How RSS progenies SJM, VHP and BMS fared over the past four years

With Modi's current tenure as PM nearing its end, Radhika Ramaseshan finds out how Sangh's progenies SJM, VHP and BMS fared over the past four years

Ashwani Mahajan, national co-convener of the Swadeshi Jagran Manch (SJM), an affiliate of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), remembered meeting Finance Minister Arun Jaitley a day after the Narendra Modi government was sworn in.  “Jaitley recalled the National Democratic Alliance’s (NDA's) first tenure (under Atal Bihari Vajpayee) and said we made had a mistake on disinvestments. He admitted we shouldn’t have gone ahead with strategic disinvestments as they brought a bad name to the government,” said Mahajan. “The present government showed a lot of receptivity instead of being confrontational.” 

Perhaps it was the realisation that the SJM itself had relentlessly baited Vajpayee — he was caricatured in its journal Swadeshi Patrika for being “unfaithful” to the Sangh’s economic certitudes — that forced a change of heart. Or more to the point, the SJM concluded that Prime Minister Narendra Modi was unyielding, unlike Vajpayee. 

The SJM remained low-pitched for nearly four-and-a-half years. The RSS’s trade union front, the Bharatiya Mazdoor Sangh (BMS), considered itself “effective” a pressure group in the NDA-II as it was in the preceding tenure when it was helmed by the larger-than-life RSS ideologue Dattopant Thengadi, who would not countenance challenges to his core “swadeshi” beliefs from the government. The Sangh’s third robust progeny, the Vishva Hindu Parishad (VHP), is a shadow of its belligerent self with the patriarch Ashok Singhal gone and the feisty Pravin Togadia out of the way. 

Ayodhya, reconversions and cow protection don’t stand big on the VHP’s table. From September 25 to October 2, its youth activists, banded together under the Bajrang Dal’s banner, plan to edify citizens on traffic rules after a recent statistic revealed that Indian roads had claimed 150,000 people in a year, said Milind Parande, the secretary-general.  “We’re basically a socio-religious-cultural organisation that doesn’t pursue a political agenda,” stressed Parande, reiterating that the BJP claimed political ownership of the Ramjanmabhoomi “movement” only after the VHP had laid a solid foundation.

However, Alok Kumar, the working president — who his VHP associates considered a “moderate” like Vajpayee and not a Togadia replica — showed impatience over the procrastination of a legal verdict on the title suit of Ayodhya’s disputed land. “The Supreme Court is hearing matters during night hours but I don’t understand why this (Ayodhya) matter is adjourned for so many years. A decision will give finality to the dispute,” said Kumar, a lawyer and former Delhi University Students’ Union president. 

If the hearing is delayed again, Kumar said the VHP would convene a “dharma sansad (religious council)” to coincide with the Kumbh Mela in January 2019 at Allahabad in which the seers will firm up a plan of action. Sources in the VHP said the idea was to put the Ayodhya cauldron on simmer and depending on the response, turn up the heat before the Lok Sabha polls.  

Asked if a renewed agitation could upset the law and order, particularly in Uttar Pradesh, Kumar said, “The Ayodhya temple is a matter of commitment for all Indians, including the BJP, which adopted a resolution in Palampur (in 1989) to construct one. If seers ask us to pressure the Centre, we will persuade the government to bring a Bill in this regard in Parliament.” 

The SJM trumpeted the Centre’s freeze on the Land Acquisition, the Rehabilitation and Resettlement (Second Amendment) Bill, 2015, and the termination of the related land Ordinance after being thrice promulgated as the outfit’s “exceptional” achievement in Modi’s tenure, although the Congress had walked away with the credit. “The day the Ordinance was brought in, we opposed forcefully. We came out on the streets for the first and last time in this government. We decided not to fuss over who should get the honours. We were compared with (Congress leader) Sonia Gandhi’s National Advisory Council and that comparison might have reflected poorly on the government,” said Mahajan. 

To each his own outlook. For C K Sajinarayanan, BMS president, a mix of “samvad (parley)” and “sangharsh (struggle)” succeeded in influencing the Centre to discard its labour reforms’ package.  “Look at the implications had the package been implemented. There would have been no labour inspectors, units would have been arbitrarily exempt from labour laws and job permanency would have been done away with, even in the government sector,” said Sajinarayanan, who heads India’s largest union.  The legislation the BMS would want to be enacted in Parliament’s winter session are The Code on Wages, 2017, and the Labour Code on Social Security and Welfare, 2017. 

Asked why the RSS outfits better leveraged their clout vis-a-vis the Vajpayee government, a former SJM activist now with the RSS, said, “The situation is different today. There’s no World Trade Organization trampling upon national sovereignty,  and, therefore, no ‘swadeshi’. There is no overwhelming clamour for a Ram temple. So there’s no place for a second Thengadi or a Singhal. The context makes the man.”


What BJP’s sister organisations want:

Vishva Hindu Parishad	Bharatiya Mazdoor Sangh	Swadeshi Jagran Manch
Enquiry commission to probe “foreign funding” to churches, churches’ alleged relations with terror groups, alleged exploitation of nuns and child trafficking	Social security right to all workers in organised and unorganised sectors	Stall promotion of mandatory fortified staple food served to pre-school children in “anganwadi” centres until proper safety net is in place
Religious freedom Ordinance to stop “illegal” conversions	Medical benefit to workers even after retirement	“Course correction” at

the Niti Aayog after member 

Ramesh Chand termed MSP given to farmers as “inflationary”

Separate ministry/department at 

the Centre and in states for cow protection

Statutory right to a national minimum wage Ban NGOs allegedly promoting pharma firms making “contentious vaccines”