Indian Youth, Identity Politics, and the Rise of Wokeism

• Wokeism erodes young people’s faith in democratic processes like voting, drawing them towards anarchic and disruptive movements.
• Many young Indians influenced by wokeism participate in protests without fully understanding the issues, as seen in the anti-CAA and farmers’ protests in India.
• India’s urban youth are exposed to woke culture through social and cultural spheres dominated by the communist ecosystem.
• India’s education system, heavily influenced by Western academia, imports wokeism from the West, making the country’s youth even more susceptible to its toxic culture.
• Hindu Dharma and culture are the ultimate targets of the “woke” lobby.
• India must create its own civilizational and cultural narrative to counter the harmful influence of woke culture on its youth.

India has a large and dynamic youth population, with approximately 65 percent of Indians being under 35 years of age. At a time when countries across Europe and even countries like the U.S. and China are struggling with dwindling youth demographics and an aging population, India’s youth stand at a precarious crossroads. The country’s young can be both an asset and a concern, depending on how one communicates with them and channelizes their creativity and productivity pool.

However, voting trends suggest that India’s youth appear disinterested in politics, at least on the surface. According to media reports, only 38 percent of first-time voters—18 million out of 49 million—registered for the 2024 national elections.[1] This is surprising, considering the Election Commission and political parties made significant efforts to encourage youth political participation. Yet, it would be wrong to conclude that young Indians are disinterested in politics. Many are drawn in by the woke movement, which paints democratic processes like voting as ineffective and encourages youth to pursue change via aggressive identity politics. This mindset has affected India’s youth, with many preferring protests over voting.

…the young are eager to make a difference, but the woke lobby often hijacks this idealism, turning them into pawns in a larger narrative game. This is exactly what’s happening in India.

Joining protests isn’t inherently wrong, but it becomes problematic when the cause is misguided, and the participants are unaware of the issue. For example, the youth participated in large numbers in the farmers’ protests and anti-CAA movements, but media reports revealed many had little understanding of the issues at hand. [2]

Young Indians joined these protests in large numbers because it was seen as cool, progressive, and “woke.” Wokeism offers the youth a way to radically reshape their identity while giving them the illusion of being socially useful. Naturally idealistic, the young are eager to make a difference, but the woke lobby often hijacks this idealism, turning them into pawns in a larger narrative game. This is exactly what’s happening in India.

During the anti-CAA protests (December 2019 to February 2020), often called the Shaheen Bagh protests, the left-liberal Indian media and Western outlets romanticized these events as a defining moment for the Indian youth. The protests were portrayed as youth-led movements aimed at saving India’s “democracy” and “secularism.” These protests marked India’s first major experiment in applying the woke template. After its relative “success,” other woke movements quickly followed. These movements exploited the rebellious nature of the youth to push certain narratives about India on a global scale, ultimately creating conditions for social unrest, mayhem, and even the potential for India’s fragmentation.

Woke culture has already made deep inroads into Indian society. The youth is being thrown into an unending vortex of divisive identity politics where things are seen in black and white, and social problems are portrayed as something that could be fixed quickly through violence and aggressive rhetoric.

In the next section, we will briefly examine the origins of the term “Woke” and its subsequent distortion and appropriation by the left-liberal cabal.

“Woke” Origins and Subsequent Distortion

 “Woke” is the perfect example of a term that has been distorted and taken out of its original context to such a ridiculous extent that, in its present usage, it perhaps does a deep disservice to the cause it espoused initially.

The term “woke” was initially associated with Black Americans fighting racism.[3] But it eventually got hijacked by the left-liberal lobby. Slowly, it became an overarching umbrella under which all forms and kinds of perceived injustices got clubbed together. First, the activist-academia ecosystem distorted the term. Then, the corporate world joined in. Eager to appear socially just and progressive, they partnered with the left-liberal lobby to manufacture their own version of “wokeness,” often promoting it as part of their brand image.

