2. Willard Mullins, ‘On the Concept of Ideology in Political Science’, American Political Science Review 66 (June 1972): p. 509.
3. Giovanni Sartori, ‘Politics, Ideology, and Belief Systems,’ American Political Science Review 63 (June, 1969): p. 401.
4. Clifford Geertz, ‘Religion as a Cultural System’, Reader in. Comparative Religion: An Anthropological Approach, ed. by William A. Lessa and Evan Z. Vogt, 3rd ed. (New York: Harper & Row, 1972), pp. 1–46.
5. For a discussion of Cassirer’s explanation of myth, see Ernst Cassirer’s Language and Myth, trans. by Susanne K. Langer (New York: Yale University Press, 1946), and The Myth of the State (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1973). For a discussion of the elements of symbolic formulation, see Susanne K. Langer, Philosophy in a New Key: A Study in the Symbolism of Reason, Rite, and Art (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1961), Chapters 2 and 3.
6. This passage is taken from Bhawani Mandir which Ghose wrote during the first partition of Bengal. Quoted in Purani, Sri Aurobindo, p. 82.
7. The four social divisions are brahmin (mouth), kshatriya (arms), vaishya (thighs), and sudra (feet).
8. This passage, explaining the origin of the caste system, is found in the twelfth verse of the nineteenth hymn of Mandala 10 of the Rig Veda.
9. See Michael Walzer’s discussion of a similar political purpose of the organic image in the English puritan movement in The Revolution of the Saints: A Study of the Origins of Radical Politics (London: Weidenfeld & Nicholson, 1966), pp. 171–83.
10. For a rather lengthy discussion of the concept, see Golwalkar, Bunch of Thoughts, Ch. 3.
11. For a discussion of the function of out-groups in belief systems, see Murray Edelman, Politics as Symbolic Action: Mass Arousal and Quiescence (Chicago: Markham Publishing Co., 1972), pp. 77–78. The organic conception of society is conducive to the identification of the ‘disrupters’ of the social order, and RSS spokesmen have frequently utilized the metaphor to point out those groups which ‘weaken’ the Hindu nation through undermining the sensitive organic fabric which holds society together. Any movement which aims to create a cultural identity separate from the Hindu mainstream is considered particularly dangerous, for its fruits, RSS writers allege, are various forms of political separatism.
12. Organiser (Delhi), 3 September 1963.
13. Shripaty Sastry, A Retrospect, Christianity in India (An Exposition of the RSS Views on the Relevance of Christianity in India Today) (Pune: Bharatiya Vichar Sadhana, 1984), p. 8.
14. Golwalkar, Bunch of Thoughts, p. 128.
15. Deendayal Upadhyaya, Integral Humanism (Delhi: Navchetan Press, 1968).
16. Golwalkar, Bunch of Thoughts, p. 16.
17. Ibid., p. 19.
18. Ibid.
19. Ibid., pp. 40–45.
20. D.B. Thengadi, G. S. Gokhale, and M. P. Mehta, Labour Policy, 4 vols. (Nagpur: Bharatiya Mazdoor Sangh, 1967–1968), Vol. 1, p. 276.
21. Mysore Hiriyanna, Outlines of Indian Philosophy (London: George Allen & Unwin, 1932), pp. 51–64.
22. Ibid., pp. 339–80.
23. For a comprehensive discussion of this doctrine, see Heinrich Zimmer, Philosophies of India, ed. by Joseph Campbell (New York: Pantheon Books, 1951), pp. 209–63; P. T. Raju, The Philosophical Traditions of India (Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 1972), Ch. 2.
24. Hiriyanna, Indian Philosophy, pp. 378–79. Hiriyanna explains that there are two stages in the acquisition of knowledge. The first stage takes place during the period when the individual is expected to perform his social obligations; the objective of the training at this stage is to cultivate a spirit of detachment. When the RSS speaks of character building, it is referring to activities during this first stage. Its goal is to train people to live in the world according to the principles enunciated in its belief system. It does not offer instruction which aims at the more advanced stage of knowledge. Because of this conception of its function, it does not claim to be a religious organization, though it does consider its activities of a ‘spiritual’ nature, training men in the first stage of knowledge. It prefers to call itself a cultural organization. Its ‘cultural’ orientation is demonstrated by the fact that the full-time workers wear no religious garb; meditation and devotional worship are not part of the discipline of the full-time workers; they do not conduct the traditional samskars (rituals) of Hinduism.
