CPI M calls RSS centenary stamp and coin an insult to Constitution

New Delhi: The Polit Bureau of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) on Thursday strongly criticised the release of a postage stamp and a Rs 100 coin to mark the centenary of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), describing it as “a grave insult to the Constitution of India.”

In a statement, the CPI M said that the Prime Minister’s move to commemorate the RSS with official honours amounts to legitimising an organisation that has historically rejected the Constitution and promoted a sectarian vision of a Hindu Rashtra.

The party objected in particular to the design of the coin, which features the image of Bharat Mata in the form of a Hindu goddess, a symbol the CPI M described as part of the RSS’s ideological project to define India as a Hindu nation. The postage stamp, showing uniformed RSS volunteers in the 1963 Republic Day parade, was also denounced as a distortion of history. The statement argued that claims of Jawaharlal Nehru inviting the RSS to march in the parade as recognition of its patriotism during the 1962 war with China were baseless. “The 1963 parade was essentially a citizens’ gathering of more than one lakh people. The presence of RSS volunteers, if any, was incidental and unrecognised,” it said.

The CPI M accused the government of seeking to whitewash the RSS’s role during the freedom struggle, pointing out that the organisation not only kept away from the movement against British rule but also “strengthened the colonial policy of divide and rule” through its sectarian activities.

The statement recalled that independent India has witnessed some of the worst communal violence, in which the role of the RSS has been documented by several official commissions of inquiry. “Even today, the RSS and its affiliates continue to target minorities and marginalised communities while promoting regressive manuvadi ideas,” the Polit Bureau said.

According to the CPI M, by releasing the stamp and coin the Prime Minister has “misused his constitutional office to honour an organisation with a divisive past and present,” thereby lowering the dignity of the post he holds.