A 20-Book Reading Journey to Understand Hindutva
Hindutva is one of the most discussed, debated and contested ideas in modern Indian political thought. Yet much of the public discussion around it takes place through political speeches, television debates, social media arguments and contemporary electoral politics. This often creates a problem: people form opinions about Hindutva without reading the thinkers who developed its ideas or the scholars who have studied its evolution.
A more meaningful way to understand Hindutva is to approach it as an intellectual and historical tradition. That means going beyond contemporary politics and tracing the ideas that developed around Hindu identity, Indian civilisation, nationalism, cultural unity and the nature of the Indian state.
A carefully structured reading list can help. The following 20-book journey moves from the intellectual background of Hindu nationalism to Savarkar, the RSS, Golwalkar, Deendayal Upadhyaya and eventually contemporary BJP politics.
1. Begin with the intellectual background
Before reading Savarkar, it is useful to understand the broader intellectual environment of nineteenth- and early twentieth-century India.
Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay’s Anandamath is an important starting point. It is a novel rather than a political treatise, but its portrayal of the motherland and its association with Vande Mataram became enormously influential in the development of Indian nationalism.
Next, read selected works from Swami Vivekananda, particularly his writings on Hindu civilisation, India’s regeneration, society and national consciousness. Vivekananda was not simply a political theorist, and reducing him to a precursor of contemporary Hindutva would be misleading. Nevertheless, his emphasis on civilisational self-confidence and the regeneration of Indian society forms an important part of the intellectual background.
Sri Aurobindo’s The Renaissance in India and his writings on nationalism provide another perspective. Aurobindo connected India’s cultural and spiritual inheritance with the struggle for national freedom.
These books establish an important point: the intellectual roots of Indian nationalism were diverse and cannot be attributed to a single organisation or thinker.
2. Read Savarkar directly
The next step should be V. D. Savarkar’s Hindutva: Who Is a Hindu?
Originally published in 1923, this is the essential primary text for anyone studying Hindutva seriously.
Savarkar’s argument is not simply a description of Hindu religious belief. He distinguishes between Hinduism as a religious tradition and Hindutva as a broader conception of cultural and national identity.
Concepts such as Pitribhu—fatherland—and Punyabhu—holy land—are central to his formulation. He also discusses geography, history, culture, common ancestry and collective memory.
The important thing is to read Savarkar himself before reading what supporters or critics say about him.
His later political writings, including Hindu Rashtra Darshan, should follow.
3. Understand Savarkar historically
After reading Savarkar’s own writings, Janaki Bakhle’s Savarkar and the Making of Hindutva provides a useful scholarly examination of the development of his thought.
This sequence matters.
If a reader starts with a secondary interpretation, it is easy to unconsciously adopt the author’s framework. Reading the primary material first allows readers to compare the original arguments with subsequent interpretations.
The broader objective should not be to decide immediately whether Savarkar was right or wrong. It should be to understand precisely what he was arguing, why he argued it and how his ideas fitted into the political circumstances of his time.
4. From ideas to organisation: Hedgewar and the RSS
Savarkar was not the founder of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh. To understand the RSS, readers must turn to K. B. Hedgewar, who established the organisation in 1925.
A biography such as C. P. Bhishikar’s Keshav: Sangh Nirmata helps introduce Hedgewar and the early RSS.
This is an important transition in the story.
Savarkar represents an important strand of ideological formulation, while Hedgewar represents an attempt to create a disciplined social organisation aimed at strengthening Hindu society.
Understanding that distinction prevents the history of Hindutva from becoming an oversimplified story in which every development is attributed to one thinker.
5. Read Golwalkar’s primary texts
The next major figure is M. S. Golwalkar, the second RSS chief.
His We, or Our Nationhood Defined is one of the most controversial texts associated with the Hindu nationalist movement. It should therefore be read directly rather than understood solely through quotations circulated online.
After it, read Bunch of Thoughts.
The latter is particularly important for understanding Golwalkar’s mature thinking on Hindu society, nationalism, national unity, minorities, communism, Western civilisation and the RSS.
Readers should also remember that intellectual movements evolve. A text from the 1930s should not automatically be treated as a complete representation of every later RSS position.
6. Study the RSS through independent scholarship
Once the primary texts have been read, Walter K. Andersen and Shridhar D. Damle’s The Brotherhood in Saffron provides an important study of the RSS as an organisation.
This helps shift the focus from ideology alone to organisational structure, social work, recruitment, political relationships and institutional development.
Jyotirmaya Sharma’s works on Hindutva and Golwalkar provide another critical scholarly perspective.
Together, these books allow readers to compare the movement’s own writings with outside interpretations.
7. Don’t skip Deendayal Upadhyaya
A common mistake is to move directly from Golwalkar to the contemporary BJP.
The intellectual development of the Jana Sangh and later BJP requires another important figure: Deendayal Upadhyaya.
His Integral Humanism is essential for understanding the political philosophy that developed within the Jana Sangh tradition.
Upadhyaya’s arguments address the relationship between the individual and society, economics, Western political models, Indian civilisation and the concept of integral development.
This demonstrates that Hindu nationalist thought cannot simply be reduced to Savarkar’s writings of 1923.
8. Compare Hindutva with competing visions of India
A serious study requires reading thinkers who offered fundamentally different conceptions of Indian nationalism.
Mahatma Gandhi’s Hind Swaraj provides a powerful alternative understanding of civilisation, modernity, religion and national freedom.
Jawaharlal Nehru’s The Discovery of India offers another interpretation of Indian history and civilisation, emphasising India’s diversity and the development of a composite national identity.
Reading these alongside Savarkar is far more useful than simply labelling one side “nationalist” and the other “anti-national”.
They were addressing overlapping questions but arriving at very different answers.
9. Study the movement academically
Once the primary sources have been covered, Christophe Jaffrelot’s The Hindu Nationalist Movement in India becomes particularly valuable.
It provides a broad historical account of Hindu nationalism and examines its development through organisations, movements and political parties.
Jaffrelot’s Hindu Nationalism: A Reader is also useful because it brings together important texts and scholarly perspectives.
Thomas Blom Hansen’s The Saffron Wave then takes the reader further into the relationship between Hindu nationalism, democracy, caste and electoral politics.
10. Finally, move into contemporary politics
Only after establishing this historical foundation should readers approach contemporary Hindutva.
Jaffrelot’s Modi’s India: Hindu Nationalism and the Rise of Ethnic Democracy offers one prominent academic interpretation of the post-2014 period.
It should not be treated as the final word. Rather, it should be read as one scholarly framework and compared with primary political documents, speeches and alternative interpretations.
The real value of the reading journey
The greatest benefit of this approach is that it separates history from political slogans.
Hindutva did not suddenly appear with the BJP, nor can its intellectual history be reduced to one book or one individual. It developed through debates over civilisation, nationalism, identity, colonialism, social organisation and the meaning of India.
Reading Bankim, Vivekananda and Aurobindo provides the wider intellectual background. Savarkar introduces the explicit formulation of Hindutva. Hedgewar demonstrates the importance of organisation. Golwalkar develops the RSS worldview. Upadhyaya contributes a distinct political philosophy. Gandhi and Nehru provide competing visions of Indian nationalism. Jaffrelot, Hansen, Sharma and other scholars then allow readers to critically examine the movement’s evolution.
The most productive question is therefore not simply whether Hindutva is “good” or “bad”.
A better question is:
What exactly is Hindutva, where did its ideas come from, how did they change over time, and how did an intellectual movement become a major force in Indian politics?
A 20-book journey like this allows readers to investigate those questions for themselves rather than inheriting an answer from either supporters or opponents.
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