A Dialogue with Swathi

What values did the film Ramadasu choose to celebrate? In this conversation with legendary filmmaker K. Raghavendra Rao, we revisit Ramadasu not as a devotional film alone, but as a cultural document. Through the portrayal of Ramadasu, Tana Shah, Kabir, devotion, power, humility, and Hindu-Muslim relations, we explore the choices that shaped one of Telugu cinema's most memorable spiritual film...

For years now, questions around Hinduism, Hindutva, nationalism, religion, identity, and India’s The political future has deeply shaped public discourse. At the centre of many of these debates stands one organisation: the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS). But what exactly is the RSS? How did it emerge? What are its ideological foundations? How did it evolve from a cultural organisation into one o...

Idea of India • Hindutva • RSS • Caste • Economy • Hindu Rashtra • Islam • DemocracyIs India a nation? A civilisation? A political experiment? Or a failed dream we are still trying to understand? In this long-form dialogue, Prof. G. Haragopal traces the evolution of the Idea of India — from Gandhi, Nehru and Ambedkar to liberalisation, Hindutva, and the rise of cultural nationalism. This is not a...

Is it a religion, a civilisation, a social order, or a political identity? And who gets to define it? In this long-form dialogue, we speak with Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd, political scientist and Dalit–Bahujan intellectual, to examine Hinduism and the contemporary Hindu national project from a Dalit–Bahujan lens. This conversation asks deeper questions:* What does Hinduism look like when viewed from l...

Questions India Avoids is the opening episode of Dialogue with Swathi, a show focused on slow, thoughtful conversations about Indian politics, ideology, and identity. India is full of political opinions, arguments, and strong positions. Yet, there are important questions we rarely pause to ask. This episode begins an exploration of those unasked questions, moving beyond elections and party politic...