annashay 
The Indian Army – long regarded as one of the region’s most professional and secular institutions – is now at risk of ideological capture. Under the Modi government’s Hindutva project, the armed forces are being infused with religious symbolism and nationalist zeal that threaten to transform them from the defenders of a pluralist state into guardians of a sectarian creed. What began as subtle cultural signaling has evolved into a structural re-engineering of the Indian military mind.
From Secularism to Saffronization: The process is visible both symbolically and substantively. When Defence Minister Rajnath Singh performed a shastra-puja ritual before India’s first Rafale jet in 2019, it was presented as a cultural expression. Yet it symbolized the merging of military power with religious ritual. Similar gestures have multiplied – generals quoting Hindu scriptures in speeches, saffron flags fluttering during regimental festivals, and religious ceremonies accompanying state parades.
Such acts may appear benign in isolation, but together they blur the constitutional boundary between faith and the state. In a country as diverse as India, they signal exclusivism; in a nuclear-armed one, they signal danger. For a nation that once celebrated its secular ethos, the military’s ideological coloring represents a profound transformation.
Historical Echoes: Mussolini, Hitler, and Napoleon: History offers chilling parallels. In fascist Italy, Benito Mussolini fused military pride with the cult of Roman destiny. His propaganda painted Italian soldiers as heirs of Caesar’s legions, fighting to revive a mythical empire. Discipline gave way to ideological conformity, and war became a moral crusade.
Adolf Hitler went further. The German Wehrmacht and SS were indoctrinated through a racial-ideological narrative that depicted warfare as a divine mission to purify the Aryan race. Officers swore personal loyalty not to the state but to the Führer. Religion was replaced by race as the moral compass of war, producing catastrophic consequences for Europe and humanity.
Even Napoleon Bonaparte, often admired for his military genius, mobilized his armies under the illusion of a “civilizing mission.” He glorified conquest as the spread of French enlightenment and superiority, masking imperial ambition with idealism. Each of these examples demonstrates how the fusion of ideology with military command transforms armies into instruments of fanaticism rather than defenders of national security.
The saffronization of the Indian Army bears a disturbing resemblance to these historic precedents. The invocation of Hindu mythology and civilizational narratives mirrors the fascist and Napoleonic models of moralized militarism – where soldiers become crusaders of faith and culture rather than servants of a constitution.
The Modi Doctrine: Militarized Patriotism: Under the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), civil-military relations have been carefully recalibrated. Retired generals sympathetic to Hindutva have been placed in key think tanks, media panels, and defense advisory bodies. Television channels celebrate airstrikes as national festivals, while dissenters questioning military operations are labeled unpatriotic. The cult of the “new India” – muscular, vengeful, and self-righteous – now defines the strategic vocabulary.
Military reforms such as Integrated Battle Groups (IBGs), theatre commands, and the modernization drive under “Atmanirbhar Bharat” (self-reliant India) are, on the surface, pragmatic. Yet when their political supervision is soaked in ideological fervor, they risk becoming tools of aggressive nationalism. The 2018 Land Warfare Doctrine and the post-Balakot rhetoric reflect a shift toward pre-emptive, high-intensity operations under the garb of “short, swift, high-tech wars.”
The fusion of populist politics and military strategy creates a dangerous emotional ecosystem. War becomes performative, a stage for electoral applause. Restraint – once the hallmark of mature statecraft – yields to religious zeal and civilizational arrogance.
Faith, Force, and the Erosion of Deterrence: In classical deterrence theory, stability rests on rational calculation. But when ideology penetrates the command structure, rationality itself becomes uncertain. If a general or political leader views conflict as a fulfillment of divine destiny, the threshold for escalation collapses.
Pakistan and China must therefore interpret India’s military posture not merely through the lens of strategic realism but also as potential ideological signaling. Border crises in Ladakh or along the Line of Control acquire a new dimension when soldiers are indoctrinated to see themselves as defenders of “Bharat Mata” against infidels or heretics.
At the tactical level, this mindset emboldens field commanders, compresses decision-time, and heightens misperception. At the societal level, it legitimizes discrimination against religious minorities, normalizing hate within barracks and beyond. At the regional level, it transforms South Asia’s fragile deterrence equilibrium into a contest of faith rather than a balance of power.
From Hindutva to Neo-Fascism: The parallels with European fascism are not rhetorical. Hindutva ideology – articulated by V.D. Savarkar and propagated by the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) – glorifies a mythical past and defines national belonging through religious purity. In Modi’s India, this ideology now permeates institutions once immune from sectarianism.
Mussolini’s Blackshirts and Hitler’s Brownshirts were paramilitary extensions of political ideology; in India, the RSS’s armed cadres play a similar role in shaping cultural nationalism. When such movements penetrate the professional military, the state crosses a dangerous Rubicon.
The fusion of populist politics, ethnic nationalism, and military power is the classic recipe for authoritarian militarism – one that Europe painfully unlearned after 1945 but which Asia now risks relearning. What we are witnessing in India is not cultural revivalism but ideological regression – a march from Hindutva to neo-fascism, cloaked in the language of patriotism and faith.
A Regional and Global Concern: Western powers, eager to counterbalance China, view India as a democratic partner in the Indo-Pacific. Yet they ignore the moral hazard of arming a state whose defense establishment is undergoing ideological mutation. Advanced weaponry, intelligence cooperation, and defense technology transfers strengthen not merely India’s military capability but also its ideological confidence.
When nuclear command structures coexist with religious nationalism, the danger becomes global. A misperception, or worse, a crusading impulse by a leader convinced of divine mandate, could ignite a catastrophe beyond the subcontinent. History shows that ideologically motivated armies rarely stop at their borders.
Policy Responses and the Path to De-Ideologization: South Asia cannot afford an arms race of faiths. The response must be rooted in strategic sobriety, not rhetorical panic. Pakistan must strengthen its early-warning and crisis-communication systems, maintain doctrinal clarity, and avoid being drawn into reciprocal religio-nationalist posturing. Islamabad, Dhaka, Colombo, and Kathmandu should collectively raise their voice at SAARC, SCO, and UN forums about the dangers of militarized religion.
Track-II dialogues and military-to-military professional exchanges can act as stabilizers. Regional defense academies should emphasize ethics, international law, and pluralism – values that transcend sectarian loyalties. Think-tanks and universities must revive inter-faith scholarship to counter the myth of civilizational conflict. The objective is not confrontation but restoration – bringing back professionalism, rationality, and moral restraint to South Asia’s military institutions.
Lessons from History: The lessons of Mussolini, Hitler, and Napoleon are stark. Ideological armies fight with passion but perish without honor. They destroy not only their enemies but also the nations that raise them. When the sword is baptized in ideology, it cannot be sheathed in peace. Europe rebuilt its civilization only after rejecting the militarism of faith and race; South Asia must do the same before it is too late.
India once prided itself on being a secular democracy where the army stood above politics. That legacy is eroding. The saffron hue now creeping over its uniform is not a matter of ceremony – it is a signal of transformation.
Conclusion: A saffronized Indian Army represents a structural shift in South Asia’s security paradigm. It undermines the delicate balance of deterrence, fuels internal polarization, and risks dragging the region toward ideological conflict. Civilizations endure not through crusades but through coexistence.
For India, reclaiming the secular soul of its military is not just a constitutional duty – it is a moral imperative. The true strength of an army lies not in the color of its flag or the sanctity of its rituals, but in its discipline, professionalism, and devotion to the collective peace of the region it serves.