25. Edgerton, Bhagavad Gita, Vol. 2, p. 47.
26. See Edgerton’s discussion of the doctrine, ibid., pp. 139–45.
27. In two places, Krishna explicitly enjoins people to abide by their caste duties. The Bhagavadgita, Ch. 2, Shlokas 31–38, Ch. 18, Shlokas 41–47. Hiriyanna explains that the writers had no need to be explicit because ‘in the relatively simple organization of the society when the teaching was formulated, the duties of the several classes were known fairly clearly’. Hiriyanna, Indian Philosophy, p. 124.
28. Edgerton translates the Sanskrit term for the elements (guna) as ‘strands’. Edgerton, Bhagavad Gita, p. 141.
29. Golwalkar, Bunch of Thoughts, p. 24.
30. Ibid., pp. 24–25; Ch. 7, Pts 1–2; Ch. 8. Various terms are employed to name the Nation-God: Jagan Mata (mother of the world), Adishakti (original force), Mahamaya (great illusion), Mahadurga (great goddess of power), Mathrubhumi (motherland), Dharmabhumi (land of religion), Devabhumi (God’s land), Mokshabhumi (land of salvation).
31. Ibid., p. 84.
32. Upadhyaya, Integral Humanism, p. 52.
33. Ibid., pp. 54–55.
34. Golwalkar, Bunch of Thoughts, p. 102.
35. Ibid., p. 115.
36. Ibid., p. 112.
37. Thengadi, Gokhale, and Mehta, Labour Policy, Ch. 20.
38. Ibid., p. 350.
39. See discussion of concept in Hiriyanna, Indian Philosophy, pp. 381–82; Zimmer, Philosophies of India, pp. 441–55.
40. Hiriyanna outlines the two stages. Indian Philosophy, pp. 379– 81.
41. Zimmer, Philosophies of India, pp. 353–63.
42. Soon after assuming his position as sarsanghchalak, Golwalkar identified Hedgewar as an avatar (incarnation of the divine) thus signifying that he was a jivan mukta. RSS pamphlet, Guruji: Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh ke Sarsanghchalak, p. 43. In an RSS pamphlet on his life, it was noted that Golwalkar’s yoga training ‘had brought to him the realization of ‘self’ which is the sine qua non for knowledge of the eternal and ultimate truth.’ RSS pamphlet, Shri Guruji, the Man and His Mission, p. 6.
43. Ibid., p. 15.
44. Ibid., p. 32.
45. A monograph on the RSS, published in India, summarizes many of the arguments directed against the RSS. In this critical analysis of the RSS, the author portrays it as an organization committed to brahmin supremacy in India. K. K. Gangadharan, Sociology of Revivalism: A Study of Indianisation, Sanskritisation, and Golwalkarism (New Delhi: Kalamkar Prakashan, 1970). In her study of the non-brahmin movement in Maharashtra, Maureen Patterson claims that the RSS represented brahmin interests in that controversy. ‘A Preliminary Study of the Brahman vs Non-Brahman Conflict in Maharashtra’ (unpublished master’s thesis, University of Pennsylvania, 1952), pp. 61–62. Gangadharan also claims that the RSS supports the orthodox varna system (pp. 11–12) and defends almost all the ‘outmoded customs’ of Hinduism such as female infanticide and sati (p. 91), and favours a restoration of the Hindu monarchical system (p. 81), and defends the privileged position of the ‘rich class of landlords and industrialists’, ( pp. 92–94).
46. On the basis of his fieldwork on the RSS soon after India’s independence, Curran concluded that RSS members were disposed to favour a socialist solution to India’s developmental problems, Militant Hinduism, p. 51. In an analysis of the economic policy of the Jana Sangh, Howard Lloyd Erdman concludes that ‘it would appear that on balance large- scale property in industry and land receives no principled endorsement and that the Sangh would not be adverse to attacking it’. The Swatantra Party and Indian Conservatism (Lo
ndon: Cambridge University Press, 1967), pp. 54–5. Also see Myron Weiner, Party Politics in India: The Development of a Multi-Party System (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1957), pp. 174–75, 210–13.
47. Golwalkar, Bunch of Thoughts, p. 107.
48. Ibid., p. 401.
49. This proposal was first adopted at a meeting of the Jana Sangh Working Committee at Indore in 1954. The committee passed a resolution advocating a minimum income of 100 rupees per month and a maximum of 2,000 rupees per month. It is an interesting footnote to this meeting that a conservative business-oriented faction of the Jana Sangh leadership bolted the party on the grounds that it had been captured by the RSS. Organiser, 13 September 1954.
