Hindutva politics and the transformation of Indian constitutional values under Narendra Modi rule, 2019-2024

Abstract

Bachelor's thesis analyses how Hindutva ideology manifests itself in the statements produced by Narendra Modi and the Bharatiya Janata Party (B.J.P.) during Narendra Modi's second term in office from 2019-2024. The research questions of the thesis are whether Hindutva manifest itself in Narendra Modi’s and B.J.P. statements during the second term of Modi’s rule and do the B.J.P.’s and Narendra Modi’s narratives contradict or agree with the narratives written in the Preamble of the Constitution of India. The analysis focuses on the Preamble of the Constitution of India, two speeches by Narendra Modi, the B.J.P.’s website post “Chapter 2: Our National Identity” and selected chapters from the B.J.P. Manifesto 2024. Thesis uses qualitative content analysis and narrative analysis based on codebooks as research methods. Primary sources are coded according to four frameworks: Democracy related themes; Framing of India; India wellbeing related themes; Culture, religiosity. Based on the codebooks, the narratives are identified, and the meanings present in Modi and B.J.P.’s messages are compared with the narratives expressed in the Preamble. The main conclusions of the work show that Hindutva manifests itself in Modi and B.J.P.’s texts primarily in linking national identity with Hindu culture and sacred canonical texts of Hinduism. B.J.P. presents itself as the main defender of the people, culture and state, while India’s diversity and non-Hindu identities are not considered in political narratives. Although Modi and B.J.P. refer to the Constitution, the analysis shows that their narratives contradict the narratives from the Preamble. The bachelor thesis’s contribution to the studies of religious nationalism and Hindutva lies in an offered detailed account of religious nationalism as a governing strategy and analysis of the ways Hindutva rhetoric corresponds with the constitutional values in modern India.