The emergence of the Hindu Right as an important political force in India in the late 1990s and early 2000s has inevitably called forth renewed interrogations about the historical genesis of Hindu nationalism. One of the major questions concerns the ambiguous relationship that has always existed between the ‘mainstream’ so-called ‘secular’ nationalism of the Congress and the specific brand of ‘Hindu’ nationalism linked to the RSS and the Hindu Mahasabha. Regarding that relationship, no schola..