Unwittingly or not, the two-term prime minister has ended up legitimising hard-line, Islamophobic hyperbole and conspiracies that, for years, had been flowing into our social media feeds and phones.
Mumbai: For the last few years, the country has seen openly Islamophobic rhetoric and wild anti-Muslim conspiracy theories from many across the Hindu right-wing ecosystem.
They have come from different sources – from hardline Hindutva extremists in religious conclaves, WhatsApp forwards to spurious YouTube channels spouting pro-Hindutva content and Hindutva popstars who create songs and poetry aligned to Hindu nationalist priorities.
Much of it has gone unchallenged.
Over the last two weeks, that rhetoric has made a comeback through an unlikely source: the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)’s campaign, primarily led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s election speeches.
This story was originally published in thewire.in. Read the full story here.