The saffron diaspora: Hindutva mobilization and state-led diaspora governance in the United Kingdom

In line with the neoliberal trends in global politics, home states started showing more interest in harnessing their diasporas for economic, political and cultural benefits. For illiberal home states, diaspora communities also have emerged as strategic assets with which they project extraterritorial power, manage their emigrant communities and expand their ideological reach and political visions beyond borders. In the light of these debates, the article focuses on India’s evolving diaspora governance policy under the Modi government where the perceptions of diaspora have shifted from a symbolic cultural resource with emotional attachments to the homeland, to a central tool for political projects, driven by external and internal motivations. Drawing on previous studies which discussed diaspora building and governance from a social engineering perspective, the article demonstrates how state mechanisms such as the Overseas Citizen of India (OCI) card help to create ideologically filtered political spaces beyond national borders.