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  Hindu brethren, including Sikhs, started coming together with self confidence in cities and villages of Punjab like Rawalpindi, Lahore, Peshawar, Amritsar, Jalandhar, Ambala, and many more places. Witnessing this phenomenon, the English Tribune wrote, “Punjab is the sword arm of Hindustan and RSS is the sword arm of Punjab.” Perturbed with this statement, the Muslim League mouthpiece, Dawn, wrote, “If Congress leadership wishes to receive co-operation from Muslims, then it must ban Sangh immediately.”

  In short, the Hindus were not in favour of partition even after Jinnah’s ‘Direct Action’. Wherever the Sangh reached, Hindu youth power began gearing up for self defence. The Communist Party was also justified partition and supported Muslim League. It had also passed a resolution in favour of partition. At the same time, British rulers and other leaders were stealthily planning for it. Under a political settlement, Congress and Muslim League formed a government in Delhi in September 1946. Central Assembly (called Parliament now) went into session with this arrangement. As soon as that happened, the Muslim League began throwing tantrums. The first day witnessed unruly scenes both inside and outside the assembly, as the Muslim League exhibited its goonda power to good effect . It continued the following day. But, some political leaders decided not to allow such rowdy behavior again. A top leader of Delhi state Congress, Lala Deshbandhu Gupta visited State Prachaarak Vasantrao Oke at the Sangh office in Kamla Nagar to see how this could be done. Consequently, hundreds of swayamsevaks surrounded the Assembly hall the following morning to signal a strong response. It was due to the presence of the swayamsevaks that peace was maintained, and the assembly could carry on with its session in a dignified manner. Yet, partition of this ancient land was announced on 3 June 1947.

  The Sangh set up the Punjab Relief Committee and Hindu Sahaayataa Samiti. Lahore was the centre of activity for both of these.

  In his tours, the then Chief of RSS, Shri Madhav Sadashiv Golwalkar, fondly referred by all as Guruji went to Sialkot and Mintgumery after touring Multan in July, August 1947. A young volunteer asked Guruji during this tour, “Should we not collect arms to defend ourselves against Muslims? Guruji asked him, “Have you read the Bhagvad Gita? The Gita says, atman (soul) is immortal. Then what are we afraid of? Collecting weapons is a sign of fear.” Quoting a proverb, he added, “A person is afraid of a person who does not terrorise others nor does he fear for self. Understand this very well that fearlessness is the strongest weapon” The Sangh leadership always presented the facts of the unfolding situation objectively in their meetings and discussions. But, it was always cautious that it should not give way to any disorderly scenario. Brief was clear that one was to be ready for self-defence but not be hot headed or violent.

  Situation had deteriorated so badly that even the Man of Steel, Home Minister Sardar Patel, had to admit, “It won’t be possible for government to defend everybody. Each person will have to try to defend self.” For the Hindus these words presented a helpless worrying situation. The Sangh volunteers took it upon themselves to protect the society at the risk to their lives. Sangh leaders, Guruji, Balasaheb Deoras, Madhavrao Muley, and Vasantrao Oke were on the battle field, namely Punjab and Sindh to guide the self defence teams, and did not scurry away to Delhi as the Congress leaders had.

  Defending the valley of Kashmir from aggressors, its merger with the nation, role of swayamsevaks and Guruji have been recorded with undeniable facts by Manikchandra Vajpayee and Shridhar Paraadkar in their well researched book ‘Jyoti Jalaa Nij Praan Ki’ (Lighting a lamp with of one’s own life).

  It was indeed the first time when the young organization of RSS was put to test. Hundreds of volunteers lost their lives. Being a Punjabi, I have heard such stories within Punjabi and Sindhi displaced families who lived through this period and were saved by RSS workers. I have with me detailed handwritten notes about swayamsevaks killed during these days. Books, Now It Can be Told and RSS – Vision and Mission too has information about these. their families or were injured during this period as they were busy with saving others rather than looking after their own families. Though, it succeeded in the limited mission of saving lives and helping refugees reconstruct their lives; the eternal regret of RSS leadership has been that it was too young and not big enough to stop the Partition.

