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Sangh Parivar
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The Sangh Parivar (translation: Family of Associations) refers to the family of organisations built around the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh. The Sangh Parivar represents the Indian nationalist movement. It includes the Bharatiya Janata Party and several dozen smaller organisations, whose members' expressed political opinions range from the extreme right to the relatively moderate.
The Sangh Parivar tends to promote Hindutva; economically, it advocates the Swadeshi ("self-reliance") philosophy, though this has also been a source of major disputes between various factions of the Sangh Parivar.
ideology of the Sangh Parivar has been seen to have a diverse set of thoughts and opinions that has made it difficult to be categorized by the Western stereotypic divisions of ‘Leftists’ and ‘Rightists’.
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Encyclopedia
The Sangh Parivar (translation: Family of Associations) refers to the family of organisations built around the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh. The Sangh Parivar represents the Indian nationalist movement. It includes the Bharatiya Janata Party and several dozen smaller organisations, whose members' expressed political opinions range from the extreme right to the relatively moderate.
The Sangh Parivar tends to promote Hindutva; economically, it advocates the Swadeshi ("self-reliance") philosophy, though this has also been a source of major disputes between various factions of the Sangh Parivar.
Ideology
The ideology of the Sangh Parivar has been seen to have a diverse set of thoughts and opinions that has made it difficult to be categorized by the Western stereotypic divisions of ‘Leftists’ and ‘Rightists’. While some of their policies are seen as ‘Conservative’ and ‘Rightist’, on a range of different issues, they have shared similar concerns as Leftists, Liberals and the Green activists.
The political opponents of the Sangh Parivar have often termed Sangh Parivar’s concerns about cultural intrusion by the Western commercial interests as ‘Rightist’ . But as David Frawley has pointed out the cause is similar to the cause of native and tribal peoples all over the world, like Native American and African groups, who too are trying to protect their native cultures. The cause of the natives is supported by Liberals in America
Sangh ideologue M S Golwalkar articulated the Sangh’s vision on diversity and pluralism, as follows, “Individuals and nations in all parts of the globe have distinctive traits and features, each of them having its own place in the scheme of the universe. The different human groups are marching forward, all towards the same goal, each in its own way and in keeping with its own characteristic genius. The destruction of the special characteristics, whether of an individual, or of a group, will therefore not only destroy the natural beauty of harmony but also its joy of self-expression. Evolution of human life also, which is a multifaced one, is retarded thereby.”
While, the BJP Governments have been progressively seen to be Industry friendly , the opinions and the views of the Sangh Parivar constituents like Bharateeya Mazdoor Sangh (BMS) find consonance with the known Leftist stands on labor rights.. The Sangh Parivar, as a whole, even the BJP in its earlier days, has advocated ‘Swadeshi’ (Self Reliance).
Sangh Parivar leaders have been very vocal in their criticism of Globalization especially its impact on the poor and native people. They have been suspicious of the role of International agencies such as World Bank and the IMF. Sangh constituents have advocated and promoted decentralized village centric economic growth with emphasis on ecological protection.
The constituents of the Sangh Parivar have been known for their demands for steps to “protect the environment, natural-ecology and agro-economy” and for establishment of a “self-reliant village-oriented economy”. . They have been vocal in their demand against the use of Chemical fertilizers and have supported preservation and development of Organic farming in India. Many of these views are seen to mirror the concerns of the Green Party.
While the different organizations within the Sangh Parivar have perused different policies and activities, the stated mission of these activities has been "attaining the 'Saravangeena Unnati' (all-round development) of Bharat" .
Putting it in the words of Shri M S Golwalkar “in order to be able to contribute our unique knowledge to mankind, in order to be able to live and strive for the unity and welfare of the world, we stand before the world as a self-confident, resurgent and mighty nation.”
Religious and Social impact
The activities of the Sangh Parivar have had considerable social and religious impact.
