 28, 2024, https://carnegieendowment.org/research/2024/10/indian-american-voters-election-survey-us. See also Tom Gjelten, “One Group Whose Political Leanings May Be Changing: Indian Americans Who Are Hindu,” NPR, February 22, 2020, https://www.npr.org/2020/02/22/808404879/one-group-whose-political-leanings-may-be-changing-indian-americans-who-are-hind.

[54] Zain Mohyuddin, “Conservative support among Chinese and Hindu voters presents opportunity and risk for the party,” UK in a changing Europe, November 19, 2024 https://ukandeu.ac.uk/conservative-support-among-chinese-and-hindu-voters-presents-opportunity-and-risk-for-the-party/ and Omar Khan, “The BJP supporters’ targeting of British Indian voters is divisive – and it won’t work,” The Guardian, November 14, 2019, https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/nov/14/friends-of-bjp-indian-voters-tories.

[55] Cited in Sophie-Jung H. Kim,“The Global Turn in Nationalism: The USA as a Battleground for Hinduism and Hindu Nationalism,” Religions 14, no. 10 (2023): 1265, https://doi.org/10.3390/rel14101265.  

[56] Esha Mitra, Aishwarya S. Iyer, and Ross Adkin, “‘Treated like criminals’: Shackling of Indians aboard 40-hour migrant flight sparks new outrage against Trump,” CNN, February 7, 2025, https://edition.cnn.com/2025/02/07/india/india-trump-shackles-deportations-intl-hnk.

[57] The White House, “Restriction on Entry of Certain Nonimmigrant Workers,” Presidential Actions (Proclamation), September 19, 2025, https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/09/restriction-on-entry-of-certain-nonimmigrant-workers/.

[58] Bernd Debusmann Jr, “Trump adds $100,000 fee for skilled worker visa applicants,” BBC, September 20, 2025, https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cm2zk4l8g26o.

[59] Karina Tsui and Matthew Rehbein, “JD Vance expressed hope his Hindu wife will become a Christian. That’s ruffled feathers in India,” CNN, November 21, 2025, https://edition.cnn.com/2025/11/21/world/jd-vance-wife-india-religion-debate-hnk-dst.

[60] VHP Canada, “Addressing Hinduphobia in Canada,” October 19, 2023, https://vhpcanada.ca/2025/02/05/addressing-hinduphobia-in-canada/.

[61] Ibid.

[62] Hindu American Foundation, “History of Hinduphobia in the United States,” Hindu American Foundation, accessed June 2, 2026, https://www.hinduamerican.org/hinduphobia-history.

[63] Acharaj Kaur Tuteja, “The Slippery Slope of Selective Recognition: The Anti-Hinduphobia Bill of Georgia,” May 30, 2025, https://ohrh.law.ox.ac.uk/the-slippery-slope-of-selective-recognition-the-anti-hinduphobia-bill-of-georgia/.

[64] “Hindu Temple Attack in Canada: Jaishankar Calls for Strong Action | India-Canada Relations,” YouTube, accessed June 2, 2026, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lG1PHiAGnuU.

[65] Narendra Modi (@narendramodi), “Strongly condemn deliberate attack on Hindu temple in Canada…,” X (formerly Twitter), August 7, 2024, https://x.com/narendramodi/status/1853442198575952031.

[66] Chandri Navarro, “US Turns Up the Heat on Indian Imports over Purchases of Russian Oil Increasing Tariffs by 25%,” Global sanctions and export controls blog, August 18, 2025, https://sanctionsnews.bakermckenzie.com/us-turns-up-the-heat-on-indian-imports-over-purchases-of-russian-oil-increasing-tariffs-by-25/.

[67] Prashant and Aishvarya Jain, “S Jaishankar Said India Not “Go-Between Country” Like Pak: Sources On Iran Mediation ,” NDTV, March 25, 2026 https://www.ndtv.com/india-news/iran-war-live-news-s-jaishankar-said-india-not-dalal-broker-country-like-pakistan-sources-on-iran-mediation-11265842.

[68] Jaffrelot, The Pakistan Paradox.

[69] Jaffrelot, Gujarat under Modi.

[70] Nandini Sundar, “When Victors Claim Victimhood: Majoritarian Resentment and the Inversion of Reparations Claims,” Development and change, April 17, 2024, https://doi.org/10.1111/dech.12822.