Movement out of India that ‘disseminates hate’ victimizes religious minority groups, report says

Canada should not allow a movement out of India that “spreads hatred” and victimizes religious minority groups to entrench itself in this country, according to a report released Wednesday by the National Muslim Council of Canada and the World Sikh Organization of Canada.

The report, called Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) Network in Canada, noting the roots of the RSS movement in India and its extensive global reach, it promotes right-wing views in a variety of ways.

“This is one of the most influential organizations in the world,” said Steven Zhou, a spokesman for the Canadian National Council of Muslims.

The World Sikh Council and Organization of Canada is trying to take into account what academics, including some in Canada, have witnessed for years – the growing influence and threat of a movement linked to the government in New Delhi called promotion. discrimination against minority religious groups at home and abroad.

“[The RSS] poses a major challenge to Canada’s commitment to human rights, to tolerance and multiculturalism,” said Zhou.

According to the report, the RSS is at the core of a network of groups “seeking to remake India into a country run by and for Hindus at the expense of state-killing minority groups.”

“It is … important to remember that the ideal nationalism portrayed by the RSS network is not only a victim of ethno-religious minorities like Muslims, Sikhs and Christians, but also members of the lower caste Hindus of India.”

“It has domestic and international organs that seize political power, maintain an ideology of supremacy and actively engage in communal violence,” the report said.

CBC News reached out to the RSS branch in Canada but did not receive a response.

On its website, the organization quotes its founder, Keshav Baliram Hedgewar, as saying that it is “the duty of every Hindu to do his best to unite the Hindu community” and that its mission is to strive for “national reconstruction.”

On Canada’s website, it is described as a “voluntary, non-profit, social and cultural organization” and “aims to organize the Hindu community to preserve, practice and promote Hindu ideals and values.”

Researchers say the ideology espoused by the RSS is generally known as Hindutva.

The Indian state has not always supported the RSS and Hindutva, banning it three times since its inception in 1925 as a paramilitary volunteer organization.

In an interview with CBC News in April 2022, Franco-Indian journalist Ingrid Therwath said that the RSS network was founded on the principles of Italian facism, ideologically similar to Nazism and exported abroad by some people in the Indian diaspora, said Therwath, who has studied Hindu extremism more than 20 years.

Therwath, who has studied Hindu extremism for more than 20 years, said the first Canadian branch of the international RSS organization was established in Toronto in the 1970s.

Zhou, a former researcher with the Canadian Anti-Hate Network who has documented far-right movements in diaspora groups, told the CBC in a previous interview that Hindutva was the politicization of Hinduism and led to discrimination and sectarian violence against minority groups in India like Muslims. and Christianity.

Human Rights Watch has also attributed religious and ethnic violence to groups supporting Hindutva ideology.

In December 2021, in the northern Indian city of Haridwar, Hindu religious leaders openly called for the genocide of Muslims in an event organized by right-wing and Hindutva leaders.

Violence against other minority groups like Sikhs and Dalits has increased in India in recent years, academics say. Dalits are members of a caste that does not belong to the social order, according to the caste system.

“There has been an increase in various hate crimes,” said Shivaji Mukherjee, an assistant professor specializing in South Asian political violence at the University of Toronto-Mississauga. He said that such crimes have increased when the present government – with its extensive links to the RSS – enjoys a majority.

“Now that the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is in power, it is easier for the group to increase violence, to fulfill its political and social agenda.”

‘This is not a fringe ideology’

While the RSS has been around for decades, Mukherjee said it had emboldened ideologically-based violence in recent years with the election of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the BJP with a majority in 2014.

According to various media, the RSS has an estimated membership of more than five million worldwide, including Modi and most of the ministers in his government.

“This is not a fringe ideology. This is a state ideology,” said Jaskaran Sandhu, a board member with the World Sikh Organization of Canada.

Academics have noted and noted the increasing efforts to challenge and silence critics of the BJP and the RSS and Hindutva movements since the party came to power.

In December 2021, Sanjay Ruparelia, professor of politics and Jarislowsky Chair of Democracy at Toronto Metropolitan University, organized a lecture by the famous Indian political researcher Christophe Jaffrelot hosted by the Toronto Public Library.

Ruparelia said she received hundreds of emails from individuals asking the organizers to stop and for the library to ban the event because it was “anti-Hindu.” Academics say that this kind of behavior can be caused by people who support the views of the RSS.

“This is an attempt to silence, to undermine legitimacy,” Ruparelia said, pointing out that anyone who participates in a debate about the Indian government or their views is automatically labeled by its supporters as “anti-Hindu” or “Hinduphobic.”

Ruparelia said she knows many academics who have been harassed and intimidated online by these people based on articles they write and events they host.

“It’s an attempt to shut down debate. It’s an attempt to curtail freedom of expression.”

RSS operations in Canada

A report in RSS highlights how the movement is taking place in Canada, including through political lobbying and through seemingly good-looking cultural organizations with charitable status.

In India, the report said, the RSS operates an India-based NGO called Seva Bharati, which operates health care units, disaster relief efforts and education in underserved areas.

Overseas, Sewa International provides these services and fundraising for these services worldwide, according to the report.

He also said that the RSS operates overseas through an organization called the Hindu Swayamsevak Sangh (HSS) that perpetuates the ideology of Hindutva in the Indian diaspora, including in Canada, the US and Europe. The report said that HSS has held events on Hinduism in several public schools in Ontario.

Through the report, the National Council of Canadian Muslims and the World Sikh Organization of Canada urged the federal government to “carefully study and track the growth of hate-mongering movements in Canada.”

The report also called for action from the Canadian government.

“Canadian leaders cannot allow individuals and [organizations] which promotes the Hindutva vision of India – a vision of supremacy that discriminates against minorities and causes mass bloodshed – [to] entrench themselves in this country, perpetuate the ideology of supremacy and radicalize the relationship between large faith-based communities,” wrote the authors of the report.

However, critics say Ottawa remained silent and satisfied as an attempt to foster economic relations with India as part of its Indo-Pacific Strategylaunched in November 2022 to promote trade and engagement in the region.

“They value trade deals and strategic relationships … instead of upholding values ​​that are important to Canadians,” said Sandhu, with the World Sikh Organization of Canada.

Some academics use Nepean MP Chandra Arya’s raising of what appears to be an RSS flag on Parliament Hill during Hindu Heritage Month last November as an example of why they are concerned.

The event prompted professors from several Quebec universities to write a letter to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau explaining why the flag is problematic. Separate letters were sent by community and cultural groups such as Hindus for Human Rights and the Muslim Women’s Council of Canada.

In a statement emailed to CBC News on Wednesday, Arya said the flag raised on Parliament Hill “represents the Hindu faith and does not represent, or show support for, any political organization or ideology.”

“This beautiful symbol belongs to all Hindus, and no country or organization or individual can claim ownership or exclusivity,” he said.

As India is projected by the United Nations to be the most populous country in the world this year, and the fastest growing economy in the next two decades, the world needs to pay attention to its human rights record, Ruparelia said.

“What happens in India has a big impact on the world,” he said. “[That’s why] the erosion of democracy we are witnessing in India is deeply concerning.

In a statement, a spokesperson for Global Affairs Canada told CBC News “promoting human rights will always be at the core of our foreign policy” especially since India will host the G20 in September.

“Canada will continue to engage with India on issues related to security, democracy, pluralism and human rights.”