Narendra Modi and the BJP: Hindutva on the march

Fergus Peace

There was a time in early 2014 when Western media was greatly preoccupied by the rise of India’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and its leader, Narendra Modi. Many column inches were spent worrying about the implications of a newly ascendant Hindu nationalism, and telling the world about the darkest moments of Modi’s time as Chief Minister in Gujarat. But since the BJP won (as expected) an electoral landslide in May of that year, Indian politics has largely slipped off the radar again.

If we were expecting the worst – a repeat of the large-scale anti-Muslim violence that wracked Gujarat in 2002, with Modi complicit at the very least through complicity – then the lack of attention is perfectly justified.

But the more likely scenario was always a more subtle and pervasive extension of the BJP’s Hindutva ideology throughout Indian life. The BJP’s rapid political growth since the early 1990s has centred on an awkward coalition of traditionalist Hindu organisations and a growing, globally-oriented upper-middle class. The glue that keeps these elements together is a vision to remake India as a strong, muscular nation, with a powerful economy and military built on the power of cultural unity.

This ambition manifests itself in three policy agendas: a pursuit of rapid, disruptive economic modernisation, military and political escalation against Pakistan, and the depiction of Hinduism as essential to Indian identity. As Modi’s government draws to the end of its third year in office, all three have been proceeding apace.

On the economic front, the government has finally succeeded in pushing through a national Goods and Services Tax, meant to come into force in April and replace a range of state and federal sales taxes. No doubt a sensible reform, it was heralded by Modi as putting an end to ‘tax terrorism’. The same kind of overheated rhetoric has surrounded the even more controversial ‘demonetisation’ policy, Modi’s bolt-from-the-blue announcement that 500 and 1000 rupee notes would no longer be legal tender. The chaotically implemented move appears to be aimed at jolting Indians to keep more money in banks and use electronic payments rather than cash, in order to modernise the country’s economy by increasing financialisation. But government figures have defended the policy – and the immense pain it’s inflicted, particularly on the poor and those in rural areas – as part of a national campaign against corrupt, ‘anti-national’ elements. Demonetisation is increasingly referred to as ‘note bandhi’, recalling the similarly disruptive (though much more violent) ‘nas bandhi’ policy of forced sterilisation implemented in the 1970s. In the week after announcing demonetisation, Modi gave a speech darkly commenting that “the forces up against me … may not let me live”. Nobody knows quite what he was referring to – certainly there hasn’t been any attempt on his life – but the language fits perfectly into what is, across the world, a common nationalist theme: that the country needs to be restored to its past glory by a period of shared sacrifice to fight a common enemy.

The most obvious enemy for Hindutva, of course, is Muslim Pakistan. The BJP is yet to follow through on its election promise to review India’s no-first-use nuclear policy, aimed at deterring Pakistan fromsparking a conventional conflict. But there has been escalation by other means. After a September terrorist attack along the de facto border in Kashmir, the PM gave a speech in which he claimed to be ‘reaching out’ to Pakistani citizens. In reality, Modi’s words – “Pakistan, ask your leaders that both the nations became independent at the same time, but why is that India exports software while Pakistan exports terrorism?” – were aimed at the old Hindu nationalist goal of portraying Pakistan as a constant menace to Indian security, to unite Indians against it. A few days later, the Indian Army launched a military operation inside the Pakistan-administered part of Kashmir, widely feted as a ‘surgical strike’ by BJP politicians. Firing across the border has occurred at an increased rate ever since; in the aftermath the Indian Motion Picture Producers’ Association has banned Pakistanis from working in Bollywood and a number of sporting associations have cut off bilateral ties.

