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[THREAD] 1/n
The Hindu Swayamsevak Sangha (HSS) is the international wing of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangha (RSS), the modern proponent of the nativist and colonial Hinduism project. Want to know more? Read on.
#HSSRSSReality
@AnticaaD @SolidarityBelg @IndeInfo @IndiaSolNW
The Hindu Swayamsevak Sangha (HSS) is the international wing of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangha (RSS), the modern proponent of the nativist and colonial Hinduism project. Want to know more? Read on.
#HSSRSSReality
@AnticaaD @SolidarityBelg @IndeInfo @IndiaSolNW
First a bit of background. The old cliché of Hinduism versus Hindutva. Sorry, there is no versus here, they are the same. But then if you criticise Hinduism are transgressing on the faiths (note the plural) of a significant portion of the Earth’s population. Nopes, not at all.
3/n
Why you ask? Since Hinduism is a colonisation project that appropriates faiths according to the rules set down by the people of the Indo-Gangetic basin. So history lesson time.
Why you ask? Since Hinduism is a colonisation project that appropriates faiths according to the rules set down by the people of the Indo-Gangetic basin. So history lesson time.
4/n
The myriad of faiths of India did not originally use Hindu as a self reference. It was a term to primarily used by south west Asian monarchies from the Sassanids to refer to the people beyond the Indus, what constitutes modern day North India and Pakistan.
The myriad of faiths of India did not originally use Hindu as a self reference. It was a term to primarily used by south west Asian monarchies from the Sassanids to refer to the people beyond the Indus, what constitutes modern day North India and Pakistan.
5/n
Later, European colonists tried to view India through the lens of their own successful national integration projects back home. Hence they used the existing term Hindu to unite almost all non-Abrahamic faiths in India under one single religion, which became Hinduism.
Later, European colonists tried to view India through the lens of their own successful national integration projects back home. Hence they used the existing term Hindu to unite almost all non-Abrahamic faiths in India under one single religion, which became Hinduism.
6/n
But was the Hinduism project only a European construction? Of course not. The British knew approximately which faiths to classify in Hindu fold and which not to. How did they know this?
But was the Hinduism project only a European construction? Of course not. The British knew approximately which faiths to classify in Hindu fold and which not to. How did they know this?
7/n
This is because there was something already binding the myriad of local faiths stretching across the Indian geography. What was it? Enter caste systems (note the plural), the building block of the Hinduism project.
This is because there was something already binding the myriad of local faiths stretching across the Indian geography. What was it? Enter caste systems (note the plural), the building block of the Hinduism project.
8/n
The caste system is a ‘colonial’ system since like a colonial project it divides geography into metropolitan (the Gangetic plain), and the periphery (loosely, the rest of India).
The caste system is a ‘colonial’ system since like a colonial project it divides geography into metropolitan (the Gangetic plain), and the periphery (loosely, the rest of India).
9/n The cultures of the metropolitan sets down rules of social hierarchy, i.e., which lineages are to be identified as upper castes or bramhans, and how the remaining lineages are to arranged, what are the intermarriage rules etc. This would also involve a few scriptural retcons
10/n The deity of the lineages identified as upper castes would be incorporated into the Hindu fold (aka the scriptural world of the Gangetic basin), whereas the deities of the lineages of the societies identified as lower castes would either be made to lose caste (for example,
11/n
identify them as an avatar who fell from grace for some random unethical act) or be seen as anti Gods (for example, the mahishashur of Bengal) and then give these stories scriptural legitimacy.
identify them as an avatar who fell from grace for some random unethical act) or be seen as anti Gods (for example, the mahishashur of Bengal) and then give these stories scriptural legitimacy.
12/n
This would also follow taking over of shrines and remodelling them according to the ‘proper’ Hindu fold.
This would also follow taking over of shrines and remodelling them according to the ‘proper’ Hindu fold.
