Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh Chief Mohan Bhagwat on Friday said people of India have not treated Hinduism as their fiefdom but as their heritage meant for the world and there is a greater need for people in the country to have knowledge of its roots than those abroad.
Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh chief Mohan Bhagwat on Monday said the goals of his right-wing organisation and that of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose are similar -- making India a great nation.
Amid outrage over personal accounts of Vice-President M Venkaiah Naidu and Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh chief Mohan Bhagwat losing verified blue tick marks, Twitter on Saturday said the blue badge and verified status could be automatically removed from an account if it is incomplete or inactive for six months as per its rules.
'Whether somebody else can take up (Narendra Modi's position) the answer to it is yes but for that (to happen) some kind of crisis must come and in that crisis Modi must lose the (trust) vote.' 'Only then another candidate from the BJP can come and most likely it could be Nitin Gadkari because he enjoys the confidence (of the RSS as well as that of BJP MPs).'
RSS General Secretary Dattatreya Hosabale has criticized the Karnataka government's decision to provide four per cent reservation for Muslims in government contracts, stating that the Constitution does not allow religion-based quotas. He also said that such reservations go against the wishes of B R Ambedkar, the architect of the Indian Constitution. He also spoke about the controversy over Mughal emperor Aurangzeb's grave in Maharashtra, stating that people who went against the ethos of India were made icons. Hosabale lauded figures like Rajput king Maharana Pratap for resisting Mughal emperor Akbar and said those who resisted invaders were also "freedom fighters". He also spoke about the RSS's idea of 'One Nation, One Culture', stating that it draws inspiration from India's rich cultural heritage and ethos.
'Everybody knows that both of them will face loss if they are going to fight over a matter'
Much drama is likely to continue in the coming year, within the Sangh Parivar as well as involving the Opposition parties and, of course the BJP's allies, predicts Modi biographer Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay.
Even as the race for the Congress president's post is hotting up, its veteran leader and Rajya Sabha member Digvijaya Singh on Friday said he is not interested in becoming the party chief.
He won two terms in office, which was a stunning feat for a leader who used his silence as the most vocal weapon to change the economy and the lives of a billion people, asserts Tarun Vijay, former BJP MP and former Chief Editor, Panchjanya, the RSS weekly.
He alleged Union Home Minister Amit Shah had directed BJP leaders in a "closed-door" meeting to "stop" him (Uddhav) and Sharad Pawar politically.
The birth anniversary of Dr Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar, whose political influence has surged with the passage of time, on Monday was marked by bitter trading of charges between the ruling BJP and opposition parties as they fought for his legacy.
He also said if Hindus want to remain Hindus then Bharat has to be made 'akhand' (undivided).
Here are some of the famous faces queued up to get ink mark on their fingers.
Mahadevan said after he got the invitation to attend the RSS event as the chief guest, he received congratulatory calls from many people, a gesture which he found deeply touching.
HAM leader Jitan Ram Manjhi on Monday said statements of RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat about a review of quotas could be one of the possible reasons for the NDA's debacle in the polls.
The five-day event, to appraise and train RSS volunteers on how to propagate nationalism and promote Swadeshi along with other such issues among the masses, is held every fifth year in different cities and states of the country.
Citing that many Muslims fought in Mewar king Maharana Pratap's army against Mughal emperor Akbar, Bhagwat suggested that in India's history people from all faiths stood together whenever there was an attack on the country's culture.
Since 2014, many of Mohan Bhagwat's speeches have acted as cues for government policy.
Owaisi criticized the court-ordered survey of a Mughal-era mosque in Sambhal, Uttar Pradesh, saying it weakens India and distracts from real issues like inflation and unemployment.
Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh chief Mohan Bhagwat on Monday came under attack from political parties for his controversial remarks that India is a Hindu nation and Hindutva is its identity.
BJP and RSS leaders are once again pushing to remove the words 'secular' and 'socialist' from the Constitution's Preamble, showing a deeper effort to change India's identity from a diverse, multi-religious republic to a Hindu-first nation, even though they don't have the numbers in Parliament to officially change the Constitution, observes N Sathiya Moorthy.
RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat is expected to deliver a keynote address at a meeting aimed at 'clearing misconceptions about the organisation'.
Evils like caste discrimination and untouchability have to be done away within society, he said.
With the Uttar Pradesh Assembly polls scheduled for 2027, political experts are observing an increasing trend of temple-mosque disputes in the state, leading to heightened polarization. Recent bypolls saw the use of divisive slogans, and analysts believe this trend will intensify as the 2027 elections approach. The recent surge in claims about the existence of Hindu temples at the sites of mosques in various cities has fueled this polarization. The BJP-led government has been accused of promoting communal polarization, while opposition parties like the SP have criticized the ruling party's actions. The RSS chief has called for restraint in raising new temple-related disputes. Experts predict that communal polarization is likely to escalate in the coming days.
Those who continue to think that the 2024 election will see the BJP pursuing a more militant line are being alarmist, argues Rajeev Mantri. The BJP, Mantri believes, is not about to shoot itself in the foot. If anything, he says, the BJP may be more inclined to push a harder secularism.
A revealing excerpt from Rahul Shivshankar and Siddhartha Talya's book, Modi & India: 2024 and the Battle for Bharat.
The election campaign was one of the most vitriolic in the state, but you would not have guessed it from the smiles and selfies from the politicians.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday hailed the Dusshera address of Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh chief Mohan Bhagwat and said the issues of social reform he raised are "very relevant".
The US state department in its annual report to the Congress on international religious freedom has alleged that in India in 2021, attacks on members of the minority communities, including killings, assaults, and intimidation, occurred throughout the year.
Visuals from the building in Sector 13 area showed flames and thick smoke billowing out.
Likening India's progress to that of a vehicle that only has accelerator and no brakes, the RSS chief said those trying to stop it will either step aside or be eliminated.
Conversion to Christianity was the main objective behind Mother Teresa's service to the poor, Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh Chief Mohan Bhagwat said on Monday.
A release issued by the RSS on Thursday had said the agenda of the four-day meeting included a discussion of Sangh volunteers' response to the coronavirus pandemic and preparations to face a possible third wave, among other things.
Uttar Pradesh BJP president Bhupendra Singh Chaudhary met Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Wednesday, sources said, and is believed to have briefed him on a host of issues related to the party's organisational matters in the politically crucial state.
Anybody living in India is a Hindu, Bhagwat said.
'We have already directed our party members and supporters and advised them that not a single vote goes to the BJP'
Bhagwat said that as a member of the Sangh Parivar, he is devoted to his organisation and the society.
Ahead of the Maha Kumbh, a senior cleric has written to Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath expressing fears that mass conversions of Muslims will take place during the event, while other community leaders have flagged the alleged demand raised by some Hindu seers' body to keep Muslims out of the mega gathering.
Only in the event of the RSS managing to force Modi into accepting a consensual candidate, will the party not continue to 'being' the 'next Congress', observes Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay.
Political power has now been outsourced fully to the Modi government. Even if the RSS is still, in principle, his guru, nobody would dare to whisper a word of advice to Modi, forget some whiff of criticism. When the shishya grows into such a popular and domineering leader, the guru has to applaud from the sidelines, points out Shekhar Gupta.
'Mohan Bhagwat's reaffirmation of the RSS's Hindu rashtra ideal has shown that nothing has changed, that it remains firmly rooted in its fundamental beliefs, that the willingness to listen to voices from outside its fold was a pretence about being openminded,' argues Amulya Ganguli.
