'Will seek explanation in feet-washing incident', says Education Minister V Sivankutty
'It is condemnable to see such practices in some schools run by Bharatiya Vidya Niketan. This is against democratic values,' he said, citing the incidents that happened at Saraswathi Vidyalaya in Bandadka, Kasargode and Vidyadhiraja Vidyapeetom Central School in Mavelikkara.
Meanwhile, SFI also criticised the activity, urging to stop such forceful uncivilised practices in RSS-controlled schools. These regressive practices pull down the state's education system, which upholds progressive, secular and democratic values, the state leadership stated in a release.
Students were allegedly made to kneel and wash the feet of nearly 30 retired teachers at the school in Kasargode offering flowers at their feet, as part of Guru Purnima celebrations on Thursday.
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Time of India
5 hours ago
- Time of India
RSS' critics are labelled as traitors since 2014: Priyank
Gadag: RDPR minister Priyank Kharge has said those questioning RSS or Veer Savarkar are labelled as traitors since 2014. Inaugurating 'Yuva Dhwani' event organised for the newly elected officebearers of Gadag district Youth Congress, Kharge said organisations which did not contribute to nation-building are now handing out certificates of patriotism. "While Mahatma Gandhi's statues are found from Gujarat to Germany, the BJP prefers statues of Godse and Savarkar," he alleged. Kharge claimed Savarkar awarded himself the title 'Veer', and received a pension of Rs 60 from the British, and was the first to demand a separate nation for Muslims. Claiming that under PM Narendra Modi, no new scheme was announced in the past 11 years, Priyank said Atal Pension Yojana was merely a rebranding of Aam Aadmi Bima Yojana from the Manmohan Singh govt. Swachh Bharat initiative was a renaming of Nirmal Bharat Abhiyan. "Youth should be aware of these issues and critically evaluate content on social media," he advised. Law and tourism minister HK Patil said Congress always walks the talk. "During Indira Gandhi's regime, a 20-point programme was announced to eradicate poverty. Now, chief minister Siddaramaiah is working to uplift the poor above the poverty line through schemes like the Yuva Nidhi and the five guarantee schemes. Opposition parties believe they can win elections by dividing people on caste and religious lines, but it is not possible," he opined.
India Today
6 hours ago
- India Today
Mohan Bhagwat: Moment of the RSS moderniser
(NOTE: This article was originally published in the India Today issue dated April 6, 2009)The man with a walrus moustache, framed and garlanded, is a customary backdrop to any stage show by the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS). Now that Mohanrao Bhagwat has taken centrestage as the new boss (sarsanghchalak) of RSS, Keshav Baliram Hedgewar, the founding patriarch of the Sangh Parivar, seems to have got a true may be two Brahmins from Maharashtra, united by the shape of their moustache and the sweep of their vision about a Hindu Rashtra, but Bhagwat refuses to be a throwback to history. The 58-year-old bachelor from Chandrapur, born 10 years after the death of Hedgewar, is the 21st Century face of an organisation that has often been accused of being steeped in a mythological new role as a moderniser (a word that doesn't sit well with the image his organisation has acquired in urban India) is daunting, for he has to strike a fine balance between the challenges of future and the burden of heritage. When the generational shift took place in Nagpur on March 21, it was pretty evident that Bhagwat wanted to be different. The meeting began with Bhagwat's request that, after nine years as general secretary, he would like to pass the baton to someone else. But before the veteran pracharak M.G. Vaidya could start the election process, K.S. Sudarshan, the outgoing sarsanghchalak, intervened. He said: 'My memory is failing. Recently I was unable to recognise the photograph of Mangal Singh who died after serving as our cook at the RSS headquarters for over 50 I met Swami Vishwesh Tirth and he advised me to speak less. My responsibility requires me to study more and more but I can't do that due to my poor health. I want to transfer my responsibilities as sarsanghchalak to Mohanrao Bhagwatji.' Then he vacated his seat and Bhagwat, after touching the feet of Sudarshan and other elders, took first appointment itself spoke a lot about the man. Many expected Suresh Soni, who works as a coordinator between RSS and BJP, would succeed him as general secretary. Bhagwat's choice for the second-in-command and general secretary was Suresh (Bhaiyaji) was a smooth transition at Nagpur where the old and the interventionist gave way to a new generation that puts culture above politics. Was it that the new boss didn't want too much 'coordination' between the Sangh and the party? Not surprising as he is the highest apostle of thinks the BJP— or for that matter any other front organisation— should be left to its own devices. (His predecessor, though, was fond of giving sagely advice to leaders like L.K. Advani and Atal Bihari Vajpayee.) Still, he wanted the pracharaks to be familiar with other family members like the BJP, VHP, ABVP and BMS. Under his initiative, some pracharaks were given six-month