And demonising Pakistan as an object of national anger is a short step from the continuing Hinduisation of Indian life. When Modi announced a crackdown on irregular migration from Pakistan and Bangladesh, he made an exception: Hindu and Buddhist migrants would be allowed to stay, but not others – that is, Muslims – who he accused of having ‘political purposes’, leaving implicit what those nefarious purposes might be. By and large, the government itself has been cautious around religious issues, but the broader family of Hindu nationalist organisations – the Sangh parivar, of which the BJP is one part – has stepped up its activity. The Bajrang Dal, a youth Hindu organisation, has engaged in vigilantism to enforce a ban on cow slaughter. The RSS and VHP have organised a series of mass conversions to Hinduism, often under a cloud of coercion when people were brought to ceremonies on the pretence of signing up to receive government benefits. Revealingly, the campaign is titled ‘Ghar Wapsi’ – Hindi for “homecoming”, reflecting nationalists’ view that all Indians are Hindu by rights and that conversion to Hinduism isn’t conversion at all, just a return to your origins. Modi himself maintains silence on most of these issues, but a number of other BJP politicians have been enthusiastic supporters of ‘reconversion’ and bans on cow slaughter. The Hindutva goal of fusing Hindu religiosity with India’s national identity has not been so far advanced since the demolition of a major mosque in 1992.

Nationalist victory, that is to say, has not plunged India into theocratic authoritarianism. But it has caused a steady advance of a militarised, aggressive idea of Indian nationhood and the increasing marginalisation of those outside the religious majority. It may be a worrying sign for the rest of the world 2017 that the West’s fear of the worst can seemingly blind us to a less extreme but still deeply troubling reality.

Western Media and ISIS Terror Attacks

Emily Dillistone

Charlie Hebdo, a controversial French magazine that publishes satirical cartoons, was never considered particularly heroic before the 2015 ISIS attack that killed 12 in their headquarters. The reporting on this event, along with the numerous fatal attacks that have occurred over the past few years, forms a powerful and essential part of terrorism’s tyranny over people’s psychology across the world. The current attacks hark back to 11 September 2001 and 7 July 2005 when the Western World was shaken by a foreign and terrifying force. Since these traumatic events, the West, and increasingly the whole world, has begun to live in fear of attacks. These past few years have seen a multitude of terrorist attacks across Europe and central Asia. To put it in context, while the Global Terrorism Database recorded 1,395 attacks in 1998, in 2012 this figure reached a record high of 8,441. Likewise, the total number of casualties from terrorist attacks in the past 15 years has soared from 3,387 to 15,396.

Since Bin Laden’s attack on the Twin Towers, the world has witnessed an increasing hostility towards Muslims, with islamophobia forming the backbone of the rhetoric propounded by Trump’s Presidential Campaign, Britain’s UKIP, France’s Front National, and Germany’s Alternative für Deutschland. Fear and anger, along with resentment of the establishment, have propelled Europeans towards a far-right extremist politics with a keenness to ‘protect their own’ from foreign terrors. Extremism and extremist politics seem to be on the rise, not just in Europe, but globally.

Terror attacks are unique in their kind due to several factors: the organization required for them to take place, and the visibility they reach in the media. Media threats are reported, no matter whether they are small or large. Michael Jetter, an academic researcher in Germany and the US, analysed more than 60,000 terrorist attacks between 1970 and 2012 and found that terrorist attacks drew a disproportionate amount of media attention. He discovered that 42 people die every day from terrorist attacks, compared with 7,123 children who die from hunger-related causes, yet the former receives far more attention.

In the early 2000s, terrorist organizations relied on pamphlets and video cassettes while media appearances were seldom, so the few pieces of propaganda that were released tended to hit big. In 2004, Zarqawi, a formerly unknown ex-convict, became a world-famous Islamic militant when his video of the execution of a young American contractor called Nicholas Berg was downloaded half a million times in 24 hours. In 2006, the 3-minute video of Saddam Hussein’s hanging was leaked and viewed by millions around the world. Even more so today, groups such as ISIS manipulate the media and new technology to their advantage. Many of the attacks in Paris were reported using photos and videos taken by passers-by and people targeted by the attacks. ISIS no longer needs to equip its killers with cameras because the public will publicize the event for them. And this soon becomes a vicious cycle: research shows that sensationalist media coverage of terrorist acts results in further acts of terrorism.

