Edit/Op-Ed

“Desh Premi” RSS Plays Sardar Patel Card, Forgets Their Past

Zaheer Zaidi for BeyondHeadlines

Old habits die hard. As if facilitating Indian partition was not enough, RSS is now trying to divide Indians. Raising issue of Prime Ministership of Sardar Vallabh Bhai 63 years after the demise of this great grand secular leader is nothing short of a mischief. Who does not know that Sardar Patel was inspired by Gandhi ji to join Congress in 1917.

He remained an ardent disciple of Bapu. He took part in every freedom movement – Non Co-operation movement, Civil Disobedience movement, Quit India Movement, among others. He was imprisoned number of times along-with Gandhi and Nehru, while none of the RSS members took part in any freedom movement and thus were never jailed.

Quite astonishingly, RSS gave in writing to British rulers that they were not supporting the freedom movement. RSS remained against Gandhi ji from the very beginning Gandhi landed at Mumbai sea port on January 9, 1915. He found that the Congress was favouring communal forces and preferring the Brahmins to others. As he wanted to make it a public movement he professed that the Dalits, Adiwasi other Backward classes and women should be roped into the political movement.

Communal forces never accepted leadership of Gandhiji and finally revolted against him. Number of people joined Hindu Maha Sabha and others formed RSS in 1925. They targeted Gandhi ji and Muslim, and never initiated any movement separately for country’s independence nor did they propagate their ideology of Freedom.

On the contrary, Guru Golwakar wrote a book ‘Our Nationhood Defined’ in which he eulogized Adolf Hitler. British did not arrest Golwakar over writing this book as they were aware of his hollowness. In fact communal forces like RSS and Hindu Maha Sabha are responsible equally for unfortunate partition of our beloved mother India.

In the 1937 session of Hindu Maha Sabha, held at Ahmadabad, Sawarkar supported the “Two Nation Theory”. Hegdewar, Golwakar and Shyama Prasad Mukherjee were in league with Sawarkar. British were aware of their cowardice. Thus, they did not pay any attention. Rather they used them against Gandhi ji. In the words of Shahabuddin Rathore, they were like Jai Chand.

First attempt to kill Mahatma Gandhi was made by Hindutva forces on June 25, 1934. A bomb was hurled over his car while he was going to address a meeting at Pune. Gandhi remained unhurt since he was in another car behind. As per the Police report, photographs of Gandhi and Nehru were recovered from the shoes of the attackers.

Till 1934, there was no question of Pakistan. Hence question of 55 crore does not arise. It is clarify that after partition Gandhi ji wanted to give Pakistan’s share of capital i.e. Rs. 55 crore. Communal forces opposed it, and it was the excuse for his murder attempt to kill Gandhiji was made in 1944 when he was 2 convalescing in a lodge in Panchgani. A group of 20 youth, led by Nathu Ram Godse, went to Panchgani in a bus and raised slogans against Gandhiji. He wanted to talk to Godse but Godse refused the offer and attacked him with a knife. He was over powered by the owners of the lodge, Mani Shankar Purohit and Bhilar Guruji. Till 1944, even Jinnah was not sure whether Pakistan would be formed.

Third attempt was made on Gandhiji at Wardha in September 1944. Fourth attempt was made on him on June 29, 1946, when he was going Mumbai from Poona in a special train. The railway track was blocked; but the smart driver saved the mishap. On January 20, 1948, Madanlal Pahwa hurled a bomb on Gandhi ji in his prayer meeting and finally Nathu Ram Godse succeeded in killing him on January 30, 1948 Gandhiji’s assassination and the involvement of Hindu militant groups in it brought Patel and Nehru the close together.

Patel banned the RSS and sent Golwalkar to jail. After his release, Golwalkar made a series of pleas to Patel, hoping to win him over. Patel finally replied him in a letter dated September 11, 1948, telling him what he thought of the RSS “attacking Musalmans”, and that all RSS speeches were “full of communal poison… as a result of the poison, the country had to suffer the sacrifice of the invaluable life of Gandhiji.” Nehru’s apathy to RSS was well known backed fully by Patel.

Patel’s big project was stitching more than 600 princely states into India, using a variety of tools and techniques. He viewed Kashmir as a “severe headache”, and the case was steered by Nehru, due to the latter’s ancestry and personal affection for Sheikh Abdullah. Patel was with Nehru in all his decisions, but Hindu nationalists feel Kashmir should have been managed in the more muscular style of Hyderabad or Junagadh. Nehru and Patel never had any difference of opinion except that Nehru had soft corner for the Communists; Patel didn’t. Now RSS is turning “Desh Premi”.

RSS backed Modi nomination as the PM candidate, who does not know that Sikandar could not cross Sutlej river. He is not aware whether Taxila is in Bihar. To him Chandragupta Maurya was not from Maurya dynasty but from Gupta dynasty. Modi’s only qualification, rather experience is that he got thousands of Muslims killed. He is craving for Sardar Patel’s title of “Loh Prush”, trying to project Patel as a communal leader. That Patel was as secular as Gandhi ji is well known. He visited Amritsar in Sep 48 to organize safe passage for Muslims migrating to Pakistan and offered prayers at Nizamuddin Dargah in 1948. Raising questions over Gandhiji’s choice to nominate Nehru as PM, speaks for itself. The mask RSS is sporting on its face is showing!

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