- 3 months ago
India’s identity is shifting, with the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh reshaping the nation. As the Hindu nationalist RSS movement marks its centenary, DW explores how it’s become one of India’s most influential and controversial organizations.
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00:00A morning ritual marked by discipline and faith.
00:15This is a shakha, a local assembly.
00:18Here, youngsters are drilled before they learn to question.
00:22The physical training camp is known as the land of penance.
00:27They say the more you discipline yourself here, the more you achieve later.
00:33At the Hindu group, Rashtriya Svayam Sevaksang, or RSS,
00:38the young girls train in self-defense, ready for when the nation needs to fight the enemy.
00:48I never learned as much from school as I learned from the RSS women's wing.
00:52My personality developed there.
00:55Muskan Bansal was introduced to RSS training camps by her grandfather when she was just seven years old.
01:03The first time my family forced me to go, but by the second time I started loving it.
01:09Matara is Muskan's hometown.
01:14The city in northern India is known as the birthplace of Lord Krishna
01:19and holds immense significance for Hindus.
01:22Here, devotion runs deep.
01:24To the deity and increasingly to the ideology of Hindutva.
01:29Hindutva is an ideology that envisions India as a Hindu nation.
01:35For Vijay Bahadur Singh, raised in the RSS, it's more than an ideology, it's a shared identity.
01:56There's power in unity. When you unite, no one can hurt you.
02:02Power in unity, but for whom?
02:06Loyalty here means devotion, not just to India, but to Hinduism.
02:12Those outside the Hindu fold aren't just excluded, they're often viewed with suspicion.
02:18For most RSS followers, the perceived threat isn't distant, it's next door.
02:24Muslims are the first to be considered. Anyone who wants to create unrest in the country is seen as an enemy of the nation.
02:37Across India, hate speech and violence against religious minorities, especially Muslims, has intensified in recent years.
02:45Even in Delhi, interfaith couples live in fear, targeted simply for loving across a religious divide.
02:53When a Muslim converts to Hinduism, it's called homecoming.
03:00But when a Hindu converts to Islam, it's called love jihad.
03:06This couple fled their hometown in Uttar Pradesh, hoping for safety in India's capital.
03:13Ghanak, an NGO for interfaith couples, explained their rights to them under the Special Marriage Act,
03:20a law that allows love across religions without conversion.
03:24But the safety they sought has not materialized.
03:27We came to Delhi hoping for protection, thinking we could file our case.
03:33But the exact opposite happened.
03:37While some couples hide in fear, others celebrate their faith, and their place in a society that increasingly rewards religious loyalty.
03:52In Mathura, Muskan's family gathers for Raksha Bantan, a festival honoring the protective bond between siblings.
04:01For Muskan's family, the RSS, or sang, is more than an organization.
04:07It's a guiding force, passed down through generations.
04:10Muskan's grandfather, Om Prakash, joined the sang in the 1950s.
04:14For decades, he led local shakas, or assemblies.
04:18Running the sang's assemblies alone will not work.
04:23The purpose of a shaka is to build individuals.
04:27But what will we do with the individuals?
04:30We will send them wherever society needs them most.
04:33We are in that very line of work, bringing people together and steadily instilling in them our spirit of nationalism.
04:54Every day across India, volunteers gather, disciplined and devoted.
05:00The RSS says it currently runs over 80,000 branches, with millions of followers across India, and in many other countries too.
05:10A movement that presents itself as a guardian of Hindu values.
05:15The RSS claims to be the world's largest volunteer organization.
05:27Founded in 1925 as a Hindu nationalist movement, it promotes a socio-cultural identity, but is often classified as a paramilitary force.
05:38The head of the RSS is Mohan Bhagwat.
05:43His words carry weight, shaping how millions see India, Hinduism, and their sense of belonging.
05:50At a centenary celebration in October 2024, he made his position clear.
05:56The belief that India belongs first and foremost to Hindus lies at the heart of the RSS worldview.
06:22The Sangh works in so many different dimensions.
06:32People can't even imagine.
06:35For the sake of society, and to take this nation to the highest level, the Sangh will do whatever is necessary.
06:43Today, that vision shapes national politics.
06:52The RSS is closely tied to Prime Minister Narendra Modi's party, the BJP, in power for over a decade.
07:00On Independence Day 2025, Modi praised the RSS from the Red Fort, the symbolic heart of Indian democracy.
07:09People are placed in crucial positions within the government structures.
07:10People are placed in crucial positions within the government structures.