Terrorism is commonly defined as criminal acts intended to create a state of terror among a group of people deemed by the terrorists to be ‘morally objectionable’. But here is where one must be careful with terminology. A key component to terrorism is that it is a foreign threat, and therefore terrorism is and by nature subjective and situational. During the Indian struggle for independence, for example, those who fought in the resistance were a kind of ‘terrorist’ to British soldiers, but for the people of India they represented freedom.

In the West, ISIS’ brand has more than tainted the image of the supposed Religion of Peace. Muslims have become an all too easy target for racial abuse and many Western newspapers pounce on any new opportunity to exacerbate the already well-embedded islamophobia prejudices that exist in Europe and the United States. A key example of this is the Bastille Day terror attack in Nice earlier this year on 14 July 2016. A man drove a lorry down the Promenade des Anglais, killing 84 people. The Telegraph’s headline read “Nice terror attack: 'soldier of Islam' Bouhlel 'took drugs and used dating sites to pick up men and women'”. Newspapers were determined to depict the attacker as a sleazy ISIS-supporter, despite the lack of hard evidence to link his attack to the terrorist organisation.

Reporting on the Charlie Hebdo attack in Paris was similarly misleading. In the immediate aftermath of the attack the journalism firm was masqueraded as the modern proponent of free speech. Facebook even enabled its users to change their profile picture to a French flag to ‘stand in solidarity’ with the people of France. The reaction to the attack was so far-flung that when Ankara was attacked a few months later on 10 October, many people on social media asked why there was no such public outcry in response to the attack. With 103 dead and 400 injured on 10 October, later 13 dead and 125 injured at the bus stop bombing on 13 March 2016, and on 17 February 2016 29 dead and 60 injured left by the military convoy attack, Ankara is the city that has suffered some of the greatest losses of any ISIS attack. So where is the hashtag #benakarayim?”

Of course, from the UK’s perspective, the Paris attacks are more alarming due to the city’s geographical proximity: Ankara is almost 3000km further away from London than Paris is. However, this is not simply an issue of geography. Facebook’s headquarters are in the United States, yet while on 13 November 2015 people in France could mark themselves “safe” to reassure their friends and family, no such function was provided to the survivors of attacks in Ankara. This is not for lack of Facebook users in Turkey; according to Reuters, in 2011 Turkey already had 30 million Facebook accounts, making it the fourth largest country of Facebook users in the world. Numerous other attacks have occurred in the East, such as the June 2015 Dayarbakiir rally bombings, in which four were killed and 400 were injured, and the suicide bombings in Istanbul and Bursa, which also had high death tolls. Yet none were reported with as much fervour and panic as were the attacks on the West. Between 2015 and 2016, the attacks that made headline news were the attack in Brussels, the Russian plane attack, the Paris attack, and the San Bernardino attack. It is worth noting that the lattermost attack was the smallest of the major ISIS attacks. The issue cannot be ignored: the Western media overwhelmingly opts to report on white deaths and casualties comparatively to deaths and causalities in countries where white is not the dominant race.

The discrepancy is evident still in issues extending beyond race. In January 2015 Paris witnessed several attacks, but the attacks on Jewish supermarkets seemed to almost pass the international news stations by. On 9 January French police were called in to deal with two hostage-taking situations taking place in Jewish supermarkets in Paris, yet this was not deemed altogether that newsworthy. By contrast, the attack of the high-speed Thalys train on 21 August 2015 made international news, though, likewise, there were no fatal casualties. A notable difference: the involvement of three US citizens, two of whom were soldiers.

Many will remember the tragic case of Boko Haram’s kidnapping of 276 girls in Nigeria in April 2014. The group have since kidnapped over 2,000 girls. The hashtag #bringbackourdaughters reached Michelle Obama, but the case still did not receive even half as much attention as the abduction of 3-year-old Madeleine McCann in 2007, despite the fact that this is a time when social media and online reporting were not half as developed as they are now. The truth is, the abduction and rape of hundreds of black women is not half as appealing to a Western audience as the disappearance of a cute little American white girl.