13/n The modern Hinduism project was born out of the marriage of the caste systems and the nationalism projects of Europe exported to southeast Asia by the colonisers. Indeed, caste systems would now start to have a definite geographical boundary (aka the British colony of India)
14/n on which will be constituted a nation of Hindus (aka India) with its own ‘pure’ national religion (Hinduism), ‘pure’ national culture (aka the Sanskritic culture), a national language (Hindi), and its own system of social rules to be converted into a code of law
15/n (thankfully, due to a major intervention, in form of the Indian Constitution, carried out by Dr B R Ambedkar, the true father of the Indian nation, this project has been thwarted so far).
16/n Among the myriad of organisations that wanted to be in the vanguard of formulating the new Hindu nation, the most dynamic has been the RSS, founded in 1925 by K B Hegdewar.
17/n I will now try to illustrate a few of the strategies undertaken by RSS in the present times to further progressing towards making project Hinduism a reality.
18/n Like a true coloniser which despises freedom movements (and our European audience should be well versed with this) RSS vehemently opposes any faith trying to leave the Hindu fold. Lingayats, a faith founded by Basavanna in Karnataka as a challenge to the local caste system,
19/n still manages to hold its own against Hinduism.Indeed, the earned the RSS’s wrath when their advocacy yielded fruit and the Karnataka government gave the Lingayats a minority status. https://caravanmagazine.in/perspectives/rss-dangerous-position-lingayat
20/n A true blue coloniser requires a mission civilisatrice, to ensure the peripheral people are forever indebted to the metropolitan centre. RSS is not far behind. It continues the precolonial remnant of the Hinduism project by continuing to convert adivasis
21/n (literally meaning indigenous people) into the Hindu fold. The RSS trains adivasi youth in the values of prescribed by the Hinduism project, often under the garb of patriotism, inculcates in them a belief that their faith and practices are inferior and flawed,
22/n and then uses this generation of brainwashed adivasi youth to train the next generation.
http://www.catchnews.com/india-news/exclusive-inside-a-hindutva-hostel-how-rss-is-rewiring-the-tribal-mind-1450354461.html
(European readers must be getting a deja vu here, but read on, the similarities are endless)
http://www.catchnews.com/india-news/exclusive-inside-a-hindutva-hostel-how-rss-is-rewiring-the-tribal-mind-1450354461.html
(European readers must be getting a deja vu here, but read on, the similarities are endless)
23/n We now take on the nativist side of RSS. We start from the previous article which notes that mission civilisatrice launched by the RSS on the adivasis teach them to drop their self referential Adivasi, and use Vanavasi (forest dwellers) instead.
24/n This is indeed a move to legitimise the credential that Hindus were the first people of the land (and not the adivasis, who are now being portrayed as backward Hindus), which clearly goes against the modern historical consensus. But why does RSS need a nativism project?
25/n Enter the Abrahamic religions.
When Islam entered India, the Hindu caste system was quick to view Allah as an avatar and the prophet Mohammad as some sort of a Bramhan. Indeed, Richard Eaton in his book “India in a Persianate Age” points out to a masjid constructed in
When Islam entered India, the Hindu caste system was quick to view Allah as an avatar and the prophet Mohammad as some sort of a Bramhan. Indeed, Richard Eaton in his book “India in a Persianate Age” points out to a masjid constructed in
26/n Somnath, Gujrat, in 1264, where the Sanskrit inscription identifies the deity in the masjid as Visvanatha (an avatar of Shiva), as well as Sunyarupa (one without forms), and the prophet as a bodhaka (an old wise man, which is a cliché for the Bramhan).
27/n However, this integration project quickly failed, because literally the Abrahamic religions were clearly not in the same weight class as the faiths which Hinduism project was co-opting.
28/n With time Islam set its roots in India, and became as much of a stakeholder in the “Indian” sphere as the Hinduism project. Think about it, Taj Mahal, Biriyani, Naan, all of them are Islamic. This sounded alarm bells for the Hinduism project.
