New Delhi: RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat Sunday said the country was in need of “intellectual warriors” who can introduce it to the rest of the world from “India’s perspective”.
Bhagwat said foreign invaders have broken centres of unity and religious faith in India. “They demolished our thousands of years of education and economy, and imposed their own systems. Therefore, we do not think of becoming a master but a servant,” he said.
The RSS chief was attending an event to release a book titled Aitihasik Kaalgana: Ek Bhartiya Vivechan by Ravi Shankar, director of the Centre for Civilisational Studies in Delhi. The book raises a number of questions on Indian historiography.
“Those who came to India tried to understand ‘Bharat’ through a westernised manner but they could not understand the diversity of ‘Bharat’, its languages, traditions, culture, etc. Though for us there was never a problem in understanding it,” he said.
He also said to rule over Indians, the foreign forces broke the ancient systems of knowledge. “Whether it was education, economy. They replaced it with their own systems, they cut us off from our own languages. They imposed their own definitions there in place of it.
“The system which is in place today to keep the nation united, even that system is abused, to show ourselves as different. This mentality, this limited vision through which we see things, we will have to rid ourselves of that,” he added.
“The first aggressive powers came to India for wealth. But all of them became part of us. Later, Islam came in a different form. Its sense was that whoever is like us, will remain and those who are not like us do not have the right to live. For this, our cultural symbols were broken. The fight lasted for a long time,” he said.
“But fighting is also the cause of a relationship. As a result, the aggressors also started being influenced by the Indian cultural tradition. The process of harmony began, in which people like (Mughal prince) Dara Shikoh, who read, knew, translated the Vedas,” he added.
However, this was not “amenable” to people who believed in invasion, Bhagwat said, and added how Mughal Emperor Aurangzeb broke the process of establishing unity with Muslims. “What Aurangzeb did was to create a feeling of separatism among the Muslims of this country and steer them away from the path of unity.
“This is done even today. The only difference is that there is no foreigner here today. Everyone is a descendant of Bharatiyas and Hindus. But if they are aware of this, then this would end the business of those who try and create differences for political interest. To ensure those businesses flourish that’s why these attempts are made over time. But there is no need to be scared of such attempts,” he added.
Citing Mahatma Gandhi’s example, Bhagwat said India will soon awaken with more energy and illuminate the world. “Gandhiji had said that Hindutva is the name of continuous research for truth, but the Hindu society is tired of doing all this work. That is the reason for its bad time. But whenever it will wake up, it will awaken with more energy than before and also illuminate the whole world.”
He, however, had a word of caution. “But what is a cause of concern is that we should not forget (our knowledge system).”
Bhagwat said at a later stage came the attack of Islam whose aim was to destroy other beliefs. He further added that the British would have faced the same fate as the Islamic attackers. But they realised that the knowledge structure of India will come in the way of their invasion, which is why they “demolished” the knowledge structures.
“That’s why to break our unity they broke our administration, our education, forced their own definitions on us,” he said.
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‘Everyone wants to associate oneself with India’
Recounting the glorious past of India, Bhagwat said there was a competition to associate oneself with India, in some way or the other.
“A person like Hitler called himself Aryan because Arya (Bhartiya Aryan) was a respected word in ‘Bharat’. And he stressed how they were the reputed Aryans. Though there was no link at all, he did it for his political interests and selfish reasons,” Bhagwat said.
Bhagwat rued the fact that Indians today struggle to think in their own languages. “They called our system of proof backward and brought in their own system. Today, we can’t think in our own language and on the basis of our own arguments. This is the situation of our scholars today too because they have cut down the base for studying knowledge,” he added.
Commenting on the feeling of “inferiority complex” visible among Indians, Bhagwat said, “We got this feeling that we don’t have anything. Our ancestors never achieved any wealth or anything good. Whatever was done was by the British. The impact of the material in our genes is that we can become good ‘sevak‘ but for becoming a master someone will have to come constantly. At the most, we change our masters but we can never become masters.
“Even today, we have got such a clear proof. No one has come from outside in this country. For the past 40,000 years, all those who have been living in ‘Bharat’ are the same. Our genetic lineage has been going on since then. We are all from here and there is such clear proof but even then these things don’t leave our minds because those things have been cut off from our minds through which we knew those things. Hence, there is a need to remove the barrier of foreign influence and think without it,” he added.
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