Intimidation of Activists Against Hindutva and White Supremacy is Not the Answer to Rising Anti-India and Anti-Hindu Hate

On October 23, 2026, Prime Minister Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) posted a message on X falsely accusing my colleague Sunita Viswanath, co-founder of Hindus for Human Rights (HfHR), of being part of a “network of hardcore anti-India elements… who amplify Rahul Gandhi’s anti-national statements… and spread his anti-India agenda.” The post included a 2023 image of Sunita seated near Rahul Gandhi at a roundtable conference with 50 other India policy experts. But it offered no real evidence to support its conspiracy theory. 

Sunita responded with a defiant one-line statement: “Proud to be on a list of people devoted to inclusive democracy and human rights. They can’t intimidate me because all I do is speak truth and spread love, and I do this as a Hindu.”

This was the BJP’s second attempt in three years to intimidate Sunita. On June 28, 2023, Smriti Irani, then a minister in the Modi cabinet, had brandished the same photograph at a news conference in Delhi as proof of an international conspiracy led by Sunita, Rahul Gandhi, and George Soros to “destroy India.” 

Sunita had dismissed Irani’s allegation with a detailed response: “Not George Soros agent, I am a practising Hindu woman against Hindu nationalism — My Jewish husband and I are being used as cannon fodder in BJP’s attempts to distract from Rahul Gandhi’s visit to Manipur.” But that did not prevent the BJP from repeating the same lie.

Irani’s reckless disregard for the truth had put Sunita in harm’s way by triggering a barrage of offensive and misogynic trolls, which continue to this day. But it has only strengthened her resolve to expose the adharmic rule of the Modi/BJP government and all the hate and violence that it has presided over in connivance with the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS). 

More and more Indians now seem to recognize that BJP, RSS, and their cheerleaders around the world have no compunction about spreading lies and misinformation to stay in power. As a result, some of the truth-seekers (e.g., Umar Khalid and Sharjeel Imam) who believed in Indian democracy and are true upholders of India’s motto, Satyameva Jayate(Truth alone triumphs) have been in jail for more than six years without a trial or bail.

Arnab Goswami Amplifies BJP’s False Claims

On October 23, 2026, the same day as BJP’s post, Arnab Goswami of Republic TV devoted his entire show to promoting the BJP’s attack on Sunita. He had promised to “connect the dots” on alleged foreign funding of the student protests, but merely recycled images of unidentified gatherings with some individuals circled in red, presumably to suggest that ‘anti-India conspirators’ were everywhere. 

For effect, he peppered his diatribe with dire warnings of the coming anarchy and a “Global Tukde Tukde Gang” plotting against India. He also drew false parallels between the student protests in Delhi and the violence in the Paris protests.  

Arnab’s dots remained unconnected: He zoomed in on the same 2023 photograph of Sunita with the label “ALLEGED SOROS AGENT,” in another try at linking her to the alleged foreign-funding conspiracy. He also labelled HfHR “the most anti-Hindu” organization in the world, a dubious honor coming from a man whose rhetoric hardly sound like a practitioner of Hindu dharma.

The Hindu American Foundation (HAF) Adds Fuel to the Fire

Just days before Arnab’s show, Suhag Shukla of the HAF, who had remained relatively quiet on the student protests, became vocal after the Paris protests turned violent. On October 18, 2026, she posted a message linking the protests in France to the student protests in India and, and by implication smearing HfHR, which had organized numerous protests outside India in solidarity with the students of India (at 10:45 in the video).

Shukla doubled down by accusing prominent U.S. lawmakers of “supporting radical leftist anti-government protests in India even after what just happened overnight in France.” But she dishonestly glossed over the fact that the Indian protests had been peaceful until they were infiltrated by RSS/BJP supporters and the police used force especially targeting women. As a people’s tribunal recently concluded, the “Delhi Police set out to crush July NEET protests, not disperse them.” The report also described the use of nail-fitted batons and pellet guns by the police after the exits had been locked, trapping students inside.

Sunita’s case is a prime example of how the Modi government, the BJP and other RSS-linked groups and their army of trolls, and the sycophantic pro-Modi media, often work in tag teams with diaspora organizations.

Shukla’s October 18 post seemed timed to provide a lifeline to the Modi government and the Delhi police, who were under intense pressure from opposition politicians and activists over their handling of the protests. Five days later, Arnab had seized the opening to accuse student protesters of being ‘foreign-funded’ — a well-known tactic employed to mobilize Modi’s supporters in India. 

Sunita’s case is a prime example of how the Modi government, the BJP and other RSS-linked groups and their army of trolls, and the sycophantic pro-Modi media, often work in tag teams with diaspora organizations  to demonize and discredit their adversaries.

Fall Out of Attempted Mass Shooting at a Hindu Temple

Just a week before Suhag’s post, on October 11, 2026, Hindu Americans in the Chicago area were jolted by news of a narrowly averted mass shooting at their temple in Aurora, Illinois. Fortunately, no one was hurt, but the incident sent a chilling reminder that no house of worship is immune from America’s grim record of mass shootings. It also highlighted our lawmakers’ shameful lack of will to enact even a basic gun-control legislation.   

