ABSTRACT
Exploring an ongoing civil war between Maoist guerrillas and the Indian government, this article looks at how emotions are mobilised, conscripted and engendered by both sides. The focus is, however, on the state’s performance of emotion, including outrage, hurt and fear-inducing domination, as part of its battle for legitimacy. Intrinsic to this is the privileging of certain kinds of emotions—fear, anger, grief—and the emotions of certain kinds of people over others. Subject populations are distinguished from citizens by the differential public acknowledgement of their emotional claims.
