 "Cover of Decoding the RSS: Its tradition and politics. Credits: Amazon.in")
Raosaheb Kasbe’s critique of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) was published in Marathi in 1978, and this translated version was published this year. The book lacks, therefore, the stigma of western elitism that the Sangh Parivar invariably mobilises to discredit criticism against it. No less importantly, Mr Kasbe, a political scientist and scholar of Ambedkar and Dalit movements, challenges the organisation’s ideology not from the standpoint of western liberalism — another bone of Parivar contention — but within the framework of Hinduism and India’s cultural history.
The author needs just six chapters to substantiate his basic argument that the RSS’
