pls readt it!!
by Abdullah on Sep 21, 2007 11:55 AM
In 1980, we were all in the Janata Party. I was its public relations officer in Mumbai. On the issue of dual membership, the Jana Sangh constituent of the Janata party decided to break away. Socialist members of the Janata Party wanted Jana Sangh members to completely disassociate themselves from the RSS. Their idea was that once the Jana Sangh severs ties with the RSS, it would also lose grassroot support and be at the mercy of socialists. But RSS leaders, BJP leaders and workers of the Sangh Parivar -- everyone -- thought it was time to break away because the Janata Party had no future. The ethos behind founding the BJP was the RSS ideology of Hindutva. We had five commitments. First, we wanted to practise politics to push for our idea of cultural nationalism, which also included the strong belief that India will not give away an inch of territory and will protect its borders. We needed unity within India to ensure that. The RSS was never overtly religious -- it never asked its members to go to the temple or perform pujas or fast. Our idea of religion was nationalism. We believed in matrubhoomi [Motherland] and Bharatmata [Mother India]. We asked our cadres to believe in heroes of the nation like Lord Ram, Lord Krishna, Sri Aurobindo, Lokmanya Tilak and Ramakrishna Paramhans. To some extent Gandhiji -- we believed and admired Gandhi's belief in grassroot-level activism. Second, we thought in 1980 that unlike Congress, ours would be value-based politics. Third, we
