Chennai: The claim of RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat that India is a Hindu nation and Hindutva its identity is a “challenge” to the concept of secular India, CPI(M) General Secretary Prakash Karat said Wednesday.
“RSS head Mohan Bhagwat has repeated his claim time and again. It is a basic challenge to the concept of a secular India,” he told party workers at a meet organised by party magazine ‘Marxist'.
The Indian citizenship, according to the view of the Left, was defined not by religious affiliation and “anyone who was born and lives in the country irrespective of caste or religious origin is a citizen and that (character) is challenged and questioned by the RSS,” he noted.
Hitting out at the RSS, he said its project of “making India a Hindu rashtra that is Hindtva” is contrary to the tenets of the Indian Constitution.
The definition of citizenship under the Constitution itself was not acceptable to the RSS, he claimed.
“This politics and ideology of Hindutva is sought to be imposed over the country and we see efforts to target minorities,” he said.
What was happening in Uttar Pradesh was an attempt to ‘recreate Gujarat' and there have been 27 incidents of communal clashes in UP after the Lok Sabha polls, he said.
“The communal poliarisation in UP before elections is sought to be carried on so that the BJP and RSS can establish their political hegemony over the biggest state in our country,” he alleged.
Condemning the BJP government at the Centre for its “vigorous” neo-liberal policies, Karat said several proposed cuts in subsidies across various sectors, including those for fertilisers and a “big curtailment in allocation for MNREGA” are on the anvil.
“Cuts in food subsidy is going to affect food security in terms of PDS and all these attacks are coming. The Left will be in the forefront to protect people,” he said.
Claiming that market capitalisation of shares of Adani group had gone up by Rs 8,600 crore after the Modi regime took over, he said except Left parties, none could stand up to “this corporate power.”
The Left had taken lessons after the LS poll debacle and it was important to widen and deepen Left unity by bringing all streams of Left like CPI(ML) to work together.
“This broad Left platform will take up issues of the people,” he said.
Sharing some plans to rejuvenate the Left movement to provide a pro-people alternative in politics, he said action plans were being put in place to effectively reach out to all sections of people through several avenues, including by using media and technology.
“The Left will have its own independent platform in politics,” he said.
“We are not going to subordinate the Left ideology and programmes to that of any other party. No electoral exigency will be able to prevent us from adopting an independent Left platform in coming days,” he added.