internships in these organisations. The RSS for him is essentially a cultural organisation with a social life so far has been a perfect blend of idealism and pragmatism. Born on September 11, 1950, in a Karhade Brahmin family in Chandrapur, Maharashtra, he began his career as a veterinary officer. His father, Madhukar Rao Bhagwat, was a close associate of Hedgewar and M.S. Golwalkar, the second spending five years as a pracharak in Gujarat, Bhagwat pre did something rarely heard of in the upper echelons of RSS: he got married and began a new life as an advocate. The son, though, would not be deviated from his path by such temptations. Bhagwat became a pracharak during the Emergency in 1975 and he has remained a strict disciplinarian ever since. At a meeting of state pracharaks, he said, 'Our focus must be on quality, not on quantity.'advertisementQuantity matters in the RSS, and Bhagwat is entitled to take credit for making the Parivar bigger. Look at the numbers: 43,905 shakhas (drills) are held daily at 30,015 venues; weekly shakhas at 4,964 and monthly shakhas at 4,507 places. The RSS has over 2,800 full-time pracharaks. And it has 58 front groups representing sections as varied as youth, teachers, Dalits, women, labour, students, and even overseas is one for Muslims as well: The Muslim Rashtriya Manch, which wants to send out the message that 'every Muslim is not a fanatic'. Presiding over such an extended Parivar, Bhagwat has the mandate to be the final arbiter of 'family values'. Will those values be in harmony with the spirit of the modern times? Or, will they make the existing cultural fault-lines more glaring? He has to kill so many stereotypes before he can play out the script of modernisation within the will have to disown and neutralise the army of rabble-rousers and demonisers who continue to manufacture enemies of the so-called Hindu Rashtra. The lathi-wielding cultural Gestapos running amok or the trident-waving demolishers atop a mosque are not images compatible with Bhagwat's message of change. He has to redeem Hindutva from the politics of hate. He has to make it culturally and socially acceptable. And it has to be a time of introspection as well. RSS is an organisation which has produced leaders like Deen Dayal Upadhyaya, Vajpayee, Advani and Nanaji Deshmukh. Today it is only capable of offering us an atrocity like a Pravin Togadia or others who can only divide the mind of may not consider the pub-going girls of Mangalore particularly modern, but he doesn't endorse the violent enforcement of culture either. Though he says that the socalled Hindu terrorism is an 'illusionary and self-contradictory lie' created by 'Hindu-hating political forces' desperate for votes, he is believed to be unhappy about some fringe Hindu groups taking the terror route. And some of his reforms are even 10 years ago, it was mandatory for the swayamsevaks to wear a uniform of khaki shorts and white shirts while attending the daily shakha. No longer. The uniform is compulsory only on special occasions. The new dress code is called 'supravesh' (all white); it could be anything, even kurta-pyjama or dhoti and shirt. He was very much instrumental in recognising the importance of caste leaders in expanding the RSS' doesn't make a virtue out of rigidity masquerading as consistency. Following Advani's controversial statement on 'secular' Jinnah, Bhagwat was the first to tell the RSS top brass that they should take on the BJP leader. Three years later, the same Bhagwat realised that there was no better alternative than Advani to lead the BJP. So he himself went to meet Advani to announce that he was once again acceptable to the RSS.A great admirer of Gandhi, he was the one who took the initiative in bringing Scheduled Castes and Tribes into the RSS fold. In one of the speeches he delivered after becoming the general secretary, he didn't mention the name of Hindutva icon Veer Savarkar even once but Gandhi was a recurring hero. An agitated Savarkar supporter went to Bhagwat and complained. Bhagwat, always polite, apologised first and then took on the challenger: 'But tell me whether you appreciate Gandhi's contribution to society despite his mistakes.' The challenger just walked away in silence, most likely as a wiser man. And his soon-tobe-launched programme called Gau-Gram Sankarshan Yatra (a cow-protection journey across the villages) too is inspired by a Reader's Digest junkie and a regular watcher of History and National Geographic channels, ended his speech in Nagpur with a call for facing up to new challenges: 'Let all of us strive to expand and consolidate still further our already existing nationwide network to enable our society to effectively respond to all the challenges it is facing, by adopting appropriate strategies and techniques'.What are Bhagwat's strategies and techniques to keep RSS relevant as a cultural organisation? He certainly requires techniques other than powerpoint presentations (of which he is a new convert) and the emphasis on youth power (of which he is a tireless promoter). He needs a message that is in tune with the ideas and aspirations of 21st Century India where a brotherhood based on religion still evokes fear, no matter what the religion is called. 'You can change everything, except our core belief in a Hindu Rashtra', he such a civilisational definition of India makes some Indians the excluded others, the challenges of the man who aspires to be the moderniser become all the more daunting. It also provides Mohanrao Bhagwat an opportunity to become the Great Reconciler.—With Shyamlal Yadav and Uday MahurkarSubscribe to India Today Magazine- EndsMust Watch
