You're listening to the London Review of Books podcast. I'm Thomas Jones. My guest this week is Pankaj Mishra, whose many books include Age of Anger, a History of the Present, Bland Fanatics, Liberals, Race and Empire, and most recently his second novel, Run and Hyde, which was published last year. He has a piece in the current issue of the LRB on Narendra Modi's India and the way it's portrayed or misportrayed in the West. Hello, Pankaj and thank you very much for joining me. Thank you, Tom. So I thought to begin, you might tell us or remind us of Modi's political

origins and his roots to power. Well, it's quite an extraordinary story because he emerged in

the state of Gujarat in Western India.

And before he became Chief Minister, not much was known about him, apart from the fact

that he had been a foot soldier for this paramilitary organization, the RSS, for almost all

his life. From the time he was was a teenager he had worked for this outfit

whose you know main aim is to essentially transform India into a Hindu majoritarian nation

this is an organization very explicitly inspired by Nazism in the 1930s.

In fact, the founder sort of quotes from Adolf Hitler and says, well, you know, he is doing the right thing.

And we should also be looking into this whole question of race in India and obviously a degree of homogenization is necessary for India to progress.

So it's a bunch of ideas derived from the 1930s that Modi is playing with all his life and then he becomes

the chief minister of this state. And then, of course, these notorious riots happen.

And actually, riots is probably not the correct word.

It was a program, anti-Muslim program, where more than 1,000.

Some estimates put the figure above 2,000, Muslims are

slaughtered, are massacred. There are some Hindus killed in the violence, but most, overwhelming

majority of the people, the casualties, are Muslims. Soon after that, he holds an election, Modi holds an election,

and wins a massive majority. So that's when this sort of particular formula is set, that

anti-minority passions is the surest way to gain national power. But the other side

of his program, which has been very successful, which also comes into focus back then, back in

Gujarat is when he decides to build bridges to the business community.

Soon after the riots, he's black-balled by big businessmen, big industrialists who want

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