I have. And you know this may sound silly, but I've actually found some of their concepts more modern and practical than some seemingly liberal organisations and movements. The Left that dominates the 'intellectual space' calls their idea of India as Hindu majoritarianism regressive and communal. Which is what a lot of us living in the Republic of South Delhi or South Mumbai or Electronic City believe is true. They are right-wing, I'll acknowledge that. But that's not the same as being fascists or Nazis or Hindu equivalents of Jihadis.
I'd like to ask you, what's you source of info of RSS ideology? Please do not quote articles, editorials or op-eds in newspapers. But if you do, please link to those articles that indicate proven cases of RSS misdeeds. And no Nathuram Godse wasn't RSS.
Well, why go to external sources, lets quote some of the stalwarts of RSS themselves.
Let's start with Veer Savarkar, the founder of
RSS (edit: Hindutva, which is the main tenet of RSS):
"We may find many passages in Manusmriti which can provide valuable guidance to today's problems. but we should accept them because they are beneficial today, not because they were found in an ancient text and certainly not because manu's orders are not to be transgressed. Whatever we find in Manusmriti to be harmful or ridiculous today should not be followed, but that does not make Manusmriti harmful or ridiculous. On the contrary, when compares Manusmriti with codes of other societies such as Babylon, Egypt, Hebrews, Greece and Roman, Manusmriti stands high above the rest. It deserves our respect for that" (
http://www.savarkar.org/en/rationalism/q)
“Compassion for all living beings is a principle to be practised to the extent it leads to material human benefit. Beyond that, a human being is not guilty of violence if he has to commit it for the benefit of humankind! That guilt lies with nature, with creation, if at all it is god who has willed it!†(
http://www.savarkar.org/.../ethics-truth-nonviolence)
"I shall content myself at present by stating that Hindudom is bound and marked out as a people and a nation by themselves not by the only tie of a common Holyland in which their religion took birth but by the ties of a common culture, a common language, a common history and essentially of a common fatherland as well.
Just as by the first constituent of Hindutva, the possession if a common Holyland-the Indian Mahommedans, Jews, Christians, Parsees, etc. are excluded from claiming themselves as Hindus which in reality also they do not,-in spite of their recognising Hindusthan as their fatherland, so also on the other hand the second constituent of the definition that of possessing a common fatherland exclude the Japanese, the Chinese and others from the Hindu fold in spite of the fact of their having a Holyland in common with us." (
http://www.savarkar.org/content/pdfs/en/hindu-rashtra-darshan-en-v002.pdf.)
The ideologies' main tenets are the intermingling of state and religion, where the latter dictates the former; a disaster in the making. For example, consider any country where religion and its teachings dictate everyday life.
Next gems of their ideology, by the successors of course.
"The non-Hindu people of Hindustan must either adopt Hindu culture and language, must learn and respect and hold in reverence the Hindu religion, must entertain no idea but of those of glorification of the Hindu race and culture ... In a word they must cease to be foreigners, or may stay in the country, wholly subordinated to the Hindu nation, claiming nothing, deserving no privileges, far less any preferential treatment—not even citizens' rights."
"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.
Ever since that evil day, when Moslems first landed in Hindustan, right up to the present moment, the Hindu Nation has been gallantly fighting on to take on these despoilers. The Race Spirit has been awakening.
The Christians committed all sorts of atrocities on the Jews by giving them the label “Killers of Christâ€. Hitler is not an exception but a culmination of the 2000-year long oppression of the Jews by the Christians
- M.S. Gowalkar, second supreme chief of RSS, in his book titled We, or Our Nation defined (1938). He was the supreme chief of RSS till he died in 1973.
Later, he went on to defend Jews when they created the state of Israel, as it gelled well with his and his organization's own religious nationalist stance. Quite a contradictory stance considering the earlier praise for Hitler.
"The Jews had maintained their race, religion, culture and language; and all they wanted was their natural territory to complete their Nationality"
Also, some people have it in their head that the RSS stands for the nation, and not for their own
notion of a nation. Here's an excerpt from Keshav Baliram Hegewar's biography, published by RSS themselves. He was actually felicitated with a postage stamp when Atal Bihari Vajpayee became the prime minister.
"Patriotism is not only going to prison. It is not correct to be carried away by such superficial patriotism. He used to urge that while remaining prepared to die of the country when the time came, it is very necessary to have a desire to live while organizing for the freedom of the country". It is indeed a pity that 'fools' like Bhagat Singh, Rajguru, Sukhdev, Ashfaqullah, Chandrashekhar Azad did not come into contact with this 'great patriotic thinker'. If they had the great opportunity to meet him, these martyrs could have been saved from giving their lives for "superficial patriotism".
Yep, that were the views of the great RSS
pracharak, who many BJP leaders even look up to today.
Again, in 1942, Gowalkar's speech:
"Sangh does not want to blame anybody else for the present degraded state of the society. When the people start blaming others, then there is weakness in them. It is futile to blame the strong for the injustice done to the weak... Sangh does not want to waste its invaluable time in abusing or criticizing other. If we know that large fish eat the smaller ones, it is outright madness to blame the big fish. Law of nature whether good or bad is true."
Again, according to their ideology, if you are big and powerful (read majority), then you can do whatever you want with the weak ones (minority/lower-castes). It is only recently that Sangh has diverted their attention strictly towards people of other religion, whereas before they even considered the untouchables below consideration; some even do it now, but in hidden sight.
Also, you've declared Nathuram Godse wasn't a part of RSS, when there is clear evidence that he was a member, or at least an ex-member. His brother Gopal Godse himself said so in an interview:
“All the [Godse] brothers were in the RSS. Nathuram, Dattatreya, myself and Govind. You can say we grew up in the RSS rather than in our home. It was like a family to us. Nathuram had become a baudhik karyavah [intellectual worker] in the RSS. He has said in his statement that he left the RSS. He said it because [Madhav Sadashiv] Golwalkar and the RSS were in a lot of trouble after the murder of Gandhi. But he did not leave the RSS.†[See issue of 28 January 1994] -
http://www.sscnet.ucla.edu/southasia/History/Hindu_Rashtra/nathuram.html
Regarding misdeeds, are you forgetting Babri Masjid demolition, which sprung a wave of extremism in India? It was good for this extremist organization though, as it gave them a reason to continue with their bigotry. It also bought them to national limelight, and their party too, espousing religious fervour of such magnitudes that it was never seen in the country since Independence.
Also, RSS doesn't work alone in its
nation-building endeavours. Its close associates such as Vishwa Hindu Parishad, Bajrang Dal, Hindu Jagaran Sammukhya, and a lot of many other smaller proxies carry out their dirty work.
Here's the role of RSS and their
pracharaks in Malegaon blasts - with a confession from the perpetrator himself:
Tehelka report,
TOI report
Are you also forgetting the role of Maya Kodani (former Cabinet Minister for Women and Child Development Gujarat and was also the Bhartiya Janata Party MLA from Naroda at that time) in the 2002 pogrom by leading the mob? Then there is also Babu Bajrangi, a Bajrang Dal activist, who was also
convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment along with her and 30 other persons.
Here is a report on
RSS worker making a bomb, but it accidentally going off.
Then the role of state ministry in denying justice, and even going as far as to obstruct it.
Human Rights Watch report about the
Gujarat riots.
And then there's Amit Shah, the home minister of Gujarat who was
arrested in a fake encounter case, and was forced to resign and seek refuge elsewhere, else he might interfere with the investigations like he did before. He is now plotting other shenanigans in Uttar Pradesh with the other politicians there.
