Newsom veto plays into Hindu nationalist agenda

OPINION – Following decades of activist struggle, California was poised to be the first U.S. state to outlaw caste discrimination, an ancient form of ancestry-based social stratification endemic to South Asia but also unfortunately upheld by diasporic communities in California.

With state legislators voting 31-5 in favor of Senator Aisha Wahab’s SB403, California might have joined the City of Seattle,  the City of Fresno, the California State University System, Harvard University, and a host of other institutions in updating existing civil rights legislation to address this oft-overlooked form of discrimination within America’s South Asian communities.

But earlier this month, Governor Newsom vetoed Senator Wahab’s bill, serving a body blow to the myriad lower-caste individuals (or Dalits) in California who have reported being excluded from employee housing, kicked out of homes by landlords, and losing jobs once others discovered their lower caste. Dalit employees have also reported humiliating treatment from their higher-caste peers and being passed over for promotions due to their status.

In vetoing SB 403, Newsom has not only blocked vital protections for this marginalized community, but also played into the broader political agenda of a group of powerful Hindu nationalist organizations who drove opposition to the bill.

SB 403’s most powerful opponent was the Hindu America Foundation (HAF), which argued that the bill was “redundant” with existing civil rights legislation. Newsom similarly wrote that “Because discrimination based on caste is already prohibited under these existing categories, this bill is unnecessary.”

It may be difficult to understand why HAF and other Hindu organizations opposed a bill bill that would have expanded civil rights protections to members of South Asian communities. To do so requires understanding these organizations’ history of attempting to silence criticism of India and secure American political support for an increasingly exclusionary, anti-minority vision taking hold in India: Hindutva.

Hindutva, or Hindu nationalism, is the ideology upheld by India’s ruling Bharatiya Janata Party. Using a combination of propaganda and violence, Hindu nationalist politicians led by Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi are seeking to remake India into a nation where Hindus reign supreme and other faiths, especially Muslims and Christians, are second class citizens. In pursuing this project, Hindu nationalist organizations in the U.S. and India fight hard to eliminate any discussion of casteism, bigotry, and other unsavory features of Indian society and politics, in order to remove blemishes from India’s ruling party spotty past.

In 2005, HAF tried and failed to change California middle school textbooks so that they eliminated all discussion of India’s caste system. In the past three years HAF has also ardently defended Modi’s anti-Muslim Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), a bill that explicitly excludes Muslim migrants from entering India, and which many fear will be used to deport some of the nation’s 200 million Muslim citizens.

As reported in The Intercept, HAF held a 2019 Senate briefing in order to again attempt to whitewash the Indian government’s history of repression of Kashmir. HAF also criticized California Rep. Ro Khanna for endorsing an article that criticized the Modi regime’s annexation of Kashmir.

In 2010, HAF defended the decision of a Hindu temple in New Jersey to invite the noted anti-Muslim, Hindu nationalist preacher Sadhvi Rithambara, a religious leader gained infamy in India for inciting violent mobs to destroy the Muslim holy site of the Babri Masjid — an incident that led to the slaughter of hundreds.

Another of the bill’s most prominent opponents, HinduPACT, is an initiative of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad of America (VHPA), a Hindu nationalist organization that shares both its name and ideology with an India based paramilitary organization listed for many years in the CIA factbook as a “militant religious organization.” On multiple occassions, the VHPA has welcomed fervently anti-Muslim faith leaders to speak to American audiences, including one Uttar Pradesh based religious leader who had preciously stated, “All Muslims should be eliminated.”

Seen against the backdrop of HAF’s and VHPA’s problematic histories, it becomes clear that these organizations’ opposition to SB 403 is just the latest in a long campaign of silencing criticism of India and promoting its anti-minority policies and leaders. In bending to their pressure, Governor Newsom has blocked a vital bill that would have extended protections to generations of South Asian Californians to come. It will be up to all of us to remain vigilant against Hindu nationalist influence in American politics and to continue to fight against caste discrimination in California and beyond.