  2. First Ban in 1948

  Congress leadership was scared and envious of the growing popularity of RSS and its organisational muscle. It could not wish it away as it had surrendered its moral authority by agreeing to the Partition. Mahatma Gandhi’s murder was a God sent opportunity for Congress to suppress the organisation. Guruji was highly disturbed with this tragic incident and had condemned the assassination in unequivocal terms immediately on hearing the news. However, a ban was imposed on the RSS following the assassination without any shred of evidence. Guruji was arrested under Section 302, as if he had shot Gandhiji with his gun! The Congress government however removed this charge within 24 hours, realizing its folly. Congress leaders in various cities, especially in Maharashtra let loose its goons on the RSS and its sympathisers. Chitpavan Brahmins faced maximum violence as Godse was a Chitpavan Brahmin. We can find similar echoes in 1984 massacre of Sikhs after Mrs. Indira Gandhi’s assassination. RSS volunteers suffered in silence on directions of Guruji who appealed to them from jail to keep their calm in that hour of tragedy as it could lead to serious repercussions for the Hindu society.

  It is a reflection of the political games that the Government of the day under the authority of Jawaharlal Nehru played, despite the investigation report submitted by Mr Sanjeevi a police official and head of the CID investigation within 17 days of the assassination that absolved RSS of any role in the plot, the ban was not lifted. The report was suppressed for a long time and it came into open decades later. Not only this, in the court case against Nathuram Godse, the accused, neither he, nor his accomplice or the judgement mentioned RSS even once.

  It is a sad commentary on our political leaders petty mindedness that the same Congress politicians who had gone to RSS offices to seek protection during pre-partition days, and who had approached RSS to help them conduct Nehru’s public meeting in Sindh peacefully were out to crush RSS now as they saw it as a rival power centre, inspite of its professed cultural and non-political work. I have mentioned in latter part of the book how RSS volunteers had foiled an attempt to kill all the ministers of newly formed government in September 1947 by reporting the conspiracy with detailed facts submitted to Sardar Patel.

  Interestingly, Sardar Patel was ready to lift the ban on RSS if it had merged with the Congress. In one of his letters to Guruji, Patel had said “I have firm belief that Sangh people can do justice to their patriotism only by working together with Congress and not by opposing it or being separate from it.” So, an apparently communal organisation accused of Gandhi murder and banned could be absolved of all its sins by merging with Congress! This was contrary to his views about the Gandhi assassination earlier as expressed to Nehru. It seems he decided to be on the side of Nehru in this instance and towed his line of not lifting the ban on RSS; although he did not believe in it, as the detailed historical records and correspondence of the time between Nehru, Sangh, Patel show.

  Nehru had made up his mind about crushing the Sangh. It was clear from his speech in Amritsar on 29th January 1948, one day before the murder when he thundered that he would see to it that the “RSS is totally uprooted from the face of India.” This was in line with resolutions passed by Congress committees and its Chief Ministers in some states demanding a ban on RSS a few months prior. They clearly saw it as the sole political competition to their monopoly over power given its huge popularity based on the work it had done for people who had suffered immensely during the Partition.

  Finally, as the government of the day refused to see reason, a satyagraha was launched. It was one of the largest, and most disciplined satyagraha until then. Around 77,000 volunteers were jailed for coming together on grounds and offer prayer to the motherland. These nu
mbers were more than the total political prisoners during freedom struggle including Quit India agitation of 1942. Incidentally, a senior volunteer of the Konkan region told me that in his jail, out of 900 inmates, 700 were agrarian families and of rural background. It shows that the support base at that time was also widely distributed and not as brahminical as is made out to be.

