swadeshi

swa·de·shi
S1W4A1D2E1S1H4I1
US, UK/swəˈdɛʃi/US, UK/-ˈdeɪ-/India/sʋəˈdeːʃi/

noun

A policy of nationalist self-sufficiency in India, involving the revival and promotion of domestic production and (originally) the boycott of British products.

RareScrabble 15

Meanings

swadeshi1

nounswadeshi (uncountable)

alternative Swadeshi

  1. IndiaalsoattributiveuncountableeconomicsA policy of nationalist self-sufficiency in India, involving the revival and promotion of domestic production and (originally) the boycott of British products.

    And yet long before this popular ebullition of excitement, I myself had given a thousand rupees, when I had not five rupees to call my own, to open a Swadeshi store and courted banter and bankruptcy.

    1921 March 5, Rabindranath Tagore, “Chicago, March 5, 1921”, in C[harles] F[reer] A[ndrews], editor, Letters from Abroad, Triplicane, Madras, Tamil Nadu: S. Ganesan, published 1924, →OCLC, page 78
    5 more examples

    The Swadeshi movement in India is one which in certain of its aspects can be regarded with much sympathy. A spirit of patriotism is excellent, and the endeavour to engender and foster it, provided it is made along legitimate lines, calls for encouragement and not condemnation.

    1906 September, “[Editorial Notes.] Missionaries Assaulted in a Swadeshi Riot.”, in The Church Missionary Intelligencer: A Monthly Journal of Missionary Information, volume XXXI (New Series; volume LVII overall), London: Church Missionary Society, […], →OCLC, page 713

    The Swadeshi movement, in its bad sense—the boycotting of foreign goods—has had no effect on imports as a whole, and even the articles specifically aimed at, cotton goods and sugar, have entered to an unparalleled extent in the last three years. The good side of the Swadeshi movement, the development of indigenous industries, is seen in the increased imports of textile machinery and metals.

    1907 July, “Notes on Colonial and Foreign Banking, Finance and Commerce. [Indian Foreign Trade.]”, in The Bankers’, Insurance Managers’ & Agents’ Magazine, volume LXXXIV, number 760, London: Waterlow and Sons […], →OCLC, page 61

    The cry of the Indian "Insurgent" to-day is "Shiksha," (education,) education in all its phases and branches, both extensive and intensive; "Swadeshi," (home industries) and "Swaraj" (self-government).

    1911 December 30, Basanta Koomar Roy, “Insurgency in India”, in Robert M[arion] La Follette, editor, La Follette’s Weekly Magazine, volume III, number 52, Madison, Wis.: Robert M. La Follette Company, →OCLC, page 8, column 1

    My work should be, and therefore is, to organise the production of handspun cloth, and to find means for the disposal of the Khadi thus produced. [...] I swear by this form of Swadeshi, because through it I can provide work to the semi-starved, semi-employed women of India.

    1929, M[ohandas] K[aramchand] Gandhi, “An Instructive Dialogue”, in Mahadev Haribhai Desai and Pyarelal Nair, transl., The Story of My Experiments with Truth: Translated from the Original in Gujarati, volume II, Ahmedabad, Gujarat: Navajivan Press, →OCLC, part V, page 572

    The anti-partition agitation with its vehement invective, its appeals to Hindu sentiment, its cry that Bengal as motherland, once rich and famous, had been torn in two despite the protests of her children, its proposals for enforcing a punitive boycott of foreign goods and supplanting them entirely by "swadeshi" indigenous products, its enlistment of students and school-boys in picketing operations, gave ample cover for the sedulous teaching of revolutionary doctrines.

    1932, H[enry] Verney Lovett, “The Rise of an Extremist Party”, in H[enry] H[erbert] Dodwell, editor, The Cambridge History of India, volumes VI (The Indian Empire 1858–1918 […]), Cambridge, Cambridgeshire: University Press, →OCLC, page 551

Swadeshi2

nounSwadeshi (uncountable)
  1. uncountableAlternative letter-case form of swadeshi.

    And yet long before this popular ebullition of excitement, I myself had given a thousand rupees, when I had not five rupees to call my own, to open a Swadeshi store and courted banter and bankruptcy.

    1921 March 5, Rabindranath Tagore, “Chicago, March 5, 1921”, in C[harles] F[reer] A[ndrews], editor, Letters from Abroad, Triplicane, Madras, Tamil Nadu: S. Ganesan, published 1924, →OCLC, page 78
    5 more examples

    The Swadeshi movement in India is one which in certain of its aspects can be regarded with much sympathy. A spirit of patriotism is excellent, and the endeavour to engender and foster it, provided it is made along legitimate lines, calls for encouragement and not condemnation.