07:14In order to suggest, to guide, to control, to let it be known what is the RSS's wish.
07:19You see, it's also very interesting, given the power of the RSS and the understanding that they are
07:26like the spinal cord, you know.
07:51For many devout Hindus, Modi's 2014 election victory marked the rise of a leader shaped by the discipline and worldview of the RSS.
08:04He began his political career as a full-time organizer within the movement.
08:09Narendra Modi is from the RSS himself.
08:19His ideology, his way of thinking have been shaped since childhood.
08:24There, he learned how to move our country forward and how to build society.
08:30The core of the RSS ideology, at its very core, there is an anti-Muslim bias.
08:38There's an anti-minority bias, brought in the Christian, but when you reduce it to its hard core, there is a very strong anti-Muslim bias.
08:48If you take it away, nothing is left of the RSS ideology, actually.
08:53The thinking that now shapes policy, public discourse and daily life in India was once on the margins.
09:01To understand the present, it helps to look at the past, to India's fight for independence from Britain.
09:08Led by Mahatma Gandhi, he envisioned a secular republic built on non-violence and pluralism.
09:17But independence came with partition and the birth of Pakistan.
09:22India was split in two.
09:24Divided not just by borders, but by beliefs.
09:29The rushed division triggered one of history's largest mass migrations.
09:35Communal violence left deep scars. Religion became a fault line.
09:42The time of the partition was truly terrifying.
09:48The next two or three years were years of unrest.
09:53And people felt that if anyone could protect them, it was the sun.
09:58Essentially, what we have in the situation immediately following independence now, is that there are two distinct visions of India.
10:08One is the predominant majority vision, which is advanced by the freedom struggle, symbolized by Gandhi, Nehru, the Congress.
10:17Which is the clear-cut vision of a secular, democratic, socially just, pro-poor India.
10:24And the other is the one which is espoused by the Hindu Massa Bar, SS and such forces.
10:31Which is, they want a mirror image of Pakistan.
10:34If Pakistan is going to be a Muslim state, well then India obviously, logically, must be a Hindu state.
10:42As time passed, the ideological divide grew deeper.
10:47This whole embedded ideology of anti-Muslim bias and hatred and all comes out in the form of an attack on the Congress and Gandhi.
10:58Who is the progenitor of partition? The British. Not a word against the British.
11:03The entire thing is turned on the Congress.
11:06And this is Gandhi, he is compromising with Muslims, they are pro-Muslim.
11:12Gandhi's inclusive and non-violent ideals clashed with rising religious nationalism.
11:18A clash that, to some, had to be silenced.
11:21Mahatma Gandhi was overly committed to non-violence.
11:28And that is okay.
11:30But he had one shortcoming.
11:33He would never oppose the wrongs committed by Muslims.
11:37And yet to Hindus he would say,
11:40If someone slaps you on one cheek, offer the other as well.
11:45Believing that Gandhi had betrayed Hindus, appeased Muslims and weakened the nation,
11:54Nataram Ghatsa, a Hindu Masaba activist and former RSS member, assassinated him in 1948.
12:02The killing shocked the world.
12:05I met the cries of a nation overwhelmed with grief.
12:08Gandhi's killer was sentenced to death and hanged in 1949.
12:15The finger of blame quickly turned to the RSS.
12:18Though no charges were brought, the organization was banned,
12:22accused of spreading hate and fueling violence.
12:281948 to 50 was a time of suppression and annihilation for the RSS.
12:33Aum Prakash recalls how different things were back when he first considered joining the RSS.
12:40He says others dissuaded and even shamed him.
12:44To this day no one questions whether Ghatsa actually had links to the RSS.
12:50But those in power can make any accusation.
12:54They suddenly found an opportunity to crush the RSS.
12:59Then came the countless arrests and acts of persecution.
13:08Members insist the RSS had no role in the assassination.
13:14But the repression helped to forge a radical and resilient movement.
13:18In Meirut, near the Indian capital, a temple built in 2015 by a hard-line nationalist,
13:25now glorifies Gandhi's killer.
13:27Now glorifies Gandhi's killer.
13:31Nathuram Gautsa is a patriot, our idol and role model.
13:40Nathuram Gautsa is a patriot, our idol and role model.
13:44Nathuram Gautsa is still a very small minority opinion.
13:48I do not at all give it greater weight than that.
13:52But it is dangerous because it is now shows the confidence you are out in the open.
13:58What was once a fringe belief is no longer taboo.
14:03When we openly began honoring the name of Nathuram Gautsa,
14:07the police sent us to jail and beat us up.
