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Translated from English with AI. The English text is the official version.
A new, independent party
India isn’t doomed. It’s captured, by dynasties, hidden money, criminal cases and the politics of fear. Undoing that won’t take a saviour. It will take people like you.
Sale receipt · buyer’s copy
One vote. Five years.
PAIDSources for every figure are in the sections below.
cases pending in Indian courts
of MPs elected in 2024 declared criminal cases
Indians gave up citizenship in 2024 alone
of Beti Bachao funds released in 2016–19 went to media advocacy
UGC rules
You’ve heard it. Maybe you’ve said it.
“Nothing ever changes?”
These did, because citizens pushed.
2002
Candidates must declare their criminal cases and assets.
Citizens took it to the Supreme Court.
Union of India v. Association for Democratic Reforms
2005
The Right to Information Act.
It began as a village campaign in Rajasthan.
RTI Act, 2005
2013
Convicted MPs and MLAs can no longer keep their seats while they appeal.
A lawyer and a citizens’ group challenged the old law.
Lily Thomas v. Union of India
2024
Anonymous electoral bonds struck down.
Citizens’ groups challenged secret political funding.
Association for Democratic Reforms v. Union of India
It has, every time enough citizens refused to accept that line. What’s been missing is doing it as a party, with candidates and a plan, so the changes stick.
On the things that matter most, too often they are: freebies before elections, tickets for candidates facing serious criminal cases, money no voter can trace. That isn’t a reason to stop caring. It’s the gap HRP exists to fill.
New parties fail when they start answering to donors, to vote banks, or to one leader. So we’re built differently: when we take donations, every donor will be public and every rupee accounted for, and policy is researched in the open with members.
That question is designed to end the conversation. It assumes the choice is fixed forever. Our answer: a party that holds BJP and Congress to the same standard, and that you can help build from day one.
We understand why people go. But when the people most able to fix things leave, the people who broke them stay in charge. Stay and build with us.
Alone, no. Together, yes. A lawyer, a researcher, a developer and an organiser in every district is how a movement starts. That’s what we’re building, one volunteer at a time.
The diagnosis
India’s problems aren’t fate. They’re the result of a political system that answers to the wrong people.
Power passed down like property.
So talent rarely gets a ticket.
Money whose source you are never told.
If you can’t see who paid, you can’t see who they serve.
Leaders facing serious charges.
Too often, the accused help write the laws.
Elections fought on fear of each other.
Fear wins votes, so fear is what gets produced.
What has been captured can be taken back.
Why corruption exists
Corruption in India isn’t mainly about a few bad people. It’s built into how elections are paid for.
Step 1
₹1.35 lakh crore
Estimated total spending around the 2024 Lok Sabha election, about double 2019. A candidate may spend up to ₹95 lakh. Parties have no spending limit at all.
Centre for Media Studies estimate, April 2024
Step 2
₹12,769 crore
Paid to parties through anonymous electoral bonds between April 2019 and January 2024. Voters couldn’t see who gave how much to whom.
SBI data published by the Election Commission, March 2024
Step 3
₹1,368 crore
Bought by a single company, the largest buyer of bonds. The Supreme Court itself said this kind of funding can lead to quid pro quo arrangements.
ECI data; ADR v. Union of India (2024)
Step 4
You pay
Favours can be repaid through contracts, licences and policy, all with public money. When donors are secret, no one can connect the payment to the favour.
Who cashed the anonymous bonds
₹ crore, 12 April 2019 to 24 January 2024
Source: SBI data published by the Election Commission of India, 14 March 2024
Congress criticised the scheme, and still cashed ₹1,421.9 crore of it.
BJP and Congress fight about almost everything. Not this.
2013
The Central Information Commission ruled that six national parties, BJP and Congress among them, must answer RTI requests. They didn’t comply. The UPA government introduced a bill to exempt parties, with support across the aisle. It lapsed in 2014.
2014–18
In 2014 the Delhi High Court found both BJP and Congress guilty of taking foreign donations in breach of the law. Both later withdrew their appeals. Finance Acts in 2016 and 2018 then rewrote the law, the second time retrospectively all the way back to 1976.
2017
The BJP government brought in electoral bonds through the Finance Act and removed the cap on company donations. The Election Commission called it a “retrograde step” for transparency. The RBI warned of money laundering. In 2024 the Supreme Court struck it all down, unanimously.
Your money
Money spent buying votes is money not spent building the country. Here’s the trade-off, in rupees, and how India compares with the US and China.
Handouts vs the future
₹ crore a year
Source: PRS State of State Finances, Oct 2025; Budget 2026-27; Ministry of Defence; Dept of Space
One year of state cash transfers is more than the Centre spends on health, nearly six times DRDO’s budget and over twelve times ISRO’s. Health and education are largely run by states, so these are the Centre’s budgets only.