The word “woke” rose to prominence in the aftermath of the Black Lives Matter Movement of 2014, following the police killing of Michael Brown, an 18-year-old Black man in Ferguson, Missouri, on August 9, 2014. Brown, who had no criminal record, was unarmed, “although local police accused him of robbing a convenience store moments before the shooting.” The “Black Lives Matter” movement used the term in a specific context, strongly critiquing racism and associated police brutality. But in the period following Brown’s death, “woke” slowly metamorphosed into a sort of buzzword of leftist political ideology, and all kinds of social science theories emanating from Western academia, such as Critical Race Theory, were mapped onto the term. Thus, Woke became a clarion call in social justice politics.[4]

The phrases “Woke” and “stay woke” had been part of Black communities for years before the Black Lives Matter movement. As a concept revolving around the idea of Black consciousness literally “waking up” to a more egalitarian society, Wokeness dates back to the early 20^th century. In 1923, Jamaican philosopher and social activist Marcus Garvey invoked the metaphor of “waking up” as a clarion call for global Black citizens to become more politically and socially conscious. Furthermore, Black popular culture of the 20^th century is full of examples wherein the term “stay woke” was used to describe the resistance of Blacks against systemic racism. [5]

The concept can be traced back to 1860, when the “Wide Awakes,” a youth abolitionist network, emerged in northern U.S. cities during the anti-slavery movement supporting Abraham Lincoln. Additionally, the term “woke” appeared in a 1962 New York Times headline, “If You Are Woke You Dig It,” written by novelist William Kelley on African American idioms.[6]

A complete history of the term “woke” is beyond the scope of this article, but this background helps explain how the left-liberal lobby hijacked a term rooted in Black American anti-racism activism to push various harmful narratives, even targeting distant countries like India. In India, “woke” has been redefined to include issues like caste, gender, and minorities. This reinterpretation constantly creates new “victim groups” and introduces terms like “cow vigilantism,” “Brahmanical patriarchy,” and “militant vegetarianism.” While these categories may seem laughable to the average person, they are no joke. The dangerous reshaping of wokeism in India threatens to mislead its youth and ultimately harm the nation itself.

Wokeism and the cultural sphere of Indian youth

Wokeism, reshaped by the left-liberal lobby, has deeply infiltrated the lives of urban Indian youth, particularly in the social and cultural spheres. In cities like Delhi, Mumbai, and Bangalore, it’s common for students and young professionals in their 20s to join various social, cultural, and literary clubs. Many young Indians move to these big cities for education or work, naturally gravitating toward cultural spaces like poetry groups, music clubs, and theatre societies. While these provide creative outlets, many have become subtle vehicles for political propaganda, often controlled by groups with hidden agendas.

Wokeism, reshaped by the left-liberal lobby, has deeply infiltrated the lives of urban Indian youth, particularly in the social and cultural spheres.

This may sound like a conspiracy to those unfamiliar, but it’s true. The youth in India are increasingly exposed to leftist and anti-national ideas, not through their families or peers, but through cultural and literary spaces. For instance, in cities like Delhi, most public talks, seminars, and discussions hosted by cultural institutions often feature the same group of people promoting divisive and anti-national ideologies. Having worked as a journalist in Delhi for years, I can say this from experience. These cultural spaces, controlled by the leftist lobby, have become breeding grounds for woke ideas, subtly influencing the minds of the youth. Those who immerse themselves in these groups are expected to align with their political ideologies—anti-Hindutva, anti-Modi, and so on. These spaces also initiate young people into the “protest” culture, turning activism into a social rite of passage.

I ran a poetry group in Delhi for a couple of years. I witnessed firsthand how interest groups attempted to infiltrate and hijack it, a common pattern in these ecosystems. For young Indians entering this environment, the experience can be overwhelming. Away from home, they are exposed to a seemingly radical world of ideas and, without realizing it, embrace wokeism. In doing so, they unknowingly sever ties with their own identity, culture, and civilization, believing they are part of something revolutionary.

