Anxieties and Visions of National Identity: The Contemporary Contest Over the Idea of India

Ansiedades y visiones de la identidad nacional: la disputa contemporánea acerca de la idea de India

Abstract

This paper explores the anxiety about an impending crisis of Indian national
identity expressed in the contest over the phrase ‘the idea of India’ in public
and political spheres in 21st century Indian politics. The paper limits itself to
exploring the sense of the crisis and the anxiety surrounding it as expressed by
public intellectuals and political formations, in the use of the phrase idea of
India. Within this limit, the paper is further focused on exploring the cultural
and representational dimension of Indian national identity and its sense of unity. The introduction plots contemporary political developments and anxieties that have animated the contest over the idea of India, followed by a section that maps conceptual issues by understanding the different uses this phrase has been put to in the last two decades. The next section summarizes the major paradigms of Indian identity and unity that have emerged in Indian politics in the last hundred years and have been influential. The final section explores the uses of the idea of India in contemporary Indian politics by focusing on the recent public articulations of the phrase by a leading politician Rahul Gandhi.