50. In 1969, Atal Bihari Vajpayee, then the Jana Sangh president, informed the party’s working committee that the party had been unfairly tarred as a conservative reactionary party; he instructed all units to educate the public that it was neither ‘rightist’ nor ‘leftist’, but a party that takes the ‘common man’s approach to economic problems’. Statesman (Calcutta), 3 September 1969. In one of the party’s first systematic analyses of India’s economic situation, the Jana Sangh Working Committee in 1954 resolved: ‘As a general rule production of consumer goods should be confined to cottage industry and only big and capital good may be reserved for large-scale industry.’ The resolution further proposed profit sharing and labour participation in management. In the agricultural sector, the party advocated the total abolition of ‘landlordism’ and it proposed that no compensation be provided the former landlords, except for those with no alternative source of income. See report of working committee resolutions in Organiser, 13 September 1954.
51. L. K. Advani, in his 1973 presidential address to the Eighteenth Annual Jana Sangh Session at Kanpur, stated that luxury consumption should be severely curtailed, and he proposed a direct consumption tax on expenditures of incomes above Rs 2500/month for each household unit. Organiser, 17 February 1963.
52. Golwalkar, Bunch of Thoughts, pp. 116–117.
53. See Jacob Leib Talmon’s discussion of left and right totalitarianism where he makes this distinction. The Origins of Totalitarian Democracy (New York: Praeger Publishers, 1960), pp. 6–8.
54. See discussion of elements of fascism in Eugene Weber, Varieties of Fascism: Doctrines of Revolution in the Twentieth Century, ed. by Louis L. Snyder (Princeton: D. Van Nostrand, 1964), Chapters 1–4.
55. Organiser, 14 July 1973.
56. Palkar, Dr K. B. Hedgewar, p. 61. Hedgewar’s participation in Bengal’s faction-ridden revolutionary movement, where the death or defection of a leader often resulted in the disintegration of his faction, might have convinced him of the need to emphasize organizational loyalty. For a discussion of organization deficiencies in Bengal’s revolutionary organizations, see Gordon, Bengal: The Nationalism Movement, pp. 155–6.
57. This suggests that Max Weber’s evolutionary assumptions on charisma were necessarily one-directional. Occupants of bureaucratic positions might use their positions in such a way as to develop considerable charisma, as Golwalkar and Deoras appear to have done.
58. Alex Inkeles, ‘The Totalitarian Mystique: Some Impressions of the Dynamics of Totalitarian Society’, Totalitarianism: Proceedings of a Conference Held at the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, March 1953, ed. by Carl Joachim Friedrich (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1954), pp. 99–101. The RSS does not make total claims on society. The members are not encouraged to overthrow or replace the government. Their claims are partial, and they demand primacy only in the character-building area. It has infrequently challenged government authority. When it did so, the actions were limited, and lasted only until the specific grievances were resolved. These examples were acts of civil disobedience, not revolution. Perhaps, the revolutionary impulse was negated by the ability of India’s political system to accommodate newly politicized social classes.
59. Organiser, 26 August 1972.
60. See an excellent discussion of samskaras in R. B. Pandy, ‘Hindu Sacrament’, The Cultural Heritage of India, ed. by Haridas Bhattacharyya et al., 4 vols. (Calcutta: Ramakrishna Mission Institute of Culture, 1953–1962), Vol. 2, pp. 392–94.
61. Ibid., pp. 402–06.
62. J. A. Curran Jr, Militant Hinduism, p. 50. In our field notes, we estimated that one-half to three-fourths of the participants were between 10 and 25.
63. Most shishu and bal meet in the evening, and taruna and proudh in the morning. The choice of times varies according to the type of neighbourhood in which the shakha is located.
64. Interview with Madhavrao Mule in Delhi, on 3 July 1968. He later became general secretary of the RSS.
65. For a discussion of group cohesion and conformity, see Etzioni, Comparative Analysis of Complex Organizations (New York: Free Press, 1961), pp. 189–90.
66. Ram Lal Dhooria, ‘I Was a Swayamsevak–II: The Vilest Abortionists’, Secular Democracy (June 1969): p. 22.
67. To vote, a swayamsevak must be over eighteen and a regular participant in RSS activities for one year or more. RSS Constitution, art. 16 (c) (Mimeo).
68. Ibid., Art. 19 (b), i, ii, iii.
69. Ibid., Art. 16 (b).
70. Ibid., Art. 15 (b) i, ii, iii.
71. Ibid., Art. 15 (e).
72. Interview with Eknath Ranade at Kanyakumari on l January 1970.
73. The ‘typical’ RSS pracharak was not deduced from any scientific sample survey. We base our remarks on some twenty which we interviewed.
