South Asia Citizens Web

In the Hindutva historiographical format Bhaarata, i.e., India, is timeless: the first man was born here; its people were the authors of the first human civilisation, the Vedic, which is the same as the Indus-Saraswati; they had reached the highest peak of achievement in both the arts and the sciences; and they were were conscious of belonging to the Indian nation, which has existed eternally. Views such as these are churned out of the cultural nationalist mill day in and day out and are peddled to the credulous, who accept them as a matter of faith. But evidence shows that India as a country evolved over a long period, and that the formation of its identity was linked with the changing perceptions of the people who migrated into the subcontinent at different times.

An interactive project exploring stories from 1947

With the BJP in power, the RSS in the ascendant, and the airwaves dominated by channels whose TRPs depend on stoking jingoism, there is an increasing tendency to submit ordinary Indians to a series of coercive loyalty tests.

There is plenty of evidence that globally inspired terrorism has come to Bangladesh

While India has made huge strides in building modern economic installations since its independence, religion still enjoys more importance than many other fields