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FIFTH
COLUMN
Comic
Relief
By trying
to propagate its fossilised ideas the RSS is making a laughing stock of
itself
By
Tavleen
Singh
For
once the RSS offers us not just free advice but free entertainment. The
BJP's favourite cultural organisation is currently sending its best and
brightest workers to traverse the land in the hope of luring back good
Hindu youths to those increasingly thinly attended shakhas. As part of
this campaign, the RSS has armed its workers with literature that has
been designed to teach Indians to be more Indian. This is understandable
since westernised Indians tend to find the spectacle of men in khaki knickers
doing martial exercises amusing rather than inspiring. So, the RSS thinks
that if they can be persuaded to shed their western ways and become more
swadeshi those dawn drills might have more appeal.
 What
offers immense entertainment, though, is the RSS idea of what being a
good Indian is. Did you know, for instance, that if you think of a honeymoon
as a pleasant way to spend your first few days of marriage then you would
be considered a seriously bad Indian? The RSS has produced a Marital Code
of Conduct that rules against honeymoons on the grounds that they could
lead to the end of our proud joint family system. "A honeymoon encourages
a couple to go for a vacation without the rest of the family ... (this)
gives rise to the feeling that the rest of the family is an obstacle to
individual freedom." In other words if you must take a vacation after
you get married be sure to take along the entire family-two sets of mothers-
and fathers-in-law, brothers, sisters, their wives, husbands and, perhaps
even the family dog. It would not be much of a holiday-and certainly no
honeymoon-but this, according to the RSS, is the Indian way.
Being a
good Indian also means rejecting feminism as yet another western plot
to destroy our Sati Savitris and-despite our population problems-being
good Indians also means rejecting family planning. Mere "economic
considerations" must not decide how many children you have and although
it goes unsaid (except privately) we need to keep breeding Hindus to keep
up with the Muslims.
These new
ideas from the RSS think tank come from a desperate fear of westernisation.
Everything foreign is bad-including, naturally, Muslims and Christians-so
we must shun foreignness. But what about those khaki knickers? Are they
part of ancient Indian couture? Surely, even if only to spare us the sight
of middle-aged men prancing around in badly stitched shorts they should
be replaced by dhotis. We have an abundance these days of indigenous designers
so it should be quite easy to persuade Tarun Tahiliani or Rohit Bal to
come up with a more Indian uniform. And what about all the other western
accoutrements that the RSS affects-like mobile phones, fax machines and
websites? Out with them too, along with toothpaste and television and
the nuclear bomb. If western ideas about honeymoons and Valentine's Day
are to be rejected then we need to be consistent and reject everything
else as well.
Un-Indian
Ideology: More seriously, though, what gives the RSS the gall to dictate
to us the rules of being Indian when at its most fundamental level its
own ideology is disturbingly un-Indian. Anybody with even a passing knowledge
of Indian civilisation knows that religious tolerance is a basic tenet.
We accept, unlike the Semitic religions, that people have the right to
worship their own gods in whichever way they wish. But the RSS does not
agree. It wants Muslims and Christians to join what it calls the "mainstream"
and constantly advises them to change their ways.
Well, perhaps
it is time that the RSS considered joining the mainstream itself. As things
stand the RSS has a limited "mainstream" involvement. Its ranks
are populated mainly by upper-caste Hindus, causing not only Muslims and
Christians but even lower-caste Hindus to stay away. So which mainstream
are we talking about?
Meanwhile,
since the RSS loves dishing out free advice here is some for them. Please,
please continue producing pamphlets explaining the RSS version of Indian
life. It is important that ordinary Indians realise quickly that the India
the RSS dreams of is a country in which every aspect of their lives-right
down to their very thoughts and ideas-will be dictated by an organisation
run by a bunch of old men with fossilised minds. Unluckily for the BJP,
it is going to be the main victim of this propaganda exercise. Since it
has shown itself to be completely incapable of cutting the umbilical cord
that binds it to its alma mater it will have to suffer the consequences.
How many Indians are going to vote for a political party which believes
that not just honeymoons but feminism and family planning are bad things?
Next time round who is going to vote for Atal Bihari Vajpayee when they
know that behind him lurks the long shadow of Chief Bongabong (K.S. Sudarshan)?
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The
Indian industry has increased its decibel level of whining. Instead, it
should get the government to deliver, says INDIA TODAY Associate Editor
V. Shankar Aiyar in 
