ABSTRACT
The post Cold War scenario in India, as elsewhere, has been marked by market triumphalism and the weakening of the nation-state. The task of redefining India’s location and destiny in a new world order, based on a global free market, has unleashed a process of major transitions affecting virtually every aspect of the country’s life. The abandonment of a state-controlled model of the economy in favour of increased liberalisation and privatisation has not only led to the redundancy of specific economic and social projects, but has also posed serious challenges to the political vision that dominated the postcolonial nation-state over the last five decades. Avoid in ideological spaces, created by a fumbling nation-state, has generated new discourses of the nation. In the context of these ongoing social and political transitions in the country in recent years, this chapter examines some aspects of the changing nature of national imagination. It discusses, in particular, some of the issues concerning the construction of the ‘authentic’ Indian citizen and its ‘other’ in contemporary Indian media and visual representation. The aim is to explore the politics involved in the production, transmission and communication of dominant visions and images of the nation in India today and to probe their roles within the larger processes of power struggle.