  A large number of its supporters lost government jobs through a government directive inked in April 1948 based on earlier government circular no. 23 in 1932 in Central province that barred a citizen from joining RSS steered by the Congress government to stop the growth of RSS. Many members lost their businesses and jobs especially in institutions owned by Congress followers or their sympathisers. Many jails also saw typical police excesses that a fascist state can bear upon its dissenting citizens. The ban and the satyagraha lasted several months and ban was lifted in 1949. Later the Kapoor Commission appointed by the government released a report in 1967 that exonerated the RSS of any part in Gandhiji’s assassination.

  To save itself from further embarrassment, the government raised a flimsy objection that RSS didn’t have a written constitution. Not a rare thing in those days. In fact, as Guruji pointed out in one of his letters to the interlocutors during the ban, even Congress did not have a written constitution for nearly for 14 years, from 1885 to 1899. Nor did Sarvoday Mandal and many other voluntary organisations of those times have had a constitution. The intermediaries requested Guruji to fulfill this simple condition. The constitution of the RSS was then formulated, ending the ban on RSS. As Guruji pointed out in his covering letter, it was nothing but a written form of how the organisation had been running since its inception. On one condition, the Sangh leadership refused to budge, though the pressures remained till the end – that was admitting young non-adult members in Sangh, as that was the foundation of its work.

  For a young organisation whose members had suffered grievously in this period, building up the organisation was a big challenge. Guruji received outstanding reception all over India wherever he went, showing the Hindu society’s support for him and RSS. He appealed to the volunteers to dedicate atleast one year for nation building. His emotional appeal was so great that hundreds of RSS volunteers left their jobs and businesses to become prachaaraks and vistaaraks to rebuild RSS. With such a ground swell of support and a renewed sense of sacrifice, RSS came out much stronger from this trial by fire.

  Articles and relevant extracts from other sources in the annexure give more details about this period.

  3. Construction of Vivekanand Rock Memorial

  Building of Vivekanand Shilaa Smaarak by Vivekanand Kendra in Kanyakumari in 1970 can be considered as a defining moment for the RSS. It was a mammoth task for it to take up a project for which it did not have resources and the governments of the time had no interest in this project at all, even if some of them were not against it. One of the senior most prachaarak and leader of RSS, Eknath Ranade, was assigned this task and he was freed from Sangh work for it fulfillment. It was a project that was to become the ’Pride of the Nation’.

  It was a historic decision to involve millions of Indians in the noble memory of one of the greatest Hindu saints of our times, who led the renaissance of Hinduism in those dark times of nation’s history. The manner of involvement was very simple – a request for donation of only Rupees one only through coupons. It had been resolved that the memorial will not be built with large donations but with small contributions. If I am not wrong, the budget was around Rupees one crore, and it was managed through this novel resolve. Collection was done entirely by RSS volunteers moving door to door without any big hoardings or newspaper advertisements. And there was no television at that time either for promotion.

  That the project faced many other hurdles and was a difficult engineering feat too, is a matter of minor details. Subsequently, the central and state governments, except the Government of Kerala (then ruled by Marxist Communists, contributed to the general funds.

  This was the first major mass contact programme of RSS, much bigger in scope than the earlier ambitious programme like nationwide signature campaign for cow protection and the subsequent massive agitation in Delhi in 1966, when nearly 20 million signatures were collected demanding ban on cow slaughter. People from the lowest strata of society to the highest were made a stake holder in this national monument in this endeavour and the message of Swami Vivekanand was conveyed to them in a simple way.

  4. Second Ban in 1975 and Emergency

  I have dealt at length about this episode in the beginning so I will skip details. It changed the thinking at workers’ level as well as the organizational. Its base expanded to hitherto untouched segments of the society. People witnessed the work and sacrifice of the RSS for restoration of democracy. This period saw the removal of so called veil of secrecy around the RSS to some extent, because media itself was harassed by the fascist policies of Congress government and had no choice but to give due publicity and respect to the work done by RSS. The taboo of virtual untouchability on RSS imposed by various interested lobbies for decades was truly broken. This was a big gain for the RSS as a movement.