In October 2023, RSS Chief Mohan Bhagwat criticized “cultural Marxists and woke people,” calling them deceitful, discriminatory, and selfish forces that use their influence in academia and media to undermine India’s culture and education, disrupt social cohesion, and promote conflict. [7] “They take control of the media and academia and plunge education, culture, politics, and social environment into confusion, chaos, and corruption”, he further said.[8]

What Mohan Bhagwat pointed out is truly symptomatic of the woke cultural sphere of India. The ecosystem systematically grooms rabidly anti-Hindu and anti-India artists, writers, etc., as “cultural brand ambassadors” of India, and such Indiaphobic and Hinduphobic figures become role models for the Indian youth. For example, Hinduphobic poet Meena Kandasamy enjoys a massive fan following amongst India’s educated youth. An Indian English poet, Kandasamy’s claim to fame is poetry that consciously abuses Hindu Gods and Goddesses, portraying this abuse as some kind of rebellion against “Brahmanical patriarchy.” In 2022, Meena Kandasamy was awarded the PEN Germany Award for her “dedicated, vocal, and engaging” work.[9] Kandasamy took wokeism to another level altogether as she reportedly admitted to pressing charges against someone who molested her because he was a non-Brahmin. She didn’t want to be branded as a “Brahmin stooge.”[10]

The woke lobby has specially appropriated poetry in the Indian context to peddle certain biased narratives and promote a homogenous view amongst India’s youth regarding what issues are deemed valid for protest and which ones aren’t. An article published by Livemint in 2020 talks about “India’s millennial political poets.” The interesting thing to observe is that all “political” poets covered in the write-up have a leftist, anti-BJP political slant. Is this a coincidence, or does the woke poetry sphere of urban India consciously groom the youth into the “leftist” tradition, one wonders? The article begins with poetry lines attributed to “Hindustani Musalmaan,” the lines have reportedly been taken from a poem that went viral during the anti-CAA movement in 2019. The article further gives examples of “anti-establishment poetic voices,” a few of which “have been jailed or charged under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (Uapa).” A full-fledged discussion on this article is not within the scope of this article, but this write-up is a perfect illustration of the workings of the leftist ecosystem in India that draws young Indians into a vortex of woke identity politics on the pretext of propagating culture and literature.[11]

Wokeism in academia and the targeting of Indian youth

One of our previous articles explained in detail how India’s education system systematically alienates youth from their own heritage. We emphasized in the write-up how elite liberal arts universities of India are importing wokeism from elite Western universities like Harvard. We also discussed how social sciences and humanities education in India is over-reliant on Western frameworks, presenting a problematic and biased critique of Indian culture and society through simplistic mapping of Western theories on the Indian context.[12]

The wokeism manifest in India’s cultural and social sphere is an offshoot of academic wokeism. First, it was elite liberal arts universities of India, like the Jawaharlal Nehru University, that functioned as bastions of left-liberal ideology, propagating woke discourse amongst the youth. Gradually, a paradigm shift took place, and new hotspots emerged vis-à-vis the propagation of wokeism in the context of humanities and social sciences education in India.

In their groundbreaking work Snakes in the Ganga, Rajiv Malhotra, and Vijaya Viswanathan offer a deep analysis of the ecosystem at Ashoka University in India. They argue that Ashoka acts as “Harvard University’s Junior Partner,” importing wokeism from elite Western institutions like Harvard. A dedicated chapter in the book explores the funding networks and ideological foundations of Ashoka University, revealing how it introduces social science theories driven by Western agendas. Malhotra and Viswanathan also provide a comprehensive look at the backgrounds of various faculty members, highlighting their left-leaning and anti-national ideologies, which have contributed to the infiltration of wokeism within the university.

…impressionable minds of the youth are exposed to woke theories concerning gender and sexuality from a very early age, thus drawing them into battles they know nothing about.

The authors further argue that in the name of promoting diversity and gender justice, impressionable minds of the youth are exposed to woke theories concerning gender and sexuality from a very early age, thus drawing them into battles they know nothing about.[13]

Wokeism has also entered India’s school textbooks in the form of social sciences text explaining concepts such as democracy, human rights, equality, equity, gender justice, social activism, the rights of the LGBTQ+, etc. While one does not deny that such concepts must be explained to students, indoctrinating the impressionable minds of 10-12 years with such loaded categories is certainly problematic.

