“You can’t take photos here.”
The command from a Hindu Yuva officer to Retrograde photographer Shreya Ravi was more than a restriction; it was a symbol of the battle over narrative that defined an Oct. 30 guest lecture at UTD.
The event, featuring author Sachin Nandha and his biography of Indian political leader Keshav Baliram Hedgewar, presented a vision of “progressive conservatism.” Yet it was met with fierce opposition from a coalition that labeled it an effort to “whitewash” a fascist leader, creating a stark divide between the story told inside the auditorium and the one contested in the hallways.
In addition to being an author, Nandha is a self-described philosopher, director of the International Centre for Sustainability, engineer and longtime businessman based in the United Kingdom. Nandha has spent the past few months on an international book tour for his most recent work, “Hedgewar: A Definitive Biography.” UTD is the latest stop on this tour advertising the book and discussing Hedgewar, the founder of Indian paramilitary group Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh — in English, the National Volunteer Corps.
Inside the auditorium, Nandha described Hedgewar as a man distinct from the descriptions of him created by his academic critics and his RSS supporters. Nandha says the true Hedgewar lies in the rational medium between accusations of fascism and deified praise. It is through what Nandha calls the progressive conservatism of Hedgewar that India would be able to build up social capital based in unity and fraternity.
It is through what Nandha calls the progressive conservatism of Hedgewar that India would be able to build up social capital based in unity and fraternity.
Outside the auditorium, a coalition of student groups, faculty and off-campus advocacy organizations decried the event as laundering a fascist leader’s image. This clash speaks to an often overlooked ideological conflict on campus.
Nandha’s “rational middle ground”
Nandha’s biography and discussion at UTD positions itself as a neutral referee in a highly contentious field. Nandha frames Hedgewar as a social reformer in India concerned about the lack of unity in the nation during and after brutal British colonialism. According to him, Hedgewar was an orphan adopted by elite members of Indian society who educated him on European and Indian philosophy. In Nandha’s telling, the RSS was conceived not as a political project, but as an apolitical “social experiment” to cure a societal “sickness” of division along the lines of religion, caste, gender and class.
Nandha said Hedgewar is misunderstood in large part because of a lack of “linguistic hygiene.” The British mistranslated Hedgewar’s idea of Rashtrabhakti as “patriotism” when it would more accurately have been translated as “social capital,” he said, which politicized the RSS erroneously. Nandha claimed that Hedgewar’s true focus was Deshbhakti, a love for the literal soil of India shared by all its people.
The presentation’s portrait of Hedgewar and the RSS as apolitical was punctuated with internal contradictions. Nandha said that Hedgewar’s adoptive father, Balakrishna Shivram Moonje, was a leader in the Hindu Mahasabha political party — one of the earliest Hindutva parties in India. Nandha also said that Hedgewar invited Vinayak Damodar Savarkar, one of the key founders of Hindutva ideology, to give a keynote address to the RSS in 1939.
When asked how Hedgewar defined who belonged to the “soil,” Nandha said that, in Hedgewar’s view, people “self-determined” if they are Indian. To critics like Safa Ahmed, the associate director of media and communications for the Indian American Muslim Council, this ignores the reality that religious minorities, particularly Muslims, Christians and Sikhs in India face. Ahmed said that the RSS and other Hindutva groups frame these minorities as inherently disloyal because they identify as something other than Hindu.
Ahmed said that the RSS and other Hindutva groups frame these minorities as inherently disloyal because they identify as something other than Hindu.
Further questions revealed gaps in Nandha’s unifying narrative. Asked about Hedgewar’s views on women’s rights, Nandha offered no concrete examples of action in their support. The RSS was founded as an all-male organization and continues to be so today. When the audience asked about Hedgewar’s stance on linguistic divisions, like those in the state of Tamil Nadu, Nandha said it was simply not one of Hedgewar’s “major four issues.” One hundred feet away, a UTD trash can was full of flyers highlighting the Indian government’s censorship of Vikatan, a Tamil language magazine, for its criticism of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government — a contemporary example of the long-standing cultural-political conflict Nandha’s presentation minimized.
