UNITED STATES, August 10, 2026 (RNS): To 15-year-old Mira Trivedi, who is Hindu, the swastika always signaled its auspicious Sanskrit meaning: well-being, good fortune and peace. So when her eighth grade social studies teacher said the swastika was a hate symbol representing Hitler’s genocidal antisemitism, Trivedi went up after class to explain that the Nazi symbol was not the swastika but the Hakenkreuz, a German word meaning “hooked cross.” The swastika, which is usually slightly different in appearance, is a devotional symbol in South Asian religions, including Hinduism, Buddhism and Jainism, she said. Trivedi hoped for a lightbulb moment after her spiel, but the teacher said only higher ups could implement changes about what’s taught about the symbol. “That’s what started my whole journey,” Trivedi said. She presented her case to the vice principal, principal and board of education at her central New Jersey school in May 2025. “I was sweating through the entire meeting, I was so nervous,” she said. But the effort paid off, and she convinced the school board to educate 35 teachers about the difference between the symbols.

In recent months, a small but growing contingent of Hindu students across the country like Trivedi have successfully pushed for curriculum changes and education about the difference. The conflation between the swastika and the Hakenkreuz emerged in the 1930s, but the presence of the swastika in Germany dates back to the late 1800s, said Baijayanti Roy, a lecturer and researcher on interactions between India and Nazi Germany at Goethe University Frankfurt in Germany. During this era, Germany’s Theosophists and Buddhists, who revered Indian philosophy, used the symbol to represent appreciation. But at the turn of the 20th century, the racist and antisemitic völkisch movement co-opted the swastika to signal Aryan German heritage, Roy said. The proposed design for the fledgling Nazi party’s flag arrived in front of Hitler bearing a mirrored version of the swastika. Hitler approved the design, with one exception: Due to his hatred of Indians, whom he perceived as bastardized Aryans, he replaced the swastika with the “Hakenkreuz” by changing the tilt and removing the four dots and flourishes that typically, but not always, adorn the swastika.

More at source.
https://religionnews.com/2026/08/10/hindu-students-ask-schools-to-discern-the-swastika-from-the-nazi-hakenkreuz-jewish-students-support-them/

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