RSS and Politics: Conspiracy is the Mantra

The RSS specialises in double-speak and triple- speak. In fact, the situation is so critical that it may be an understatement regarding the RSS behaviour. No other organisation which claims to be committed to moral regeneration of India can compete with the RSS in manufacturing lies. The current public manifestations of the RSS for active participation in Indian politics, especially forcing the BJP to project Narendra Modi as the prime ministerial candidate for the 2014 elections, is a continuation of the same conspiratorial mind-set. In the aftermath of the brutal killing of the Father of the Nation, Gandhiji, by committed and trained cadres of the Hindutva camp, the RSS was forced by Jawaharlal Nehru and Sardar Patel to write a constitution declaring that the it would be “devoted purely to cultural work†and would not indulge in “political†activities. But the fact is not that the cat is out of the bag now. Despite its assurances that it would not participate in politics before the nation (on the basis of which the ban imposed on it for being responsible for killing of Gandhiji was lifted), this is not first time that it has violated this cardinal pledge.

The most prominent ideologue of the RSS, M.S. Golwalkar, openly declared that it had political ambitions and wanted to control politics directly. This was in total violation of the pledge to the Government of India that the RSS would not indulge in political activities. While addressing a gathering of top-ranking RSS cadres on March 16, 1954, at Sindi, Wardha, he said:
“If we say that we are part of the organisation and accept its discipline then selectiveness has no place in life. Do what is told. If told to play kabaddi, play kabaddi; told to hold meeting then meeting….For instance, some of our friends were told to go and work for politics that does not mean that they have great interest or inspiration for it. They don’t die for politics like fish without water. If they are told to withdraw from politics then also there is no objection. Their discretion is just not required.†[Shri Guruji Samagar Darshan, (Collected Works of Golwalkar in Hindi), Volume III, Bharatiya Vichar Sadhana, Nagpur, nd, p. 32]

He continued to relish the RSS’ ambition to control the politics of a democratic-secular India clandestinely and did not mind sharing this ambition publically. While addressing top-level cadres of the RSS at Indore on March 5, 1960, this Hindutva ideologue went on to declare:
“We know this also that some of our Swayamsevaks work in politics. There they have to organise according to the needs of work public meetings, processions etc., have to raise slogans. All these things have no place in our work. However, like the character in a play whatever role has been assigned should be performed to the best of capability. But sometimes Swayamsevaks go beyond the role assigned to a performer (nat) as they develop over-zealousness in their hearts, to the extent that they become useless for this work. This is not good.†[Ibid., Volume IV, pp.
4-5.]

We find here Golwalkar referring to the Swayamsevaks loaned to the political offshoot as ‘nat’ or performers who are meant to dance to the tunes of the RSS. This fact should not be missed here that Golwalkar’s above design of controlling the political arm was elaborated in March 1960 almost nine years after the establishment of the Jan Sangh (the forerunner of the BJP) in 1951.

The RSS cadres, who control the BJP, keep on harping that the BJP is an independent political organisation and does not work under the dictates of the RSS. It is pertinent that one compares this claim with the facts available in the official publications of the RSS to know the whole nexus. The central publication house of the RSS, Suruchi Prakashan, Delhi, published a book in 1997, titled Param Vaibhav Ke Path Par (On The Road To Great Glory) penned by Sadanand Damodar Sapre, a senior RSS functionary.
This book contains details of more than 40 organisations created by the RSS for different tasks. The preface of the book itself declares that
“Without the knowledge of the different kinds of activities of the Sawyamsevaks (the volunteers of the RSS) the introduction of the RSS is incomplete. Keeping this in mind it has been attempted in this book to produce the brief information about the diverse activities of the Swayamsevaks. This book covers the organi-sational status till 1996. We believe that this book will prove to be of use for those who want to understand the RSS along with the Swyam-sevaks.â€

The BJP as a political organisation figures prominently in it at number 3 out of 37 major outfits. The chapter on the Jana Sangh/BJP describes in detail how and why the RSS created them.

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This publication of the RSS also shows how the organisation is run in a clandestine manner. It runs like a well-organised mafia through its subsidiaries and pocket organisations. There has always been a conscious attempt to create confusion about its different fronts which provide RSS with the opportunity to dissociate with any of these as per its convenience. For instance, it used the Hindu Jagaran Manch (HJM) for attacking Christians in the late 1990s and when public opinion, the media, judiciary and Parliament seemed to turn against it, the RSS denied any relation with the HJM. Moreover, when the nefarious designs of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad, Bajrang Dal and Dharam Sansad were exposed before the nation, the RSS announced that these were independent organisations. Interestingly, it was often seen mediating between the BJP-led government (1998-2004) and these outfits.

It will be interesting to know that many of these organisations have been organised in the true fascist and clandestine manner. For instance, while giving the details of the Hindu Jagaran Manch (HJM), the book says:
“From the point of view of Hindu awakening this kind of forums (HJM) at present are active in 17 states with different names like ‘Hindu Manch’ in Delhi, ‘Hindu Munani’ in Tamilnadu, ‘Hinduekjut’ in Maharashtra. These are forums, not associations or organisations, that’s why it is not required to have membership, registration and elections.â€

It is clear that such RSS organisations, “not required to have membership, registration and elections†are purposely created to avoid scrutiny by the law and government. Such an organisational mode provides an opportunity to the RSS to disown any individual or organisation any time.

The RSS resorts to underhand methods also to accomplish or execute its nefarious designs. Self-confession appears in clear words through a disclosure in Param Vaibhav Ke Path Par about a case in Delhi immediately after the partition:

†Swayamsevaks had posed to have adopted Mussalman religion in order to gain the confidence of the Delhi Muslim League for knowing their conspiracies.†[Sadanand D. Sapre, Param Vaibhav Ke Path Per (Hindi), Suruchi, Delhi, 1997, p. 86.]

What these Swayamsevaks, impersonating as Muslims, on the eve of independence were doing was made clear by none other than Dr Rajendra Prasad who later became first President of the Indian Republic. In a letter to the first Home Minister of India, Sardar Patel, he wrote on March 14, 1948:
“I am told that RSS people have a plan of creatingtrouble. They have got a number of men dressed as Muslims and looking like Muslims who are to create trouble with the Hindus by attacking them and thus inciting the Hindus. Similarly there will be some Hindus among them who will attack Muslims and thus incite Muslims. The result of this kind of trouble amongst the Hindus and Muslims will be to create a conflagration.†[Rajendra Prasad to Sardar Patel (March 14, 1948) cited in Neerja Singh (ed.), Nehru Patel: Agreement Within Difference: Select Documents and Correspondences 1933-1950, NBT, Delhi, p. 43]

If our democratic-secular India is to be saved from the anti-national conspiracies of the RSS and its overt and covert outfits, it is high time that immediate measures are taken to investigate the activities of the RSS. The Indian state must put in public domain the constitution of RSS and force the latter to adhere to it. The RSS as a non-state organisation is the biggest coloniser of estates and largest recipient of funds from abroad and India. The vast resources in its kitty and nefarious designs in its ideology make a deadly cocktail capable of undoing a democratic-secular India to the jubilation and amusement of the forces inimical to us. The nation needs to move fast so that India does not turn into a Hindu Pakistan.

The author, who teaches Political Science in Satyawati College of the University of Delhi, is active in the street theatre movement in the Capital and has done extensive research in nationalism and the two-nation theory.