WHEN Narendra Modi won the elections last year, many wondered whether he would act to dispel the impression — created in part by his own association with organisations that actively propagate Hindutva — that India’s constitutionally mandated secular character was under threat. Unfortunately, to date his government has done little to check the rise of aggressive Hindu nationalism.

In one of the most recent examples of this, multiple reports have emerged of ‘forcible conversions’ of Christians and Muslims to Hinduism, achieved apparently through methods ranging from offers of free food and education to outright threats of violence.

These conversion ceremonies, perversely called ‘homecomings’ in an allusion to the ‘original’ nature of Hinduism, have taken place at the hands of hard-line Hindu groups that are allied with the ruling BJP and that, along with corporate India, played a key role in its electoral success.

Also read: Indian parliament in chaos over forced conversion protests

The prime minister, meanwhile, has observed a deafening silence on the issue. On Monday, however, his reticence precipitated a storm of criticism in the Indian parliament from opposition lawmakers demanding he take a stand against the growing incidence of these conversions.

Tainted as he was by the horrific Gujarat riots that occurred on his watch as chief minister of the province in 2002, despite having been cleared of culpability by a Supreme Court investigation, Mr Modi’s election to the highest office in the land was viewed nervously by the minorities.

As prime minister of the world’s largest democracy, it behoves Mr Modi to alleviate these fears aggravated by the strident patronage of ‘cultural revivalism’ by some quarters.

So far, his hands-off approach has sent the resurgent right into overdrive, rewriting school textbooks and calling for the Bhagwad Gita to be declared the national holy book.

The conversions are the latest, most ominous portent of a deepening sense of alienation among minorities in the country. A chauvinist incarnation of Hinduism is on the march.

India need only look across the border to see the devastation that can result when religion becomes the business of the state.

Published in Dawn December 24th , 2014