The voluntary organisations which are part of the Sangh Parivar, today run more than one lakh service projects in remote areas of the country mostly within the economically and socially neglected sections of the society. ([Rashtriya seva bharathi report]). As against the commonly held belief that the Sangh Parivar is anti-muslim, there have been many instances where the Muslims have been directly benefitted from its service projects. One such instance was when Sewa Bharti, affiliated to the Sangh Parivar, adopted 100 children, most of them Muslims, from militancy affected areas of Jammu and Kashmir to provide them education.
In 1979, the religious wing of the Sangh Parivar, the Vishwa Hindu Parishad got the Hindu saints and religious leaders to reaffirm that untouchability and caste discrimination had no religious sanction in the Hindu scriptures and texts. “. The Vishwa Hindu Parishad is also spearheading efforts to ordain Dalits as priests in temples accross India, positions that were earlier usually occupied only by people of "upper castes".
The service programs, over the years, have led to the empowerment of the economically and socially underprivileged sections of the society, mostly the tribal, who have long remained politically under-represented. Babulal Marandi belonging to the tribal community, who was the organizing secretary of Vishwa Hindu Parishad, became the first Chief Minister of the state of Jharkhand. Other such leaders of Sangh Parivar who belong to the tribal community include Karia Munda, Jual Oram both ministers in the Union Government led by Atal Bihari Vajpayee.
The emergence of the Sangh Parivar in Indian politics also brought many Dalits and representatives of the backward classes, who had been victims of social neglect, to prominent positions in the Government and Administration. Dr Suraj Bhan, a dalit, who had been a member of the RSS, became the Governer of Uttar Pradesh, the most populous state in India, in 1998. . Other leaders of the Sangh Parivar from the backward classes, who rose to prominence include Gopinath Munde, the former Deputy Chief Minister of Maharashtra, and Shivraj Singh Chauhan, the Chief Minister of Madhya Pradesh.
The leaders of the Sangh Parivar have also been involved in the campains against female fetocide and movements for the education to the girl child.
The Sangh Parivar has spread Hindu nationalism through local "Bhagat schools", in which children are provided a Sangh-sanctioned education. In many villages across India, dharma raksha samitis (Religion protection committees) promote religious discourse and form an arena for bhajan performance. The Sangh sponsors calendars of Hindu deities and provides instruction on sanctioned methods of conducting Ganesh Chaturthi and Navaratri. This phenomenon has been documented in Tamil Nadu, where high caste workers of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh and Hindu Munnani teach Tamil dalits (untouchables) devotional hymns and persuaded many dalits to begin celebrating Ganesh Chaturthi, a festival not widely marked in Tamil Nadu.
The Sangh has also promoted changes in caste identity as its promotion of the God Krishna in Uttar Pradesh led to the lower caste Ahirs joining the Yadav caste, though the Yadav's en masse do not support Hindutva. This phenomenon is described by Poornima Mankekar and Christopher Fuller as an "incorporation of Hindu nationalist themes in the local Yadav narratives".
Reception
The Sangh Parivar has been described with monikers spanning the spectrum from "patriotic Hindus" to "Hindu nationalist" to "Hindu chauvinist".
David Frawley, an American author and indologist observed "Its brand of Indian nationalism, recognizing cultural and religious pluralism, is more tolerant than most American nationalism. The organization is free of caste and members are not judged by their material status."
Former President A.P.J. Abdul Kalam has lavished praise on veteran Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) leader Nanaji Deshmukh and the organization started by him, the Deendayal Research Institute (an organization of the Sangh Parivar), for giving the nation the litigation-free model of resolving disputes he had devised. The President said "In Chitrakoot, I met Nanaji Deshmukh and his team members belonging to the Deendayal Research Institute (DRI). DRI is a unique institution developing and implementing a village development model which is most suited for India," the president said. "Apart from all the development activities, the institute is facilitating a cohesive conflict free society. As a result of this, I understand that the 80 villages around Chitrakoot are almost litigation-free". "The villagers have unanimously decided that no dispute will find its way to the court. The differences will be sorted out amicably in the village itself. The reason given by Nanaji Deshmukh is that if the people fight among each other, they have no time for development," the President added. "I consider that this model may be propagated in many parts of the country by societal organisations, judicial organisations and government," Kalam contended.
