Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, abbreviated as RSS (Rāṣṭrīya Svayamsēvaka Saṅgha; IPA: [rɑːʂˈʈriːj(ə) swəjəmˈseːvək ˈsəŋɡʱ], lit. "National Volunteer Organisation"[12] or "National Patriotic Organisation"[13]), is a right-wing,[1] Hindu nationalist,[5] paramilitary[4] volunteer organisation in India that is widely regarded as the parent organisation of the ruling party of India, the Bharatiya Janata Party.[14]
Founded on 27 September 1925, the organisation calls itself a non-governmental organisation,[15] the world's largest such, and claims a commitment of selfless service to India.[16] The initial impetus was to provide character training through Hindu discipline and to unite the Hindu community to form a Hindu Rashtra (Hindu nation).[17][18] The organisation carries the ideal of upholding Indian culture and civilizational values. It drew initial inspiration from European right-wing groups during World War II.Gradually RSS grew into a prominent Hindu nationalist umbrella organisation, spawning several dozen affiliated organisations that established numerous schools, charities and clubs to spread its ideological beliefs.
The RSS was banned once during British rule, and then thrice by the post-independence Indian government — first in 1948 when a former RSS member assassinated Mahatma Gandhi;then during the emergency (1975–77); and for a third time after the demolition of Babri Masjid in 1992. The ban imposed in February 1948 was withdrawn in July 1948, on the condition that RSS would purely be a cultural organisation, and have no politics of its own.
RSS was founded in 1925 by Keshav Baliram Hedgewar, a doctor in the city of Nagpur, British India.[24] He had been charged with sedition in 1921 by the British Administration and was imprisoned for one year.[25]
Hedgewar was educated by his elder brother. He then decided to study medicine in Calcutta, West Bengal. He was sent there by B. S. Moonje in 1910 to pursue his medical studies. There he lived with Shyam Sundar Chakravarthy[26] and learned the techniques of fighting from secret revolutionary organisations like the Anushilan Samiti and Jugantar in Bengal. He is said to have joined Anushilan Samiti and he had contacts with revolutionaries like Ram Prasad Bismil.[27]
Previously he was involved in such type of revolutionary activities, a fact disclosed by writers such as viz. C. P. Bhishikar,[28] M. S. Golwalkar,[29] K. S. Sudarshan[30] and Rakesh Sinha.[31]
After completing his studies and graduating, he returned to Nagpur, inspired by the armed movement. In his memoirs, the third chief of RSS, Balasahab Deoras narrates an incident when Hedgewar saved him and others from following the path of Bhagat Singh and his comrades.[32] Later he left the revolutionary organisations in the year 1925 and formed the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh.
A rare group photo of six initial swayamsevaks taken on the occasion of a RSS meeting held in 1939[33]
Since Hedgewar was primarily associated with the Hindustan Republican Association, he adopted the full constitution of erstwhile HRA and implemented it forcibly in his newly established organisation RSS later on. The RSS first met in 1925 just after two months of Kakori train robbery in a small ground of Nagpur with 5-6 persons on Vijaya Dashami.[not in citation given] After the formation of the RSS, Hedgewar kept the organisation away from having any direct affiliation to any of the political organisations then fighting British rule.[34] But Hedgewar and his team of volunteers, took part in the Indian National Congress, led movements against the British rule. Hedgewar was arrested in the Jungle Satyagraha agitation in 1931 and served a second term in prison.