What does the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh believe in and who are its heroes, asks this book

Where is the RSS’s life breath hidden away?

Dr Hedgewar is the founding father of the RSS. He considered Savarkar his guru, philosopher and guide. Golwalkar was the chief of the RSS for a long time. Now, let us consider some passages from Golwalkar and Savarkar.

Golwalkar’s God

The first and the most fundamental aspect is the urge for realisation of the Supreme Reality permeating the entire Universe – whatever the name given to it. Or in simple words, it is “to realise God.” But where is God? How can we know Him? How does He look? What are His appearances? The description that He is nirakar (without form), nirguna (without attributes) and all that leads us nowhere.

Various ways of worship are also evolved. But all this does not satisfy us who are full of activity. We want a “living” God. Hence our forefathers, understanding the limitations of the human mind and intellect, said, “humanity” and all that is all right, but before one can rise to that state, one should take a view of the Almighty with certain limitations as it were, which one can understand, feel and serve. The Hindu People, they said, is the Virāt Purusha, the Almighty manifesting Himself. Though they did not use the word “Hindu”, it is clear from the following description of the Almighty in Pursha Sūkta wherein it is stated that the sun and moon are his eyes, the stars and the skies are created from His nābhi (navel) and

ब्राह्मणोऽस्य मुखमासीद्बाहू राजन्यः कृ तः।
ऊरू तदस्य यद्वैश्यः पद्भ्याँशूद्रोऽअजायत ।।

(Brahmin is the head. King the arms. Vaishya the thighs and Shudra the feet.) This means that the people who have this fourfold arrangement, ie, the Hindu People, is our God.

The Manudharmashastra in Savarkar’s view:

Manusmriti is that scripture which is most worshipable after Vedas for our Hindu Nation and which from ancient times has become the basis of our culture-customs, thought and practice. This book for centuries has codified the spiritual and divine march of our nation. Even today the rules which are followed by crores of Hindus in their lives and practice are based on Manusmriti. Today Manusmriti is Hindu Law. That is fundamental.

Noting that people taking pride in Hindu traditions exist everywhere, Golwalkar writes:

In [the] Philippines a marble statue of Manu is placed in the Court Hall with the inscription: “The first, the greatest and the wisest lawgiver of mankind.”

On Hitler and Nazism, Golwakar writes:

German race pride has now become the topic of the day. To keep up the purity of the Race and its culture, Germany shocked the world by her purging the country of the semitic Races – the Jews. Race pride at its highest has been manifested here. Germany has also shown how well nigh impossible it is for Races and cultures, having differences going to the root, to be assimilated into one united whole, a good lesson for us in Hindusthan to learn and profit by.

It is worth bearing well in mind how these old Nations solve their minorities problem. They do not undertake to recognise any separate elements in their polity. Emigrants have to get themselves naturally assimilated in the principal mass of population, the National Race, by adopting its culture and language and sharing in its aspirations, by losing all consciousness of their separate existence, forgetting their foreign origin. If they do notdo so, they live merely as outsiders, bound by all the codes and conventions of the Nation, at the sufferance of the Nation and deserving of no special protection, far less any privilege or rights. There are only two courses open to the foreign elements, either to merge themselves in the national race and adopt its culture, or to live at its mercy so long as the national race may allow them to do so and to quit the country at the sweet will of the national race. That is the only sound view on the minorities problem. That is the only logical and correct solution. That alone keeps the national life healthy and undisturbed. That alone keeps the Nation safe from the danger of a cancer developing into its body politic of the creation of a state within the state.

Savarkar on Nazism:

The very fact that Germany or Italy has so wonderfully recovered and grown so powerful as never before at the touch of Nazi or Fascist magical wand is enough to prove that those political “isms” were the most congenial tonics their health demanded.

Golwalkar on the Constitution and federalism:

The Poisonous Seed

That the framers of our present Constitution also were not firmly rooted in the conviction of our single homogeneous nationhood is evident from the federal structure of our Constitution. Our country is now described as a Union of states. Those that were merely provinces in the former set-up are now given the status of States, with many exclusive powers. In fact, it was the fragmentation of our single national life in the past into so many exclusive political units that sowed the seeds of national disintegration and defeat.

The present federal structure has in it the same seeds of disruption, which are already sprouting. Towards this end the most important and effective step will be to bury deep for good all talk of a federal structure of our country’s Constitution, to sweep away the existence of all “autonomous” or semi-autonomous “states” within the one State viz, Bharat and proclaim “One Country, One State, One Legislature, One Executive” with no trace of fragmentational, regional, sectarian, linguistic or other types of pride being given a scope for playing havoc with our integrated harmony. Let the Constitution be re-examined and re- drafted, so as to establish the unitary form of Government.

On freedom, Golwakar writes:

In fact, protection and propagation of our national life-values ie, our dharma and samskriti, have always been held in our historical tradition as the raison d’etre of swatantratā.

Golwalkar on what inspires the RSS:

RSS, inspired by one flag, one leader and one ideology is lighting the flame of Hindutva in each and every corner of this great land.

Excerpted with permission from RSS: The Long and Short of It, Devanura Mahadeva, translated from the Kannada by SR Ramakrishna, Eka.