Praising Nanaji Deshmukh for his single-minded devotion to the uplift of the people, Kalam said “what the octogenarian leader was doing at Chitrakoot should be an eye-opener for others.”
Prominent industrialist, Jeh Wadia, the grandson of Muhammad Ali Jinnah, is influenced by the work of
Sangh organisation, Deen Dayal Research Institute (DRI), and is now a volunteer of the DRI. He says
"At 26, I realised that while I was seeking responses to my questions, the answer was always in front of me. That's when I joined Nanaji and got involved in social work at Chitrakoot,"
"Nanaji (founder of DRI) envisions self reliance for 600,000 villages in his life time. It is my dream to
translate Nanaji's vision of ameliorating the lives of this rural population."
There has been considerable debate whether the RSS and Sangh Parivar could be considered fascist. While its constituent organisations present themselves as embedded in the traditional ethos of Hinduism, their ideological opponents, mainly the leftists, have characterised them as the representatives of authoritarian, xenophobic and majoritarian religious nationalism in India. Belgian scholar Koenraad Elst has dismissed the portrayal of Sangh Parivar's ideology as fascist by some leftist groups. He writes in his doctoral thesis, which is now published as a book The Saffron Swastika, “So far, the polemical arrows have all been shot from one side, replies from the other side being extremely rare or never more than piecemeal”
The Bharatiya Janata Party, which represents the Sangh Parivar in national politics, has formed several governments in India, most recently being in power from 1998 to 2004 under prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee.
Political opponents of the BJP maintain that the party's moderate face merely serves to cover the Sangh Parivar's "hidden agenda" of undiluted Hindutva, detectable by the BJP's efforts to change the content of history textbooks and syllabi as well as other aspects of the education system.[Thakurta & Raghuraman, 2004:64]
Members
The Sangh Parivar includes the following organisations (1998 membership figures in brackets):
- Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), Indian People's Party (17m)
- Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), National Volunteer Association (2.5m)
- Bharatiya Kisan Sangh, Indian Farmers' Association (8m)
- Bharatiya Mazdoor Sangh, Indian Labour Association (4.5m)
- Adivasi Kalyan Kendra (2.3m)
- Fishermen's Co-op Societies (2.2m)
- Vivekananda Medical Mission (1.7m)
- Adhyapak Parishad (1.8m)
- Vivekananda Kendra (1.8m)
- Bharatiya Vikas Parishad (1.8m)
- Deen Dayal Shodh Sansthan (1.7m)
- Rashtriya Sevika Samiti, National Volunteer Association for Women (1.8m)
- Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad, All India Students' Forum (1.8m)
- Janata Yuva Morcha (1.8m)
- Shikha Bharati (2.1m)
- Vishwa Hindu Parishad, World Hindu Council (2.8m)
- Hindu Swayamsevak Sangh, Hindu Volunteer Association – overseas wing
- Swadeshi Jagaran Manch, Nativist Awakening Front
- Saraswati Shishu Mandir, Nursery
- Vidya Bharati, Educational Institutes
- Vanavasi Kalyan Ashram, Organisation for the improvement of tribals
- Bajrang Dal, Army of Hanuman
- Vijnana Bharati, Indian Science Movement
- Samkalp,
- Sanskar Bharati, Organisation of artists
- Sahkar Bharati, Organisation of co-operatives
- Adhivakta Parishad, Lawyers' association
- Vit Salahkar Parishad, Financial consultants' association
- Seva Bharati, Organisation for service of the needy, founded in 1984.
- Bharatiya Vichara Kendra
Footnotes
External links
- – Unofficial website of Sangh Parivar
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