Mohammed Shafi: Gandhi’s true killer still at large, 72 years later after his death
Gandhi was killed on Jan. 30, 1948, at Birla House, New Delhi.
Written by: Mohammed Shafi of Indo-Canadians For Humanity
On Jan. 26, during a protest in Finland against Indian government’s Citizenship Amendment Act, a passer by of Indian origin was angered by protesters referring to Godse as a Hindu terrorist. The man insisted the crowd not to call Godse, a Hindu terrorist but a murderer.
People apprised of the matter know Nathuram Godse didn’t kill Gandhi due to any personal enmity but because of the latter’s ideology. An ideology that believed in communal harmony and a pluralistic India.
The RSS: extremists on the fringes
Godse’s ideology was inspired from Hindutva or Hinduness, a philosophy promoted by V.D. Savarkar in 1923. It considered anyone who doesn’t consider Hindu culture as theirs, foreigners. This mostly targeted Muslims and Christians. Savarkar had great admiration for Nazism and Hitler. Hindutva projected India as HinduRashtra or a Hindu state.
Godse was a member of Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), a right-wing Hindutva nationalist organization again advocating Hindutva. Though RSS disowned Godse and escaped the temporary ban laid on it soon after Gandhi’s killing, the family of Godse claimed that he never left RSS.
Its important to understand that though the two names seem similar, Hinduism is distinct and distant from Hindutva, and has much broader meaning. Hindus, the followers of Hinduism unlike the followers of Hindutva, are very tolerant. In fact, Gandhi himself was a staunch practicing Hindu.
Godse was eventually hanged on Nov. 15, 1949. However, due to insufficient evidence of his connection with RSS at the time of murder, the ban on RSS was lifted.
The founding forefathers of India most of whom were from Indian National Congress and the followers of Gandhi defined the new formed country of India to be pluralistic. The constitution which was effective from Jan. 26, 1950 considered everyone within the territory of India, not just citizens, equal regardless of their background. Secularism is a part of the basic structure of the Indian Constitution and it means equal freedom and respect for all religions.
Dr Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar, who is considered the architect of the Indian constitution, believed the possibility of a Hindu State was the most dangerous menace India would ever face. These leaders would have seldom imagined that the Hindutva ideology which they thought had been exposed and pushed to the fringes for good, would come back in the future to haunt the country.
The extremists take power
Seventy years later, RSS is not just any organization. It has ideological and organizational links to BJP, the ruling and the largest party of India. In fact, the President, the Vice President, the Prime Minister, the Home Minister and the Defence Minister were all once the members of RSS.
In the last five years of their rule, there had been an unprecedented drop to the Human rights situation of the country. The minorities including Muslims, Dalits [considered lower caste in India] and Christians are feeling threatened and are living under a sense of fear.
In the last five years of the Bharatiya Janata Party’s government under Prime Minister Narendra Modi, many have lost their lives in mob lynchings, most of whom are Muslims or Dalits. Some journalists who were critical of the ruling government were killed by extremist elements.
Human Rights activists has observed large scale violence against civilians who are peacefully protesting against the Citizenship Amendment Act, which promotes religious discrimination. This threatens the foundation of the constitution and hence the fabric of the country.
Twenty-seven people have been shot and killed by police across three states during protests, all of which are ruled by BJP. Meanwhile, on Jan. 5, 2020 violent extremists who are linked to ABVP, the student wing of RSS, attacked students of the prestigious Jawaharlal Nehru University. They are still on the run.
Currently, Kashmir and Assam, two states from India top the Genocide Watch List, while has India slipped 10 places to the 51st position in the 2019 Democracy Index. UN Human Rights has called the CAA fundamentally discriminatory.
Pragya Singh Thakur who was the prime suspect in the Malegaon bomb blasts which killed 6 people, won the elections as a BJP candidate and became a member of parliament. Last November, she called Godse “a patriot” in the Indian Parliament.
If Gandhi and Godse are not just mere individuals but ideologies, 72 years after Gandhi’s death, the killer is still at large.
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