India Today
6 hours ago
- India Today
Ideology as the organisational compass: How RSS imagines the next BJP chief should be
The BJP has requisite quorum to elect its new national president. The party's discussions with its ideological parent, the Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh (RSS), have happened. Senior Sangh leaders have emphasised to the BJP leadership that the appointment of their president was not a routine organisational exercise but a chance to recalibrate the backchannel discussions, Sangh functionaries have conveyed to the BJP top brass that the next president must do what the Narendra Modi-Amit Shah era in the party sidestepped: restore the organisational, ideological and cultural balance that once defined the Sangh-BJP ecosystem. Sangh leaders also want the new president to be the 36 state units, the BJP has elected (or re-elected) unit chiefs in 28 states; some crucial states, such as Karnataka, Uttar Pradesh, Haryana and Gujarat, are works in progress. The party is also ready to announce the process and election of state chiefs in Jharkhand and Delhi. These two decisions could happen within a week before finalising the shortlisted panel for the national president and setting up the election leaders don't get involved in micro-management of any of the RSS affiliates, including the BJP. Yet they expect the affiliates to push their ideological narrative and build enablers in society. 'Politics and governance are not the goal but means to achieve larger goals,' said a senior RSS pracharak. By now, there is little doubt that the tectonic plates beneath India's ruling party have shifted. The Modi-led BJP is in power, yet the party no longer wears the aura of unchallengeable dominance. Denial of an outright majority after the 2024 Lok Sabha elections triggered not only a rethink within the saffron bloc but also an unmistakable ideological rumble from the RSS headquarters. The RSS made no bones about its desire for introspection—and perhaps more importantly—course-correction by the the past year, the Sangh has grown increasingly vocal. In June last year, RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat's now widely-discussed address —wherein he lamented about the rise of arrogance, the decline of dialogue and the BJP's disconnect from civilisational humility—was more than a sermon. It was a coded critique of what many in the Sangh see as the BJP's over-centralised, personality-driven sermon landed just as the BJP had entered its most vulnerable phase in a decade, forced into coalition management at the Centre with the Telugu Desam Party (TDP) and the Janata Dal (United), or JD(U), struggling to contain factional frictions in Maharashtra and Karnataka, and facing organisational drift in some former bastions, including Uttar is clarity among both Sangh and BJP leaderships that they need each other and can't have independent futures. There is also growing acceptance of the Sangh's ideas but, notably, also the enduring popularity of Prime Minister Modi across ideological spaces. The Sangh has been able to piggyback on this popularity to expand into new demographics and geographies.A top Sangh pracharak told INDIA TODAY that a towering figure like Modi does help, and that one doesn't have to remind him of the ideological stances. 'He is much clearer on the subject than anyone else. Yet we have the role of a custodian and watchdog to play, to caution our colleagues working in the various affiliates from time to time,' he the last week of June and the first week of July, several RSS pracharaks from around the country had camped in Delhi, particularly for the three-day annual convening of prant pracharaks at the RSS office in the national capital. Speaking to them gives one a sense of what the RSS would like to see in the next BJP the Sangh, the BJP president must not be a mere electoral strategist or seat-sharing tactician, but rather a custodian of political dharma—grounded in the BJP's ideological moorings, respected by the Sangh and trusted by the cadre. In closed-door conversations, Sangh seniors have stressed on the need for a president with an organisational mind. The appointee should be someone who understands the pulse of the party, and can engage with not just ministers and state presidents but also booth workers, shakha volunteers and RSS pracharaks, who increasingly feel is not that the incumbent J.P. Nadda or his predecessor, Amit Shah, never did so. They built infrastructure and programming for communication, including the robust mechanism of panna samitis, and kept cadre engaged via various party programmes. However, the Sangh wants the internal communication to become sharper and is particular concern over how the BJP, in its quest for electoral expansion, has become 'transactional'. The Sangh is uneasy about the growing influence of technocrats, political migrants (turncoats) and public relations operatives in shaping the BJP's public persona. The worry is not just that these newcomers dilute the party's ethos but that they hollow it out from ideal president, in the Sangh's eyes, will be one who can reinstate ideological clarity—not only around classic Hindutva issues, such as the Uniform Civil Code (UCC) or population control, but also in domains like education, family values and cultural build the quorum, BJP has elected 28 new state unit chiefs, and nominated a working president in Punjab. Most of the state chiefs are hands-on politicians and dyed-in-the-wool Sangh leaders. 