Encounters with the RSS: The Ancient, Medieval and Modern History Episode

[This is series of posts which started off with this and then followed by this. Keep coming back for more!!]

Okay, now after about 30-40 mins of furious debate with an RSS/BJP/VHP/Bajrang Dal hardliner if you're still in your senses and have not fainted due to the sheer incomprehensibilty of simple logic exhibited by an otherwise sane person (oooh - that was a Looong phrase), I'm sure the conversation would shape up something like this:

RSS: The problem is that we Hindus are too tolerant. Now enough is enough. We have to reply back. We have to fight back!
You: Tolerant? Tolerant to what?
RSS: To Muslim atrocities!
You: What? Has any Muslim ever done anything to you?
RSS: Ha! Don't forget history. Those who say that we should forget the history and look towards the future are condemned to repeat it. [Ed: Oh btw, this is an oft repeated statement. To save you from the sheer boredom of reading it again and again just try to think that I wrote this out, say, about 10 times in this convesation :-)]
You: Okay, so tell me the History Mr. Historian, what have - you a PhD in Indian history or something? [Ed: Uh-oh! Wrong question - now you're DOOMED!]
RSS: Gandhi was a bloody chutiya. He was anti-Hindu and always appeased Muslims. He supported the Khilafat movement which had nothing to do with the Indian freedom movement. He supported the Muslim League. And look what they did in the end. They wanted Pakistan. Gandhi and Nehru both agreed. The bloody muslim bastards. If we dont act they will take away all our land...
You: Whoa, whoa whoa! Calm down buddy! One issue at a time. Okay, so Muslims demanded Pakistan. Those were the Muslims 50 years back!! Are they here now?
RSS: Yes! These Indian muslims - jis thaali mein khaate hain, usi thaali mein chhed karte hain - whenever India loses a match against Pakistan they burst crackers. Muslims are anti-nationals. They are anti-Hindu.
You: Dude! I said ONE ISSUE AT A TIME! Being a hindu and being a nationalist is not the same thing. But that comes later. First of all - have you seen any Muslim bursting crackers?
RSS: Er..... um..... my friend lives near a muslim dominated area and he told me that he heard some crackers being burst in the recent India-Pakistan match. And I'm pretty sure that he won't lie to me. [Okay. If the guy is balls enough he might say that he had seen muslims bursting crackers himself]
You: Okay! Is that a friend from your good ol' neighbourhood RSS shaakha?
RSS: Yes! He is Shri Tanveer Pogadia. He is a noble man. He does a lot of social work, infact he even went to so-and-so relief camp in some far-flung area of the country on his own money....
[Let me add, the guy actually might say, that he himself has seen the crackers bursting, and then you wouldn't be able to say much. I too have heard these rumours (RUMOURS - if you missed it the last time)]
You: Great! Just my point. Believe that Pogadia guy and do what he says. Exaclty what he wants.
RSS: No! The muslims have been doing that to Hindus for centuries. Ab Hindu samaaj ko jaagna hai! We must unite. We must answer back. Ab bahut ho chuka Enough is enough.
You: Owwwwkay! So, for some atrocities and political moves taken by muslims centuries ago you'll crucify the muslims living in India, today! Great logic buddy! Tell that Pogadia guy that his speeches really work! Idiots like you stop thinking when they listen to him!
RSS: Blah, blooh, bleeh, blah [Ed: You can safely switch your ears off. Nothing even remotely sensible from this point onwards]

Quoting from another of many RSS propaganda texts going around:

We have lost Afghanistan (for your kind information it was a part of India), we have lost Lahore, we have lost Bangladesh, we have lost our Sindhu river, Kashmir is having big questions mark and let me say that we have lost it as well because Hindus have been thrown out of Kashmir. Now what we are going to loose next?

Where they get this notion that Afghanistan was part of India (with reference to whatever that word meant centuries ago), I fail to comprehend. Check out Wikipedia for the history - and let me know if you find something to that tune.

The second thing is, the Hindutva brigade says that Muslims are anti-nationals and that they dont belong here. Then they say that we (India - the Hindu nation, which they proclaim it to be) - are losing Muslim dominated land, like Pakistan, Bangladesh, Kashmir, etc. Dudes! Stick to one stand. Either we are NOT a Hindu nation OR Muslim dominated land does not belong to us! You cannot have your cake and eat it too!

And puhleeeaase, spare us the long drawn sermons on your twisted Indian history. It puts us in a state of historia ;-)

Encounters with the RSS: The Social Organization Episode

[This is the first part of my series of posts which started off due to this.]