    1906 September, “[Editorial Notes.] Missionaries Assaulted in a Swadeshi Riot.”, in The Church Missionary Intelligencer: A Monthly Journal of Missionary Information, volume XXXI (New Series; volume LVII overall), London: Church Missionary Society, […], →OCLC, page 713

    The Swadeshi movement, in its bad sense—the boycotting of foreign goods—has had no effect on imports as a whole, and even the articles specifically aimed at, cotton goods and sugar, have entered to an unparalleled extent in the last three years. The good side of the Swadeshi movement, the development of indigenous industries, is seen in the increased imports of textile machinery and metals.

    1907 July, “Notes on Colonial and Foreign Banking, Finance and Commerce. [Indian Foreign Trade.]”, in The Bankers’, Insurance Managers’ & Agents’ Magazine, volume LXXXIV, number 760, London: Waterlow and Sons […], →OCLC, page 61

    The cry of the Indian "Insurgent" to-day is "Shiksha," (education,) education in all its phases and branches, both extensive and intensive; "Swadeshi," (home industries) and "Swaraj" (self-government).

    1911 December 30, Basanta Koomar Roy, “Insurgency in India”, in Robert M[arion] La Follette, editor, La Follette’s Weekly Magazine, volume III, number 52, Madison, Wis.: Robert M. La Follette Company, →OCLC, page 8, column 1

    My work should be, and therefore is, to organise the production of handspun cloth, and to find means for the disposal of the Khadi thus produced. [...] I swear by this form of Swadeshi, because through it I can provide work to the semi-starved, semi-employed women of India.

    1929, M[ohandas] K[aramchand] Gandhi, “An Instructive Dialogue”, in Mahadev Haribhai Desai and Pyarelal Nair, transl., The Story of My Experiments with Truth: Translated from the Original in Gujarati, volume II, Ahmedabad, Gujarat: Navajivan Press, →OCLC, part V, page 572

    The first Indian Industrial Conference meeting in 1905, bringing together industrialists from all over India, decided to "foster and extend the use of such manufactures in India in preference to foreign goods." That demand intersected with the emerging Swadeshi movement, which advocated Indian self-sufficiency, especially in cottons, and symbolized the confluence of cotton entrepreneurs and the emerging nationalist political elites.

    2014, Sven Beckert, “The Return of the Global South”, in Empire of Cotton: A Global History, New York, N.Y.: Vintage Books, published November 2015, →ISBN, page 420

Synonyms & antonyms

Also see

Origin

  1. Proto-Indo-European*deyḱ-“to point out”
  2. Proto-Indo-European*swé“(pronoun) self”
  3. Sanskritस्वदेश
  4. Hindiस्वदेशी“nationalist, patriotic; policy of nationalist self-sufficiency, swadeshi; proponent of the swadeshi movement”
  5. Englishswadeshi

PIE word *swé Borrowed from Hindi स्वदेशी (svadeśī, “nationalist, patriotic; policy of nationalist self-sufficiency, swadeshi; proponent of the swadeshi movement”), from स्वदेश (svadeś, “one’s own country”) + -ई (-ī, suffix forming adjectives, or forming nouns meaning a person who does an action indicated by the stem). स्वदेश is derived from Sanskrit स्वदेश (svadeśa), from स्व (sva, “his or her own”) (ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *swé (“(pronoun) self”)) + देश (deśa, “country; point, place”) (ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *deyḱ- (“to point out”)).

Full word history & related roots →

Translations

Bengali স্বদেশী
  • স্বদেশী (śodeśi)policy of nationalist self-sufficiency in India
Hindi स्वदेशी
  • स्वदेशी (svadeśī)policy of nationalist self-sufficiency in India
Indonesian swadesi
  • swadesipolicy of nationalist self-sufficiency in India
Punjabi ਸਵਦੇਸ਼ੀ
  • ਸਵਦੇਸ਼ੀ (savdeśī)policy of nationalist self-sufficiency in India
Tamil சுதேசி
  • சுதேசி (cutēci)policy of nationalist self-sufficiency in India
Urdu سودیشی
  • سودیشی (sodeśī)policy of nationalist self-sufficiency in India

Rhymes & wordplay

Rhymes with swadeshi

All rhymes →
Cite this entry
APA

swadeshi. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 4, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/swadeshi

MLA

“swadeshi.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/swadeshi. Accessed November 4, 2026.

Chicago

WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “swadeshi,” accessed November 4, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/swadeshi.

Source: swadeshi on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.