A history of omissions and contradictions
The event’s sanitized tone stood in stark contrast to the alarmed response it provoked from the UTD community.
Prior to the lecture, a coalition including the Indian American Muslim Council, Hindus for Human Rights and UTD student groups like the South Asian Pre-Law Student Association sent a letter to the university administration. It labeled the RSS a “a fascist paramilitary organization” and made extensive citation of RSS actions and statements throughout history, including Hedgewar’s RSS successor, Madhav Sadashivrao Golwalkar, who praised Hitler and the Holocaust.
“Germany has also shown how well-nigh impossible it is for races and cultures, having differences going to the root, to be assimilated into one united whole, a good lesson for us in Hindustan to learn and profit by,” Golwalkar said in his book “We or Our Nationhood Defined.”
In an official statement to The Retrograde, Hindu Yuva at UTD said that the event was organized to host a scholar and engage in “a conversation and open discussion.” Hindu Yuva said its focus was to reflect on Hedgewar’s ideas of social capital and how India could engage in national self-reflection after decolonization. The coalition letter stood firmly against this view.
“Presenting such a view of a fascist group in a university setting … implicitly validates a worldview that denies equal dignity to minority communities and has incited real-world violence,” the letter stated.
Flyers protesting the event were quickly removed and a Retrograde photographer was instructed to delete photos of the event, suggesting Hindu Yuva’s desire to control the narrative.
For many students, the issue is deeply personal. A Hindu undergraduate student, who requested anonymity for fear of retaliation, described facing caste discrimination at UTD, something they had never experienced before college. They see Hindu Yuva as a part of the problem.
“They are not advocating for ending Hinduphobia on campus for all students,” the undergraduate student said. “It is a protection of students who are already in caste-dominant groups. The way that they claim to practice Hinduism is so far from the way that I do.”
They are not advocating for ending Hinduphobia on campus for all students. It is a protection of students who are already in caste-dominant groups. The way that they claim to practice Hinduism is so far from the way that I do.
— Anonymous Hindu undergraduate student
Professor Ali Asgar Alibhai, who specializes in Islamic art and architecture in the Mediterranean, Middle East and South Asia, supported the free expression of students on campus but said he feared what the “normalization” of such ideologies could do on campus. Alibhai was particularly concerned with what seemed like unequal enforcement of university policy, given students supporting Palestine have historically been forbidden from chalking on campus and heavily limited with their protests, but TPUSA could host right-wing influencers that discriminated against students and staff on campus. Alibhai said that the Wednesday before the Hindu Yuva event, TPUSA had a right-wing YouTuber on campus with a sign that read “Islam is incompatible with America!”
“I don’t think the university is being true to free speech,” Alibhai said. “If it’s free speech for some, it should be free speech for all.”
Hinduism vs. Hindutva
Vivek Kembaiyan, western regional organizer for Hindus for Human Rights, said that at the heart of the controversy is the distinction between Hinduism, a millennia-old religion, and Hindutva, a modern political ideology.
“Hinduism is an ancient religion that is extremely diverse with this as one of its core tenets: pluralism,” Kembaiyan said. “Hindutva or Hindu nationalism or Hindu supremacy is a right-wing extremist political ideology that is premised on ethno-nationalism.”
Ahmed said Hindutva’s founders were deeply inspired by European fascists, and that they never truly hid such beliefs in their public statements, political platforms and writings.
“In their effort to create some all-encompassing Hindu culture, they labeled Muslims and Christians as their unifying common enemy,” Ahmed said.
Kembaiyan and Ahmed said that this blurred line between culture and right-wing ideology goes far beyond just one event. Kembaiyan said that Hindu Yuva is the college wing of the Hindu Swayamsevak Sangh, which is the American wing of the RSS. A UTD master’s student, who is South Indian and Hindu, said that during their time at UTD they have seen Hindu Yuva officers proudly participate in weekly HSS activities. The master’s student requested anonymity because of how people had been allegedly targeted by Hindu Yuva members for disagreeing with the organization’s past activities.