Vamsee Juluri, a Professor of Media Studies at the University of San Francisco, ran an X thread in April 2024, focusing on schools, civic textbooks, and children’s books to critically evaluate the approaches used to teach children about inequality, social justice, and political activism. He picked up examples from class 7^th and 8^th school textbooks in India to illustrate how the textbooks end up propagating “wokeism” by making crass, simplistic, and uninformed generalizations regarding Indian society to ostensibly explain concepts like social justice, inequality, etc.[14]

When 12–13-year-olds are bombarded with such value-laden concepts, they become biased against their own society and culture. Instead of using an objective approach to teach about topics like equality and social justice, wokeism employs a manipulative, emotionally charged, and aggressive method that lacks rationality and often feels like propaganda. By the time these kids enter college, they are further exposed to a toxic environment of identity politics and divisive woke discourse disguised as progressive social science theory. This paves the way for the formal initiation of Indian youth into the deep and destructive world of wokeism.

The problem with wokeism today is that it deprives young people of the critical thinking skills needed to choose their own battles and form independent opinions. Instead, it dictates a set of causes to support, much like a dictator, while ignoring many other important issues. The woke lobby acts as a kind of enforcer, shaming and labeling those who don’t align with its predetermined narrative. Young people feel pressured to champion certain causes to appear progressive and socially aware.

This phenomenon is visible in recent pro-Palestine protests on U.S. and European university campuses. Many students lacked a deep understanding of the issue they were supposedly supporting. Some even glorified Hamas, a terrorist organization, likely due to ignorance rather than intentional support.

In the case of Indian universities, pro-Palestine protests didn’t quite hit the headlines, unlike U.S. universities, mostly due to the government’s strict vigil. However, many well-known Indian universities adhered to the woke template, supporting the resistance quietly, as it were.

An article published by The Diplomat in May 2024 elaborates on “New Delhi’s Quiet Student Solidarity With Palestine .”The write-up claims that since pro-Palestine student protests in India were “muffled swiftly”, students in the Indian capital, Delhi, came up with unconventional ways to register their dissent- graffiti, poster campaigns, boycott movements, etc. The article further elaborates on these acts of dissent across universities like Delhi University, Jawaharlal Nehru University, and Jamia Milia Islamia.[15]

This pretty much sums up the academic nexus of the student protest ecosystem in India. Students are often drawn into protests under the influence of “politically inclined” faculty members. For students of social sciences, humanities, and liberal arts, such “protests” and “social movements” are seen as real-life applications of the social science theories they study in the classroom. This is how wokeism engulfs academia and turns the Indian youth into mere pawns in its overarching narrative game.

Hindu Dharma and Culture the Prime Target of Wokeism

Ultimately, Hindu Dharma and culture are prime targets of wokeism. In its current form, wokeism often involves demonizing Hinduism, which poses a significant danger. Theoretical concepts like Critical Race Theory, emerging from U.S. academia, increasingly use “race” and “caste” interchangeably. Worse, they suggest that “caste” is the root cause of all forms of oppression and discrimination, implying that so-called “upper-caste Hindus” are responsible for global injustice.

The Hindu youth of India is getting increasingly groomed into an over-apologetic “politics of guilt” vis-à-vis its cultural and civilizational roots.

This caste narrative is being forcefully applied to every issue, whether it’s equality, social justice, gender equity, or human rights. Wokeism is reframing a variety of social issues through an anti-Hindu lens. As a result, young people in India who speak up for Hindu issues or express pride in Hindu culture are automatically labeled by woke logic as Islamophobic, patriarchal, homophobic, and socially regressive.

This is the core of the problem. With wokeism infiltrating India’s social, cultural, and political spaces, the youth are feeling pressured to accept these labels. This, in turn, alienates them from the roots of their own culture and civilization, pushing them further away from their heritage.

The Hindu youth of India is getting increasingly groomed into an over-apologetic “politics of guilt” vis-à-vis its cultural and civilizational roots. The Western academia, media, and think tank ecosystem has created an arbitrary dichotomy between “Hinduism” and Hindutva,” insinuating that good Hindus follow their religion in the private sphere and are peaceful beings, whereas “Hindutva” guys are intolerant and create political trouble. This vicious narrative is further propagated through the academic ecosystem of India’s elite liberal arts universities. The liberal media, too, follows suit. Thus, before they have even realized what is happening, the educated Indian youth has already been groomed into a perennial guilt complex vis-à-vis their religion and culture.

