When the swayamsevaks came marching in
Posted by Balvinder Singh S Bal
When the swayamsevaks came marching in
Posted by Balvinder Singh S Bal on Tuesday, 12/26/2000 6:41 PM MST
| Email from Harbans Lal [email protected] When the swayamsevaks came marching in The Indian Express December 21, 2000 EXPRESS FOCUS: SOCIETY Apart from the Muslim and Christian communites, the RSS has managed to cast its long shadow over the Sikh clergy in Punjab. S.P. SINGH reports They've always had an uneasy relationship, but now, their animosity is out in the open, fangs and all. The loudest buzz in the Sikh clergy and community is around the recent campaigning by the RSS in Punjab, and attempts by the RSS to rewrite Sikh history and ethos. The head of the Shiromani Gurudwarak Prabhandak Committee, R.S. Talwandi, even sounded his "last warning" recently. "The swayamsevaks are coming" seems to be the cry across Punjab's countryside. But how serious are claims that the RSS is making inroads in Punjab? The answer lies in the RSS' aggressive posturing over the recent past. Even as the Sikh community was celebrating the tercentenary of the Khalsa, the RSS was setting up yet another forum, the ?Rashtriya Sikh Sangat', with the same acronym as its parent body. It was claimed that the Sangat was in fact a decade-old body, but few seemed to have heard of it before. Then, as part of its recent Rashtra Jagran Abhiyan, the RSS began swamping Punjab's countryside with literature and personal visits. Sikh scholars were quick to zero in on what they considered attempts to fudge facts and distort history. And, in the process, confuse the peasant, for whom anyone who talked of Guru Nanak and reeled out Gurbani was worthy of respect. In fact, prior to the Sangat's rural tourney, a former BJP MP B.L. Sharma Prem underwent baptisation with much fanfare and became a Sikh. Soon enough, Prem was being spotted in villages, moving from door to door, a bunch of pamphlets in hand. The problem area is the claim propounded in RSS literature that the Khalsa, as created by the tenth Guru Gobind Singh, is nothing but a Hindu sect. Sangat ideologues declare that Sikh Gurus were Suryavanshis and were descendants of Luv and Kush, sons of Ram. "The RSS also wants to develop ties with premier Sikh institutions to subvert Sikh culture and identity. In a subtle way, it is helping the BJP shape the country's politics by discouraging communities from focusing on identity," says Gurdarshan Singh Dhillon, president of Institute of Sikh Studies, a leading thinktank. Complaints piled up at the Akal Takht, the supreme temporal seat of the community, forcing the clergy to act. On May 14 this year, the clergy finally issued an ambiguous warning to forces that were out to misinterpret Sikh ethos. Meanwhile, the swayamsevaks continued to spread out. Nearly 50,000 students across Punjab's schools even took a "general knowledge test", based on a booklet which glorified the RSS' role in struggles in the country. Another contentious RSS document was a pamphlet titled ?Sada Virsa Sada Gaurav', the same title of a monthly periodical of Guru Gobind Singh Study Circle, a Sikh missionary group. In fact, many of the pamphlets issued during the Abhiyan have used hymns from Gurbani. A booklet titled ?Hindutav ate Pariyavaran' has a picture of a cow and calf on the title page superscribed ?Poota Mata Ki Asees' (a phrase from Gurbani), to which many Sikh clerics have objected. Similarly, Guru Gobind Singh has been projected as a ?Gau Rakhiyak'. Shivaji's guru, Samrath Ramdas, has been called Samrath Guru Ram Das ji, thus confusing him with the fourth Sikh Guru Ram Das. One pamphlet carries a poem ostensibly taken from ?Chandi Di War, Dasam Granth'. However, the verses appear nowhere in Chandi Di War, nor anywhere else in the Dasam Granth, says renowned Sikh scholar Dr Jodh Singh. As protests mounted, the Sikh clergy too went on the offensive: they directly named the RSS for being responsible for ?polluting the Sikh ethos'. But with the ruling Akali Dal running a government in alliance with the BJP, chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal lost no time in berating those who were "raising the RSS bogey". "What is this but political hypocrisy? The entire community is agitated, the clergy has taken exception, but Badal still sees no harm in the RSS' activities in Punjab. He should realise that at stake is the very issue of Sikh identity, an identity that the Akali Dal is bound to protect, given its historical legacy," remarks Prof Jagmohan Singh, general secretary of Akali Dal (Amritsar). "Sikh leaders must realise that their religion and identity are under attack from people who have resources, means, strategy and political clout on their side. One would have expected a more reasonable approach from Badal and his government but they have failed the community at this crucial juncture," said Saran Singh, former Bihar chief secretary and editor of The Sikh Review. Insiders in the RSS say the Sangat has managed to achieve some degree of success in the villages, where it had failed for decades to find a foothold. And the organisation has more up its sleeve. "This time, we will be more aggressive. For too long now, Akalis have reaped benefits by harping on Sikh identity. Now, we will tell villagers that the true identity lies in the mainstream, where Sikhs are part of a larger Hindu society," says a senior RSS ideologue. The national president of the Sangat was more blunt. "Before the British and during the Mughal rule, all Hindus considered themselves as Sikhs and Sikhs considered themselves as Hindus...This Hindu-Sikh problem is the result of British diplomacy and mischief," he said in his presidential address before the sixth national convention of the body."It is precisely such a theory which spells danger for Sikh identity," says Harbhajan Singh, principal of the Sikh Missionary College. "Badal is silent because he wants to save his gaddi, while the president of BJP's Punjab unit continues to harp on his pet theme of installing a BJP chief minister in the state," he points out. Even those who earlier felt that saffron forces would never be able to establish themselves in any significant way in Punjab given the reality of its villages, concede that the RSS has made some inroads. A senior functionary of the RSS' Punjab unit, Sudarshan Chowhan, has fired his latest salvo: he says gurudwaras and temple management committees should not be the sole preserve of one community. "When the Gurus are common, Gurbani is common, Gurpurabs are common to both Hindus and Sikhs, why shouldn't the managements of gurudwaras and temples?" he says. The war of words and ideas rages on. |
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