History is Not Someone’s Ancestral Property – When the left Wants Us to Believe Myths That Don’t Hold Up

 

It is kind of disconcerting that we have so much brouhaha to the kind of unfounded, selective discourse being written about people and the choice of characters we have taken up, just to put across a point. Be it the whole rigmarole about Savarkar’s petition, or the hilarious outrage about Jawaharlal Nehru verging on muted hagiography, there are several problem points that keep getting parroted without substance. Controlling discourse, the once strong citadel of the select few, and glorification of those who had little to say for themselves, is intellectual dishonesty that we wish were not prevalent in the vox populi media and academia of our times, especially when information lies everywhere. However, each point that causes outrage deserves its own dismissal, which shall be presented in a rather brief manner.

The ‘Mercy Petition’ of Savarkar – Different Yardsticks for Different People

So much has been written about the petition about Savarkar as if it was some kind of sin. While much of it has been rebutted time and again, especially by the erudite scholar Vikram Sampath among others in recent times, one wonders if there is true scholarly or nationalist intention to rake up this non-issue.

If a mercy petition is to be the yardstick, there are many other sinners, including Jawaharlal Nehru, who must be equally castigated. It must be recalled that when it came to the Nabha incident during the Akali movement of 1923, Jawaharlal Nehru’s father had rushed in to save his son after spending mere twelve days in jail in Jaitu, to the point that his father filed a petitionsigned a bond and Jawahar promised never to enter Nabha again.

Or perhaps they would like to call Ramprasad Bismil, that great revolutionary, another sellout. He too after all had written a mercy petition. To quote Bismil in his own words:

“Before filing an appeal, I had already sent an application to the Governor that ‘I have not taken part in any secret conspiracies nor will I have any links with these’. This application was mentioned in mercy petition also. But judges did not pay any attention to it.”

The sole reason for the different stroke for a different folk lies entirely in the difference created by the elite historians of India. To portray someone as the villain is essential play with respect to narrative setting, and who else but someone disagreed with ideologically and personally but Savarkar?

The sad bit is that the continued hatred for Savarkar has gone to the extent that no government of India has to date restored the certifications and degrees of Veer Savarkar that had been stripped of him by the British government, be it in Maharashtra or at the Centre. And no, as India’s First Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru certainly did not have the grace or courtesy to do it either.

RSS and the Freedom Struggle – Another Myth of the Liberal Cabal

It is akin to a classic Greek farce that we also have people struggling to ask what role the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh played in the freedom struggle. Many people forget that the founder of the RSS Dr. K B Hedgewar was a member of the Congress party. Even after he withdrew, the members of the RSS in their own individual capacities. The success of the 1930 civil disobedience movement was driven by the mass participation of volunteers in the Central Provinces and Berar remain a matter of record, whatever fanciful abuse one may try to tarnish it with.

Another small example is of the manner in which Aruna Asaf Ali, called by some as the ‘heroine’ of 1942 Quit India Movement, and Sane Guruji, a virulently anti-RSS man, were sheltered by RSS volunteers in their houses when she was evading arrest. Of course, a lot of mental gymnastics often takes place around the RSS’ role in the freedom struggle, but one should ponder and think after leaving aside facetiousness. Did the Congress fight for India’s independence as Congress members or as Indians? And if an organization did not prohibit one from participating in the freedom movement while remaining mum on it officially, does it make an organization some kind of traitor? If so be the logic, all left party members are traitors because they are compadres of the Chinese Communist Party whose murderous intentions of hegemony have resulted in the death of our soldiers repeatedly, be in 1962 or 2020.

The Troublesome Question of the ‘Hindus’ of the Congress

The real problem of the Congress actually stems from its inability to digest the fact that the Congress of the yore was not ashamed of the Hinduness of its leaders as it is today save the odd Temple Run of Shri Rahul Gandhi. Have you ever wondered by Lala Lajpat Rai or Pandit Madan Mohan Malaviya never feature on the posters of the Congress party anywhere? Or have you ever wondered why Indira Gandhi government’s issuing a stamp on Savarkar has remained a no-go area for the Congress of today?

Does it have something to do with the pathological hatred that the Congress party developed towards Hindus in general? Going by the charade of a book written by Congress member Shashi Tharoor, who has rediscovered Hinduism in recent times only to negate his own confused understanding, this seems to be the case. When you see Congress party members parade a slaughtered cow’s head in the name of protest in Kerala, one wonders if the pathological hatred is institutionalized to the point of no return.

Whatever be the case, it is perhaps time to realize that history cannot be the sole proprietorship of a few privileged elite. More so, in this age of knowledge when people dare to read and question, one needs to be more truthful and objective. In the land where a genocide marauder like Aurangzeb gets accommodated, or where a road, heck even a celebrity kid is named after a man like Timur who created a mountain of skulls in Delhi, surely we can be more honest in our conversations about Savarkar and RSS.