Congressman Raja Krishnamoorthi, whose district includes the temple, was in the temple at the time of the planned attack. Shaken by the incident, he called for an FBI investigation of the attempted massacre as a hate crime. The congressman condemned the alarming rise in anti-India hate in the Chicago Tribune: “No community can defeat bigotry alone. We must stand together against hatred in all forms…No one should ever be targeted because of who they are or whom they love.”

The congressman’s call to “stand together” against hate was appreciated by the community; however, I’m personally skeptical about his credibility in leading the charge, given his close friendship with Prime Minister Modi, his allegiance to RSS-linked organizations in the U.S., and his indiscriminate acceptance of donations from everywhere, including “corporate, pro-war, anti-Palestinian, anti-immigrant special interests, ICE contractors, weapons industry interests, and AIPAC.” 

In any case, I don’t believe that congressional resolutions, or more proclamations from local governments appreciating the Indian/Hindu community, are the answers to rising hate online. On the contrary, they are being perceived by some Americans as special recognition of one specific community over others, and are eliciting more negative reactions. The recent Diwali greeting by Rep. Krishnamoorthi was turned into a personal attack that even he doesn’t belong in America. 

Thankfully, a united front representing Hindus, Muslims, Christians, Dalits, atheists, and academics (including HfHR) has been at work for over three years to counter the rise of supremacist movements in the U.S. and in India: The Savera coalition, of which HfHR is an active participant, has been working with established civil rights and anti-Zionist movements to organize educational conferences and produce meticulously researched white papers on supremacist movements. 

Savera “Stands Together” But Hindutva “Stands Apart” 

The mission and values of Hindutva organizations like HAF are diametrically opposed to those of Savera and HfHR. Unlike them, HAF’s raison d’être is to shield the Modi/BJP government and the RSS family from criticism and potential sanctions by the U.S. government. So, it frequently   amplifies the Modi government’s attacks on its opponents, for example, on the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF), which has been highly critical of Modi’s human rights record. In the past, HAF has also vigorously defended India’s discriminatory and unconstitutional Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) and its violent suppression of Kashmir’s Muslim majority.  

In reality, HAF’s priorities also happen to ‘coincide’ with the presumed interests of its largely privileged ‘upper-caste’ supporters: For example, HAF went to great lengths to block a California resolution that would have provided a legal foundation to people facing caste discrimination in the workplace. HAF also opposed a congressional resolution on transnational repression of U.S. citizens (TNR), introduced following the assassination of a Canadian Sikh activist and the attempted murder of a Sikh activist in the U.S., allegedly by proxies for the Indian government. 

Finally, the HAF has tried every trick in the book to delegitimize and dehumanize its opponents, including filing frivolous lawsuits, spreading conspiracy theories and misinformation, and often using ‘dog whistles’ to mobilize its base to join in the fray.

For all these reasons, HAF and other RSS-linked organizations in the U.S. continue to operate in their own islands and are not part of any broader coalition of Indian Americans. I don’t see how they can play a constructive role in countering the rising anti-India/anti-Hindu hate coming from White supremacists. 

Opportunities and Challenges ahead

Obviously, there are no instant solutions to stop the hate. But the community can start by recognizing some ground realities: 1. Many of the hateful posts on social media are reactions to holier-than-thou posts by Indians and other negative news headlines about Indians, including stories on H1B visa fraud and other financial frauds; 2. Not every negative comment should be dismissed as just an act of hate – many of them are frustrated attempts to help Indians see ourselves as others see us; 3. Proliferation of video clips from all parts of India are exposing average Americans to the lived realities of India and the mind-boggling diversity of Hindu practices and rituals, some of which play into the innate bigotry and xenophobia of White supremacists and Christian fundamentalists who have renewed their attacks on Hinduism as a demonic cult.

More specifically: 

• Americans are noticing and commenting on the hypocrisy of those who portray themselves as a minority under duress in the U.S., while cheering India’s ongoing persecution of religious minorities under the Modi government. Modi supporters in the U.S. have no control now over the daily dose of clips showing the destruction of churches, mosques, dargahs, and even Muslim cemeteries; beef-related lynchings; and the fiery casteist and Islamophobic speeches by Hindu leaders calling for the mass murder of Muslims!  

• Political advocacy in the U.S. Congress on behalf of a particular faith is not normal, perhaps because of the constitutional separation of church and state. So, the appearance of a Hindu caucus that’s openly pro-Modi and pro-RSS has raised new questions about the allegiance of Hindu Americans. It would be a grievous error to dismiss or underestimate the seriousness of this allegation.

Democrats’ massive victory in the U.S. midterm elections and the growing opposition to the Modi government in India offer a ray of hope that both peoples can free themselves from fascist autocrats to reclaim their democracies. More and more Indians seem to be waking up to the reality that Modi’s twelve years as Prime Minister has severely wounded Indian democracy, and if left unchallenged will seriously corrupt American democracy as well.

But we cannot afford to remain on the sidelines for two more years and allow others to shape our destinies. Progressive Indian/Hindu organizations such as HfHR and Savera are leading the fight. They cannot compete with the money power of Hindutva organizations, but they have a more potent weapon, as exemplified by Sunita: confidence that Shanti (peace), nyaya (justice) and satya (truth) will always triumph over hate.

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Raju Rajagopal is the Cofounder, Hindus for Human Rights, The views expressed here are personal.