Abstract

With Hindutva being a ‘global movement,’ Hindu Diaspora communities who do not necessarily feel connected to the contemporary politics of India may be affected and mobilised by and through Hindutva discourse.  In this webinar, Dr Priya Swamy will share more about her work and continued insight into Hindutva in the Netherlands, including Surinamese Hindu community members’ relationship to Hindutva discourse, and how this discourse circulates. She will reflect on how the presence and form of Hindutva in the Netherlands is shifting. She will foreground the importance of emotional labour and affect, reflecting on the 2024 opening of the Ram Mandir as a pivotal moment wherein Hindutva discourse and affect was, and continues to be mobilized. These insights offer a lens with which to understand diasporic Hindus’ affinity or disinclination for religious ideas associated with Hindutva in the context of living as a racialized minority in Europe.

About the Speaker

Dr Priya Swamy has conducted postdoctoral research on issues related to religion and politics in the lives of Surinamese Hindus in The Netherlands and Suriname. She is affiliated with the Leiden Institute for Area Studies as a lecturer and has been a visiting research fellow at the Royal Dutch Institute for Southeast Asian and Caribbean Studies. She is currently curator of Globalisation and South Asia at the National Museum of World Cultures (The Netherlands).

About the Moderator

Antara Chakraborthy is a Senior Analyst at the Centre of Excellence for National Security (CENS) at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS), Nanyang Technological University, Singapore. With a background in journalism covering Indian domestic politics, she now explores multiculturalism and citizenship in plural societies. Her research focuses on the areas of social cohesion, social resilience, and polarisation in multicultural landscapes. Her current research delves into the rise of religious nationalism in India and its impacts on diasporic identity.