Reviled or respected, the Sangh has, regardless, marched to its own drum—and risen to unprecedented importance in recent times. With over six million members in 60,000-plus branches, and more than 30 affiliates, it is India’s—and possibly the world’s—largest NGO. For that reason, the publication of Conflict Resolution: The RSS Way by Ratan Sharda and Yashwant Pathak is timely. With six books on the RSS under his belt, Sharda is a seasoned chronicler of an organisation that has attracted a fair bit of controversy since its inception nearly a century ago. But it has, avers Sharda, a swayamsevak himself, received little attention for its efforts, especially from academia. The authors’ objective is to redress this lacuna. The book is based on Sharda’s doctoral thesis.
Its raison d’etre is spelt out in the preface. Sharda aggregates the cultural linkages that bind the nation under the umbrella of Hinduness. He defines Hinduness as “some central characteristics that are common to all Indians whether we belong to the Hindu religion or any other religion or faith” and claims that the criticism of the RSS is due to its critics seeing Bharat through the westernised prism of nation state. To go beyond this standpoint, “one needs to find out how RSS views, applied to day-to-day affairs of the nation”, have affected the country. Sharda’s approach has been to study hitherto unexamined documents, the resolutions of the organisation, or ‘RSS thoughts in action’, in the context of three domestic insurgencies—Jammu and Kashmir, Punjab and the Northeast—that “challenged the very basis of the idea of nationhood that RSS espouses”.
The part devoted to Jammu and Kashmir explores the unfinished agenda of 1947 in three stages—Partition as the event that led to conspiracies to carve out an independent Kashmir; introduction of radical Islam and the exodus of Hindus; state sponsorship of terrorism by Pakistan. The RSS presence in J&K dates back to 1947, says the author, when swayamsevaks entered the newly formed Pakistan to gather intelligence that helped organise resistance when the conflict began. But it was the meeting of the then chief of RSS, MS Golwalkar (Guruji), with the Maharaja of Kashmir that tilted the latter’s decision to sign the Instrument of Accession. The convoluted politics of J&K are mapped out by using journalistic sources, interviews with RSS workers, contemporary accounts and documents pertaining to the internal resolutions of the RSS. What is made clear to the reader is that the Sangh constantly warned the Centre about the deteriorating ground situation but the warning was ignored.
The story of Punjab wasn’t very different. Here too the Congress takes the major blame and again the roots go back to the Partition. In the ensuing violence, the RSS worked towards organising the safe evacuation of displaced Hindus and Sikhs. Later when separatist ideas gained ground, it lent support for Punjabi language and Hindu-Sikh unity. For this effort, the RSS “received no support from the government or other political parties, except the BJP.”
Finally, the authors trace the seed of separatism in Northeast to the Christian missionary activity that began in 1836 with the arrival of “the Baptist Church from the USA under the protection of the British.” Churches had a free run till 1950 when the RSS entered the region and confined its role to promoting educational facilities while encouraging the locals to return to their tribal faiths.
“The biggest failure of the RSS is communication,” say the authors. This book’s selling point is that it is possibly the first academic study of the organisation based on its internal documents. As such, a literature review that established the originality of the contribution would have been helpful. Furthermore, the transition from a doctoral thesis to a book that is meant to enlighten lay readers would have gained from a tighter structure and careful editing.
Conflict Resolution: The RSS Way
By: Ratan Sharda and Yashwant Pathak
Publisher: Garuda Prakashan
Pages: 549
Price: Rs 498