Government spending as a share of the economy. India keeps pace with China on education. On health and research, it falls far behind.
Government health spending
% of GDP, 2023
Source: World Bank WDI (WHO Global Health Expenditure Database), SH.XPD.GHED.GD.ZS
Research & development
% of GDP, all sectors (India 2020; US, China 2023)
Source: World Bank WDI (UNESCO Institute for Statistics), GB.XPD.RSDV.GD.ZS
Public education spending
% of GDP (India 2022, US 2021, China 2023)
Source: World Bank WDI (UNESCO Institute for Statistics), SE.XPD.TOTL.GD.ZS
₹5,987 cr
spent by the central government on advertising from 2014-15 to 2024-25: about ₹1.5 crore every day.
Ministry of I&B, Lok Sabha reply, March 2026
78.91%
of ₹446.72 crore released under Beti Bachao Beti Padhao (2016–19) went on media advocacy.
Parliamentary Committee on Empowerment of Women, 5th Report, 9 Dec 2021
25%
of the scheme’s ₹622 crore released to states was actually spent by them.
Same committee report
₹10,000
transferred to each of 75 lakh women in Bihar on 26 September 2025, weeks before the state election.
PIB, 26 Sep 2025
21 lakh
more women received ₹10,000 on 6 October 2025, the day the election schedule was announced.
All India Radio; Election Commission schedule, 6 Oct 2025
12 states
now run unconditional cash transfers to women, up from 2 in 2022-23. Budget: ₹1,68,040 crore. Six of them run revenue deficits.
PRS Legislative Research, State of State Finances, Oct 2025
Justice, delayed
Religion and caste fill rallies. Slow courts don’t. But almost every failure on this page grows from the same root: when justice takes a decade, nobody fears breaking the law.
5.8 crore
cases pending in Indian courts right now. More than one in ten has been waiting over a decade.
Source: National Judicial Data Grid, 10–13 Oct 2026 (our sum of the three courts)
Judges per million people
What India was told it needs, in 1987, and what it has
Source: Law Commission 120th Report; Ministry of Law, Rajya Sabha, Jan 2026; India Justice Report 2025
72.6%
of India’s prisoners haven’t been convicted of anything. They are undertrials, 9,028 of them held for more than five years.
NCRB Prison Statistics India 2024
30%
of High Court judge posts are empty (341 of 1,122). In district courts, 7,310 posts are vacant.
Ministry of Law & Justice, July 2026
47 lakh
cases in district courts have been pending for more than ten years. 80,660 High Court cases are over 30 years old.
NJDG, Oct 2026; Law Minister in Rajya Sabha, 23 Jul 2026
<1%
of its budget is what every state spends on its courts. The average is 0.59%, or ₹182 per person a year.
India Justice Report 2025 (2022-23 budgets)
Slow courts don’t just delay cases. They change how everyone behaves.
Because justice takes years…
46%
of MPs elected in 2024 declared criminal cases; 31% face serious charges like murder, rape or kidnapping. Trials that never end never disqualify anyone.
ADR analysis of 2024 Lok Sabha affidavits
Because justice takes years…
10 of 19
death-penalty cases the Supreme Court decided in 2025 ended in acquittal. Those acquitted had spent, on average, more than nine years waiting to be hanged for crimes the court found they didn’t commit.
Square Circle Clinic (NALSAR), Death Penalty in India: Annual Statistics 2025
Because justice takes years…
89.7%
of rape cases were still waiting for trial to finish at the end of 2023: 1,82,163 cases. Every year of delay is another year of facing the accused, the hearings and the pressure to settle.
NCRB Crime in India 2023
Because justice takes years…
₹50,387 cr
a year in wages and business lost just to attending hearings. The Economic Survey called contract-enforcement delay “arguably now the single biggest hurdle” to doing business.
DAKSH Access to Justice Survey 2015-16 (estimate); Economic Survey 2018-19
In March 2025, burnt bundles of cash were found after a fire at the official home of a sitting Delhi High Court judge. A parliamentary inquiry committee reportedly found the allegations proved. The judge resigned in April 2026. No criminal case has been reported.
LiveLaw, May 2026; The Week, Aug 2026
No party rallies around judge vacancies, because they don’t stir anger or unite a vote bank. That’s exactly why they never get fixed.
Handouts vs systems
Before every election, parties offer cash. It feels like help, and for many families it is. But look at what it’s meant to replace.
Put a price on your family
Pick an offer to see what it’s really worth.
Can’t buy: a safe street for your daughter
4.4 lakh
crimes against women recorded in 2024. That’s about 1,200 every single day.
