Bhagwat Draws Battlelines, Rahul Accepts Challenge!

In covering Congress’ response to Bhagwat’s assertions, Indian media has, as usual, missed the core of the conflict between Congress and the RSS. It is attacking Rahul Gandhi and trying to portray it as if his statement is part of a publicity stunt

The inauguration of the Indian National Congress’ new headquarters in Delhi has only confirmed a new phase in the party’s journey. The Indira Bhavan not only announces a change in the address of the grand old party but also the completion of a stage in the ideological transformation it has been undergoing for some time now.

The transformation could be traced to the Bharat Jodo Yatra of Rahul Gandhi. With the Yatra, the party decisively abandoned the political inertia that had gripped it since its defeat in the 2014 elections. Speeches of Rahul Gandhi and Mallikaarjun Kharge at the opening ceremony of the new building signify the change the party has undergone since the 2024 elections.

The intervention is timely, considering the RSS’ preparation for its centenary in 1925. The Hindutva outfit seems to be abandoning its ambivalence in disowning Indian freedom and moving towards taking a rigid stance against the post-independence Indian state erected on the principles of democracy, secularism, and equality. In his recent speech at Indore, RSS Chief Mohan Bhagwat has explicitly defined how his organisation will shape its ideological articulation in the coming days.

“There is, of course, an example of the freedom movement and the fruit of that movement, which was the Constitution, which was essentially attacked yesterday by Mohan Bhagwat when he said that the Constitution was not the symbol of our freedom,” Rahul Gandhi said in his inaugural speech.

“There are two visions of the self in India in conflict. One is our idea, the idea of the Constitution, and the other is the idea of the RSS. One idea is that India is a union of states; we have all the national languages there, equally placed together; there is no superior language, there is no inferior language, there is no superior culture, there is no inferior culture, there is no superior community, there is no inferior community; they are all the same; that is written in the Constitution,” he says.

Rahul makes a frontal attack on the RSS, “On the other side, there is the idea of a centralised knowledge, of a centralised understanding. Mohan Bhagwat has the audacity to inform the nation, every two or three days, what he thinks about the independence movement and what he thinks about the Constitution. In fact, what he has said yesterday is treason.”

“In any other country, he would be arrested and tried; that is the fact. To say that India did not get independence in 1947 is an insult to every single Indian person, and it’s about time we stop listening to this nonsense,” he declares.

In covering Congress’ response to Bhagwat’s assertions, Indian media has, as usual, missed the core of the conflict between Congress and the RSS. It is attacking Rahul Gandhi and trying to portray it as if his statement is part of a publicity stunt. It fails to comprehend the unambiguous response of the Congress and Rahul Gandhi to the RSS articulation of India’s freedom. The party and its leader look firm on the issue of Hindutva. We had seen their vacillations in the past. It is not long ago that advisors made Rahul wander from temple to temple. They even discovered a Gotra for him and declared him a Shaiva. The Congress leader has refined his thoughts perceptibly since then, and he is trying to converse his ideas with the syncretic traditions of the Bhakti movement. He is also trying to articulate them in terms of the universal themes of tolerance and peace stated by the Buddha, Jesus, Sufis, Guru Nanak, and others.

It is hard indeed to revive the spirit of great thoughts our freedom struggle has tried to inculcate among the minds of common Indians. Gandhi led a civilizational revolution in India. The achievement of this revolution could be understood in the radical transformation of the society that a Dalit no longer could be pushed back to his or her status given by the scriptures. The replacement of the Manusmriti by the Constitution is in no way a small achievement. If Rahul Gandhi and the Congress are reclaiming the legacy, they are completely entitled to it. The Congress has come out of the narrow ideological articulation it had developed during its post-independence politics. Was it not a political failure on the part of the Congress that it was unable to relate to the legacy of Baba Saheb Ambedkar, the man who piloted the navigation of India from British slavery to a free modern nation? The incorporation of Jai Bhim into the lead slogans of the party and acknowledging social justice as its prime task show how far the party has traveled in recent years.

What Bhagwat and the RSS are trying is to go back to the colonial politics in which every transformation was being resisted by the conservatives in the name of preserving the ancient culture and civilization of India. The Congress has rightly read Bhagwat’s Indore statement of terming the construction of the Sri Ram temple at Ayodhya as the real independence against the spirit of the freedom struggle and the constitution. However, Bhagwat’s statement does not stop there. He dismisses the struggles and achievements of independent India. Does his rejection come only from the fact that the foundation of independent India was laid by Jawaharlal Nehru, the leader of the Congress? No, it is because Bhagwat rejects principles of democracy, secularism, and socialism. He believes in the theocracy.

Bhagwat has drawn the battle line, and Rahul has accepted the challenge!

(The author is a senior journalist. He has experience of working with leading newspapers and electronic media including Deccan Herald, Sunday Guardian, Navbharat Times and Dainik Bhaskar. He writes on politics, society, environment and economy)