The Hindu Swayamsevak Sangh HSS UK, arranged a very large gathering of 600 British Hindus, Jains and Sikhs at the wonderful venue of the Jain Oshwal Centre in Hertfordshire to greet the RSS Chief Dr Mohan Bhagwat to mark the RSS 100th anniversary this year.
Dr Bhagwat delivered a message of oneness and love among all communities. He said that diversity is the nature’s way which we must accept but the Truth is only one and we must aspire and unite at that level. He explained that Hindutva is essentially the ideology of unity in diversity. It is very much a Hindu Sanatan concept and indeed if you don’t respect the spirituality in other religions then you can’t be a Hindu. RSS unites all Indians: Hindus, Jains, Buddhists, Sikhs, Zoroastrians, Bahai, Christians and Muslims and they all through the RSS organisation work for at community level in Sewa, free, for what you may call the Bhartyia Rashtra, subscribing to the Hindutva ideology of Oneness of Humanity.
The RSS Uniform, which people may buy themselves to wear on a ceremonial event only, is to foster a community spirit of Oneness of all members including Christians and Muslims who subscribe to the Hindutva ideology of ‘Live and Let Live in Diversity but as One Humanity’ – a ruling by the Supreme Court of India on Hindutva that it is a way of life. RSS is not a political organisation but a cultural one.
He went on, so what is the ‘Rashtra’? It is our culture that has survived for over 5,000 years, in spite of various invasions including the last colonialism. The RSS was formed to protect our culture of inclusiveness and oneness – Vasudevaya Katumbakam the world is one family – from occupying ideologies that are exclusive, they leave no room for others, whereas we love every religion every community: Hindutva being the essence of Hindu Sanatan philosophy, of all religious paths leading to the same one divinity.
Dr Bhagwat said that Rashtra does not mean Hindu Nationalism, but it does mean that as a Rashtra, sharing the inclusive culture of 5,000 years, we should not be enslaved in future under any exclusive and supremacist ideology. We must unite to live together in diversity with the Hindutva inclusive ideology.
Dr Bhagwat continued to use phrases like our Humanity Oneness and Love for all. It was inspiring to hear his words of wisdom, first hand. It’s a little wonder that there are over 60,000 daily RSS meetings (Shakas) across India where the members do community welfare work to preserve the Hindutva culture of ‘One Humanity in All Its Diversity’.
Further, I was heartened by the Mantra Hindu Council UK coined to British Hindus after the 7/7/2005 event, which now Dr Bhagwat reminded all that our first duty/loyalty lies to our Karma Bhoomi Britain and second only to our Spiritual Bhoomi India.
I requested Dr Bhagwat whether they could lobby the Indian Government to teach ‘Moral Philosophy’ at schools through discourses on the Bhagwad Gita, as India’s National Heritage Book, whilst equally on other books from other religions that teach pluralism, as has so done the Gita for the last 5,000 years. The Bhagwad Gita teaches us that all spiritual paths are valid – Many paths lead to One Truth, and the One Truth expresses itself in many ways.
Indic religions are not monotheistic, even though they all seek One Ultimate Omkar or God, they are pluralistic. For instance, Jains’ Mahavira a contemporary of Buddha during the 6th century BCE postulated a different path to Buddha’s but they respected each other to have found the same unity of Oneness at the top. Mahavira’s path was of austerity and penance of the ‘Ahimsa-path’ which led to his enlightenment, but Buddha found the ‘middle-path’ to his enlightenment; different paths but they converged in their enlightenment. Several Hindu religious factions of ‘multiple-paths’, and other religions like the Sikh Dharma of the ‘Sewa-Path’, all ‘seek’ the One Omkar but with their own different ways. This is India’s pluralism, the ideology that RSS works to protect, and in which India’s Jews from the BCE era, the Syriac Christians, the Parsi’s and others have never been persecuted, for millennia.
Anil Bhanot
Managing Director
Hindu Council UK
[Hindu Council UK – a national umbrella body representing one million British Hindus of all denominations through their temples and cultural organisations, estd. 1994.]