Talk about RSS feeding communal rot to the masses and blame them for propogating their shitty Hindutva agenda and this is what will ensue:

The RSS is a Social Organization
RSS: How can you even say such things about the RSS? You have no right to comment about the RSS if you dont know what it does?
You: Okay, so what is it that you guys do?
RSS: The RSS is a social organization. We do N number of things - lot many things.
You: Like?
RSS: Like, we were the ones to reach Bhuj first and start the relief camps and that too on our own money. And then the relief during the recent Bihar floods...
You: Oh great! Kudos to RSS. You guys are the real heroes.
RSS: Yes, that's what. But the media never reports these good deeds of ours. They simply want to malign RSS.
You: So why dont you tell people about what you do - why dont you start your own publicity and let people know that you are nice people and not bigots that you are made out to be.
RSS: But that would be like pushing your own agenda. We dont want to do that. We want to work silently - without the fanfare - so that people dont join us for name an glamour.

[Okay, you might just want to hit him with - "So, isn't ranting and raving about Hindutva, pushing your own propaganda?" But wait, not yet! We'll come to that]

You: Oh! That's really noble of you. So, why is the Ayodhya temple so imporant for RSS then? I mean you can do your good work without the temple as well.
RSS: No! That's the epitome of Hindu devotion to Ram. We have to build that temple... [blah blah blah]
You: But that will cause riots, as it already has. And causing riots should not be the aim for such a good organization like you.
RSS: No. The Musilims should vacate the masjid peacefully - it was ours. The foreigners came and broke the temple - the statues are still liying inside - you can go see them for yourself.
You: Did you see them?
RSS: No! But everyone knows. It's common knowledge.
You: Ok, so who built the mosque?
RSS: [Now, the guy gets confused! Exepect anything from Akbar, Jahangir, Aurangzed, Mohammed, Salman, Pathan, Irfan, etc]
You: Oh, great! You know a lot of history!
RSS: Yes! The Muslims should give us that land back - it is holy for us, it is the birthplace of Ram. The Muslim rulers have destroyed so many temples. Now we shall take them back. They should vacate them peacefully or else we shall have to snatch them. We dont want fights/riots but they should not force us! [blah blah blah...]
You: But hey! I thought you were a social organization. Not some Temple Building Authority. I'm confused! And why are you worried about temples of all things. Go work for the poor and downtrodden.
RSS: No! But Hindus have been tolerant for too long. Now the water is up to our noses....
You: Hey, hey! I thought you were a social organization - not a Hindu organization.
RSS: No! We're not a Hindu organization. We're not VHP. We're a social organization.
You: Okay, so how many Muslims are there in RSS.
RSS: [er... er....] The Imam of XYZ, the Jamam of ABC, etc. etc.
You: Okay, so when did they come in RSS?
RSS: Very recently. Didn't you read the news?
You: I thought so. Muslims joining RSS should make news!!

[I could go on an on.... but basically I think you got the point. Within moments the "do-gooder" attitude goes to the dogs - all that's left is the Hindutva crap - more on that in the next episode]

Hindutva Propaganda = Disease!

[I started off writing this as one single post - but in the end it's becoming so damn HUGE that I've planned to split it up into parts]

The Students' Film Society (SFS) had recently organized a mini film festival called Vikalp. It screened some rare (mostly unreleased and un-certified) documentaries, two of which have really got me thinking. Both of them were on very sensitive issues and the reaction of certain sects of the audience has actually disturbed me.

The first movie was "Men in the Tree" - a movie on RSS - how they recruit, the way they organize, the "education/knowledge" that they impart to their swayamsevaks, and basically how they organize and mastermind riots (especially the demolition of the Babri Masjid).

The second movie, "The Final Solution" - was a movie on the Godhra riots. It had people (mostly Muslims) talking about the way they were brutally killed, hacked, burnt, raped by the Hindus hand in hand with the Gujarat police. Apart from other things the director had actually followed Modi on his Gaurav Yatra trail, and it made me almost puke when I heard him proclaiming that there had been no riots in Gujarat and all this is just a concoction of the "enemies of Gujarat" (Congress) to mar the BJP's and the states image!! Further on, the bastard went on to proclaim that "all this" (whatever it was) - was just a reaction to what "they" did to the karsevaks in the Sabarmati Express! He was actually justifying the riots. And then, clipping of the VHP propaganda VCDs which showed footage of the burning train and the funeral rites of the victims with a marquee (scrolling text) which read something to the effect - "These are the karsevaks that had been brutally burnt/murdered by Islamic terrorists in the name of Jihaad!"

I could go on an on about what the movie uncovered - the way the BJP/RSS bastards were clearly instigating gatherings and spreading communal disharmony - but that would be in vain - all of us know that politicians are the scum of the earth. The are mother fucking bastards!

But what disturbed me more was the reaction of the audience, students from IIT Kanpur - the so-called "cream of the nation" - the intellectuals of the country. After the RSS movie people actually got up and started shouting and giving useless arguments.

The auditorium was turning into a catfight - so the SFS folks shut down the audi and asked everyone to continue the discussion outside. So I ended up "discussing" with an RSS hardliner outside the auditorium for a complete 1 hour or so.

[Their (RSS bigots) pscyhe is so damn botched up that reproducing each argument verbatim would take up so much of my blog space that I think I'll need to put each of them as separate posts.]