RSS reverses position, says gay sex not a crime but still a 'socially immoral act'

The RSS has also been diluting its stands on reservations, temple entry for women, and its uniform in an attempt to appeal to a younger demographic

Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) joint general secretary Dattatreya Hosabale said on Thursday that homosexuality is not a crime if it does not affect the lives of others, reported the Times of India.

In what is a significant shift from the Sangh's conservative views on sexuality, while speaking at the India Today conclave, Hosabale said, "Why should RSS have an opinion on homosexuality? It is not a crime as long as it does not affect the lives of others. Sexual preferences are personal issues."

However, it took a mere 24 hours before Hosabale took the usual two steps back. On Friday, clarifying his comments, he tweeted “Homosexuality is not a crime, but socially immoral act in our society. No need to punish, but to be treated as a psychological case”.

Hosabale also made it clear that he was not batting for legalising gay marriage and said that "gay marriage is Institutionalization of homosexuality. It should be prohibited".

Despite what looks like a retreat from his earlier remarks, Hosbale still stuck to his guns on homosexuality not being a crime.

The comments come in the wake of the Lok Sabha last week voting against the introduction of a private member's Bill, sought to be tabled by Congress leader Shashi Tharoor, for decriminalising homosexuality as defined by Section 377 of the Indian Constitution.

According to the Indian Express, Tharoor blamed the BJP – which has long taken its ideological line from the RSS – for having scuttled his Bill.

The softening of RSS' stance on homosexuality is not new though. In an interview with Business Standard in 2014, RSS leader Ram Madhav had said, "As for Section 377, let us see what stand the government takes on this issue. But I can say this - that while glorification of certain forms of social behaviour is not something we endorse, the penalising and criminalisation aspects need to be looked into. Whether to call homosexuality a crime and treat it as one in this day and age is questionable."

In November last year, while criticising the Supreme Court for reversing the Delhi High Court order de-criminalising consensual sex among gay adults, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley had said: "When millions of people world over are having alternative sexual preferences, it is too late in the day to propound a view that they should be jailed. The Delhi High Court's view appears more acceptable."

Of course, these recent remarks and moves are in stark contrast to the organisation's long held beliefs and stated positions, especially on homosexuality.

Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh's remarks on homosexuality, of more recent vintage than Bhagwat's, also shed light on the fact that existing members of the Sangh, its core constituency, and its old guard might not be on board with this new direction – even if it is the need of the hour.

Last December, as the Supreme Court looked into Section 377, Singh had said: "We will state that we support Section 377 because we believe that homosexuality is an unnatural act and cannot be supported."

What makes Hosabale's comments important is that they come at a time when the RSS is looking to change long-standing practices in order to repackage itself for the Indian youth.

Recently, the RSS decided to do away with its long-standing uniform of brown shorts and replace it with trousers in an attempt to make itself more acceptable to the younger generation. The RSS statement at the end of the three day consultations of its Akhil Bharatiya Pratinidhi Sabha – its top decision making body – in Rajasthan has surprised many for its relatively modern outlook on the entry of women into temples and its efforts to reach out to Other Backward Castes and Dalits.

The Rajasthan meeting also called for social harmony and working towards ending caste discrimination and untouchability. While the statement criticised affluent castes for demanding quota and attempted to reach out to OBCs and SC/STs, recent controversies have yet again betrayed the RSS’s upper caste bias.

Repeated statements by RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat calling for a review of the caste-based reservation policy and the BJP's mishandling of the suicide of Dalit PhD scholar Rohith Vemula have not gone down well with backward castes.

Another shocking volte-face came in December last year when, according to a report in the Telegraph, RSS' all-India prachar pramukh Manmohan Vaidya said that eating beef cannot come in the way of becoming a member of the RSS.

Vaidya, who was on a three-day visit to Arunachal Pradesh, was addressing reporters when he said that "we don't tell society what to eat or not to eat".

Meanwhile, the RSS has moved the needle on women rights also, criticising temples which have barred women from entering their premises.

The ideological u-turn over homosexuality and other issues that clash with a modern temper of the youth seems to be aimed at tapping into that demographic.

As a Business Standard editorial noted earlier this week, these changes can be regarded as “recognition of concern that the BJP needs to address its dwindling mainstream popularity, and the RSS' backward-looking dogma might have stood in its way. The serial controversies over the first year and a half of the National Democratic Alliance, of which the stunning loss in the Bihar Assembly polls was one rude awakening, underlined how far Hindutva ideology, as dictated by the RSS, is out of sync with modern times as well as the multiple ideas of India vested in its population.”

While the RSS claims to have increased its number of ‘shakhas’ from 40,000-odd in 2014 to nearly 57,000 now, the ground reality, says Business Standard's Archis Mohan, is quite different.

Fewer younger men, particularly in urban areas, frequent these ‘shakhas’. The RSS constitution allows only Hindu males above 18-years of age to become swayamsevaks, or volunteers. These volunteers have to attend morning ‘shakhas’, which comprise drills and discussions on current affairs in neighbourhood parks. But there are hundreds of shakhas where no more than half dozen young men, at times not even that, are in attendance.