How PM’s ‘Demographic Mission’ promise aligns with BJP, RSS narratives | Political Pulse News

For years, the BJP and RSS have linked the issue to infiltration from neighbouring countries, religious conversion, and differential fertility rates among communities — framing it as a challenge with national security, political, and socio-cultural dimensions. For the BJP, illegal immigration from Bangladesh and Myanmar is tied to concerns over voter rolls, resource allocation, and communal tensions. For the RSS, conversions and infiltration threaten to alter the balance between communities, potentially redrawing political boundaries.

Border states in focus

On August 18, 2022, Union Home Minister Amit Shah, while speaking at the concluding session of the National Security Strategies Conference, told Directors General of Police of border states to keep a “watchful eye on the demographic changes taking place in border areas”, describing it as a priority in the fight for the country’s future. He said the issue had been formally deliberated at the conference under the topic “Demographic changes and growing radicalisation in border areas”, alongside counter-terrorism, Maoist overground networks, cyber surveillance, and drug trafficking.

Shah’s warning came amid political sparring over the entry of Rohingya Muslims from Myanmar and continuing concerns about illegal immigration from Bangladesh. At the time, the Border Security Force (BSF) had raised the issue with the Border Guard Bangladesh, only for the latter to deny that its citizens needed to cross over, citing economic progress at home.

The Home Minister has long articulated a hard line on infiltration. In September 2018, as national BJP president, Shah described illegal Bangladeshi migrants as “termites” who would be removed from electoral rolls. “They are eating the grain that should go to the poor, taking our jobs… They will be struck off the voter list,” he said at a rally.

The BJP had then repeatedly demanded the extension of the National Register of Citizens (NRC) exercise beyond Assam to other states, including Jharkhand, and raised the issue in the context of state elections. In 2019, ahead of the Jharkhand polls, senior BJP leaders again warned about “Bangladeshi infiltrators”, linking them to crime and security problems.

RSS framing: imbalance, infiltration, conversion

For the RSS, the issue has been framed as a civilisational challenge that could alter India’s socio-political fabric.

In his 2022 Vijayadashmi speech, RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat said “population imbalance” had led to the creation of new countries such as East Timor, South Sudan, and Kosovo, and warned that “when there is population imbalance, new countries are created”. He also cited the Partition of India in 1947 and the creation of Bangladesh in 1971 as examples of how shifts in population composition, when aligned with political movements, could alter the map itself. He called for a “comprehensive population control policy” applicable to all, without exception, and said it must be brought “with determination” so that society accepts it.

While acknowledging that birth rate is only “one part of this imbalance”, Bhagwat pointed to “conversion by force and allurement” as the “biggest factor”, alongside cross-border infiltration. He underlined that India’s large young population could be a demographic dividend, but the country needed to plan now for when that population grows old in 50 years.

In October 2024, this theme resurfaced in political discourse when Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu and Tamil Nadu CM M K Stalin — from opposing political camps — voiced concern over falling fertility in southern states and its potential impact on parliamentary representation after delimitation. Stalin joked about “aiming for 16 children” to preserve seats, echoing, in a different context, earlier Sangh Parivar calls for Hindus to have more children to counter a “rising Muslim population”.

Past RSS chiefs and leaders have openly urged bigger Hindu families. Former RSS chief K S Sudarshan said in 2005 that families should have “not less than three children”, current general secretary Dattatreya Hosabale argued in 2013 for larger Hindu families to prevent minorities from gaining demographic advantage in certain areas, and the Vishva Hindu Parishad’s (VHP) Champat Rai said in 2015 that family planning was no longer a purely personal matter for Hindus.

Policy debates and southern concerns

The RSS’s position has evolved to also recognise “regional imbalance” — the fear among southern and western states, which have lower fertility rates, that they will lose parliamentary seats if delimitation is based on the latest population figures. In July this year, RSS-linked weekly Organiser backed calls for a policy that prevents population trends from disproportionately affecting any community or region. Editor Prafulla Ketkar warned that ignoring these imbalances could lead to “socio-economic disparities and political conflicts”.

Within the BJP, the push for legislation has had mixed outcomes. Assam’s 2017 “Population and Women’s Empowerment Policy” was amended in 2021 to bar those with more than two children from government jobs. Uttar Pradesh’s law commission has proposed denying government subsidies to families with over two children, though the measure is still under consideration.

From security to representation

In BJP and RSS narratives, demographic change is not only a matter of numbers but also of political and security implications. For the BJP, illegal immigration from Bangladesh and Myanmar is tied to concerns over voter rolls, resource allocation, and communal tensions. For the RSS, conversions and infiltration threaten to alter the balance between communities, potentially redrawing political boundaries.

With PM Modi now proposing a formal demographic mission, the government appears to be moving towards institutionalising the study and monitoring of these shifts. The mission’s remit — whether confined to statistical analysis or extended to recommending policy interventions — will determine how far the BJP translates its and the RSS’s ideological concerns into administrative measures.