Photo by Akanksha Mehta During my doctoral research in 2013 and 2014, my Hindu right-wing research interviewees in suburban Mumbai and Thane made me aware of their practice of ‘daily walks’. Small groups of women from Hindu nationalist organizations drove to what they identified as Muslim neighbourhoods, sometimes with sticks and stones, always with loud chants and shouts. They usually didn’t physically attack individuals, but created a ruckus around the inhabitants of these spaces. Warning them that India was and will remain a Hindu nation, they exhorted Muslim ‘traitors’ to leave the country. Screaming slurs against Pakistan and slogans about Kashmir belonging to India, they pelted stones and banged on doors. When satisfied with the disruption they had caused, they would leave, filled with excitement, energy and laughter. This ritual of violence both marked and claimed a territory as Hindu and tried to terrorize those who were seen to be…

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