29/n Here was an enemy which it could neither appropriate, nor violently confront and marginalise (like it had done to Buddhists). Thus began the great nativism project, with the myth of the Hindus being tied to the land as original inhabitants (a clear historical fallacy),
30/n and Islam being the invader, the outsider.
As always, Europe was the inspiration, this time in the form of anti-semitism and Nazism.
As always, Europe was the inspiration, this time in the form of anti-semitism and Nazism.
31/n One of the RSS’s most dynamic leaders, M S Golwalkar, wrote “To keep up the purity of the nation and its culture, Germany shocked the world by her purging the country of Semitic races – the Jews. National pride at its highest has been manifested here.
32/n 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 Hindustan to learn and profit by.” https://www.thehindubusinessline.com/news/national/golwalkar-drew-lessons-from-hitlers-germany/article7924161.ece
33/n If one is still in doubt as to who are supposed to be the “Jews” here, Golwalkar makes it explicit.
“[H]ere was already a full-fledged ancient nation of the Hindus and the various communities which were living in the country were here either as guests, the Jews and Parsis,
“[H]ere was already a full-fledged ancient nation of the Hindus and the various communities which were living in the country were here either as guests, the Jews and Parsis,
34/n or as invaders, the Muslims and Christians.” https://theprint.in/pageturner/excerpt/nationalism-golwalkars-head-of-rss-three-decades/31781/
35/n In short, Golwalkar’s message was either you integrate to be a Hindu (hence a native to this land), or you stay as a guest (i.e., a manageable minority like Jews or Parsis), or we shall treat you as a foreign invader and take the necessary steps. In essence,
36/n Golwalkar was saying, either you become a part of the Hinduism project and integrate yourself (for example, be a “good Muslim” like Dr. Kalam) or you are going to be eliminated. Thus began a series of violence against the Muslims which are too numerous to list,
37/n some of the bloodiest of them all being the Ayodhya Rathyatra riots of 1990s and the Gujrat genocide of 2002.
Even today, the RSS had significant roles in the recent Delhi pogroms where Muslims were butchered. https://scroll.in/article/966775/from-planning-murder-to-praising-modi-whatsapp-chats-offer-a-window-into-the-minds-of-delhi-rioters
Even today, the RSS had significant roles in the recent Delhi pogroms where Muslims were butchered. https://scroll.in/article/966775/from-planning-murder-to-praising-modi-whatsapp-chats-offer-a-window-into-the-minds-of-delhi-rioters
38/n How does one organise riots though? This is exactly where lower stratas of the caste society are used. They are made into footsoldiers of the Hindu army to go out and slaughter the Muslims.
39/n Suddenly caste system vanishes into thin air, and everyone is part of a bigger brotherhood, the Hinduism project, united not based on any essential sense of cohesion but primarily through a constructed hatred towards muslims.
40/n As Dr. Ambedkar rightly observed, “A caste has no feeling that it is affiliated to other castes, except when there is a Hindu-Muslim riot.”
41/n This again shouldn’t be too obscure to our European audience. After all, during the inter-European wars, suddenly the soldiers conscripted from the colonies became saviours of freedom.
42/n I have tried to provide some insights into the workings of this blight called the RSS. To sum up, it aims to complete the Hinduism project, a colonial, nativist project, whose salient features I have highlighted in this thread.
43/n There are a whole bunch of other strategies of it which I couldn’t cover here, including, its treatment of adivasi Christians, more details on how it plays good cop-bad cop with dalits,
44/n its imperialist views to reclaim the entire geography of Hinduism including Kashmir, Nepal, Bangladesh, and Pakistan, its integration efforts in the north eastern states of India, among the Himalayan communities etc.
n/n
Whatever you do, do not, under any circumstance, support any activity or front of the RSS, or its branch, the HSS.
[THE END]
Whatever you do, do not, under any circumstance, support any activity or front of the RSS, or its branch, the HSS.
[THE END]
