By: PRABHAKAR K.B.
Abstract
This review examines Luna Sabastian’s Fascism in India: Race, Caste, and Hindutva, a groundbreaking theoretical intervention that redefines the study of global authoritarianism. Challenging Eurocentric frameworks, Sabastian argues that Hindutva is an original and generative form of fascism, rather than a belated derivative of European models. She introduces the concept of “demo-despotocracy” to explain how fascist movements radicalize popular sovereignty by purging pluralism, thereby locating authoritarian potential within mass democracy itself rather than outside it. The book further reconceptualizes race through V.D. Savarkar’s notion of a “miscegenous collectivity,” highlighting how violence against minorities—particularly Muslims—operates through coerced inclusion and cultural erasure rather than biological exclusion. Tracing a pivotal ideological shift post-1947, Sabastian contrasts Savarkar’s early “Hindutva of enmity” with Deendayal Upadhyaya’s “Integral Humanism,” demonstrating how the collapse of politics into dharma produces an anti-statist project aimed at forging a normalized “total society.” By positioning South Asia as an active producer of modern authoritarian concepts, Sabastian’s work sets a new benchmark for understanding both the Hindutva project and the broader, global dynamics of contemporary fascism.
