#134 "Phir Bhi Dil Hai Hindustani" Or "तथापि हृदय भारतीय अस्ति"? 🎧

<em>While excellent newsletters on specific themes within public policy already exist, this thought letter is about frameworks, mental models, and key ideas that will hopefully help you think about any public policy problem in imaginative ways.</em><br/><br/><em>Audio narration by </em><a target="_blank" href="https://www.ad-auris.com/"><em>Ad-Auris</em></a><em>.  </em><br/><br/><strong>India Policy Watch: प Se Pew. प Se Pluralism  </strong><br/><br/><em>Insights on burning policy issues in India</em><br/><br/>- <em>RSJ</em><br/><br/>I’m sure by now most of you would have seen the findings of the new Pew survey on religion in India. The <a target="_blank" href="https://www.pewforum.org/2021/06/29/religion-in-india-tolerance-and-segregation/">report is here</a> and the <a target="_blank" href="https://www.pewforum.org/2021/06/29/appendix-a-methodology-12/">methodology is outlined here</a>. The size of the sample chosen, the extensive field work done, the questionnaire used and the index devised to measure religious segregation are rigorous and thorough. This is a solid survey that should be basis for further academic work. It will be useful for Pew to publish the raw data soon for further research. <br/><br/>What The Survey Says About Us<br/><br/>My first reaction reading the findings was here’s a giant Rorschach test for all political commentators in India. What you might conclude from the report will reveal more about you than about India. But I’m getting ahead of myself. Here’s a short summary of the findings if you found the report TL;DR:<br/><br/>Indians believe they have religious freedom. Respecting all religions to them is an important marker to being truly Indian. It is also core to their own religious identity. Further they don’t see widespread religious discrimination around them.<br/><br/>Indians value religious diversity. However, Indians of a religion see themselves as very different from others of a different religion. A few things therefore follow from here: <br/><br/>Stopping religious intermarri