How is RSS different from Other Hindu Organizations?

Modern day Hindu organizations are mostly indulged in Bhakti (Devotion) & Seva (Service) movements in the society. Their interaction with the Governance is only giving away their temple earnings and then asking for some alms & grants. Nothing beyond. They struggle to get some land grant or publication grant from the Government. RSS is the only Hindu Organization which doesn’t shy from saying Hindu philosophy has great things to offer to the Governance. And Governance by Hindu philosophy has to be embraced. RSS firmly believes Bharath is Hindu Rashtra and must be governed by its principles.

Religion & State are Separate – It is a European theory for Dogmatic Religions; Not for Hinduism

Religion & State should be kept separate. This is a famous theory of the Europe during the renaissance of the early 17-19^th century. Pre Renaissance from 3^rd cent to 14-15^th cent, when the Roman empire held the masses under strong grips of the entire Europe, they ruled by the tenets of the strict Catholic Christian tenets. It curtailed the scientific temper, reasoning and liberty of the people. Then came the people movements of liberty. They shattered the shackles of orthodoxy and became explorative. It ushered in the era of great awakening in society for fundamental rights. Along came the scientific inventions. This brought in industrialization.

So this movement coined the famous ‘State & Religion are Separate’ theory. When all the European countries along with American freedom movement embraced Democracy & Republic, this theory became prominent & remained corner stone of the Governance.

Why this theory gained momentum? Because, the Governance by the Church was religious going strictly by the book of Bible. It created dogma. No questioning of the book and deviations. Philosopher stating earth is round being executed by the state. Gregory Mendel kept his Genes theory hidden till his death fearing execution. So the awakened people who shot to power through French, Russian revolution & Protestantism drove Religious institutions out of governance by stating ‘State & Religion should be separate’. Because a religion does not give freedom of thought, freedom of reasoning, logic & inventions. So they argued, Governance by the Religion will curtail progressive thoughts.

But in India, Aryabhatta stating Earth is round and revolves around the Sun was venerated as the university head. Here the religion was not by the book; nor was dogmatic. It allowed reasoning, debate, logic. It encouraged people who question the dogma. That is why there is continuous flow reformers and philosophers in India. This is true to Hinduism.

By 19^th century, British subjugated India by force & treachery. They took to governing entire India directly or through princely states.  Macaulay shunted out the Sanskrit education. He was exactly following that everything in Sanskrit is religious and should be kept away from Governance. He pushed only basic mathematics and English as mass education. Ramayana, Mahabharata, Panchatantra thrown out of the basic education saying it is religious.

All our English educated elite freedom fighters followed suite. When they shot to power, they kept away all Sanskrit literature as untouchables. To top it, the new political power (Nehru & Congress) gave full freedom to the Communist scholars to occupy seats of eminence in Universities to drive education course of the country.

Very sadly, our Hindu institutions sulked. They became powerless. They did not assert their capability in Governance and offering services. They thought themselves useless and nothing beyond some religious rituals keepers.

Since then, our Hindu institutions kept away from Science, Technology, Medicine, Architecture etc., The great many scriptures in their closets are not opened up for the universities to study. They don’t call for University -  Institution exchange. Very rarely it happens. The Panchanga system which can foretell eclipses mathematically for many centuries in advance accurately, is ubiquitous in all mutts. It follows Aryabhattas theory. Such theories galore in the closets of these religious institutions. Universities don’t study Kanada’s atomic physics, Bhaskaracharyas Beejaganitha (algebra), Nagarjuna’s metallurgy. There is no scope for further inventions and extensions based on these theories. Why? Because, University is leftist & believes it is derogatory to research Sanskrit literature. Our Hindu institutions fear it is going to be ridiculed unnecessarily. So why try?  

RSS is one organization which is doing small bits in organizing like-minded people from both religious institutions and universities to interact and converse. They are creating common forums. They are giving platform for interaction. It is a slow process. It is not possible overnight even if they have put their prime minister and president out there. The entire educated Indian psyche is clouded by the Macaulay philosophy, not just the professors. The educated Indian thinks everything that is Hindu or Sanskrit is dogmatic rituals only, nothing scientific. It requires a lot of ground work at grass root level over a sustain period of time to change this dogma and open up our studies of ancient technologies.

KSHATRA missing in today’s Hindu Organizations

Most dreaded is our Hindu Organization’s stoic silence over the violence spreading ideologies. No Hindu organizations condemn them. No one calls for a debate over their ideologies or publish their critical analysis.

Hinduism has Kshatra as one of its tenets. It is an important aspect in the society. Kshatra is meant to use the strength and power to demolish terror and protect the meek. Guru Nanak in his verses says, when the powerful fights the powerful it doesn’t hurt too much, but when the powerful hits the powerless and meek, someone powerful needs to stand & fight for the meek.

All of our Puranas and Itihasas are filled with this fundamental heroism only. All of our Mutts & Ashramas tell hours and hours of lectures on these themes only. They eulogize Krishna slaying Kamsa, Rama slaying Ravana in myriad ways. But today if some terrorist attack happens on Amarnath piligrims, when West Bengal Government let Jihadists to reign in terror, none of the Hindu organizations raise any protest. They don’t waste their time & effort in condemning the act. They don’t lecture the powerful armed police should slay down the armed mob. Unlike Guru Nanak they hesitate to say, that the Powerful and armed police forces should be fully supported and given full authority to attack the insane powerful & armed mob.