14:11And the general public insulted us.
14:13Gandhi was a very foolish man who caused the partition of this country.
14:19Millions of people died.
14:21Today our biggest enemy is Islam.
14:23So Hindus need to be armed.
14:25They need to be armed.
14:28Sentiments like these cause huge problems for some members of society.
14:33In India, interfaith relationships can provoke not just social hostility but state violence.
14:40Couples are monitored, harassed and sometimes even brutalized.
14:51When I stepped outside, they shoved me into a car and took me to the Govanpuri police station.
14:57The driver cursed me the whole way, saying things like,
15:00you want to run off with girls, why not from your own family?
15:03Muslims do this, he said.
15:08Then he said, strip him here and make him run on foot.
15:14I was so terrified.
15:17It was the first time anything like this had happened to me.
15:20In that moment, it was just…
15:23Humiliated for loving a Hindu woman.
15:35While he was abused by the police, authorities were trying to convince his Hindu partner to leave him.
15:42I was mentally tortured.
15:47I was pressured not to continue this relationship.
15:53They said many things about Muslims.
15:58And they tried their best to brainwash me and send me back home.
16:04When they refused to give in, her father filed a petition, claiming she wasn't capable of making her own decisions.
16:16The couple turned to the Delhi High Court, seeking protection and the right to stay together.
16:28In Muskan's home, warnings about love jihad were very normal growing up.
16:33The claim is that Muslim men seduce Hindu women to convert them to Islam.
16:42I've heard many Muslims say, it's fine, in a few years we will make this a Muslim country.
16:48So we have to remain vigilant.
16:51But today Hindutva is growing so powerful that they should be afraid.
16:56So either you embrace our roots and culture or leave here.
17:00You can't live here otherwise.
17:02You couldn't survive here.
17:05What does Hindustan mean?
17:08Say it.
17:10The land of Hindus, Hindustan.
17:12When did the Muslims arrive?
17:14Before that, who was here?
17:17It was Hindus, wasn't it?
17:21This rhetoric reflects an exclusive vision of nation.
17:26A century ago, European nationalists rallied around authoritarian ideas of identity.
17:33Mussolini's Italy led the way with fascism.
17:36Currents that resonated with some of the early Hindu nationalist thinkers and movements in India.
17:42In 1925, KB Hetgevar founded the RSS, convinced that India's subjugation began not with the British but centuries earlier under Muslim rule, symbolized by the Mughal Empire and the Babri Mosque.
17:59Hetgevar's mission was to unify Hindus and reclaim India as both the Holy Land and Motherland.
18:05The word secular is so misleading. There's only one true religion.
18:10A vision that excluded Muslims, Christians, and other faiths.
18:15It was inspired by Vinayak Damodar Savakar, who first developed the concept of Hindutva.
18:24The other person who's played a crucial role is Munjay, who we recognize as a leader of the Hindu Mahasaba.
18:33He makes a visit to Italy, coming back from the Round Table Conference of 1931, where he goes and meets Mussolini.
18:42And then he goes and visits the youth and children organizations to see how they are organizing.
18:49And then he comes back and very consciously puts those ideas into practice, that this is how we need to organize.
18:57It wasn't just Mussolini. The RSS top brass also looked to Adolf Hitler, the German dictator, for inspiration.
19:09The valuable possession of this world is the own people.
19:16And for this people, and for this people, we want to ring and we want to fight.
19:26Hitler's ideas were praised in the writings of M.S. Golwakar, the second chief of the RSS.
19:33He says German race pride has now become the topic of the day.
19:38A good lesson for us in Hindustan to learn and profit by.
19:43He's actually approving and recommending that we do in India to the Muslims what Germany has done to the Jews.
19:55Hindus can never be like that. But one thing holds true. You need to fight fire with fire. That is what our principles teach us.
20:12It's not clear whether Golwakar actually condoned the Holocaust. His writings came before its full horror was revealed. But his ideas still shape the RSS.
20:27Today the message travels even faster. Social media has amplified Hindutva's reach, connecting young voices across India.
20:34Today's youth are strong. Everyone wants to do something. There is a desire to do something.
20:41And I believe that if they are on the right path, they can build a future of India.
20:49That desire to build India grounded in Hindutva nationalism would determine the path taken by Vijay Bahadur Singh.
21:02Raised by the RSS worldview, he became deeply involved in Hindu activism and joined a campaign in the early 1990s that reshaped India's political landscape, the Ramjanma Bhumi movement.
