Hindutva fantasies

Publishing date: 29 November 2025

Published in: Business Recorder

Indian Defence Minister Rajnath Singh’s remarks at a recent event in India’s capital, asserting that although Sindh is not part of India today, it remains so “civilisationally,” and that borders can change “who knows, tomorrow Sindh may return to India”, have drawn a predictable sharp response from Islamabad. The Foreign Office condemned the comments as “delusional and dangerously revisionist,” pointing out that they reflect an “expansionist Hindutva mindset” that challenges established international norms.

The FO statement also underscored that such rhetoric violates the sanctity of recognised borders and threatens regional peace at a time when South Asia can ill afford renewed geopolitical friction.

Yet Pakistan is not alone in viewing such pronouncements with unease. Across the region, India’s neighbours have grown increasingly wary of the ideological messaging emanating from New Delhi. Just two years ago, the inauguration of India’s new parliament building by Prime Minister Narendra Modi triggered significant diplomatic discomfort when a mural evoking the idea of “Akhand Bharat” (undivided India) was unveiled. The depiction included not only Pakistan but also Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, Sri Lanka, and Myanmar.

Bangladesh and Nepal formally sought explanations from Delhi, while Pakistan noted the unmistakable symbolism with concern, describing the map as a manifestation of “an expansionist mindset that seeks to subjugate the ideology and culture not only of India’s neighbours but also its religious minorities.” It was, without doubt, a political assertion aligned with the ideological Hindutva project of the ruling BJP.

It is this ideological frame that renders Singh’s latest remarks particularly troubling. With its political identity rooted in Hindutva, the BJP–RSS combine promotes the idea of India as fundamentally a Hindu civilisational state. Although officials often describe references to “Akhand Bharat” as merely historical or cultural, their repeated use by senior leaders tells a different story. They blur the line between cultural nostalgia and territorial imagination, unsettling neighbours in a post-colonial region already marked by traumatic partitions and contested borders.

It is also worth recalling that the idea of India as a homogenous Hindu nation has little grounding in historical reality. For centuries, the subcontinent was a diverse tapestry of religions, cultures, and kingdoms. Even under the Mauryan Empire — one of the rare periods when much of present-day South Asia was under a single political authority — India, led by Emperor Ashoka after his conversion to Buddhism, was neither Hindu majoritarian nor ethnically uniform.

The current ideological push, therefore, is not a revival of ancient India but a reinvention of it. It departs sharply from the secular and pluralistic vision that guided the framers of modern India’s constitution. Rhetorical provocations of this nature do nothing but inflame regional tensions and alienate neighbours. More dangerously, they risk transforming cultural history into political ambition, which the region’s states cannot afford to ignore.