Gujarat Under Modi - Christophe Jaffrelot

Date: 
19/03/2024

London, Hurst, 2024, 416 p.

In 2012 Narendra Modi became the first Hindu nationalist politician thrice elected to lead a state of the Indian Union, his stewardship as Chief Minister of Gujarat being the longest in that state’s history. Modi and his BJP supporters explained his achievement by pointing to economic growth under his leadership, yet detractors point out that Modi has been more business-friendly than market-friendly—to the benefit of large industrial corporations, and at the cost of great social polarisation. In 2002, an anti-Muslim pogrom of unparalleled ferocity occurred in Gujarat, leading to the biggest number of Muslim deaths since Partition. The state’s Hindu majority immediately rallied around Modi. No serious riot has occurred in Gujarat since, but polarisation was key to Modi’s strategy there, and he has deployed that strategy again and again since he became Prime Minister of India in 2014. For Modi has cultivated a communal image. A marketing genius, his messaging combines the politics of Hindutva with economic modernisation, to the clear appreciation of Gujarat’s middle class. Christophe Jaffrelot’s revealing book shows how Modi’s Gujarat served as the laboratory of Modi’s India, not only in terms of Hindu majoritarianism and national populism, but also of caste and class politics.

Autour de la publication

Media
13 February 2024
The enduring personality cult of Narendra Modi
Book extract, Himal Southasian

Videos
22 May 2024
[Book Talk] “Gujarat Under Modi: Laboratory of Today's India”
Interview with Christophe Jaffrelot by Ingrid Therwath, Asia Society

24 February 2024
Modi is India’s Most Powerful PM Ever But the Divisions He Has Caused Are Very Worrying

Interview with Christophe Jaffrelot by Karan Thapar, The Wire

Entretiens du CERI
19 March 2024
Modi’s Strategy, Rise, and Rule, from Gujarat to the Indian Nation State. Interview with Christophe Jaffrelot
Interview with Christophe Jaffrelot, by Miriam Périer

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