A record number of around 26 Bharatiya-origin MPs have been elected to the House of Commons in the UK’s General Elections, in what is being hailed as one of the most ethnically diverse Parliaments in British history.

What’s interesting is that a good number of newly elected Bharatiya MPs chose to take their oath on the Bhagavad Gita during the swearing-in ceremony.

The newly elected British MPs who took their oath of allegiance on the Bhagavad Gita included 29-year-old Tory leader Shivani Raja, Bob Blackman MP from the Harrow East, Bihar-born Labour MP Kanishka Narayan, and the leader of opposition Rishi Sunak.

According to the rules of the British Parliament, members can swear in either using a religious text or take a non-religious, solemn affirmation. The decision of these newly elected MPs to take their oath on the Bhagavad Gita carries immense symbolic significance in the context of rising Hinduphobia in the West.

While antisemitism and Islamophobia have been duly recognized in the UK and gotten the required attention from lawmakers, Hinduphobia or anti-Hindu hatred and violence haven’t quite been on the legislative priorities of British lawmakers. Despite the alarming rise in temple attacks across the country and anti-Hindu hate crimes, as established through the  trail of evidence in cases like Leicester communal violence, Hindu issues have been mostly marginalized in the UK and tangible threats to the lives of Hindus and their right to practice their religion are often dismissed as “Hindutva conspiracy theory”.

It’s also common in countries like the UK and the US to brand anyone who speaks about the rights of Hindus as “Hindutva fascists” and “right-wing”. Hindu advocacy groups in these countries are routinely accused of working on the behest of the Modi government in Bharat, which is branded as “Hindutva right-wing” by the Western ecosystem.

Thus, in the context of this anti-Hindu narrative fast gaining ground across the UK, the symbolic significance of a couple of British MPs choosing to swear their oath of allegiance on the Bhagavad Gita becomes important.

Let’s take a detailed look at the profiles of two of the newly elected MPs who chose to swear on Bhagavad Gita, and who have also won the election based on their raising of issues concerning British Hindus.

1. Shivani Raja Tory leader from Leicester East – 29-year-old Shivani Raja secured a phenomenal, almost historic victory from Leicester East constituency, a longstanding Labour party bastion that hadn’t seen a Tory getting elected since the past 37 years.

Shivani Raja hails from Leicester. The Bharatiya-origin MP with Gujarati roots graduated from De Montfort University with a degree in Pharmaceutical and Cosmetic Science and went on to work with major cosmetic brands in the UK, gaining valuable business experience.

Hailing from a business, family, Shivani Raja is also known to be actively involved in her family business focusing on hospitality and construction.

She secured a massive victory with 14,526 votes beating Labour Party’s Rajesh Agrawal, the former Deputy Mayor of London, who received 10,100 votes.

Shivani Raja’s victory is also being attributed to the inability of the previous political representatives to effectively address the spate of anti-Hindu violence orchestrated during the Leicester riots of 2022. The aftermath of the Leicester riots saw the perpetuation of an anti-Hindu narrative wherein Hindus were exclusively blamed for the violence, despite evidence pointing otherwise. The mainstream British media too largely propagated the biased and one-sided narrative, creating the impression that it was Hindus initially attacking Muslims.

             The findings of the Henry Jackson Society Report on Leicester riots authored by Charlotte Littlewood were ignored by the media for a long time. The report based on Charlotte Littlewood’s interviews with both the Muslim and Hindu residents of Leicester, and a compilation of social media evidence, video evidence, police reports, and statements observed that contrary to the claims made by media reports of that time, the investigation did not find any “Hindutva extremist” organizations operating in Leicester. What caused the riots instead was a micro-community cohesion issue that was falsely presented as an issue of organized Hindutva extremism and terrorism, the report further said.

Shivani Raja managed to raise the issue of Leicester violence amongst her Hindu voter base successfully while campaigning for the UK general elections, as per media reports. “They had lost faith in politicians as previous MPs had not really stood for the people. There was no one standing that was relatable and people saw me as a breath of fresh air. They were also disappointed that the previous MP did not stand up for Leicester during the riots and immediately blamed Hindus before speaking to anyone”, Raja reportedly said.

Shivani Raja also made significant efforts to connect with the British Bharatiya community in Leicester during her campaign. She visited temples, participated in traditional garba dance events, and appeared alongside Surat Mayor Daxesh Mavani to highlight her Bharatiya roots.

• Bob Blackman

Bob Blackman, the Tory MP from Harrow East constituency also took the oath in the British Parliament with both Bhagavad Gita and Bible.

“Proud to have taken my oath of allegiance to HM King Charles on the King James Bible and the Gita as we return to Parliament after the General Election”, he wrote on X.  He also shared the video of taking oath with Bhagavad Gita in his hand.

Bob Blackman’s oath-taking on the Bhagavad Gita is immensely significant since he is perhaps the first non-Bharatiya-origin MP to do so. It’s a huge statement for a non-Bharatiya origin MP of White ethnicity to take their swearing-in on a Hindu religious text.

Bob Blackman has been consistently winning the Harrow East Constituency since 2010. Thus, speculations are rife that his oath of allegiance on Bhagavad Gita might have something to do with his massive British Hindu voter base, whom he might be trying to impress as they form a significant percentage of the voter base in his constituency.

Looking at Blackman’s political record though, one can see that it goes way beyond that. He is one of those rare politicians in the UK who have courageously raised issues impacting Hindus in the House of Commons. He had earlier called out the British media’s biased reporting of the Ayodhya Ram Mandir Consecration Ceremony. He particularly criticized the BBC, pointing out its “inaccurate” coverage as they failed to acknowledge the site’s 2,000-year-old history as a temple “ before the Muslims had been allocated a five-acre site on which to erect a mosque adjacent to the town”.

Blackman aptly pointed out that the BBC, while omitting the historical details pertaining to the existence of a temple on the site before the Babri mosque came into being, peddled a false narrative focusing solely on the destruction of the mosque, thus causing “great disharmony” amongst Hindus worldwide.

Bob Blackman has consistently taken up Hindu issues in the British Parliament. In March 2024, Blackman raised the issue of anti-Hindu hatred in the House of Commons as he asked Penny Mourdant, the then Leader of the House, about the appalling rise of anti-Hindu hatred in the UK and the lack of coverage given to the report published by the all-party group on British Hindus.

He said that the shocking rise in antisemitism and anti-Muslim hatred have been well publicized in the UK, however the shocking rise in anti-Hindu hatred in the country on campuses and other public places has not been well publicized. He urged the House to take up a debate on the topic of anti-Hindu hatred and celebrate the contributions of the British Hindu community to the UK.

Bob Blackman was also one of the candidates to have endorsed the Hindu manifesto launched for the first time by British Hindus, in the run-up to the UK General Elections.