In this video interview with Tom Wilkinson, Yogendra Yadav addresses the changing relationship between democracy and diversity in India. As the keynote speaker at the prestigious Ralph Miliband lecture, and discussant at LSE South Asian Centre event exploring ‘The Urgency of Secularism” with Amartya Sen, the academic confronts India’s modern political transformation: that is, the growing hegemony of the BJP. He offers a compelling theoretical framework for making sense of the electoral, coercive and cultural dominance of the party of Narendra Modi; and the crisis of the idea of India and his engagement as a political activist. The founder of Swaraj Abhiyan will bring to light the organisations effort to challenge the BJP and offer an alternative to Indian youths.

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Bios

Yogendra Yadav is an Indian politician, psephologist and academic whose primary interests are in the political and social sciences. He has been a Senior Fellow at the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies, Delhi since 2004. He is a former member of India’s University Grants Commission and National Advisory Council on Right to Education Act. He tweets @_YogendraYadav

Tom Wilkinson is a PhD candidate in the Department of International History at the LSE. His doctoral research investigates the penal and non-penal negotiate of youth in colonial and early post-colonial India.  Prior to commencing his doctoral research, he worked as a Parliamentary Assistant in Westminster and as a teaching assistant in Delhi for the British Council. 

Mahima A. Jain (@mahima_a) is blog editor at LSE South Asia Centre. She has a Masters in Journalism and has worked as an editor and journalist in India.