The RSS didn’t contribute to Independence. Now, it threatens the freedom struggle’s legacy

Our struggle was not just a movement to remove the British from power. It also had an agenda for the country’s future. That agenda of social reforms and liberation from poverty and inequality was the outcome of a dialogue between the major ideological currents fighting for independence. The most important among these were the school of thought represented by Mahatma Gandhi through the policies and programmes of the Congress party, the communists and socialists, and advocates of social reforms best represented in the work of B R Ambedkar. Dialogue and debates between these streams produced the values that best define our struggle against colonialism and gave a coherent shape to the future republic and state, with secularism and welfarism at its core. These values are under threat from an organisation that played no role in our long fight for independence, the RSS.

At the time of Independence, the form of government India should opt for was a much-debated issue. Discussions around the Westminster system and the American presidential system were common. A majority of the leaders preferred parliamentary democracy. In his address to the nation on the 50th anniversary of Independence, the then President K R Narayanan said: “The Drafting Committee in choosing the parliamentary system for India, preferred more responsibility to more stability, a system under which the government will be on the anvil every day.” This idea of collective responsibility is under strain today due to the encroachments made by the executive on other branches of the state under the influence of RSS.

During the freedom struggle itself, the RSS was not pleased with representative democracy and constitutional safeguards. The RSS’s admiration for the European fascists and their emphasis on the leader principle made it incompatible with the very functioning of a democratic society. B S Moonje, mentor to RSS founder K B Hedgewar, met the leader of Italian fascists, Benito Mussolini, and told him, “I shall have no hesitation to raise my voice from the public platform both in India and England whenever occasion may arise in praise of your Balilla and fascist organisations. I wish them good luck and every success.” The RSS still follows the rule of subservience to one supreme leader. When we say that democracy itself is under threat from the RSS-BJP, the seeds of that can be found in the very foundation and functioning of the RSS.

Another example is the case of secularism, an important foundational value of our freedom movement. Hindus and Muslims fought shoulder-to-shoulder in the fight against the British. However, it is widely known and clear from the writings of RSS leaders and ideologues that their objective is to establish a hierarchical, exclusionary and discriminatory Hindu Rashtra. Ambedkar warned about this menace. He said, “If Hindu Raj does become a fact, it will, no doubt, be the greatest calamity for this country.”

When the nation was uniting to drive away the British, the RSS was busy finding the “enemy within”. They soon found the Muslim bogey to unite the Hindus under their divisive hold. This has led the RSS to declare open war on the country’s past as they continue their attempts at demonising Muslims. For the nation, the enemy was British colonialism; for the RSS, it was Muslims. The difference in identifying what we are fighting against made a crucial difference between Indian nationalism and the RSS’s narrow Hindutva nationalism.

Social reform was integral to our fight for independence. Two major components of this reform programme were related to caste and the status of women in society. Manusmriti, a compilation of the ordinances of Manu, was held responsible for the caste system in India by Ambedkar, who fought hard and established political equality, along with safeguards for the historically deprived sections through the Constitution. However, for the RSS, Manusmriti has remained a source of authority and law in society. Less than a week after the ratification of the Constitution, the RSS mouthpiece Organiser wrote on November 30, 1949: “To this day his (Manu’s) laws as enunciated in the Manusmriti excite the admiration of the world and elicit spontaneous obedience and conformity. But to our constitutional pundits that means nothing.”

It should be underlined that our freedom fighters lived and died for a secular, democratic, egalitarian and inclusive India. Ironically, those who stayed away from the freedom struggle are now trying to redefine what freedom meant and distributing certificates of patriotism.

The writer is general secretary, CPI