Source: The Hindustan Times, February 13, 2000, Op-Ed.
LIKE IT OR NOT, RSS IS POLITICAL
By D R Goyal
The Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh (RSS) is not a political outfit. It is a
cultural and social organisation and I do not think objection should be
raised on anybody joining it, said Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee.
This he said to justify the Gujarat government's decision to lift the
ban on state employees joining the RSS. Encouraged, Uttar Pradesh chief
minister Ram Prakash Gupta, too, has followed suit.
The controversy has arisen as the Central Civil Services (Conduct) Rules
specifically prohibit government servants from joining any political
party or organisation which participates in political activity, and
subscribes or assists in any manner any political movement or activity.
Now, Home Minister LK Advani has decided to examine whether the
restriction under Central Services Rules is applicable to the RSS.
Apparently he, like the PM, believes that the RSS is a non-political,
socio-cultural organisation, and poses no threat to the civil democratic
order.
If one is not to doubt the motives of these gentlemen, one can only say
that their training in the RSS has not only immunised them to the pain
and misery that the Sangh Parivar has caused, but also affected their
sense of discrimination and objectivity.
The RSS may not take part in day-to-day politics, but has a definite
political philosophy. The current RSS chief, Rajju "Bhaiya" and his
predecessor, Balasaheb Deoras, in a deposition in 1978 in the court of
that Nagpur Charity Commissioner had claimed in "the RSS activity is
akin to a work for a political purpose, though the RSS as an
organisation eschews participation in active politics of power as of
policy." (Para 27)
Earlier in the same deposition, it was said: "It is possible for Sangh
to change its policy and even participate in politics." (Para 14)
Further, Para 19 stated, "Tomorrow the policy could be changed and the
RSS could participate in even day to day political activity as a
political party because policy is not a permanent or irrevocable thing."
So, why did the RSS shy away from political activity despite having a
definite 'political philosophy'? Firstly, it was opposed to democratic
practice. According to its ideologue MS Golwalkar, democracy bred
self-praise and denunciation of others, both unworthy traits. It also
feared both government action and popular disapproval. People like Dr
Shyama Prasad Mookerjee, who sponsored and nurtured the RSS, belonged to
that Hindu elite which sought to surpass Muslims in currying favour with
the British. Significantly, Golwalkar described the prevailing
anti-British attitude as unfortunate in his book, We or Hindu Rashtravad
Defined.
RSS leaders were simultaneously afraid of adverse popular reaction
because Gandhi with his mantra of Hindu-Muslim unity had emerged as the
patron-saint of composite Indian nationalism, and had taken politics to
the working masses. Dr Mookerjee, the patron of Dr KB Hedgewar, was an
admirer of Mussolini and wanted a Hindu organisation on fascist lines.
Open political activity, therefore, would have brought the RSS in
conflict with either the British or the Gandhi-led movement. To steer
clear of the dilemma it adopted the strategy of infiltration. Both the
administration and the freedom movement were targetted for the purpose.
For instance, KR Malkani, former editor of the Organiser, has recorded
that there was a shakha [branch] in the secretariat (The RSS Story). And
Rajeshwar Dayal, the Chief Secretary of UP in the late forties, has
mentioned in his autobiography that the Speaker of the state assembly,
Kher, was an RSS sympathiser. Kher was instrumental in stalling the
arrest of Golwalkar in 1947, when the police had found copious evidence
to prove he had masterminded a conspiracy to unleash an orgy of communal
violence in western UP.
Post-Independence, the RSS hoped to be invited to participate in
government. The Congress Working Committee had, in fact, adopted a
resolution to associate the RSS with itself. The resolution was
subsequently rescinded because of strong and determined opposition from
Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru. The hope died with the assassination of
Mahatma Gandhi. Even Sardar Patel, who had earlier advocated its cause,
lost sympathy for it. So intense was the public outrage against it that
open political activity was just out of the question.
That also rendered the infiltration strategy infructuous. It, therefore,
took recourse to launching a political party which could defend the RSS
in the political sphere and, simultaneously, build public sympathy for
its ideology. Dr SP Mookerjee's exit from Nehru's Cabinet provided the
opportunity. The RSS needed a publicly-known personality; and Dr
Mookerjee was looking for an organisation. So was set up the Bharatiya
Jana Sangh, which was kept under control through the network of
organising secretaries who, according to its leader Balraj Madhok, were
all RSS pracharaks, paid by the RSS and answerable only to it.
Over time, the RSS cadres attached to Dr Mookerjee learnt the ways of
politics and emerged as public figures. And yet they never developed the
confidence to snap the umbilical cord that tied them to the RSS. The
most glaring evidence of it was when the RSS men in the Janata Party
walked out on the issue of that relationship ò and established the
Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
At the founding conference in Bombay, the BJP adopted a public posture
that made its ideology look different from the RSSÇ. The camouflage did
not bring the expected political dividends in the 1984 elections and the
party veered back to the old Jana Sangh ideology. It was not openly
flaunted because the party did not want to lose the respectability it
had found in the anti-Congress conglomerations.
The objective of the political formation has been to build and
consolidate a separate Hindu political entity. Towards that end it had
been adopting agendas calculated to widen the communal gulf. If it was
the demand for a uniform civil code and abolition of Article 370 at one
time (1951), it later became ban on cow-slaughter (1967) and revengeful
demand for return of temples supposedly destroyed by Muslim rulers.
For creating popular hysteria, other RSS fronts like the Hindu Dharam
Raksha Samiti (Ahmedabad, 1969), the Rashtriya Utsav Mandal and Shree
Ram Tarun Mandal (Maharashtra, 1970), and Bajrang Dal (Moradabad, 1980)
were floated. Inquiry commissions have revealed their true character.
The Vishwa Hindu Parishad and Bajrang Dal have been quite prominent
during the last two decades.
To deny that the RSS is a political organisation is to fly in the face
of facts. The only difference from what we generally recognise as
political parties is that it is neither democratic nor secular. American
researcher Donald E Smith had come to the conclusion: "Nehru once
remarked that Hindu communalism was the Indian version of fascism, and,
in the case of the RSS, it is not difficult to perceive certain
similarities. The leader principle, the stress on militarism, the
doctrine of racial-cultural superiority, ultra-nationalism infused with
religious idealism, the use of symbols of past greatness, the emphasis
on national solidarity, the exclusion of religious or ethnic minorities
from the nation-concept ò all of those features of the RSS are highly
reminiscent of fascist movements in Europe."
Its 'socio-cultural character' has been on display recently in Ahmedabad
and Varanasi.
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