21:17At the heart of the movement was Ayodhya, a small town in northern India. It was home to the 16th century Babri mosque, built during the Mughal era.
21:29The mosque had to be removed. This is Lord Ram's place, and this stain had to be removed no matter what.
21:38For Hindu nationalists, the Babri mosque became a symbol of historical grievance.
21:45Reclaiming the land for a Ram temple became a matter of faith and national pride.
21:51The core demand was now a religious demand. The religious demand with a clear-cut communal angle.
22:00You were not just saying, we want to build a grand temple to Ram in Ayodhya or somewhere else.
22:08You chose something where it was a direct conflict with Muslims.
22:15It sparked fierce debate, not just about religion, but about India's secular foundations and national identity.
22:23Campaigners rallied support for the Ram temple.
22:26In 1990, BJP leader LK Advani traveled across India promoting the message.
22:32Backed by the RSS and other Hindu nationalist groups, they mobilized over 100,000 supporters.
22:39The organization felt more and more Ram lovers should reach Ayodhya and show their devotion.
22:49While Hindu hardline foot soldiers like him drummed up religious passions,
22:54the BJP had turned it into a mass political movement.
22:58That set the stage for the fateful day of December 6, 1992.
23:04The turning point came when LK Advani, who was a senior RSS and BJP leader, later became Deputy Prime Minister.
23:13He jumped into the fray and he organized a march.
23:19Speeches would be given by people on the way and a lot of mobilization was done.
23:25And in fact, Mr. Modi himself was involved in the organization of Tithra Teatra.
23:30The government deployed police officers across Ayodhya, but they were outnumbered by hundreds of thousands of protesters who had descended on the town.
23:39All the borders were sealed.
23:44Anyone wearing Hindu symbols like a Tilak, a Mala or a Kanti was arrested by the police.
23:51We jumped over the barricades and did whatever we could.
23:58By sunset, all three domes of the mosque were demolished.
24:04They were torn down.
24:06The demolition unleashed a wave of communal violence across India, claiming over 2,000 lives, most of them Muslim.
24:25But the deeper impact was ideological.
24:28It normalized religious polarization and laid the groundwork for future unrest.
24:34In 2002, even more brutal riots broke out in Gujarat, the western state led by Modi.
24:43The violence went largely unpunished, and the pressure to conform to a Hindu identity grew far beyond politics.
24:52When I was at school, people would say, you were converted during the Mughal era.
24:57Your forefathers were all Hindus.
24:59So why don't you just live as a Hindu?
25:02Why live like this?
25:04But in our view, it wasn't a choice made by us or our parents.
25:08Their relationship isn't rooted in faith, but in love, and in the belief that the rule of law will prevail.
25:17If we made up our minds, if we decided to do this, I don't believe anyone should stop us.
25:26So long as we act within the law, and the law does grant us this power, it is written in our law, so no one should hold us back.
25:36Our greatest hope lies in the Constitution that we have the right to be together even today in a secular country.
25:45But that hope stands in stark contrast to reality.
25:50Religious identity continues to shape public life, affecting how communities interact with each other and the state.
25:58Along with top BJP leaders, Vijay Bahadur Singh was accused, but acquitted, of conspiring to demolish the Babri mosque.
26:07Once imprisoned for their ideological beliefs, Hindu nationalists now find themselves aligned with the political mainstream.
26:15The RSS holds a central place in Indian politics.
26:27That influence was on full display when India's Prime Minister inaugurated the Ram Temple in Ayodhya, on the very ground where the Babri mosque once stood.
26:38The RSS is a new state.
26:47By consecrating Lord Ram's statue, Narendra Modi fulfilled one of the most significant political promises of his 2014 election campaign.
26:57Building a grand temple on the site of the former Muslim mosque.
27:01I think Narendra Modi has a big vision of a Hindu nation.
27:25Our roots run very deep.
27:27He has built the Ram Temple.
27:29He has taken such a big step.
27:36I see the building of the temple as a symbol of what the Hindutva forces want India to be.
27:45We have finally asserted our national identity.
27:48What is that national identity?
27:50Hinduism.
27:51Ram.
27:52The temple.
27:55Today the situation of the country has improved so much.
28:00Even our great leaders and astrologers say that the 21st century is India's century.
28:12As the flames rise in celebration, a century-old vision stands fulfilled and the future of India remains contested.
28:21in Turkey
28:24and a city evet
28:25signing
28:40okay so we've been till of tasse of followers for one another so that the suited and, we get to work with that is sinister.
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