NCRB Crime in India 2024
Can’t buy: a fair exam for your child
1.4 crore
applicants hit by 41 recruitment-exam paper leaks in 15 states over five years. The 2024 NEET leak was “not in dispute”, said the Supreme Court.
Indian Express investigation, Feb 2024; Supreme Court, 23 Jul 2024
Can’t buy: air your family can breathe
20 lakh+
deaths in India linked to air pollution in 2023. The average Indian loses 3.5 years of life to it; in Delhi, 8.2 years.
State of Global Air 2025; AQLI 2025 (EPIC, Univ. of Chicago)
Can’t buy: food that won’t poison you
1 in 4
food samples tested by FSSAI failed quality or safety standards, on average, from 2014-15 to 2024-25.
FSSAI data, via Dataful
Can’t buy: a bridge that holds
135
people died when the Morbi bridge collapsed in 2022. In 2024, about 10 bridges collapsed in Bihar in 17 days.
Morbi SIT report; Bihar govt suspension order, Jul 2024
Can’t buy: a home that doesn’t flood every year
73%
of Bihar is flood-prone, and 40% of Assam. Assam spent ₹574 crore repairing embankments in 2022-23; 71 breached again in 2024.
Bihar & Assam govt data; Assam Assembly reply via Newslaundry
A handout
A working system
₹1.68 lakh crore
budgeted by 12 states for unconditional cash transfers to women in 2025-26. That’s more than the Centre’s entire health budget for 2026-27 (₹1.05 lakh crore).
PRS State of State Finances, Oct 2025; Budget at a Glance 2026-27
दूसरे देंगे तो पिंजरा ही देंगे।घोंसला तो ख़ुद ही बनाना पड़ता है।
Others will only give you a cage.A nest is something you must build yourself.
Corruption you live with
Record budgets, record announcements. Then the auditor opens the files.
39%
of Indians who used a public service paid a bribe in the past year: the highest rate in Asia.
Transparency International, Global Corruption Barometer Asia 2020
46%
used personal connections to get a public service done, also the highest in Asia.
Same survey (17 countries)
91st
of 182 countries on the Corruption Perceptions Index 2025. India scores 39 out of 100.
Transparency International, Feb 2026
₹15.4 → ₹32.2 cr
cost per km of the Bharatmala highway programme, from approval to sanction. By March 2023 only 38.8% of the planned length was built.
CAG Report No. 19 of 2023 (our division of CAG’s totals)
₹250.77 cr/km
civil cost of the Dwarka Expressway per CAG, against ₹18.20 cr/km approved by the Cabinet committee. The road ministry calls this comparison a “gross mis-representation”.
CAG Report No. 19 of 2023; MoRTH clarification
The exit door
Every year, around two lakh Indians give up their citizenship. Founders move their companies abroad. And the world is racing ahead in AI while our politics argues about religion and caste.
Indians who gave up citizenship
Per year, 2015–2024. 2020 dipped with Covid travel limits.
Source: Ministry of External Affairs, Rajya Sabha replies (latest 11 Dec 2025)
20.86 lakh since 2011
26,134
clauses in India’s business laws that can send an entrepreneur to jail, across 69,233 compliances.
ORF & TeamLease, Jailed for Doing Business, 2022
20 of 108
Indian unicorns were headquartered abroad in early 2023, mostly in the US.
Inc42, 2023
3,500
millionaires Henley & Partners estimated would leave India in 2025, the world’s third-highest outflow. Its 2026 report stopped publishing country outflows and ranks India among the countries facing “persistent structural” wealth-mobility challenges.
Henley Private Wealth Migration Reports 2025 and 2026 (estimates)
IT is India’s biggest services export. AI is about to rewrite it, and almost all the money is being spent elsewhere.
Private AI investment, 2025
US$ billion
Source: Stanford AI Index 2026
$246 bn
of tech exports in FY26. Revenue grew 6.1%, but jobs grew just 2.3%.
Nasscom, Feb 2026
15 lakh
tech jobs India could lose by 2031, or up to 40 lakh it could create, depending on what we do now.
NITI Aayog roadmap, Oct 2025
Average hours worked per week
Per employed person (Germany 2024, others 2025)
Source: ILOSTAT (HOW_TEMP_SEX_NB)
Unemployed people receiving unemployment benefits
% of the unemployed (India 2022; world and G7 2023)
Source: ILO, SDG indicator 1.3.1
India’s total tax take is less than half of Europe’s. The problem isn’t how much the state takes. It’s how little comes back, so you pay again, privately.
30%
income tax above ₹24 lakh, plus 4% cess, plus 18% GST on most services you buy.
