With the Union government led by the Bharatiya Janata Party — the political arm of the Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh — embarking on a perception management exercise, the Sangh wants the focus of the outside world and the media to shift from its pro-Hindutva rhetoric to its welfare and social service activities.
RSS leaders made news in the first year of the Modi government for their rhetoric on programmes such as ghar wapsi (religious conversion), embarrassing the government in the international arena and causing unease to religious minorities back home.
The RSS leadership has instructed its publicity divisions across the country to propagate the Sangh’s social service credentials over and above everything else, multiple sources in the RSS’s Prachar Vibhag (publicity department) said.
“The resistance to conversion will continue, but the focus will be on talking about social welfare activities,” a source said.
Vast networkThe RSS currently coordinates nearly 1.5 lakh service activities through the Rashtriya Sewa Bharati, a confederation of different RSS-affiliated organisations. The number of organisations affiliated with the RSB has grown from nearly 450 five years ago to more than 800, with a spurt seen in the past one year. Sangh leaders concede that service activities are among the easiest way to spread the reach of the RSS and its affiliates.
“The Sangh has been growing and spreading in all parts of society. Sewa activities started with Dr. Hedgewar [founder of the RSS], who was a doctor and used to provide free services,” Surya Prakash Tonk, who took over as chief of the RSB from the current Sarkaryavah (general secretary), Suresh Bhaiyyaji Joshi, in 2009, said.
Mr. Tonk recently said in Delhi that RSS Karyakartas (workers) were able to collect donations and supplies for Nepal earthquake victims from “all communities despite our apprehensions that the RSS banner would deter donations from certain sections”.
“Service activities are the best measure of what we learn and how we apply it and the best way to connect with the have-nots,” he said.
Sources said with Mr. Joshi’s experience as all-India chief of Sewa activities, his elevation to the position of Sarkaryavah helped the Sangh leadership realise the importance of social work projects for its spread and the Sangh was currently working on a major organisational expansion plan leading up to its centenary in 2025.
“Whenever a BJP-led government comes to power, sewa activities go up. They are a catalyst for organisational spread,” an RSS source in Delhi said.
