DISCURSIVE CONSTRUCTIONS OF POWER AND NATIONAL IDENTITY: A CRITICAL DISCOURSE ANALYSIS OF INDIAN POLITICAL AND MEDIA NARRATIVES ON OPERATION SINDOOR

Abstract

The study examines the discursive creation of Operation Sindoor by the Indian political leaders and the mainstream media using language, symbolism and ideological framing. A review of 35 texts was done using the three-dimensional Critical Discourse Analysis developed by Fairclough and features of the Discourse-Historical Approach in relation to political speeches, and English media reports published in the period between 15 February and 31 March 2025. The results indicate that operation Sindoor was always presented as a moral action of defending national integrity, and India was a peaceful country that had to do it. Both media and political discourses were based on binary oppositions that portrayed Pakistan and militants agents as aggressors and existential threats. The concept of symbolic framing was about the word Sindoor, which uses a gendered and sacred image to compare national defense with that of a sacred wife or mother. Media exaggerated emotionalized rhetoric and reduced controversy, which in many ways reduced opposition to labels of unpatriotism and collaboration with the enemy. In general, the rhetoric upheld the prevailing nationalist, security and integration ideologies.