Identity has become an important phenomenon in the modern politics in India. Discuss. (Answer in 150 words)

- Identity has become an important phenomenon in the modern politics in India. Discuss. (Answer in 150 words)
Introduction
Identity is the working currency of Indian politics because democracy gave numbers a value that caste, religion, language and tribe convert into power. Mobilisation follows the franchise.

Body
1. The founding insight: Rajni Kothari argued in 1970 that politics did not corrupt caste so much as caste organised politics, secularising it into an interest group.
2. The second democratic upsurge: after Mandal's implementation in 1990, Yogendra Yadav and Christophe Jaffrelot document the rise of OBC, Dalit and Adivasi leadership.
3. Religious identity: the Ayodhya mobilisation made majority identity a political project, and the Sachar Committee (2006) put minority deprivation on the agenda.
4. Linguistic, regional and tribal identity: the States Reorganisation Commission (1955), the anti-Hindi agitation of 1965, Telangana in 2014, and PESA and the Forest Rights Act each institutionalise a claim.
5. Sub-identity is the newest layer: sub-categorisation of Scheduled Castes upheld in Davinder Singh (2024), and the caste census.

Conclusion
Identity politics has deepened democracy by widening who governs. Its risk, which Sen names in Identity and Violence, is singular affiliation — one identity taken for the whole person, displacing redistributive claims.