I think once you have a RSS in the name of Hindus, the rise of religion based political parties in other communities is inevitable. You cannot fault the AIMIM on this, as many secular minded liberals do.

As somebody who wants a secular state, I concede that. However .... https://twitter.com/OmairTAhmad/status/1330434074691981319

How should liberals approach the issue of religion based parties?

The wrong approach, is not to concede that all Hindus vote BJP and that all Muslims vote AIMIM. Or that AIMIM is winning b/c not enough Hindus vote secular minded parties. 4 the begs the question: Do Muslims?

So at the outset, the hurry to project RSS/BJP electoral success as a Hindu-Muslim issue should be avoided. In doing so, not only to secularists admit defeat, but also vitiate the space in which solutions can be found.

Fact is the issue is larger than Hindu vs Muslim.

Liberals secularists must understand that a secular state is possible but secular individuals aren’t. Nor is it necessary that individuals renounce their faith & turn agnostic in order to have a secular state.

Fact is, a secular state exists 2 guarantee religious freedom 4 all.

Populism works for the bottom to the top. Religiosity is driven from the bottom. Asking Indians to be agnostic will just kill secularism. Which is why RSS/BJP spend so much effort in distorting the concept of secularism in order to conflate it with being anti-religion.

The case 4 a secular state is straight forward & we can put the RSS/BJP on the Blackfoot by pointing 2 ancient Indian traditions of not only tolerating dissent/alternate faiths but also assimilating them in the mainstream.

RSS/BJP cannot win this argument. We need to get smart.

Apple AI is really getting smart. *back-foot becomes Blackfoot.