What is the solution to this chaos? There are no easy answers out there, but it’s high time India starts creating its counter-narrative to creatively engage the youth in constructive discourse around Indian society and culture:

India must create and set its own self-sustaining narrative involving education, regulation, awareness, and a collective commitment to preserve the values ​​that have held the nation together for centuries. It is a delicate balancing act, but one that is necessary to ensure that India’s cultural heritage remains alive and intact for years to come. In this endeavor, it is imperative that India does not fall victim to the divisive and monopolistic tendencies of the woke narratives but instead charts a path that promotes unity, inclusiveness, and progress while celebrating its rich cultural identity![16]

Citations

[1] Why Indian youth is not at the polls: no desire to be part of the solution | The Indian Express;     https://indianexpress.com/article/opinion/columns/why-indian-youth-is-not-at-the-polls-no-desire-to-be-part-of-the-solution-9319098/

[2] Politics and Instagram generation: Of memes, misinformation and whole lot of misguided youth;    https://www.opindia.com/2020/07/instagram-memes-misinformation-jokes-woke-generation-politics/

[3] Where “woke” came from and why marketers should think twice before jumping on the social activism bandwagon; https://theconversation.com/where-woke-came-from-and-why-marketers-should-think-twice-before-jumping-on-the-social-activism-bandwagon-122713

[4] What is woke: How a Black movement watchword got co-opted in a culture war | Vox;   https://www.vox.com/culture/21437879/stay-woke-wokeness-history-origin-evolution-controversy

[5] Ibid.

[6] A Brief History of Wokeism- Open the Magazine;  https://openthemagazine.com/cover-story/a-brief-history-of-wokeism/#goog_rewarded

[7] Mohan Bhagwat: cultural Marxists, ‘woke people’ spoiling India’s ethos | Nagpur News – Times of India;     https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/nagpur/cultural-marxists-woke-people-spoiling-indias-ethos-rss-chief/articleshow/104681467.cms

[8] ‘Woke Claim To Work for Lofty Goals, But Real Aim Is..’: RSS Chief Mohan Bhagwat;     https://www.ndtv.com/india-news/woke-claim-to-work-for-lofty-goals-but-real-goal-is-rss-chief-mohan-bhagwat-4508902

[9] German embassy honors controversial Hindu-bashing Meena Kandasamy, who kept quiet about sexual harassment by fellow leftist; https://hindupost.in/world/german-embassy-honours-hindu-bashing-kandasamy/

[10] Dravidian Stock Writer Meena Kandasamy Shoots Herself In The Foot, Admits Protecting Her Molester Because He Was Non-Brahmin – The Commune; https://thecommunemag.com/dravidian-stock-writer-meena-kandasamy-shoots-herself-in-the-foot-admits-protecting-her-molester-because-he-was-non-brahmin/

[11] Meet India’s millennial political poets | Mint Lounge;  https://lifestyle.livemint.com/news/big-story/meet-india-s-millennial-political-poets-111601292201092.html

[12] Unveiling the Biases in Indian Education: How it Alienates Youth from their Own Heritage – Hindu Dvesha; https://stophindudvesha.org/unveiling-the-biases-in-indian-education-how-it-alienates-youth-from-their-own-heritage/

[13] Snakes in the Ganga by Rajiv Malhotra and Vijaya Viswanathan, Ch 19. Ashoka University, Harvard University’s Junior Partner, p. 517-563.

[14] Is the import of wokeism in Bharatiya school textbooks a worrying trend?;    https://hindupost.in/society-culture/is-the-import-of-wokeism-in-bharatiya-school-textbooks-a-worrying-trend/

[15] New Delhi’s Quiet Student Solidarity With Palestine – The Diplomat;   https://thediplomat.com/2024/05/new-delhis-quiet-student-solidarity-with-palestine/

[16] Awakening India: Navigating  Woke Narratives and Culture Wars in the pursuit of Narrative Sovereignty – Chintan;   https://chintan.indiafoundation.in/articles/awakening-india-navigating-woke-narratives-and-culture-wars-in-the-pursuit-of-narrative-sovereignty/