Budget 2026-27; GST Council, Sep 2025
43.4%
of all health spending in India is paid by families out of their own pockets.
National Health Accounts 2022-23 (released May 2026)
9×
what a private school costs per student (₹25,002) compared with a government school (₹2,863).
NSS Comprehensive Modular Survey: Education, 2025
18.5%
India’s tax-to-GDP ratio (Centre and states), against 40.4% in the EU.
EY on FY24 data; Eurostat 2024
A policy case study
India switched almost all petrol to 20% ethanol. The government now admits what drivers noticed first.
3–5%
drop in fuel efficiency in some vehicles, admitted by the petroleum ministry.
Ministry of Petroleum & Natural Gas FAQ, July 2026
₹0
pump-price cut for you. The ministry says E20 costs more to produce than plain petrol at about $70 crude.
Ministry of Petroleum & Natural Gas FAQ, July 2026
75–80 mn
older two-wheelers the Chief Economic Adviser suggested should get an E10 option, writing in a personal capacity.
CEA column, 17 Aug 2026
No
E10 or ethanol-free option for older vehicles. The Supreme Court dismissed a plea asking for one.
Govt statement, July 2026; Supreme Court, 1 Sep 2025
Fuel policy moves thousands of crores between consumers, farmers, refiners and distillers. Yet India has no dedicated conflict-of-interest law for ministers: disclosure rests on an executive code of conduct, not a statute. So every big policy shift invites suspicion, and there’s no clear standard to settle it with facts.
Tools
Interactive tools built on public records. Every figure links to its source.
544 outlets mapped
Who owns the news you watch? Follow the companies, people, investors and disclosed funding behind India’s newsrooms.
Explore the graph297 days, not rolled back
BJP’s UGC rules wrote a caste definition with one group missing. The Supreme Court froze them in 16 days. BJP still hasn’t withdrawn them.
See the clock19 cases on the clock
A 15-year-old’s insult got a response from the Prime Minister the next day. Compare that with his response to cases involving BJP leaders, allies and governments.
See the clockSpot the difference
Take the things voters say they’re tired of, and check which party does them.
| The practice | BJP | Congress |
|---|---|---|
| Freebies as election bribes | Yes | Yes |
| Dynasties and patronage | Yes | Yes |
| Tickets for candidates facing serious criminal cases | Yes | Yes |
| Hidden party funding | Yes | Yes |
| Courts left short of judges | Yes | Yes |
| Identity politics over equal citizenship | Yes | Yes |
There isn’t a difference. That’s the problem.
The two-party systemAn interactive thought experiment
BJP on the trolley. Lever pulled 0 times. Tracks changed: zero.
Pull the lever. Watch what changes. And what doesn’t.
To the party in power
BJP asks for votes in the name of Hindus. Look at what it does in power. We praise good work where it’s due; this is about the gap between the slogan and the record.
The washing machine
23 of 25
Opposition politicians facing central-agency corruption probes who crossed over to the BJP or its allies since 2014. In 23 cases, the probe was closed or went cold.
3 cases closed, 20 stalled or inactive. Relief in a case doesn’t prove guilt or innocence; the pattern is the point. Source: Indian Express investigation, April 2024
The true Unlimited Gunah Simulator Mod APK.
1. Choose a load
Before
July 2015: a BJP booklet called Himanta Biswa Sarma “the prime suspect” in the Guwahati water-supply scam.
After the wash
Press Wash to find out.
2018
Prof. G.D. Agrawal, an IIT professor who became Swami Gyan Swaroop Sanand, fasted for a law to protect the Ganga and wrote to the Prime Minister four times. The PMO forwarded his letters and closed the matter. He died on 11 October 2018. The Ganga law he asked for still isn’t law.
2013 → 2026
When Asaram was charged with rape in 2013, senior BJP leaders called it a political conspiracy. He was convicted of raping a minor in 2018, and of rape again in 2023: life imprisonment both times. In March 2026, out on interim medical bail, he had darshan at the Ayodhya Ram temple. Patrika reported he was taken in through the gate used for VVIP guests; Aaj Tak reported that a top official of the government-constituted temple trust welcomed him. Ram went to war for one woman’s dignity. His temple’s VIP gate opened for a man convicted of raping a minor.
2015–2018
BJP governed Jammu & Kashmir in alliance with the PDP for three years. In 2018 it fielded a former JKLF militant, who had served his prison sentence, as a municipal candidate in Srinagar. In 2022 a man appointed IT in-charge of BJP’s Jammu minority wing weeks earlier was arrested as a Lashkar operative; the party said he had quit and wasn’t a member. In 2024 it accused rivals of using ex-militants.