In contrast, RSS condemns such mindless killings and mob attack on civilized people. In their yearly resolutions, this year for 2017, they passed a resolution condemning the West Bengal State government policies supporting of violence by the Jihadist forces. They have written scores of reports through their magazines and portals condemning the attacks. They are bringing like-minded brave hearts together in the heart land of troubles like West Bengal, Kerala & Kashmir to energize the youth to sacrifice fighting for justice. No other Hindu organizations has raised concern or calling for youth to organize themselves to resist this lawlessness. They don’t raise voice against bad Governance. They don’t condemn the State’s inaction. When RSS does resist, other Hindu organizations will distance themselves leaving them sole protectors of the civil society. This emboldens the Jihadi appeasing politics to be silent supporter of Jihadi attacks and be inactive. If only all Hindu organizations join hands and voice their concern together will the politics also turn around to protect the normal civilians.

Surely we cannot ask for the people to get armed against the Jihadists forces. Then there will be civil war. But people should exhort the powerful state & police to reign in on those spreading terror. But who is people? How the state recognizes them? The state will recognize institutions and organizations. Who best other than the Hindu organization who are already highly organized by their temples & mutts? But they are silent today. Individuals here and there talking at coffee corners, writing articles & letters to the editor make very little impact. The state and the media will support those who are organized. And if the organized people stay aloof or silent over lawlessness, then, lawless people become rulers.

Silence of Hindu Organizations over Organized Terror

Islamic organizations send terror signal amongst civilians by releasing fatwa against whoever who questions their rituals. For example, one Islamic Ulema released a Fatwa against Sonu Nigam for uttering some opposition to using loud speaker for their daily Azaan.

When Yakub Memon the terrorist who burnt down Mumbai being a Mumbaikar was hanged, the Muslim organizations called for showing their solidarity by large attendance to his funeral. So these organizations eulogize the terrorists and send terror signals to civilians to be careful to touch their ilk even if they are terrorists.

What are the Hindu organizations’ response in general? They say the terrorism is not organized by any institution. They are here & there done by some individuals. It is fringe elements and not an organized terror. This is not a line only by the Government and Media. But the Hindu organizations stay aloof from condemning this or they utter this standard line. By this, they allow the politics and governance to go easy on the institutional terror.

RSS opposes and organizes rallies to condemn such wrong hero worshipping. For example, the Jihadi elements along with the leftists often arrange Hero worshipping of such terrorists like Yakub Memon, Afzal Guru in college campuses and universities. ABVP the RSS Student wing opposes such wrong hero worshipping. There will be altercations. Because the wrong doers are shameless and will take up physical fights. Self-defense is the fundamental right which leads to physical altercations.

The state of Karnataka has newly started celebrating Tipu Jayanthi. Tipu no doubt fought powerful foreign forces. But was the Governance under him, peaceful for its citizens? He massacred, terrorized, converted thousands of civilians of his own state. How can you consider him Hero? Recall what Guru Nanak told about powerful hitting the meek? RSS through its various organizations staged protest against this in various cities of Karnataka where the scars of Tipu’s atrocities bear pains in the citizens even today viz., Chitradurga, Tumkur, Mandya, Mysore, Kodagu, Mangaluru, Bengaluru etc.,

What is other Hindu Organizations reaction to all this? Either silence or let them celebrate whatever they want. Even worse is opposing RSS itself. State is separate from Religion. If so, then why celebrate wrong doers as Heroes?

Selfless Service is Sangh Ideology

Above few lines are about what is different of RSS from other Hindu Organizations. Basically RSS is bold enough to oppose the wrong doers and wrong doing forces, institutions even if it is the Government itself. This will call for sacrifice of sometimes blood and sometime even life.

The above lines are not to condemn or belittle any Hindu Organizations. But only express my hope that if all the Hindu organizations also join the voice and action to suppress the anti-national & adharmic forces, then the Government machinery which is very powerful to implement the law and order gets to implement it with confidence. Thats it.

For RSS, what is similar to other Hindu Organizations is selfless service to the society and servitude. Today RSS is unperturbed by its success or failure. It is moving on its core ideology of Rashtra Nirmana through Vyakti Nirmana. And that is possible by exhorting individuals to sacrifice their time & energy for the selfless service to the society. That’s it. Nation will be built automatically based on our fundamental conviction of Dharma.

Sangh joins hands with all religious, cultural or any societal institutions with like mindedness to service the society selflessly. It has joined hands in River Rejuvenation, Lake cleaning, Anti-Corruption crusades, Swadeshi Andolans, Tree plantation drives. It has its affiliates working in Education field, Agriculture, Farming, almost all Industries. It has provided structure for policy making, political parties, institutions for governance. Cultural associations for sustaining and promoting local art, global art, literature, music, dance etc., It works with Ramakrishna Matha, Art of Living foundations, Amrutanandamayee, Lingayat mathas, Brahmin mathas, all traditional mathas, modern ashrams and mathas; It enables and encourages lower castes to establish their own mathas or ashramas or any such order to strengthen their voice in the society. It works with tribals to unite them to stand against their exploitation. It has no untouchability. It works with all institutions at equal proximity. It promotes, temple entry for all, one cremation ground for one village for all castes.