Most Indians believe only a Hindu can be an Indian

The vast majority of Indians believe that to be truly Indian, it's very important to be Hindu, a survey from Pew Research Center has found.

Almost 64 percent of Hindus believe that religion and language are closely connected to national identity. Around 80 percent of respondents believe it's very important to speak Hindi to be truly Indian.

India, a religiously and ethnically diverse country of 1.3 billion people, has in recent years been led by the right-wing government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who has championed Hindu nationalism.

There are more than 19,500 languages or dialects spoken in India as a mother tongue. The findings by the Pew Research Center will likely be concerning for minorities in the country who may have a different mother tongue to Hindi.

In January of 2020, 53 people were killed, mostly Muslim, in communal rioting in the capital New Delhi. Muslims, who were protesting against a controversial citizenship bill that would strip them of their Indian citizenship, were targeted by Hindu extremists.

Under Modi's rule, far-right Hindu nationalists have become emboldened in their use of violence against the country's Muslim minority, which makes up around 15 percent of the population.

Interfaith marriages

In another finding from the Pew Research Center was how polarised views were amongst the country's different religious groups on intermarriage.

More than 75 percent of Hindus who say being Hindu is very important to being truly Indian also believed that it was very important to stop a Hindu woman from marrying a person from another religion.

Over the last few decades, India's far-right has promoted the spectre of 'love jihad', an Islamophobic idea that Muslims are trying to marry Hindu women in a bid to convert them to Islam. 

Believers in the idea of 'love jihad' think that Muslim men can not have real feelings of attraction towards Hindu women, and they feign love to manipulate them into marrying them.

Laws have been introduced in northern India compelling couples of different religions to publicise their marriage at least two months before tying the knot.

Indian police in October of last year arrested ten Muslim men for engaging in the offense of marrying a Hindu woman.

Pew interviewed 30,000 people across India in 17 languages for the study.

According to the survey, 80 percent of Muslims also believed it was important to stop members of their community from marrying into another religion.

The study found that increasingly India's religious groups don't feel that they have much in common.

Many Indians would rather live segregated lives, with the Pew survey finding that "many would prefer to keep people of certain religions out of their residential areas or villages."

Politics and religion

Among Hindus, views on identity go hand in hand with politics. Support for Modi's ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) was closely tracked with being Hindu.

More than 60 percent of Hindu voters who think it's very important to be Hindu and to speak Hindi also voted for the BJP.

Equally, cows that are viewed as sacred by Hindus have become another flashpoint in the polarised country.

More than 72 percent of Hindus believe that a person cannot be a Hindu if they eat beef which is also tied to notions of being Indian and voting intentions.

The results also indicate that the country’s drift towards extreme right-wing politics is also resulting in a hardening of identities which in turn is feeding into increasingly ethnic and religious polarisation.

“Indians’ concept of religious tolerance does not necessarily involve the mixing of religious communities,” said the Pew report adding “while people in some countries may aspire to create a “melting pot” of different religious identities, many Indians seem to prefer a country more like a patchwork fabric, with clear lines between groups.”