So far they have been using history in order to stigmatise Muslims. Their entire communal enterprise was based on that stigmatisation. Now communalism has entered a new phase in which aggressive steps are on to define India as a Hindu nation. As part of this project, they have developed this concept of cultural nationalism, which is based on a reinterpretation of the past. Therefore in the present circumstances, particularly in the context of the recent socio-economic developments, the reinterpretation of the past in religious terms has become more crucial.
All secular voices have to be marginalised or suppressed.
So history is going to be a major arena of contest. These are the forewarnings of greater attempts, sponsored and supported by the state, to change our notions of the past. The suppression of the two volumes of Towards Freedom is another sharp warning of the implications of the extreme rightwing political agenda of the BJP and its associated Hindu chauvinist organisations. For decades, support for the BJP's communalist agenda was marginal. But the Indian ruling class can no longer employ anti-imperialist rhetoric to try to claim it is pursuing a people's development program.