I have always believed that politics is a war that dwells on the result of how well the battle of human psychology can be won. Votes are not earned or won, they are influenced, and the stakeholders are intimidated. Appeasement is eventually what the truth of election promises becomes, and the perception building process becomes the core of any party’s priority, be it the ruling or the opposition.
With the coming of BJP in 2014, this trend witnessed a change, and that is what disturbed the parties that thrived on appeasement and false perception building. The honorable Prime Minister, before and after the elections, has always focused quantifiable aspects of nation building. Economy, social structure, wealth distribution, subsidies, and so much else became the prime focus of the NDA government that appeasement and perception looked like a thing of the past.
However, the buck for every ‘Adarsh Liberal’ stops at appeasement, communal divide, and perception building, so how could they led BJP go on with the agenda of nation development, and therefore, came in the conventional formula of linking BJP to RSS, and abusing RSS to accuse the government in power.
Before we dig into the recent happenings in Bihar, I would like to narrate my experience with helping my friends and acquaintances understand RSS.
Before 2014, ‘Being Liberal’ was the in-thing. You could imagine someone walking through the top brass of the National Capital, or perhaps some intellectual from the shallow film industry we all know as Bollywood who would draw parallels between India and North Korea, or some journalist and so on. ‘Being Liberal’ was linked with ‘Being Modern’. Now, my generation, the same which the PM focuses on for the sustainability of every development agenda, prefers modern over anything else. They don’t want to hear about RSS, or even talk about it, and once they knew that I was related to the organization in a small manner, they wanted to pretend that they were ignorant about it. Now, these acquaintances I mention were well-educated, had graduated from the top public universities in India, and were well-informed, but when it came to RSS, the hunger for knowledge took a back seat. No, not all of these acquaintances prefer ‘Being Liberal’, but even the idea of understanding what RSS really is or what is it all about felt to them as repelling.
A bomb goes off somewhere in Europe, or a man is stabbed by someone from ISIS in the United Kingdom, and all attention turns to how extremists from the religion of Islam are looking to destroy the world. However, the ‘Adarsh Liberals’ in India, the gang led by Rajdeep Sardesai, with members from different media outlets like Sagarika Ghose whose Bloody Mary is as tasteless as her facts; Barkha Dutt, whose buck doesn’t stop without comparing RSS with ISIS, and many more, especially from the Samosa-Tea party who have no ethical conundrums in comparing a violent outfit that beheads journalists, has a mechanism in place on how to rape women, with RSS. These are the key players when it comes to perception building, and with their flawed projections and biased opinions are directly responsible for the experience I had, and many like me continue to have.
The smartest politician in India who has taken birth from the smartest political import of India is busy switching sides on his own statement in the Supreme Court. On odd days, he doesn’t mean whatever he said about the RSS, and on even days, he maintains that RSS is a curse. For him the RSS didn’t participate in the Independence Movement, and hence, deserves all the criticism that comes from his brain that wouldn’t qualify as manure before a fresh stock of cow-dung. The truth however is far from what he thinks.
RSS came to being because of the merciless Hindu Killings in Kerala, in 1921. While the 1920s and 1930s saw RSS coming together as an organization focused on uniting Hindus, majority of which were living in poverty and distress, it also focused on values that could create a nation, and for some, a Hindu nation. RSS did not start out as a political organization, but as a voluntary one, eager to serve the Hindus in distress. Today, when the other religions follow the same structure, the word chosen to describe it is ‘fraternity’, but when RSS does it, it is communalism.
The phrase ‘Hindu Nation’ is a nightmare for many of the above-listed ‘Adarsh Liberals’, but take this into consideration; the British in their early years were keen on exploring the Indian History, the one that existed before the coming of Mughals, in order to understand the subcontinent they were alien to. Then followed the deciphering of all the Hindu texts, literature, and so on, thus giving us the history we rightfully deserved.
Congress, with all its might and manipulation did all it could to take it away from us, and thus, Rahul Gandhi became the youth icon, and Nehru became the imaginary John Rambo of our freedom movement. The truth about Indian history, the same truth that was required to understand Indian subcontinent, was wiped away from textbooks and memories of the Indian population. The approximate 300 years of Mughal and British Rule formed the core of Indian history. Hindu ideology, idols, and culture were lost, and when RSS decided to get it back, it was attacked, sometimes because of its former members, and often, because it stood for Hindus.
Is RSS the best organization? No, it’s not. Is RSS the future for India? No, it’s not. Am I a huge fan of RSS? No, I am not. However, I admire RSS for the values it inculcates in members. I like them for their selfless approach. You won’t find a JNU leader helping out the army during the floods or rescue operations, but members of the RSS, keeping their lives on the line, and who, without any training, stand firm to help those in distress. For someone stranded in a flood, a meal does more good than a webpage of Bloody Mary and that is what RSS focuses at. The organization is far from perfect, but it is farthest from ISIS, to which it is regularly compared. To put things into perspective, one doesn’t see how ISIS could give the world 2 able leaders of the state in the next 1000 years, forget 100.
Bihar was hit by floods recently, and 11,000 volunteers from RSS and its affiliates rushed to the state in order to offer their services for the distressed.
However, the media outlets with their creative content teams didn’t shy away from calling the affiliates the ideological parent of BJP, and this is what perception building is all about, and this is what they use to fool a generation that spends a large part of their day before screens for their bread and butter, with a nullified hunger for facts and non-existing curiosity for external knowledge.
The CM of Bihar who was once called the termination of RSS as the key to India’s future was seen visiting the camps setup by RSS. With medicines and consistent food-supply in place, the RSS aims to reach out to as many victims as they can, with the present number close to 70,000. Could the ruling government in Bihar accomplish that? Well, for a leader convicted for stealing cow-dung, the probability of corruption in such relief operations could break the barrier of 1.
While the RSS discussed the villages that were isolated, and how they hired private boats to get the supplies to them, the State government was quick to discard all the claims, because ‘Votes before Life’.
This is not all; fearing that the RSS would reach out to victims who could constitute the critical vote bank in future, the Nitish Kumar government was quick to seize boats that carried food and medical supplies from the RSS.
Honestly, if political parties were measured on the parameters of humanity, RSS would certainly outshine RJD-JD (U), the current caretakers of Bihar.
However, for RSS it’s not about making a mark or taking some credit. They have been there for victims in distress before, and they shall be seen in the future. School kids today take pride in joining NGOs that run on a local level, and they must. College kids take credits by forming NGOs on a local level, out of which most no longer exist once their college tenure comes to an end, and yet, the tech-savvy generation of today doesn’t want to learn about the RSS and keeps itself shrouded in a shallow cloak of liberalism and hollow ideologies.
The next time someone draws parallels between RSS and ISIS on Twitter, you would know from where the strings are being pulled. At the end of the day, a meal for the one in distress does more good than a slogan to break the nation, and at the end of every day, a slogan to break the nation garners more attention than a meal to help make a nation. RSS is not about a political party, but about a nation, and probably that’s why Congress stooges and parties based in few states detest it the most.