Hindutva's fringe beneficiaries

For almost a decade, the Jana Sangh remained a marginal political force

Shadow Armies: Fringe Organizations and Foot Soldiers of Hindutva 

Author: Dhirendra K Jha

Publisher: Juggernaut

Pages: 240

Price: Rs 499

For several decades after its inception, the Sangh Parivar did not interest mainstream scholars, analysts and journalists. This was due to Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) and Hindu Mahasabha displaying scant interest in the Indian national movement and instead staying focussed on reinforcing Hindu society. In the aftermath of Mahatma Gandhi’s assassination, these two organisations were kept at a distance as political pariahs. 

For almost a decade and half after India became a republic, the Jana Sangh remained a marginal political force. Consequently, barring odd American academics like Craig Baxter, and Walter Andersen later, scholarly interest in the Parivar remained notable in its absence. Independent or leftist Indian political scientists, historians and sociologists did not consider the phalanx of Hindutva organisations worthy of note. Resultantly, though there was abundant literature and reference books — mainly sympathetic if not always hagiographic — from within the Hindutva fraternity, there were barely a few independent or critical tomes to turn to. 

The Ram Janmabhoomi agitation for constructing a Ram temple at Ayodhya triggered interest in the Parivar, its history, politics and ideology. Yet, till the end of the 1980s, an objective understanding of what constituted this fraternity remained extremely limited. The media abundantly quoted Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP), Bajrang Dal, Sri Janmabhoomi Mukti Yagna Samiti and Sri Ram Janmabhoomi Nyas leaders without decoding these groups and detailing how one was different from the other. The Babri Masjid’s demolition enabled leaders of the Parivar to take stock of the path traversed and chalk out the future course. The demolition also got academics, analysts and journalists interested in the subject and new post-demolition developments began getting studied and analysed. 

Over the past two decades, six years of Atal Bihari Vajpayee’s government, the Gujarat riots of 2002, the emergence of Narendra Modi, the quaint mix of Hindutva, technology and development, the decline of the Bharatiya Janata Party for a decade starting 2004 and its subsequent re-emergence from 2012, provided the basis for more literature on the subject.

The book under review fills a significant void and provides cogent narratives of a few so-called “fringe” organisations, either explicitly or implicitly part of the saffron brigade. Within weeks of Prime Minister Narendra Modi assuming office, the BJP entrusted Yogi Adityanath with the responsibility of stewarding the bypolls in Uttar Pradesh. He got into the act with a tirade against religious minorities and giving fresh wind to the “Love Jihad” campaign. Hindu Yuva Vahini (HYV), an organisation he independently floated in 2002 to strengthen his position within the Parivar, steered this campaign. 

Over the past three years, HYV has propagated the Hindutva agenda without formal association with the Sangh Parivar. When Adityanath was appointed chief minister, questions arose on the organisation’s future role. It has since ceased enrolling new members but its activities continue, probably with law enforcers looking the other way. The HYV is not the only group which provides the Sangh Parivar liberty to step into contentious areas. Called fringe, they, however, are as “mainstream” as officially linked social and political arms of the fraternity. Jha has done good service with this primer and adds valuable information and insight into the seamier side of the Parivar.

In the highly polarised world of analyses and books on the RSS and its affiliates, this book adopts an unabashedly antagonistic position. This is the strength of the book but also becomes its limitation because unravelling nuanced differences and contradictions between different organisations remains outside its brief. This book presents and examines the narratives of eight such fringe organisations. Of these, the author claims, four are formally part (though it is not legally possible to establish this connection) of the Sangh Parivar — Bajrang Dal, Rashtriya Sikh Sangat, Bhonsala Military School, Hindu Aikya Vedi. The others, Sri Ram Sene, Sanatan Sanstha, Hindu Yuva Vahini and Abhinav Bharat, may be officially unconnected with the RSS but either “have an umbilical cord attached to the Sangh Parivar” or are ideologically “on the same page”.

Narratives or chapters on Sanatan Sanstha, Sri Ram Sene, Bhonsala Military School and Abinava Bharat establish the extra-legal activities of these menacing groups on the one hand and the political connections with the Parivar organisations on the other. The crisp text stays focussed on narratives of these groups and linkages are established with different violent episodes like the murders of rationalists Narendra Dabholkar, Govind Pansare and M M Kalburgi and presents a chilling picture of the Sanatan Sanstha, a collective that spares no effort to spread obscurantism. 

In a different league are organisations like Sri Ram Sene, notorious for moral policing activities that underline the upper caste patriarchal worldview of its activists. Probably the best known of these — for being in the limelight for over three decades — is the Bajrang Dal, formed by the RSS/VHP in early 1980s with the explicit objective of drawing Hindu youth into the Ram temple agitation. Ayodhya is no longer a big draw and the Dal has receded into the background. Yet, its tale is necessary, especially the eerie account of its Mangalore convenor’s security service. Muslim shopkeepers in the city’s malls are encouraged to hire its services as barter for peace with Bajrang Dal activists!

Not all shadow armies of Hindutva provide cover to protection-rackets. Instead, they were named and probed for years on charges of involvement in various terrorist attacks in the country. Recent events demonstrate that different cases will eventually conclude in acquittals of the accused. Links of Abhinav Bharat and Bhonsala Military School with Hindu nationalists are the oldest, the former established by VD Savarkar and the latter started by BS Moonje. Chapters on these two organisations provide absorbing details on the Nazi influence on early Hindu nationalists and the turf war between Savarkarites and RSS. Particularly intriguing is the RSS “takeover” of the Military School. Yet, the superficial battle did not destroy the organic links between the Savarkarite school and others. 

The current political scenario will embolden more such groups to emerge from sidelines. This alone makes this book an important prologue.
 

The reviewer is a Delhi-based writer and journalist. He authored Narendra Modi: The Man, The Times and Sikhs: The Untold Agony of 1984. Twitter handle: @NilanjanUdwin