'They could still make mistakes but at least, they will not deviate from the core philosophy of the Sangh,' remarks a more. July 2025 marks a critical moment in the BJP's succession calendar. Modi turns 75 in September. While there is no formal resignation mechanism tied to that age in the party, the transition moment—anticipated for years—is no longer abstract. A week before Modi, RSS sarsanghchalak Mohan Bhagwat will also turn 75. And within a fortnight, the Sangh will be celebrating its in BJP nor in the Sangh is there any anticipation that Modi will make space for a successor soon. There is consensus that Modi is the best bet to push the ideological agenda, take everyone in the ideological sphere together and re-strengthen the narrative. In fact, some Sangh ideologues believe Modi is needed for a longer term to set the trajectory to bring 'civilisational change' in the wider Hindu on July 10, Bhagwat surprised everyone when he said that people in public life must make way for their successors after attaining the age of 75. He was speaking at the launch of a biography of veteran pracharak Moropant Pingale, who himself retired after 75 years of age. Whether Bhagwat's statement was aimed at Modi or a general comment, only time will tell. Yet it has stirred a political BJP preparation for a post-Modi era will require a lot of hard work. It would mean building a second-rung leadership, mentoring state-level satraps and restoring inner-party democracy. The high-command culture—long typified by Modi-Shah-Nadda's closed-circle style—is now being seen as pracharaks call for a renewed focus on cadre-building. The post-Covid years have seen an explosion in electoral technology—apps, data dashboards, call centres, and so on. But Sangh functionaries complain that ideological education has weakened. Shakhas may be growing, but the party, they say, is losing character. In states like Bihar, West Bengal and Telangana, the BJP's growth has to be complemented with depth. The new president will be expected to rebuild the training architecture in order to elevate not just performers but believers in the is also a political imperative: the BJP's coalition compulsions in 2024 forced it to compromise on long-pending ideological agendas. The Sangh believes that only a grounded, ideologically attuned BJP president can safeguard the party's convictions in the coalition era. On contentious issues like the UCC or education reforms, there is apprehension that coalition partners will demand dilution or may bargain Sangh would obviously want a party chief who knows how to balance alliance pragmatism with ideological persistence. It is looking for someone with organisational experience and depth, a long innings in the trenches and the ability to engage with both the Delhi leadership and the shakha the BJP's internal climate has grown more brittle. Post-2024, state units have begun asserting themselves again. Fissures have opened in Maharashtra, Karnataka, Telangana and West Bengal. Leaders once overshadowed by Modi-Shah are staking claims. Sangh leaders do see this decentralisation as healthy but only if channelled by a party president who can mediate between ambition and alignment. Someone who respects feedback, tolerates constructive dissent and rebuilds what insiders call the 'invisible glue' of the leaders are mindful of how the BJP engages with the larger non-political ecosystem. In recent years, several movements—on Sanskrit education, decolonisation of history, Ayurveda and cultural revival—have emerged from Sangh affiliates. Yet, the BJP's attention has been new president, the Sangh hopes, will institutionalise these linkages. Not just through photo-ops but policy direction and party philosophy. In short, the RSS wants the BJP to remember who it is. The party may have won 240 Lok Sabha seats, but in the Sangh's reckoning, the election was a wake-up call. It proved that Modi alone can no longer win the war. It underlined that governance, ideology and organisation must now go together. And it reminded the BJP that even empires need choice of the new BJP president will signal the direction of that renewal. Will the BJP tone down on centralised charisma? Will it continue to treat ideology as a campaign asset or re-embed it as a moral compass? The Sangh has made its preference clear: it wants a president who is less of a war general and more of a civilisational steward. One who leads not from the stage but from the Sangh knows it cannot dictate terms to today's BJP. But it also knows that the BJP cannot afford to ignore the ideological umbilical cord that made it what it is. In the year after the 2024 Lok Sabha poll verdict, the Sangh's mood has changed—from celebration to scrutiny, endorsement to expectation. As the BJP prepares to anoint its next chief, the message from Nagpur is clear: course-correct or risk to India Today Magazine- EndsTune InMust Watch