2024
Commentator Ajeet Bharti says RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat once asked him publicly: “Has the Sangh taken on the contract for Hindus?” He repeated the claim on X in December 2024 and April 2026. What is on record: in December 2024, Bhagwat, head of the organisation widely seen as BJP’s ideological parent, said in Pune that people who think they can become “leaders of Hindus” by raking up new temple–mosque disputes every day was “not acceptable”. Seers including the Jyotirmath Shankaracharya publicly disagreed. The movement that rode Ayodhya to power now decides which temples Hindus may ask about.
2019 → 2025
BJP’s 2021 manifestos in Tamil Nadu and Kerala promised to hand temples to devotees. Where it governs, it went the other way. In 2019 Uttarakhand’s BJP government put the Char Dham and around 50 other temples under a state board; it repealed the law in 2021 only after two years of priests’ protests, months before an election. In December 2021 Karnataka’s BJP Chief Minister promised a law to free temples; none was ever introduced. In May 2025 UP’s BJP government took over Vrindavan’s Banke Bihari temple by ordinance, and the Supreme Court asked what the “tearing hurry” was before staying the new trust.
2024 → 2026
Months after the inauguration, the new Ram Path caved in during the June 2024 rains; the UP government suspended six engineers and served notice on the contractor. In June 2026, eight people were arrested over theft of temple donations. UP’s Speaker suggested the stolen offerings may not have been given with true devotion; he later said he meant one opposition leader.
2018
In March 2018 the Supreme Court, citing misuse, allowed anticipatory bail, a preliminary inquiry before an FIR, and approval before arrest under the SC/ST Atrocities Act. Within five months the BJP government passed an amendment undoing all three: no inquiry, no approval, no anticipatory bail. No party opposed it; it passed by voice vote. The court upheld the amendment in 2020, leaving anticipatory bail only where no prima facie case is made out.
2026
The UGC’s 2026 equity regulations, notified under a BJP government, were stayed by the Supreme Court as “vague” and “capable of misuse”. In August 2026 the Centre told the court they were being reconsidered.
₹6,769 cr
BJP’s income in 2024-25: 85% of the income of all national parties combined.
ADR analysis of party filings, 2024-25
₹3,335 cr
spent by BJP on elections and propaganda in 2024-25 alone.
ADR analysis of party filings, 2024-25
₹1,400 cr
of BJP’s 2022-23 income came from ‘unknown sources’, 76% of all such income across national parties. Not illegal; just invisible to voters.
ADR, 2022-23
For the connected
Aug 2026: a tribunal approved settling about ₹22,006 crore of claims against media baron Subhash Chandra, a BJP-backed Rajya Sabha MP from 2016 to 2022, for about ₹6.5 crore. A 99.97% haircut. Some lenders are appealing.
For you
Miss your income-tax return deadline by a day: up to ₹5,000 late fee.
NCLT order via The Week, Aug 2026; Income Tax Act s.234F
Being Hindu isn’t a vote bank. Hindus deserve what everyone deserves: clean government, working courts and a Ganga that’s actually clean.
Delimitation 2026
In April 2026 the government tried to redraw the Lok Sabha by population, using the 2011 Census. States that controlled their population, the South and the Northeast, would have lost a share of their voice. The amendment was defeated on 17 April 2026, 298 to 230, short of the two-thirds it needed. It will be back.
South + Northeast, share of Lok Sabha seats
28.4% → 24.5%
The South and the Northeast hold 28.4% of Lok Sabha seats today. Redrawn by 2011 population: about 24.5%. Roughly 4 of every 100 seats gone, from the regions Delhi already finds easiest to ignore.
Kerala
3.7% → 2.8%−25% of its voice
Northeast8 states
4.6% → 3.8%−18% of its voice
Tamil Nadu
7.2% → 6.0%−17% of its voice
Andhra Pradesh
4.6% → 4.1%−11% of its voice
Telangana
3.1% → 2.9%−8% of its voice
Karnataka
5.2% → 5.0%−2% of its voice
Fewer seats means even less attention, and the Northeast and the South already know how little they get. Look at Manipur.
260
people killed in Manipur’s ethnic violence since May 2023, by the Home Minister’s own count. Nearly 59,000 were still displaced in March 2026.
Home Minister in Lok Sabha, Apr 2025; Manipur Home Dept via RTI, Apr 2026
28 months
before the Prime Minister visited Manipur after the violence began.
Scroll, Onmanorama, Sept 2025
₹2,152 cr
of school-education funds for 2024-25 withheld from Tamil Nadu, which says it was for refusing to sign up to the Centre’s PM SHRI scheme. The state sued in the Supreme Court.
