Harsh Mander: RSS leader Mohan Bhagwat speaks of fidelity to Constitution – but ignores its essence

As the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh enters the 100th year of its formation, why is it imperative to listen attentively to the words, spoken and unspoken, of Mohan Madhukar Rao Bhagwat, the Sarsangchalak or supreme leader of the Sangh?

The RSS is today the world’s largest civic organisation of the far-right, with an estimated 50,000 branches. A volunteer Hindu nationalist paramilitary association, it was founded on the notion of Hindu supremacy and opposition to the idea of equal citizenship to Muslims and Christians in India. It has spawned myriad formations inspired by the ideology of the RSS, often described as the Sangh Parivar, including the more openly combative Bajrang Dal and Vishva Hindu Prashad. The political arm of the Sangh is the ruling Bhartiya Janata Party.

It was on Dussehra in 1925, 99 years ago, when Keshav Baliram Hegdewar, a doctor in Nagpur, met four senior leaders of the Hindu Mahasabha. Together, they resolved to constitute a new volunteer paramilitary Hindu organisation, the RSS. Their dream was to unite the Hindus of British India and stir in them valour and civic character based on India’s glorious ancient traditions, unsullied by Muslim and Christian influences.

This meeting was destined to have reverberations even a century later. It is commemorated every...

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