Modi, RSS and Lies

Prime Minister Modi has released a commemorative stamp and coin on the occasion of the centenary of the foundation of Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh [RSS]. He glorified the organisation in his speech and spoke about its contribution to India’s freedom struggle. Utter lies. Why does the Prime Minister of a country as big and supposedly glorious stoop so low with blatant mendacity?

Modi’s speech made me look once more at the numerous posts I wrote in this space over the years. Let me present a few of them here with brief notes.

1. RSS: A View to the Inside: A book review which looks at the ominous growth of RSS. A quote from the post: The history of India is being rewritten too by the affiliates of the RSS. One of these affiliates, Vidya Bharati, runs about 13,000 schools in the country with 3,200,000 students and 146,000 teachers making it “the largest private school system in India”. Ekal Vidyalayas is another organ of the RSS which runs schools in the remote rural and tribal areas and they have about 1,500,000 students though they are single-teacher schools.

The above post was written in 2018. A lot of rewriting of history has already been perpetrated and minority communities in the country face the threat of gradual extinction.

2. The Menace Called RSS: Another book review, written in 2020. A quote: The RSS sprang from the conviction of people like Hedgewar, Savarkar and Golwalkar that India belonged primarily to the Hindus and that others, particularly the Muslims and the Christians, might live here as subordinates of the majority community who were the only rightful citizens here. 

3. A Disillusioned Hindu: Yet another book review from 2020 again. A former member of the RSS expresses his disillusionment with the organisation in the book. A quote: The Sangh has many strategies to hoodwink people. One of them is to appropriate antithetical thinkers like Ambedkar and then corrupt their teachings. The RSS meetings misquote Ambedkar and present him as “anti-Muslim and a supporter of the Hindu Rashtra”. The most fundamental strategy is to ensure that “Muslims, Christians, Dalits and Adivasis don’t come together.” Any organisation that brings these people together or works for their uplift is “officially hounded, investigated, and their funds restricted by manipulating the Foreign Contribution Regulation Act [FCRA].

4. The RSS and Paradoxes: A quote from this recent post: That Hinduism which is a great philosophy and a profound civilization has been straitjacketed by some “narrow-minded, mean-spirited” men in the RSS and its affiliate organisations. When the Sangh, as the RSS is known commonly in India, celebrates the centenary of its foundation, it can do well to contemplate on what they have done to a great tradition, a philosophy, a civilisation.

5. The RSS does not exist: Another recent post based on the articles from The Caravan, a bold periodical that has withstood Modi’s usual stifling strategies against media he doesn’t like. A quote: The RSS is India’s most powerful organisation, says The Caravan, with Z+ security given with the taxpayers’ money. Yet the citizens are not allowed to know how this organisation functions, let alone enter the gates of the headquarters. This organisation which exercises the maximum influence on the Modi government does not exist legally on any paper. Intriguing, right?

6. IS and RSS: A short post from 2016 about Ghulam Nabi Azad’s discovery of similarities between the terrorist outfit Islamic State (IS) and the Hindu RSS.

7. The Indignity of Homecoming: A 2014 post about how the RSS offered Rs 5 lakh to each Muslim for converting to Hinduism and Rs 2 lakh to a Christian. The worth of a Christian to RSS is much less than that of a Muslim, says the post, “Because the Christians were originally Valmikis, untouchables.” The post laments that the untouchability won’t be erased even when the people are converted back to Hinduism.

8. The Story of Two Flags: Releasing the new coin and stamp in honour of RSS, Modi spoke about the organisation’s contributions to India’s freedom struggle. This post from 2022 shows how the RSS insulted India’s freedom struggle and its flag. “The RSS mourned India’s Independence,” says the post quoting the classical book Freedom at Midnight.

Matheikal’s blog has written a lot more on the RSS. I highlighted a few salient posts above. The long and short of it is just that the RSS is a menacing organisation which is no less terrorist than many Islamic outfits out there or the medieval Christian crusaders. Christianity outgrew its primitive belligerence with ‘the Enlightenment’. Hinduism always towered above such belligerence until Modi became its Hriday Samrat [Emperor of Hearts]. Islam seems to be learning better lessons.

If Modi’s recent act of releasing the coin and stamp is any indication, he doesn’t seem to be going to learn anything from history. Rather he seems destined to wreak much havoc on his nation.

💐 HAPPY GANDHI JAYANTI 💐