The Week, Deccan Herald, May 2025
May 2023
Ethnic violence breaks out on 3 May 2023, in a state run by a BJP government, with a BJP government at the Centre.
July 2023
A video surfaces of two women paraded naked by a mob on 4 May. The next day, outside Parliament, the Prime Minister speaks on Manipur for the first time: his heart is “filled with pain and anger”.
Feb 2025
President’s Rule follows. In April 2025 the Lok Sabha approves it at 2 a.m., after about 40 minutes of debate.
Sept 2025
The Prime Minister visits Manipur for the first time since the violence began, and launches projects worth over ₹7,300 crore.
The amendment tied the 33% women’s quota to the redrawing. But nothing stops any party from giving women a third of its tickets today.
12.9%
of BJP’s Lok Sabha MPs are women: 31 of 240 (2024). It gave women about 16% of its tickets.
ECI results via Factly and Tribune, 2024
54
sitting BJP MPs and MLAs have declared cases of crimes against women, the most of any party.
ADR & National Election Watch, Aug 2024
17
times convicted rapist Gurmeet Ram Rahim has been let out of jail since 2020 under Haryana’s BJP government, several times just before elections.
Indian Express, Hindustan Times, Aug 2026
September 2026
On 19 September a gang in Jamui, Bihar, molested a Class 10 girl, beat the boy with her and filmed it. Bihar’s BJP Chief Minister Samrat Choudhary, who runs the police, drew his lesson: “If he hadn’t made a reel, would he have been caught?” Two days later his own X handle posted a photo of the girl with her parents. Police booked a stenographer in his office.
2019
Kuldeep Singh Sengar, expelled by the BJP only after national outrage in 2019, was convicted of raping a minor in Unnao and sentenced to life. He was also convicted over the custodial death of the survivor’s father.
2022 → 2024
On 15 August 2022, Gujarat’s BJP government released the 11 men convicted of gang-raping Bilkis Bano and murdering her family. In March 2023 one of them sat on stage with a BJP MP and MLA at a government event. In January 2024 the Supreme Court quashed the release, saying the state had usurped power and acted in complicity with a convict.
2023 → 2025
In December 2023 a BJP leader in Hassan wrote to the state party chief about sex-abuse videos involving JD(S) MP Prajwal Revanna, warning BJP would be seen as aligned with “the family of a rapist”; the state chief denied receiving it. In April 2024 the Prime Minister shared the stage with Revanna, the NDA’s Hassan candidate, at a joint rally. In August 2025 Revanna was convicted of rape and sentenced to life.
2023
Ramdular Gond, BJP MLA from Duddhi, UP, was convicted of raping a minor and sentenced to 25 years, and disqualified from the Assembly.
2012
At an election rally, Narendra Modi said of Shashi Tharoor’s wife: “Aapne kabhi dekha hai 50 crore ki girlfriend?” She called it “disgusting”.
c. 2004
Sonia Gandhi’s memoir recalls Modi calling her a “Jersey cow” at a rally. In 2026 her publisher wanted the line cut. She refused, and changed publishers.
More cases, public remarks and the sources behind each one.
Explore Cultural ShockTamil Nadu, Kerala, Assam and Manipur are as Indian as any other state. A country that punishes its best-governed states for governing well is telling everyone not to bother.
To the party that ruled longest
Congress says it stands for secularism and against caste. Here is what it did when it had the power to prove it.
Caste means your birth decides your place, and your children inherit it. For about half the years since independence, Congress has been led by one family: five generations as party president. Its current Leader of the Opposition is the fifth.
Generation 1
Motilal Nehru
1919, 1928
Generation 2
Jawaharlal Nehru
1929–30, 1936–37, 1946, 1951–54
Generation 3
Indira Gandhi
1959, 1978–84
Generation 4
Rajiv Gandhi
1985–91
Generation 4
Sonia Gandhi
1998–2017, 2019–22
Generation 5
Rahul Gandhi
2017–19; Leader of the Opposition since 2024
1985 → 1986
The Supreme Court held that Shah Bano, divorced after 40+ years of marriage, was entitled to maintenance under the law that covers every Indian woman. The Congress government then passed the Muslim Women Act, 1986, taking that right away from Muslim women. It took courts 15 more years to read the right back in.
1988
India banned imports of The Satanic Verses under a Congress government, among the first countries to do so. In 2024 the authorities told the Delhi High Court the ban notification couldn’t be found, and the court presumed it didn’t exist.
1984
Official count of those killed in the anti-Sikh violence after Indira Gandhi’s assassination, 2,733 of them in Delhi. In 2018 the Delhi High Court sentenced former Congress MP Sajjan Kumar to life, calling the killings “crimes against humanity”.
