‘Dimagi Naxal’ row revives debate over the NAC: What was it, and how influential was it?

'Dimagi Naxal' row revives debate over the NAC: What was it, and how influential was it?

Key points

• On India's 80th Independence Day on August 15, Prime Minister Narendra Modi c alled on the nation to identify and isolate "Dimagi Naxals".
• 5 min read New Delhi Aug 30, 2026 06: 12 AM IST.
• The National Advisory Council comprised activists, academics and policy experts, and became closely associated with the UPA's rights-based welfare agenda.
• "Dimagi Naxal" is a political label applied by the BJP-RSS ecosystem for intellectuals, activists and others it accuses of ideologically supporting Left-wing extremism.

'Dimagi Naxal' row revives debate over the NAC: What was it, and how influential was it? The UPA-era body was formed in 2004 when the Congress-led alliance returned to power. Chaired by Sonia Gandhi, then the party president, the NAC functioned as an advisory body for the Centre on its common minimum programme.

During the UPA years, the BJP, then in Opposition, repeatedly attacked the NAC as an "extra-constitutional" and unelected body that wielded influence disproportionate to its formal powers. (Wikimedia Commons).

Against the backdrop of the BJP's ongoing campaign against "Dimagi Naxals", the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh mouthpiece Organiser on Friday linked the erstwhile National Advisory Council (NAC) to the ongoing debate.

"Dimagi Naxal" is a political label applied by the BJP-RSS ecosystem for intellectuals, activists and others it accuses of ideologically supporting Left-wing extremism. The term has additionally been employed more broadly for critics of the administration.

What exactly was the NAC, why did it become so influential, and why does it remain politically contested? What was the NAC?

For context, the National Advisory Council comprised activists, academics and policy experts, and became closely associated with the UPA's rights-based welfare agenda.

In practice, the NAC was influential in shaping and pushing some of the most transformative policy reforms of the UPA era – the Right to Information Act and the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA, replaced by the VB-G RAM G Act this year), and the push towards a legal right to food that culminated in the National Food Security Act. Penguin drops Sonia Gandhi's memoir after she rejected 'changes, deletions'.

Formally, nevertheless, the NAC was only an advisory body. Its recommendations were subject to the government's "normal scrutiny", and the final decision rested with the administration, according to the Prime Minister's Office. Why was the NAC so influential?

Right from its inception, the NAC occupied a contentious position: While it did not have any formal decision-making powers, it enjoyed a powerful role due to its proximity to the executive and the individuals who sat on it. Its members included prominent activists and policy thinkers such as Aruna Roy, Jean Drèze, N C Saxena and Mirai Chatterjee, plenty of of whom had worked extensively on matters that afterwards became central to the UPA's legislative agenda.

At the launch of the NAC website in September 2004, then Prime Minister Manmohan Singh remarked the Council enabled the administration to reach out to "non-government organizations, social activists and intellectuals". He continued that "the government takes the advice of the NAC seriously". This offered civil-society actors an unusually direct route into the government's policymaking process.

This status did not mean its recommendations were accepted without question. The Indian Express documented in September 2010 that differences between the administration and the NAC over legal guarantees for non-BPL families and the availability of foodgrain were holding up the proposed Bill. At an NAC session that month, representatives of the Planning Commission and a number of ministries were consulted. While M S Swaminathan remarked the NAC would finalise its recommendations after considering the government's inputs, Food Minister Sharad Pawar stated the states would additionally have to be consulted before the proposals went to Cabinet.

So why is the NAC being invoked now?

On India's 80th Independence Day on August 15, Prime Minister Narendra Modi c alled on the nation to identify and isolate "Dimagi Naxals". The call was subsequently amplified by BJP leaders, with Parliamentary Affairs Minister Kiren Rijiju saying the Prime Minister was referring not to Opposition leaders, but to those who backing Maoists and reject the Constitution. Dimagi Naxal frames the mind as enemy territory.

Leaning into this framing, Organiser 's Chief Editor Prafulla Ketkar described the Sonia Gandhi-led NAC as a "classic takeover of the Dimagi Naxals of governance", and alleged that such actors had penetrated the "bureaucracy, policy machinery, legal system, academia, media, and NGOs".

Notably, the latest accusation revives a much older criticism of the NAC. During the UPA years, the BJP, then in Opposition, repeatedly attacked it as an "extra-constitutional" and unelected body that wielded influence disproportionate to its formal powers. Much of the criticism centred on Gandhi herself: while she was not part of the Manmohan Singh Cabinet, the NAC chairperson had the rank and status of a Union Cabinet Minister. The PMO informed Parliament in 2004 that the Council had its own secretariat, was funded by the Centre, and could draw on outside experts, even as its recommendations remained subject to normal administration scrutiny.

These criticisms came to a head during the 2006 "office of profit" controversy, culminating in Gandhi's resignation as Rae Bareli MP and NAC chairperson in March 2006 after the Opposition alleged that holding the post while remaining an MP could attract disqualification. She subsequently won the Rae Bareli bypoll by more than four lakh votes. Parliament additionally amended the Prevention of Disqualification Act that year to exempt the NAC chairperson's post.

Notably, the episode illustrated why the NAC remained politically contentious: it had no executive authority, but its access and political weight created it far more consequential than an ordinary advisory body. © The Indian Express Pvt Ltd.

Taken together, the developments around 'Dimagi Naxal' row revives debate over the NAC: What was it, and point to a situation that is still moving, and the coming days should bring more clarity.