Everyday Communalism

Book excerpt: The authors analyse the reasons underlying the resurgence of communalism in the 2000s in Uttar Pradesh (UP) leading to riots in Mau in 2005, Gorakhpur in 2007, and Muzaffarnagar in 2013, but more importantly move beyond riots to analyse the new ways and means whereby communalism in the present phase is being manufactured by the Hindu right. They argue that UP is experiencing a post-Ayodhya phase of communalism markedly different from the late 1980s/early 1990s. The text employs a model of institutionalized everyday communalism whose defining feature is that rather than initiating major, state-wide riots, the strategy of the BJP-RSS currently is to create and sustain constant, low-key communal tension together with frequent, small, low-intensity incidents out of petty everyday issues that institutionalize communalism at the grassroots.