BEFORE BJP’s ascendency into power, India branded itself as a tolerant, secular and inclusive society whose democratic principles were largely anchored in sociopolitical diversity and religious freedom while externally, it championed being non-aligned and occupied an important place amongst the global south countries.

Nevertheless, since 2011 onwards, BJP regime has converted India into a far-right wing Hindu Rashtra, fostering an elitist and extractive authoritarian regime and nurturing an intolerant, radical and extremist society.

More dangerously, riding on a bubble of populism and false sense of security, PM Modi structured his internal and external policies on certain fragile and wrong assumptions. To count a few: (i) India enjoys unprecedented global geopolitical and geo-economics relevance; (ii) India is the net security provider and counter weight to China; (iii) India has attained formidable military strength and established impregnable air defence; (iv) India can find a space for waging war with Pakistan under nuclear overhang; (v) India can simultaneously ride eastern and western boats on the pretext of so-called strategic autonomy; (vi) India is the global manufacturers’ and investors’ destination; (vii) India is the rightful claimant of regional and global leadership; (viii) and finally, India has enough global clout to kill political dissent even by exporting terrorism to regional and global countries.

In order to actualize these misplaced assumptions, PM Modi orchestrated his power structure around: (i) fostering anti-Pakistan sentiments as the central theme of his election campaigns; (ii) using false flag........

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