2007
In the Ram Setu case, affidavits filed in the Supreme Court under the UPA government questioned the historicity of the Ramayana. After protests, the government withdrew them within days.
2008
Days after the Mumbai attacks, a Union minister asked on TV why ATS chief Hemant Karkare went “to such a place where there was nothing”, adding: “Whether he was just a victim of terror or something (else), I don’t know.” Congress said it did not endorse his views.
2010
The Union Home Minister spoke of “saffron terror” at a police chiefs’ conference. A Congress general secretary attended the launch of a book titled “26/11: RSS ki Saazish?”; its author later printed an apology. In 2025 a special court acquitted all seven accused in the 2008 Malegaon blast case, finding the evidence “riddled with inconsistencies”.
2011 → 2014
The draft Communal Violence Bill from the Congress-led National Advisory Council defined ‘victim’ only as a member of a minority or an SC/ST group. In February 2014 the UPA tried to bring it to Parliament; parties across the spectrum objected, and it was dropped.
1975–77
Civil liberties suspended for 21 months after a court voided the Prime Minister’s election. Over 1,10,000 people detained without trial; the press censored.
2012
The CAG estimated ₹1.86 lakh crore in gains to private companies from coal block allocations. In 2014 the Supreme Court cancelled 214 of 218 blocks allocated since 1993, a period that includes NDA years too.
2010 → 2017
The CAG put the presumptive loss at ₹1.76 lakh crore, and the Supreme Court cancelled 122 licences in 2012. In 2017 a special court acquitted all the accused; the CBI’s appeal is pending.
₹836 cr
Haj subsidy in 2012. The Supreme Court ordered it phased out within ten years; it ended in 2018.
Lok Sabha answers; Supreme Court, 8 May 2012
59.1%
Muslim literacy, against 64.8% nationally, after decades of Congress rule.
Sachar Committee Report, 2006 (Census 2001)
3%
of IAS officers were Muslim, against a 13.4% share of the population.
Sachar Committee Report, 2006
“The subsidy money may be more profitably used for upliftment of the community in education and other indices of social development.”
Supreme Court of India, Union of India v. Rafique Shaikh Bhikan, 2012
The court also noted the Quran makes Hajj a duty for those who can afford it.
Appeasement isn’t kindness. It buys one community’s votes with another community’s resentment, and leaves both poorer.
The hard part
Every community in India has been handed a special favour by some party. Equal citizenship means giving yours up too. Look closely, though: almost every ‘favour’ ended up hurting the weakest people in the group it claimed to help.
“Though we are not responsible for the introduction of untouchability and castes among us, we are surely responsible for their annihilation.”
Dr B.R. Ambedkar, Bombay Presidency Mahar Conference, 31 May 1936
From the speech ‘What Path to Salvation?’, delivered in Marathi; English translation by Vasant W. Moon.
Give upBeing a vote bank.
GainElections fought on jobs, courts, safety and clean food, because there’s no community left to frighten.
Appeasement buys one group’s votes with another group’s resentment. Remove it for everyone, and the polarisation has nothing left to feed on.
Symmetric by design
To Congress
Hindu concerns are not communalism.
To BJP
Muslims are not suspects.
And Hindus deserve real governance, not a pro-Hindu façade.
No community is a terrorist.No caste is an oppressor by birth.
Every Indian stands before the law as an individual.
Phase 1 · Draft v0.1
Three reforms that make every other reform possible. These are drafts: tell us where we’re wrong.
Cases drag on for years because India doesn’t have enough judges.
You can’t hold power to account when you can’t see who funds it.
Within reserved categories, benefits often miss the communities left furthest behind.
“Indian Society is a gradation of Castes forming an ascending scale of reverence and a descending scale of contempt.”
The stand others avoid · Draft v0.1
Others won’t say it out loud. We will.
That is why we oppose rules that presume guilt by caste, including the SC/ST Act’s bar on anticipatory bail and the UGC’s 2026 equity regulations.
Read the full reform and discuss itAlso on the agenda · Draft v0.1
Showing 10 planks
Clean politics
No tickets for candidates facing serious criminal cases. No inherited power.
Clean politics
No one in office decides matters they stand to profit from.
Clean politics
Funding and spending rules that are actually enforced.
Clean politics
Dedicated teams staffed by officers with clean records.
Justice & policing
Protect every genuine victim. Stop misuse.
Justice & policing
Recorded policing protects citizens and honest officers alike.
Equal citizenship
One law for the property of every faith.
Equal citizenship
An equal voice in national decisions for every region.
Economy & future
Redirect money spent on pre-election handouts into research and development. Welfare that builds capacity stays.
Economy & future
Fuel policy decided on evidence and consumer interest.
