 NEW DELHI (AP) ‐ As she patrols for cow smugglers, Sadhvi Kamal, a Hindu holy woman in a saffron robe, rides in a white SUV with a sticker on the rear window displaying a cow framed by swords and rifles. The words in the sticker’s logo say, "The cow is the mother of the world."
Kamal leads a vigilante force of thousands of volunteers, mostly young Hindu men. Such vigilante forces have emerged after several Indian states banned the slaughter of cows, sacred to Hindus, in recent years. Mobs have lynched three dozen Muslims, who traditionally run meat shops and slaughterhouses.
As India heads toward a general election that begins this week, taking up arms for "mother cow" is part of a broader campaign to impose ancient Hindu religious values across a multicultural country. As with similar movements across the world, Hindu nationalism, once fringe, has now taken a central place in India’s politics.
The movement is led by the party of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who grew up chanting slogans and practicing maneuvers at nationalist training camps. Modi and his Bharatiya Janata Party seek to retain power in the elections by promoting Hindutva ‐ a Hindu way of life ‐ instead of secular pluralism. A fresh mandate for Modi could embolden efforts to mold the world’s largest democracy of 1.3 billion people into a stringently Hindu nation. 
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