By Nilotpal Basu
The struggle over defending the right to vote has spilled over to issues which are more fundamental to Indian nationhood. At the same time, it has also inevitably brought to fore the question of right to peaceful protest and public assembly. These are the issues which were once thought to have been settled through the adoption of our Constitution on January 26, 1950.
But, obviously, the RSS, which had no role to play in the anti-colonial freedom struggle, did not accept it then. And now, from its position as BJP’s main backseat driver controlling the executive and most of the legislatures, RSS is reasserting its basic opposition to the very symbols which describe Indian nationhood premised on the Republican Constitution.
Apart from intermittent comments and articles by VD Savarkar and MS Golwalkar, the most authentic chronological documentation of this alternative vision exists in the archives of the mouthpiece of RSS —Organiser. RSS’s fierce opposition to the tricolour and its demand for a Hindu nation, Hindi and the saffron flag were articulated forcefully. The July–August1947 issues of Organiser bring out the precise contours of that vision. During the turbulent months of 1947, when India approached independence, the RSS’s opposition to emerging national symbols aimed to redefine the nation explicitly along Hindutva lines.
The name of the Nation, language and flag were not questions of identity; they attempted polarisation between Hindus and the minority communities. The assertion of these counter symbols that the RSS proposed were instruments of exclusion. The July–August 1947 issues of Organizer betray failure of the Sangh to impose their vision. In July 1947, the Constituent Assembly debated the National Flag. As the country moved towards adopting the tricolour, the RSS embarked on a vicious campaign. Bhagwa Dhwaj is the saffron flag that the RSS reveres and is unfurled in their shakhas.
Some sanyasis affiliated to RSS also carry them physically. In its July 17, editorial Organiser lauded the greatness of their Flag. “This is sheer nonsense. The flag represents the nation, and there is only one nation in Hindustan, the Hindu nation, with an unbroken history extending over 5000years. That is the nation, and the flag must symbolise that nation and that national one. We cannot possibly choose a flag with a view to satisfy the desires and wishes of all the communities,” the editorial asserted.
This premise encapsulated a fake narrative about our past showing sporadic anecdotal references to the kingdoms of Hindu kings in parts of India. There is absolutely no historical or archaeological evidence to authentically claim that a Hindu nation bereft of all other communities existed uninterruptedly for 5000 years leading up to Indian independence from the British colonial yoke. In fact, there is no evidence of the Indian nation being exclusively Hindu. And this was clearly witnessed in the struggle against colonial rule, which, in fact, resulted in Indian nationhood described by a unity of diversity. It was a nation which was syncretic by its very nature through assimilation rather than annexation. But RSS contested all that. In singing praise for the Bhagwa Dhwaj, Organiser went on with its fictional narrative to recommend it.
The editorial went on to assume a threatening tone – “It is only the ignorant or the malicious who cannot find or appreciate these particular charm, nobility and grandeur in the Flag (Bhagwa Dhwaj). This flag, and this alone, can be the true national flag of Hindustan. That, and that alone, will be the only one acceptable to the nation. There is growing evidence of this insistent demand on the part of the public, and the Constituent Assembly would be well advised to carry out their wishes.” As much as the RSS insisted on their delusion, the ‘public’ did not share that perception. Obviously, the ‘public’ was moved by their real-life experience of the freedom struggle where the Sangh brass were openly advising the people against joining the struggle for independence. They were acting as loyal British subjects.
Expectedly, the tricolour was adopted by the resolution of the Constituent Assembly. This could not deter Savarkar, whose entire statement was reproduced in the August 7 issue of Organiser. Likewise, Golwalkar also articulated similar views published in the July 3 issue of Organiser. In the August 14 issue of Organiser, a day before the formal declaration of Independence, RSS continued in the same delusional vein, declaring — “The people who have come to power by the kick of fate may give in our hands the tricolour, but it will never be respected and owned by Hindus.
The word Three is in itself an evil, and a flag having three colours has a very bad psychological effect and is injurious to a country.” No wonder that RSS, from those initial days, also indulged in superstitious beliefs. There is no further need for elaborating on what the RSS stood for, but RSS and its affiliates, including the BJP, having now arrogated to itself the sole authority to dispense certificates on who is an anti-national, using the national flag with absolute duplicity. Therefore, the RSS headquarters in Nagpur had not unfurled the national flag for nearly 52 years.
The BJP, however, made a huge noise about hoisting the tricolour at Lal Chowk in Srinagar on Republic Day in 1992. Murli Manohar Joshi, as the BJP President, led the so called Ekta Yatra from Kanyakumari to Srinagar to hoist the tricolour. The scrapping of Article 370was the foremost political agenda of the party at that point in time. Factually, not that the tricolour was not being hoisted, but it was being done by the security forces in different parts of the valley. Therefore, the tricolour has been a very convenient tool to flaunt patriotism and nationalism, notwithstanding the virulent and abusive views about the national flag.
It is heartening that in the course of recent struggles, the national flag — the tricolour — has become a badge of honour for all those who believe in the Republican Constitution and feel threatened by the direction of the Modi Government, which is essentially leading a Corporate-Hindutva nexus and is engaged in hollowing out the basic principles enshrined in the Constitution. The large-scale use of the national flag in the struggles of resistance against the Corporate-Hindutva rule came to be displayed during the twenty-month-old struggle of the peasantry against the three black laws signalling the takeover of Indian agriculture by corporates.
The allegiance of people was expressed by the national flag and appearances of replicas of the Constitution and images of Dr Ambedkar. It is quite natural that, given the basic approach of the RSS, its fascistic tendencies and its indulgence towards promotion of corporate interests, the people fought back and found it appropriate to use the tiranga as the most inspiring symbol of resistance. Therefore, what is happening in the streets of Delhi, and elsewhere in the Gen Z movement and the wider struggle for defending the right to vote —the re-assertion of the tiranga — is not surprising.
The inhuman barbarity by RSS goons without uniform and the uniformed goons of different security forces, on the participants of the struggle against Gyanesh Kumar for the freezing of SIR and greater transparency and non-partisanship in the appointment of Election Commissioners, has resulted in the protesters once again finding the most creative and spirited wielding of tiranga. The ‘tiranga laherao’ call by various organisations of the youth have effectively galvanized authentic patriotic essence in the struggle for saving voting rights and democracy.
The assertion of tiranga has also got inseparably interlinked to the right to protest and Article 19 of the constitution. The entire approach of Delhi Police and the government makes it abundantly clear that notwithstanding the Supreme Court’s assertion that Article 19 will have to be honoured, Delhi Police will go on relentlessly undermine the possibility of protest for detaining and imprisoning the organisers. This reassertion of the tiranga and the right to protest is the greatest thing to have happened in these otherwise dark times. (IPA Service)