  5. Ekaatmataa Yatra

  After the alarming mass conversions of Hindus, primarily Dalit brethren, in Meenakshipuram in Tamil Nadu to Islam, many activities were initiated by RSS, its affiliates, other conscious Hindu organisations and saints. It persuaded and activated many religious leaders, heads of various mathams to come out into the society and create a sense of oneness amongst the Hindus.

  One of the initiatives that RSS took was to organise a nationwide movement called ‘Ekaatmataa Yatra’ in 1983. The idea was simple. Trucks carrying image of ‘Bharatmata’ (sacred motherland) and a huge vessel containing sacred waters of Ganga were to crisscross length and breadth of the country on four major routes with scores of supplementary yatras in internal regions. Holy river Ganga is a symbol of the uninterrupted flow of noble Indian traditions and culture over ages and evokes reverence and respect for our motherland. The trucks were to take various stop-overs on way and cover thousands of villages and cities. At these stop-overs, some religious functions and presence of local religious leaders were also planned. Holy Ganga water was especially packaged in bottles to be distributed through the yatra to the participants. There were hundreds of other smaller yatras to supplement these main yatras. The idea was to weave a theme of timelessness of our civilisation and unity in diversity around one of the most sacred symbol of India, namely sacred river of Ganga. The most seen iconic image of ‘Bharatmata’ that you find in thousands of places all over India was created during this campaign.

  It is a tribute to the social sensitivity of the senior RSS leaders that they could judge the feelings of the Hindu society about the threat from mass conversions. I could actually understand the meaning of having your ‘ears to the ground’! Local workers at various places were not at all sure of the reception that this yatra would encounter. Many of us tried to hunt for smaller grounds to avoid the embarrassment of seeing near empty grounds. One of the senior most RSS central leader and prachaarak from the first shakha established by Dr. Hedgewar, Shri Moropant Pingley, in one of his meetings with workers said, “This yatra is going to succeed, we are 100 per cent sure. It is upto you to take part in organising it well and be a part of its success.”

  We were amazed at its success. The turnout of the people, spontaneous welcome programmes on way were as unbelievable as the scenes during the 1977 elections. It was an unforgettable overwhelming experience. An estimated eighty million people participated in this programme. For me, this event is a defining moment as it was the first RSS and its affiliate organizations’ programme at all India level with truly mass participation. It was a programme that brought the RSS in close contact with the Indian society as envisaged by its founder. This could be called the precursor the Ram Janmabhoomi movement that saw further consolidation of Hindu society.

  6. Dr. Hedgewar Birth Centenary Celebrations

  D
r Hedgewar’s birth centenary, the founder of RSS, was celebrated in 1989 with great enthusiasm and sense of dedication. One of the decisions taken by the leadership was to create a corpus of funds that would help launch large number of social service projects, or seva projects, as RSS calls it. This focus on seva karya (service to the society) and financial support to such activities through this fund mobilisation gave a new impetus to the social service facet of RSS work.

  From an organisation focused primarily on organisation building, RSS expanded into another direction in social life with clear focus on an activity that was in desperate need of a proper structured approach. This aspect of RSS activity has become a huge network by itself. You will get a glimpse of some of the seva projects in later part of the book. With a beginning of targeted 1,000 social service projects, RSS and its affiliate organisations conduct nearly 1 lakh 70 thousand social service programmes now.

  To feel the difference they make, one should visit some of these projects and understand what they have done for the society. The social changers like Ekal Vidyalay movement; Swasthya Rakshak (bare foot doctors or primary health volunteers) movements; and, Graamoday (all round development of villages) are a spin-off of this initiative.

  7. Ram Janmabhoomi Movement