Abstract This article examines the two waves of the covid-19 pandemic in India in 2020–2021. It disaggregates the different narratives constructed by the Hindu right-wing in online circles. It shows that by instrumentalizing the interactive and multimodal features of social media, the Hindu Right amplified the notion of Muslims as contaminants in the first wave of the breakout, accusing them of weakening the otherwise sacred, virus-resistant Indian nation. During the second wave, the Hindu Right downplayed the role of the Kumbh Mela, a major Hindu pilgrimage and festival, as a super-spreader event. Criticisms of the Hindu festival was deemed a foreign conspiracy aimed at harming India’s body politic. The article argues that the Hindu Right capitalized on the covid-19 crisis to promote religified and somatisized ideals of a ‘muscular Hindu India’ weakened by the Muslim Other from within. This narrative heightened the schism between Hindus and Muslims in India, with long-lasting effects that outlive the pandemic itself. Finally, the article problematizes the notion that digital technologies and virtual spaces necessarily overcome physical barriers and divisions, arguing instead that in the case of the right-wing Hindu Twittersphere, social media congealed intra-communal solidarities and inter-communal antagonisms online echoing divisions in the non-digital, offline world.