Open now · The People’s Manifesto
Not a PDF handed out weeks before an election. A working space where members map what is broken, test HRP’s reforms and propose their own, with a source for every claim.
Long-unsolved problems across India and in every state: the number, what failed and who is responsible. Reply with an idea, evidence or a question, or add one from where you live.
Browse the problemsHRP’s proposed fixes, each with its evidence, cost, trade-offs and a dated history. Every reform opens for discussion, and members can contest it even after it is approved.
Read the reformsHave a fix? Write it up with the proposal template: the problem, the evidence and what it costs. It stays between you and HRP’s reviewers, and every proposal gets a status and a reason.
Write a proposalWhy this time is different
Every new party promises to be different. Promises aren’t enough, so these are built into how HRP works.
Judge us by what we stand for, not by who is speaking. Policy is researched and decided in the open with members, so no single leader can quietly rewrite it.
We aren’t taking donations yet. When we do, every donor will be named publicly and every rupee we spend will be accounted for, so no donor can quietly call in a favour.
Our member platform is open: anyone who joins can add a problem, challenge a reform or propose a fix, and every proposal gets a visible status and a reason.
We criticise BJP and Congress by the same rules, and we praise good work from either when it is due. We never soften a position to get closer to power.
No dynasties. No candidates facing serious criminal cases. If we ask it of others, we ask it of ourselves first.
Where we are
HRP is at the very beginning, testing its ideas in the open. The people who show up now will shape what it becomes.
NowYou are here
The manifesto is open: problems, reforms and member proposals, all in public. Plus research.
Next
Introduce the founding team and bring more members into the manifesto.
Then
Registration with the Election Commission of India.
2029
Take the People’s Manifesto to the general election.
Our think tank. Open policy research on the problems in our agenda, with every source published, so anyone can check it, challenge it or reuse it.
NeedsResearchersData analystsWriters
Connecting people facing false cases with volunteer lawyers. Genuine SC/ST victims are referred to free government legal aid.
NeedsLawyersDevelopers
Helping acquitted people pursue cases against those who falsely accused them.
NeedsLawyersResearchers
A searchable data platform on political parties’ records that any voter can use.
NeedsDevelopersData analystsResearchers
A map of where the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita conflicts with the Constitution.
NeedsLawyersWriters
The People’s Manifesto 2029
In India, manifestos are written in closed rooms and handed to you weeks before an election. We’re doing it the other way round. Tell us the problem where you live, the change you’d vote for, or where our drafts are wrong.
Join, and bring an idea
A problem, a policy idea, or a challenge to our drafts. Or just bring your skills.
Sign in to the manifesto
Once your email is confirmed, add problems from where you live, discuss reforms and send proposals under a display name.
Write it with us
Volunteers get an invite to our private Discord to research each draft: how other states and countries tried it, what it costs, what went wrong. The finished research is published for everyone.
Decided with reasons
Members set priorities. Every proposal gets a public status and a reason, including the ones we turn down.
Our core principles stay open to evidence, not to vote-brigading. Popularity isn’t proof, so ideas are weighed on evidence as well as support.
Questions
For now, the founder is anonymous by choice. HRP is in an open-draft phase: our positions are versions, not verdicts, and we want them tested and corrected on their merits before anyone attaches a face to them. The founder will introduce himself publicly before we register the party or ask anyone for money.
We don’t ask you to trust a leader; we ask you to check us. When we take donations, every donor will be public and every rupee accounted for, and we’re building policy in the open with members. Read ‘Built so we can’t become them’ above.
Read what we say about both. We hold BJP and Congress to the same standard on freebies, dynasties, criminal candidates and hidden funding, and we praise good work by either when it is due.
No. Welfare that builds capacity, like food security and scholarships, is not the problem. Handouts timed to buy votes before an election are.
Not yet. When we do, every donor will be listed publicly and every rupee we spend will be accounted for, down to the last one. We will never take foreign money. For now, we’re asking for time and skills, not money.
Not yet. New parties register with the Election Commission of India under Section 29A of the Representation of the People Act, 1951. We’re testing our ideas in the open with our first members first.
Fair question. We ask only for your name, email, city and profession. We confirm your email before counting you, use your details only to contact you about HRP and invite volunteers to our Discord, never sell or share them, and delete them whenever you ask.
No. Disagreement backed by evidence is exactly what we’re asking for. Add an idea and choose ‘Challenge our drafts’, or sign in to the manifesto and contest a reform directly.
Service conduct rules generally bar government servants from joining or working for a political party. Please check the rules that apply to you before registering.
We use your details only to contact you about HRP and to invite volunteers to our private Discord. You can ask us to delete them at any time.
BJP
Congress