Why Religious Nationalism Isn’t Patriotism.

Hie, welcome to my first political post. I’m usually excited when writing something new, but this time I’m not. In fact, I feel sad writing this because I never imagined I would see my country as it is at the moment and I just can’t ignore what’s happening around me.

I never publicly criticized the government but I’m doing it now because anyone can cheer those who are already doing it, but doing it yourself acts as a future reminder that you were a part of the movement when things change for good. And as citizens, I believe it’s everyone’s responsibility to speak up in whatever way they can and make people aware.

I’ve seen a lot of influencers, stand-up comics, and journalists speaking up these days, and I have huge respect for all of them. It takes real effort and mental strength to put everything you have at stake and stand up when the world around you is filled with brainwashed people.

I might not have a big audience, but I’ll consider it a win even if it reaches a small section of people who will find this post relatable and if it makes them rethink speaking up in any way they can.

What’s wrong?

Pretty much everything! That’s how I’d like to describe the current state of the country. This doesn’t feel like the India I knew more than a decade ago. The India I knew wasn’t filled with hate for each other, it didn’t used to worship politicians, it didn’t have sold out mainstream media fueling religious hate 24/7, it didn’t have a government who threw journalists and questioners behind the bars and allowed rapists to roam freely on bail, nor it had politically brainwashed people labeling everyone as “anti-nationals” who questioned the government.

The India I Knew

I come from a small town in Adilabad, a district in Telangana. I spent my entire childhood there, and the best part about it was how our home sat between two other homes of different religions. I’m a Muslim. The house to our left belonged to a Hindu family, and the home on the right belonged to a Christian family.

All those years growing up, I never once felt that any of us were somehow different from each other. We used to receive everyone’s festival snacks. Whatever they made, we would definitely get some of it, and we would do the same. Thinking about it now, I still can’t put into words how beautiful it was. I genuinely felt what we were taught in school: “Hindu, Muslim, Sikh, Isai, apas mein hai bhai bhai.”

Another favorite memory of mine is waiting for diyas during Diwali from my neighbor so I could play with the fire, lighting small things. We shared the same wall, and it almost felt like a passage into their house. I don’t ever remember using their main gate to enter. In the same way, I remember seeing a beautiful star hanging before Christmas from the family on the right.

I grew up with friends of different religions and even today, I have all friends who are not Muslims, and I’m genuinely glad they’re not stupid or brainwashed. They think critically, question injustice, and stand by what’s right. This is the India I’m talking about. Now compare any of this to how the country is today. Minorities are being lynched over their religion, forced to chant slogans, beaten unnecessarily, and made to change the names on their shops.

Why a Nation’s Identity Shouldn’t Be Tied to Religion

When you start believing that a nation belongs to one religion, you also start believing that people who don’t belong to that religion are somehow the problem. Just like we say Rome wasn’t built in a day, India wasn’t either.

If India exists today and holds an identity in the world, it’s because of contributions from people of different religions and backgrounds. If you believe otherwise, you’ve seriously been deprived of history, knowledge, and facts.

People have long outsourced their thinking to politicians. They no longer question, they no longer think. It’s a blind-faith relationship where no one questions anyone. It feels like we’re watching the idiom play out in real time: the blind leading the blind. To where? They don’t know, but the bystanders do. They’re leading the nation to nowhere, and calling it progress.

An environment like this helps no one. It only makes the everyday lives of ordinary people worse than they already are. We’re all stuck in a rat race while politicians and their believers play out a script of divide and rule. It seems to work perfectly fine for them as they live in their luxurious mansions, with their kids settled abroad, while it’s the common man who takes the hit. And they even take pride in it. It’s time we take these things seriously and speak up.

Being Religious Doesn’t Mean Being Patriotic

If the title of this section were true, anyone could wear a religious dress, claim to have read holy books, and suddenly be seen as more patriotic than others. As if patriotism can be measured by belief, and as if people who don’t belong to the same religion somehow love their country less. This is exactly why this way of thinking is incorrect and harmful.

The sad part is that this ideology has already spread across the country. And for a nation as populous as India, this has serious consequences, many of which we are already seeing unfold in real time, some of which I’ve mentioned earlier.

If two people, one religious and one not, pay the same taxes and walk on the same roads, but one questions the government to improve the everyday lives of ordinary citizens while the other follows it blindly in faith, ask yourself who is more patriotic. Isn’t the very meaning of patriotism loving your country and wanting it to be better so everyone can live better lives?

Patriotism Versus Obedience

More than a decade ago, questioning the government was seen as a sign of being a responsible citizen. The same citizens who elected public servants to serve the country and make everyone’s lives better are now treated as betrayers for doing exactly that. It almost feels like we’ve regressed two decades into the past. Everything we once overcame as a country, we now seem to be walking back toward.

When was the last time you saw the current government hold a press conference and take questions from journalists across the country, the way a normal, functional democracy is supposed to? Never. Not in the last decade. I’m not even exaggerating. This is the state of our public servants, and we somehow seem to be fine with it. Because why bother if it doesn’t directly affect you, right?

When this happens, not holding the government accountable slowly becomes normal. No one asks questions anymore, and leaders who never had the spine to answer them are more than happy to ignore the issues the country is facing.

Over time, we get used to it. We accept that this is just how things work. Work hard in silence, give all your hard-earned money to the government, and in return get broken roads, failing infrastructure, poor public hygiene, and underfunded public health systems.

No matter how much the state of the country is glorified, those of us living here know what the ground reality looks like. Not NRIs, and not people watching from the outside. And to make sure this isn’t dismissed as just opinion, here are a few numbers:

• World Happiness Report – #118 out of 147 countries (2025)
• World Press Freedom Index – #161 out of 180 countries (2023)
• Human Development Index – #134 out of 193 countries (2023–24)
• Gender Inequality Index – #108 out of 193 countries (2022)
• Corruption Perceptions Index – #93 out of 180 countries (2023)
• Global Peace Index – #116 out of 163 countries (2024)

This is nothing but the cost of mistaking patriotism for obedience. Criticizing the government doesn’t make you “anti-national.” It means you care about the country, not the other way around.

Why Speaking Up Matters

You might ask what the point of speaking up is when no one seems to be listening? Sure, the government might ignore you. But when you speak up, you’re not just speaking to those in power. You’re speaking to fellow citizens. That’s how conversations start. That’s how the word spreads. And that’s how more people start asking questions.

Incompetent leaders can only ignore so much. When everyone starts speaking up, they go from ignoring people to being forced to act. We’ve already seen this happen recently. The Aravalli Hills redefinition and mining policy was stayed only because people protested. The stray dog removal decision was questioned for the same reason. This didn’t happen out of goodwill. It happened because people refused to stay silent, and that’s exactly what we need to keep doing.

You might not have an audience, and neither do I. But even small voices can have a real impact. These are the real patriots of the country. Not the ones who sell their soul for a few bucks and blind obedience, but the ones who care enough to speak up.

That’s about it for this post. I look forward to writing more of these. Thanks for reading. Have a good day, and keep questioning.