With India’s general election now underway, a report from the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace looks at the the core beliefs of India’s current governing party, the BJP, and examines the rise of Hindu nationalism and its consequences for India’s political life.

In the spring of 2019, nearly 900 million Indians will be eligible to cast their ballots in the country’s seventeenth general election held since independence in 1947. As is the case with each successive Indian election, this year’s contest will be the largest democratic exercise in recorded history. While the election will influence the direction of India’s economy, the country’s foreign policy, and the dynamics between New Delhi and India’s state capitals, the campaign’s outcome will also determine the contours of India’s future as a secular republic dedicated to upholding the country’s unparalleled diversity and committed to embracing ethnic and religious pluralism.

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