In Cleansing the Nation, Raka Shome explores the logics of governmentality of contemporary Hindu nationalism in India by advancing the concept of the “Hindu modern.” Analyzing a national cleanliness program and other development projects, Shome shows how the Hindu modern—a form of national governmentality that disciplines and regulates individual subjects to create desirable “clean” citizens—inscribes Hindu nationalism in India. Focused on security, progress, and development while celebrating and protecting the figure of the upper-caste Hindu woman, the Hindu modern works toward a religious and casteist cleansing of the nation that rewrites Indian modernity as a purified and cleansed Hindu modernity. It shores up caste and religious inequalities around who is authentically Indian, reproducing historical violence and exclusions of caste, gender, and religious minorities, especially toward Muslims, Dalits, and Adivasis. By outlining how the Hindu modern sutures Hindu-ness to the contemporary Indian national project of modernity, Shome helps us further understand projects of national purification and cleanliness within global populist authoritarian movements.

Raka Shome is the Harron Family Endowed Chair and Professor of Communication at Villanova University and author of Diana and Beyond: White Femininity, National Identity, and Contemporary Media Culture.

Preface  xi
Acknowledgments  xv
1. Cleansing the Nation: Hindu Nationalism, the Hindu Modern, and Gender  1
2. Purifying Bharat Mata  57
3. “Women’s Empowerment” Through Toilet Modernity: The No Toilet, No Bride Campaign  107
4. Swachh Violence: The Will to Punish  158
5. From Cleansing to Cleaning: An Alternative (Clean) India  205
Notes  221
References  231
Index