74. Those pracharaks from Maharashtra and south India were largely from brahmin castes while those from north India tended to come from vaishya (i.e., business) and kayastha (i.e., writer) castes. We did not meet any pracharaks from the scheduled castes or tribes, though we were told that there are a few.
75. RSS Constitution, Art. 17 (a) ii.
76. Interview with Madhukar Dattatreya Deoras, then RSS general secretary, at Nagpur, on 21 April 1969.
77. The RSS constitution states that the ‘sarsanghchalak will nominate his successor, as and when the necessity arises, with the consent of the then kendriya karyakari mandal’. However, Deoras was selected without such consent. Neither Golwalkar nor Hedgewar chose their successor until shortly before their deaths. Unless the RSS abandons the guru-model of authority, it is unlikely that they will submit the position to any real scrutiny by the kendriya karyakari mandal.
78. RSS Constitution, Art. 12.
79. Interview with Madhav Sadashiv Golwalkar at Nagpur, on 16 April 1969.
80. RSS leaders have stated that Golwalkar’s opposition to the Jana Sangh participating in coalition governments with communists was a rare incident of involvement in policy making.
81. For the complete speech, see Organiser, 21 July 1973.
82. Because of public criticism that they were a paramilitary group, the RSS during 1970–71 opened shakhas in half circles rather than in rows in some places (e.g., Delhi).
83. Until 1940, simulated gun practice (i.e., use of a wooden rifle) was a regular feature of the shakha, but it was eliminated from the ‘curriculum’ when the British government prohibited such military drills during World War II.
84. Dhooria, ‘I Was a Swayamsevak–III: Victims of an Idiotic Approach’, Secular Democracy 2 (July 1969): p. 12–1 4, 26.
85. Ibid., p. 12.
86. Dhooria comments that when enforcing such discipline, ‘there was . . . never any rancour malice, for Bhaiji . . . was always loving and affectionate’, ibid.
87. Baudhik sessions have recently been explicitly reoriented to cover current political and economic issues.
88. Golwalkar, Bunch of Thoughts, pp. 335–6.
89. It is traditional Hindu practice for jatis (subcaste) to perform puja (worship) of the implements connected with hereditary jati occupation.
90. The costs to the participant are kept to a minimum. For example, in 1969, participants from Allahabad (in Uttar Pradesh) who joined a winter camp in Lucknow paid 10 rupees for round-tri
p transportation and 10 rupees for camp fees. If they did not already have a uniform (and most have it), they were required to spend another 40 rupees to cover the cost of footwear, half pants, cap, shirt, lathi, boots, socks. The RSS itself sells these items at a minimal profit margin. This was an ITC, and fees for an OTC (Officers’ Training Camp) would be approximately three times those charged for the ITC. The district branch of the Allahabad RSS paid fees, round-trip transportation cost, and the cost of uniforms for those who could not afford them. Interview with Dr Krishna Bahadur in Allahabad, 16 January 1970.
91. These overseas affiliates have begun in two ways. Either emigrating swayamsevaks begin RSS work in their new country, or overseas Indians themselves will initiate the work. In some African and Asian countries, there are organizations which function very much like the RSS in India. In other countries, the swayamsevaks agree to support various Hindu cultural organizations. In the United States, for example, the RSS members actively support the work of the Ramakrishna Mission, as well as the Vishwa Hindu Parishad, a Hindu umbrella religious organization linked to the RSS. The Delhi office keeps extensive records of all swayamsevaks who leave the country and endeavours to remain in communication with them. This is particularly the case with students who intend to return to India.
92. Reported in Organiser, 14 July 1973.
93. These notes are translated from Marathi and were a part of the diary of a swayamsevak attending a 1971 Maharashtra state Officers’ Training Camp.
94. We have several diaries which note themes similar to those mentioned here.
95. These questions were given to participants at an Officers’ Training Camp run for swayamsevaks from Jammu and Kashmir, Punjab, Haryana, Delhi, and Himachal Pradesh in 1969.
96. The RSS pracharak at Allahabad mentioned that only about 40 per cent of those who regularly attend ever take the pratigya (oath). He mentioned that he (and other pracharaks) were very careful regarding who could take the oath. In most cases, the oath is administered only after a person has proven himself through several years of active RSS work. It is a kind of confirmation ceremony indicating that one is an ideal swayamsevak.
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