The Tories risk being dragged into India’s party politics

Concerns have been raised this week over attempts by Hindu nationalists to involve themselves in the upcoming British election. While the British Indian community has traditionally voted Labour, the party’s hold on the community was substantially eroded in 2017 election, with Hindu British Indians leading the switch to the Conservatives. Now it seems that British Hindus sympathetic to India’s current ruling party, the Hindu nationalist BJP, are trying to accelerate this shift due to anger over the Labour Party position on Kashmir.

The pressure group, the Overseas Friends of the BJP, has declared its intention to campaign against Labour and for the Conservatives in 48 marginal seats. Messages are also circulating on WhatsApp groups urging British Indians not to vote Labour. These messages claim that the Labour party is anti-Hindu and pro-Pakistani. While some make false claims, such as accusing London Mayor Sadiq Khan of having boycotted Diwali, many focus on the Labour Party’s position on Kashmir.

Kashmir, an area both India and Pakistan lay claim to, but that is held by the former, has long been an inflammatory political issue. It has sparked wars between India and Pakistan and came perilously close to doing so again in February this year. While war was avoided, the patriotic fervour aroused in India played a key role in Narendra Modi’s BJP unexpectedly winning a resounding majority in India’s May elections this year. Buoyed by the victory, Modi subsequently took the radical decision in August to revoke Kashmir’s semi-autonomous status. In a series of moves designed to crush any protest the Indian government has also flooded the region with troops, imposed a curfew, shut down telecommunications and the internet, and arrested hundreds without trial including Kashmiri political leaders.

At the Labour Party conference this September an emergency motion strongly condemning India’s actions in Kashmir and accusing it of human rights abuses was passed overwhelmingly. The motion sparked immediate backlash amongst British Indians. Attempts to walk-back on the motion, Corbyn saying the motion’s language was stronger than he would have liked and Labour subsequently clarifying it was “opposed to external interference” in the region, seems to have done little to repair the damage.

However, behind this lies a longer story of Labour’s weakening grip on British Indian voters, and in particular British Hindus. In 2009, David Miliband also sparked furore over an editorial he penned on Kashmir for The Hindu while visiting the country as Foreign Secretary. Furthermore, as British Indians, particularly Hindus, have become one of the most economically successful minority groups in the country, their sympathies have unsurprisingly begun to tilt Conservative. Already in 2010 there was evidence middle class Hindus were more likely to vote Conservative than other middle-class minorities.

The effects on voting patterns have been striking. In 2010 Labour still won 61% of Indian voters, 60% of Pakistani voters and 68% of BME voters. However, by 2017, while Labour won 77% of the BME vote it won only 55% of the Indian vote, with 40% of British Indians voting Conservative. This strikingly split the South Asian vote as only 5% Pakistani and Bangladeshi voters chose the Conservative party. According to a Runnymede Trust report on the issue, middle class Hindu voters were central to this trend.

The Conservatives’ courting of influential Hindu groups has also been vital. The 2015 and 2017 elections saw The National Council of Hindu Temples urge Hindus to vote Conservative, earning a rebuke from The Charity’s Commission. The Conservatives look keen to make further inroads. Priti Patel as Home Secretary puts a British Hindu, and an avid supporter of Modi, in a prominent position. Plans to send Rishi Sunak, the Chief Secretary to the Treasury, to the Friday leader’s debate in lieu of Johnson is likely also partly influenced by this strategy.

Meanwhile, the Labour Party has continued to make missteps. In Keith Vaz’s former seat the Indian community has been angered by what they see as the parachuting in of a pro-Corbyn candidate, Claudia Webbe, over the heads of an experienced local councillor Sundip Meghani. Labour Friends of India has also criticised the Labour Party for failing to field enough Indian candidates in winnable seats.

As such while the actions of the OFBJP and the WhatsApp messages are a worrying development if they have an effect, it will be due to trends in UK politics. The growing split in the South Asian vote has created the opportunity for groups to play on communal tensions.

Conservatives therefore must be careful that their outreach to the Hindu community does not come at the cost of alienating other South Asian groups. If it does they are running a risk for little profit. Writing in The Guardian Omar Khan, Director of the Runnymede Trust, argued the Hindu vote was not large or concentrated enough to have a significant effect on the electoral results.

However, the Conservatives do risk further alienating other parts of the South Asian community by being drawn into Indian party politics, and communal politics. The BJP, while India’s current government, is but one party in a (for-now) still functioning democracy. Furthermore, the BJP is explicitly a Hindu nationalist party that is viewed fearfully by ethnic minorities, not just Muslims but also by Sikhs and liberals generally.

The Conservatives are already facing charges of Islamophobia in the party ranks and linking itself to Indian party and communal politics will only worsen this. In 2016, Zac Goldsmith’s mayoral campaign faced sharp criticism from many including senior Tory politicians and the Conservative Muslim Forum, who accused it of Islamophobia due to its attempts to depict Sadiq Khan as a potential security risk. The 2019 election has already seen revelations that the Conservatives knew their candidate for Brent North, Anjana Patel, was embroiled in an Islamophobia scandal but let her stand anyway. Notably Patel had also previously tweeted support for Modi (while her Twitter account has been deleted the Tweet is still accessible in cached form).

Meanwhile, the OFBJP is specifically targeting five Indian Labour MPs -Lisa Nandy, Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi, Preet Gill, Seema Malhotra, and Valerie Vaz – accusing them of being too pro-Pakistani. They have also accused the Sikh MPs of sympathising with the Sikh secessionist Khalistan movement.

Even more concerning are the potential effects on foreign policy. Keen for a trade deal with India post-Brexit, the Conservative government has been wary of speaking out too strongly against Modi’s worrying authoritarianism, be it in Kashmir or in Assam, where the government plans to expel millions of Muslims as “illegal immigrants” (non-Muslim immigrants are to be made citizens). Should an influential pro-BJP Hindu lobby form within the Conservatives this trend will likely continue. Even more concerning is the worry that British relations with a BJP-led India and Pakistan might become a partisan issue as Labour and the Conservatives seek to cement their grip on rival ethnic voter banks.