This August the suicide bombing of a hospital in Quetta yet again brought to the fore the double standard the West manifests in its news reporting. The bombing left at least 70 dead and more than 100 wounded, making the attack one of the most fatal to have been carried out in Pakistan. Survivors of attacks in the East are rightfully outraged by the comparative lack of coverage and recognition of their suffering in the rest of their world. So what is to be done? The French media has stated that it will not show pictures of terrorists, but one could argue that the damage of racial profiling has already been done: the ‘Muslim’ and ‘terrorist’ stereotypes are so regularly conflated and misrepresented that the two have become virtually indistinguishable in the mind of the Western citizen. Moreover, it is somewhat difficult to support the notion that France is successfully dealing with its prejudices given Marine le Pen’s standing in the presidential polls. It seems evident after this discussion that the most proactive way forward is to cease using the term ‘terrorism’ to describe attacks, as it seems to obscure the crime. Moreover, naming the perpetrator of a crime a ‘terrorist’ can sometimes afford the killer more attention than necessary. So is it the fault of the media? I believe that news sites do have a responsibility, though not a mandate, to be objective, and to report news fairly and without bias. Efforts to be disinterested when it comes to reporting attacks is yet to manifest itself in many Western newspapers, and it seems to me that this is the main factor fuelling racial hatred and prejudice in the Western world in 2016. 

Is the EU shooting itself in the foot with Brexit negotiations?

Olivia Rohll

Just over five months on from the UK’s vote to leave the European Union on the 23rd of June 2016, there seems to have been almost no progress on what a post-EU Britain will look like. This is partly because of domestic disagreement - the Economist recently reported an almost perfect 50:50 split of opinion over the key free trade/free movement trade-off in the Brexit negotiations - but also because of the reactions of EU leaders nervous of right wing populism in their own backyards. The situation appears at times to have reached a total stalemate which only the goodwill of the negotiators can dissipate. Unfortunately for Theresa May the inner insecurity about the EU aroused across the bloc by Brexit has made goodwill hard to come by because an easy exit for the UK would encourage others to follow suit. 

However the resistance by French President François Hollande and, more recently Germanfinance minister Wolfgang Schäuble is unlikely to achieve the neutralisation of anti-EU sentiment they seek. Even among ‘Remain’ voters in the UK, the hostility sensed behind statements that the UK could face EU budget commitments up to 2030 and the like, have stirred up the feeling that Brussels has ambitions that override the sovereignty of EU member states. Britain has become a hazard to ‘The Project’ and is being punished for it - not a sight that is likely to appease nationalists. What is more, seeing leaders scrabbling to maintain their positions at the expense of their allies will do nothing to dispel feeling that the world is being run by a small group of elites uninterested in the concerns of the ‘everyday man’. Elitism even seems to be being felt at the state level, with Italy threatening to veto the EU budget due to what they see as a lack of support from EU countries with handling asylum seekers and immigrants. This is no doubt partly a political move by prime-minister Matteo Renzi, who is currently facing a referendum which, like the Brexit vote, is becoming as much about anti-establishment feeling as the constitutional reform it proposes. However the almost childish move to veto the budget also reflects the power imbalance between members which EU leaders like Renzi are finally pushing back against. The upshot is that whatever strategy European governments employ to handle Brexit they are eventually going to have to face internal unease about the EU face on, both at a domestic and national level. An easy Brexit may well encourage further departures, but throwing up barriers simply demonstrates the qualities of the European Union its people are coming to resent. 