This alignment extends to the university’s academic sphere. The Ackerman Center for Holocaust Studies partnered with Hindu Yuva and academics across the country on the “Understanding Hinduphobia” project. During its 2025 conference, hosted earlier this year on UTD’s campus, the project created a working definition of Hinduphobia that closely mirrors the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s definition of antisemitism.
While not officially adopted by the U.S. federal government, the IHRA definition has been adopted by the cities of El Paso and Dallas in Texas, and Gov. Greg Abbott issued an executive order in 2024 seeking to incorporate this definition into state university policy. In 2024, a federal judge blocked the enforcement of that definition after the Houston chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine sued. Since as early as 2006, scholars have criticized the IHRA definition for its conflation of Judaism the religion with Zionism the political ideology.
Kembaiyan said that the definition of Hinduphobia provided by the project creates a similar conflation that attempts to stop criticism.
“Hinduphobia is often used to target people for their political views,” Kembaiyan said. “If you criticize Hindu nationalist parties such as Modi or BJP, they would consider that Hinduphobia under this definition.”
Hinduphobia is often used to target people for their political views. If you criticize Hindu nationalist parties such as Modi or BJP, they would consider that Hinduphobia under this definition.
— Vivek Kembaiyan, western regional organizer for Hindus for Human Rights
The Retrograde reached out to the Ackerman Center for details regarding its role in the “Understanding Hinduphobia” project as well as its view on the RSS and its rhetoric. As of publication, the Ackerman Center did not provide comment.
Hindu Yuva’s defense and history
In its written statement, Hindu Yuva UTD defended the event, saying it “carefully evaluates the credentials of its speakers and invites individuals from diverse schools of thought.” It reported that over 50 engaged attendees came and were able to “broaden their appreciation for diverse and even contrasting viewpoints.”
In response to the IAMC letter and pre-event criticism online, Hindu Yuva UTD said “Unfortunately, the letter published by these organizations not only misrepresents our position but also makes factually incorrect assumptions about Hindu Yuva.” Hindu Yuva did not elaborate on what was incorrect with the letter.
Ahmed said this event was far from the first time that Hindu Yuva at UTD had hosted a far-right Hindutva event. According to Ahmed, Hindu Yuva worked to send students to the “Howdy Modi” political rally in Houston in 2019, and in 2021, it held a webinar with BJP parliament member Tejasvi Surya. Ahmed shared screenshots of both events advertised on the Hindu Yuva UTD Instagram page; as of publication, both posts have been removed from their Instagram page.
Kembaiyan said that at most Hindu Yuva chapters across the country, the members rarely know about the organization’s connection to the HSS and RSS. He said that, for many South Asian students attending U.S. universities, the college environment can be isolating and that Hindu Yuva presents itself as the main place for cultural acceptance and celebration. His organization, Hindus for Human Rights, seeks to push back against this right-wing dominance of Hindu culture and religion. Kembaiyan said that Hindu and South Asian students are interested in creating progressive alternatives that still celebrate their culture without basing themselves in hate-filled politics.
Kembaiyan said that at most Hindu Yuva chapters across the country, the members rarely know about the organization’s connection to the HSS and RSS.
Calls for dialogue and protections
As the auditorium emptied Oct. 30, two realities persisted. The event attendees were left with Nandha’s glowing portrait of a pragmatic apolitical and inclusive Hedgewar that would disapprove of the modern RSS. Outside, the removed flyers and public denouncement signaled a battle over narrative that was far from over.
The coalition of critics requested in the IAMC letter that the university “evaluate whether hosting a celebration of a paramilitary ideological founder aligns with its stated values of diversity, safety, and nondiscrimination.”
For the anonymous Hindu undergraduate student, the path forward is clear.
“What I do think we need to see on campus is more protections against caste discrimination,” the student said. “And more invitations of leaders who are promoting unity, nuanced public service, and not oppression, not racism, and not casteism.”
One Comment
Very interesting read. Excellent work