Title: Blaming Sangh
'obsession' with left historians: RSS ideologue
Author: Press Trust
of India
Publication: The Observer
Of Business And Politics
Date: February 28, 2000
Blaming the Sangh parivar
for the decision of the Indian Council of Historical Research (ICHR) to
recall and review two volumes of Towards Freedom was a 'ruse' on the part
of the Leftist historians to cover up their prejudices and failures, RSS
ideologue and director of 'Bharatiya Vichara Kendram' P Parameswaran said
here on Sunday.
"This has become an obsession
with them. They see a ghost in every bush. Anything that happens they see
the hand of the Sang Parivar in it," Parameswaran said in an interview
here.
"It is unfortunate that
the Sangh's name is drawn into the controversy. It seems the only way for
them to gain some credibility," Parameswaran, who was recently nominated
to the the court of Jawaharlal Nehru University, said reacting to the charge
that two volumes of the Towards Freedom, edited by Prof. K N Panikkar and
Prof. Sumit Sarkar, were recalled by the ICHR from the publisher following
pressure from the Sangh Parivar.
"The book has not been
withdrawn. It was being recalled by the ICHR for a review by a panel of
eminent historians. Why do they pre-judge? They have got a case if the
book was withdrawn," Parameswaran said.
"The Parivar has got
to do plenty of its own work. The ICHR and the HRD ministry are capable
of doing their job," Parameswaran said. Holding that there was nothing
wrong in having a re-look at the volumes, he said bringing out the truth
was not only in the interest of ICHR, but also in the interest of history
itself.
Even if the book was
withdrawn they (the editors) were free to get their work published. "Nobody
could stop them from publishing their work," he said when asked about the
charge of Prof. Panikkar that the present leaders of the country were 'afraid
of history.'
"In the past a similar
work by Prof. R C Majumdar was withdrawn. Instead of going hammer and tongs
at others, Majumdar got it published on his own," he said.
On the charge that the
Sangh Parivar was afraid of getting the "collaborationist role" of the
Hindu Mahasabha and RSS in the freedom struggle, Parameswaran shot back
"what about their (communists') collaborationist role?" "The worst they
can say about the RSS is that it did not participate in the freedom struggle.
But the communists did betray the freedom struggle.
Maybe it is a too well
known fact," he said. "If the rss did not directly participate in the freedom
struggle that was because it was a social and cultural movement. The role
of the RSS was to organise the Hindu society. They can put the same charge
on the Sree Ramakrishna Mission also alleging that it did not participate
in the freedom struggle," Parameswaran said.
Charging its adversaries
with drawing on selective sources and quoting out of context to criticise
the RSS, he said the Sangh's critics often quoted from M S Golwalkar's
work We, our nation hood defined.
This was a work published
in the late '30s when Guruji (Golwalakar) was not the head of the Sangh.
After he became the head of the Sangh the book was not used or re-published.
The Leftist historians
have been quoting the book arguing that this was the ideological basis
of the RSS, he said. The 'bunch of thought', a compilation of Golwalkar's
speeches and writings, could be considered as ideological basis of the
RSS. But they could find nothing objectionable in it, he held. Confirming
that he accepted his nomination to the JNU court, Parameswaran said "it
is good to be on such a body."