The possibility of closer ties between the UK and US since the election of Donald Trump will do nothing to lower the tension. A British-American trade deal, although far from certain, would substantially strengthen the UK in the face of a weakened post-Brexit economy. Trump’s protectionism could well lead to complete abandonment of the work done towards a US-EU free trade deal, and his open enthusiasm for Brexit only adds insult to injury. While the scrapping of what has now been several years of complex negotiations would be an understandable blow for Brussels, failure must not be pinned on Trump or Brexit. At the end of August 2016 European politicians such as French Trade Minister Matthias Fekl began calling for the end of EU-US negotiations because of unmeetable demands from the Americans. In light of the possibility that the proposed deal was never going to come into fruition it is just worth wondering whether Angela Merkel’s calls on Trump not to give up on the deal would be as forthcoming if it weren’t for the remote possibility that the UK might get there first. 

The worrying possibility that the EU is being held together more because it is uncomfortable to leave, than because it is an attractive group to be in has not gone completely unnoticed however. As recently as 16th November, ex-French President Nicolas Sarkozy, writing in the Financial Times has stated ‘the rift between Europe and its citizens is wider than ever before.’ He recognises the legitimacy of the concerns of British people and extends the hope that they may choose to rejoin the Union once it has been reformed to better serve its members. The refreshing sentiment that rejoining the EU is an option for Britain also makes a welcome change from the finality Brexit is generally spoken about with. Before being defeated in the French primaries on 20th November, Sarkozy was seeking the Republicans’ (‘Les Républicains’) nomination for the 2017 French presidential election and was clearly hoping that EU reform might attract voters away from the far right better than Hollande’s defensiveness. This may just be another political manoeuvre by a member of ‘the elite’, but it might be the only way to save the EU and keep its people on board. If the UK must be punished for leaving, let it be done by making Europe better than it’s ever been before, not by making an example of it for those that might follow. 

Escalating Tensions in Myanmar: Conflict Between the Rohingya Muslim Minority and Security Forces

Justin Graham

On October 9th, militants in the north-western Rakhine state of Myanmar launched three simultaneous, coordinated strikes against border-police posts held by government security forces.  The militants, numbering anywhere from 250 to 800 strong, armed with knives, slingshots, and a few firearms, killed 30 police officers, and escaped with at least 50 guns and over 10,000 rounds of ammunition.  Over the last month, there has been an escalation in armed clashes between security forces and this militant group. 

The troubling part of this story is who the attackers were: members of Myanmar’s oppressed Rohingya Muslim minority group.  Both government and local sources corroborate that fact, and a video circulating around Myanmar’s social networks, purporting to be of the attackers, shows one member of the group calling on all “Rohingya around the world to prepare for jihad and join” the attackers in their assault.  As the International Crisis Group puts it: the video, “the need for local knowledge to carry out the assaults, and the difficulty of moving large numbers of people around this area are all suggestive of local Muslim involvement – possibly organized with some outside support.”  The group could potentially be a resurgent form of the RSO, or Rohingya Solidarity Organization, which operated in the 1990s as a terrorist organization advocating a form of Rohingya nationalism.

Myanmar’s Rohingya Muslim minority have essentially become a stateless nation within Myanmar, as the country refuses to recognize members of the Rohingya group as citizens, and tensions with Buddhist-majority Myanmar have exploded in the past, particularly in 2012, when conflict resulted in the deaths of 200 people, and 150,000 members of the Rohingya forced into squalid camps where most still languish, four years later.  In Rakhine, tensions are further compounded by the fact that 90% of all people living in the region are Rohingya community members.  Even with a democratic transition ongoing in Myanmar, the Rohingya have largely been left out of the process – marginalized and persecuted by Buddhist leaders.

Myanmar’s brutal mistreatment of the Rohingya community leaves them ripe for recruitment into terrorist organizations, as evidenced by the attacks carried out last month.  However, the government’s response to the attacks has been a string of high-handed, poorly targeted, ethnic revenge killings, instead of a legitimate counter-terrorism strategy.  Since the October 9th attacks, security forces have killed more than 100 people, most of whom were civilians, and burned down over 430 homes across Rohingya villages.  Over the last month, 3,000 Rohingya have fled Myanmar to seek shelter and China, and more than 500 people entered refugee camps in neighboring Bangladesh just last weekend.

