#devanuru mahadeva

When the BJP-led NDA came to power in 1998, the government of India's human resource development minister Dr. Murali Manohar Joshi included 'Priesthood and Ritualism' into school curriculum. During his time, astrology began to be taught instead of science-based astronomy. Learning how to perform the Putrakameshthi Yajna, a (Vedic) ritual to get a male child was also introduced. They are inculcating unfounded beliefs and foolishness into children's minds. Recalling Golwalkar's call for involvement in RSS activities to be essentially devoid of any critical thinking and discernment, once they are in power, they have set about implementing this in children's education. Recently, CBSE has removed several topics from their syllabus. Of these, topics such as democracy and diversity, impact of globalization on agriculture, popular (mass), movements and communalism were removed from the Class 10 syllabus. It is for this kind of school curriculum excisions that the RSS has nurtured one of its offsprings, the 'Shiksha Sanskriti Uttahn Nyas. It has consistently been pressurizing NCERT to remove from textbooks, allusions to 'the former prime minister Manmohan Singh's magnanimous apology for the Sikh riots', and the 'killing of around two thousand Muslims in the 2002 Gujarat riots'. This is their chicanery.

A nice illustration of how the RSS and their progeny create deception: the defamatory propaganda they are indulging in about Tipu Sultan. Tipu Sultan's reign was from 1782 to 1799. The Sangh Parivar's RSS scholars contend that Tipu Sultan was involved in the religious conversion of 69,000 Hindus in Kodagu (then Coorg) into Islam. Examine the population details of Kodagu district in the state gazetteer any which way mathematically and the population of Coorg at the time never crosses the upper limit of 69,000. If their contentions are true, then shouldn't Kodagu be entirely Muslim by now? However, Kodagu's muslim population stands at about 15% today. The RSS scholars are blind to this, nor does it puzzle them. Sow the seeds of deceit, and watch it grow. Tragically, these seeds of deceit are growing. The RSS and its family are even harvesting this crop of chicanery. It is evident from these that there is no Godliness in them. Deceit is their deity. It appears that these factories of deceit have strangled their own conscience.

Today, there is a sense of urgency and a special responsibility on these organisations to unmask the various guises of these retrograde groups who have created a big illusion of being the majority, but are actually a minority, which is advocating for the diabolical Chaturvarna system from our ancient past; their true colours need to be revealed to society. For this, in spite of all their other struggles, the ones leading need to be aware. At least now, organisations that seek to move our society forwards need to coordinate better amongst them, look beyond their small streams and unite into flowing river. For this, they need to let go of this disease of brahminical superiority. Inflated ego too needs to be jettisoned. One has to humbly accept that there may be many different paths to the goal. Singular rogue leadership has to be discarded. Instead of the pettiness of doing it for one's own/organisation's glory, we should seek a broad-based alliance, for the survival of the constitutional principles, for safeguarding pluralism and our federal system which is the life-soul of India, for participatory democracy in which all the citizens participate, for realizing the culture of tolerance, for the love of equality of coexistence without superiority or inferiority. Justice ought to thrive in our society. Mixing with communities and wider society ought to bring a new lease of life to all of us.

Indira Gandhi of the (Indian National) Congress too was briefly dictatorial. This was only for a brief period, and her dictatorship was only administrative. During Indira's brief dictatorial stint, the judiciary, executive, the press, and autonomous institutions were not rendered impotent as today. However, under Modi's rule today, the judiciary, executive, the press and autonomous institutions are struggling for survival. The dream rule of the RSS has begun to annex all spaces of our society. This means that they (seek to) rule over (political) party, society, culture, executive… all of these. This is universal and unrestricted authority!