While Myanmar’s government should pursue terrorists, killing civilians and pursuing a campaign of ethnic-based persecution will only lead to a riper recruiting ground for whichever organization(s) carried out the attacks last month.  The real pathway to peace lies in ending attacks by security forces against civilians and entire villages, moving Rohingya members out of squalid camps, and giving the group real rights, incorporating them into Myanmar’s larger society.  That however, seems unlikely, as even the vaunted Aung San Suu Kyi has taken to calling Rohingya members “Bengalis,” in an attempt to emphasize their foreignness – and some might say, to dehumanize people, who like it or not, are part of her country.

Is the end of The Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan near?

Gal Treger

Since twenty-six year old Mohamed Bouazizi set himself on fire and sparked the Arab Spring not much has been stable in the Middle East; Tunisia, Mohamed’s home country, ousted their long time President Zine Ben Ali. In Libya, rebel forces lynched Gaddafi in the streets of Sirte. Syria will soon enter the sixth year of a ferocious civil war. Egypt managed to democratically elect the first ever leader of a country from the fundamental Muslim Brotherhood movement, overthrow him and replace him with an old-school military general. Yemen is on the verge of complete disintegration. Iraq is already there. And even the wealthy, agile kingdoms of the gulf suffered their concussions. There seems to be just one Arab country that was not affected: The Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan. However, there are good reasons to think that Jordan is up next.

With a population of 9.8 million people, Jordan has been home to over 1.5 million refugees of the Syrian Civil War. That is an increase of over 15% in Jordan’s population in just six years. It is analogous to Germany welcoming 12.2 million immigrants by 2021 or the United States offering asylum to some 49.5 million refugees over the same time period.

Most refugees live in dire conditions in camps on the northern border with Syria. According to UN estimates, two-thirds live below the national poverty line and one in six households is in abject poverty, living off less than $40 per person per month, or just over $1.30 a day. With the battlefields of the civil war behind them and the wealthy cities of Amman, Irbid and Zarqa in front, their struggle for jobs, homes and recognition will eventually have political consequences.

The economic situation is a stressor on the political order as well. According to the World Bank, unemployment rates reached 13% in 2015. The annual growth in GDP per capita was zero percent in 2015 and is projected to be lower than one percent in 2016. Total productivity growth slowed for the first time since 2010. Foreign aid, investments, remittances and tourism, the fundamental growth sectors, are in persistent decline. Deflationary pressures persist due to lower oil prices, the weakness of the euro and slow economic growth, while the Central Bank of Jordan tries to stimulate the economy with a loose monetary policy.

The danger of high inflation, the precursory of revolution, is discernible. The scenario of a sudden surge in the prices of basic goods seems highly probable; whether due to a sharp rise in the prices of global commodities, a government tax-reform aiming to secure an IMF loan, geopolitical pressures or drastic changes in exchange rates of the dinar.

The current political structure in Jordan is also facing a perilous ideological threat. The Islamic groups in Jordan are moving towards a more militant, proactive and jihadist Islam, affiliating themselves with fundamental groups in the region, primarily Al-Qaeda.

Additionally, Islamic State propaganda is ubiquitous, not just in mosques but also in universities, sports clubs and youth groups. Youth are futile ground for radicalization, with unemployment for those under the age of 30 – which account to 70% of the population – just over 30%, twice the world average. Furthermore, there are growing indications that Sunni militants, Salafi groups, Syrian opposition and ISIS supporters are smuggling more and more arms into the country.

When a car drives over a bridge and the bridge collapses we tend to focus on the specific car, the driver, the time and place the accident took place. We rarely discuss the structural stability of the bridge. The political system in Jordan is an unstable bridge. We have good reasons to believe that one of the cars driving over will make the entire bridge collapse.