Noted Columnist Swapan Dasgupta

In an age where bluntness and brevity are at a premium, the discourse of the Sangh Parivar is replete with riddles and parables, resonant with hidden meanings.

On February 11 the top brass of the RSS family gathered for an awards ceremony hosted by its Hindi weekly Panchajanya, "which nationalism are we talking about?" asked RSS Joint Organising Secretary K.S.

Sudarshan. "The one that talks about India or the one that speaks of Bharat? One that says India is a multi-cultural, multi-ethnic nation in the making? Or one that believes that we are one nation, one people and one culture?"

Sudarshan's preferences were undisguised but Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee chose to have the last word ... The. problem, he noted wryly, isn't insurmountable. "It's a question of approach and behaviour ...

. As opposed to Vajpayee's 13-month first innings when the government and the RSS seemed on a collision course, the second innings has so far been marked by a spectacular degree of bonhomie. The Prime Minister has endorsed the RSS' self-perception of being a "cultural" body and the home minister has asked for a status paper to determine whether or not restrictions on Central Government staff participating in RSS functions can be removed ... On its part ... the RSS has been most supportive of the Vajpayee Government ...

... The RSS had four demands on the Government: promote rural development, encourage small-scale industries, focus on trial welfare and enhance national security ...

... "A Government or a political party has to take its own decisions", Advani told India Today. "Decision- making cannot be from any outside organisation but the Sangh Parivar is always concerned about values and ethics to public life. Therefore, it is legitimate for the Sangh to extend its moral authority on the functioning of a government in which there are swayamsevaks".

The question is: What are the parameters of "moral authority"? "We are just a sorting office for ideas", says Sudarshan, adding that, "Every person has a right to advise. Let the Government consider" ...

BJP ministers are naturally reluctant to talk about the RSS' intrusive style. The experience of both Kalyan Singh in Uttar Pradesh and Bhairon Singh Shekhawat in Rajasthan shows that displeasing the RSS has a direct fallout when it comes to electoral mobilisation. Despite its phenomenal growth, the BJP remains dependent on the mobilising skills of the 4,000 RSS full-timers during elections ... It is just not possible to flower in the BJP with an antagonistic relationship to the Sangh.

This is why it is not feasible for lesser BJP ministers - Vajpayee and Advani may be the exceptions - to disregard the advice of the RSS leadership ... "We re in the RSS simply want that the front organisations are given as much advantage as the NDA alliance partners are getting", says Chari.

To deter the RSS from muddying its hands in economics, the Government would love it to focus on its self-confessed agenda - culture. The RSS is quite pleased with the Ministry of Culture's celebrations of the 125 years of Vande Mataram and the HRD Ministry's nti-Left stance. But there is a menacing flip side in the form of the VHP and the Bajrang Dal. Unlike other RSS front organisations, the VHP has evolved into a rogue elephant. Comprising mainly sadhus who are not bound by the niceties of civil society, the VHP and the boisterous Bajrang Dal are always on the look out for confrontation ... Leaving the Government looking very foolish and even ridiculous.

It is primarily to keep the delicate RSS-Government relationship on an' even keel that both Vajpayee and Advani have been emphasising the umbilical cord that ties them to the Sangh. The charisma of the prime minister and the authority of Rajju Bhaiyya have so far ensured relative harmony ... It knows that keeping the RSS at an arm's length is the only recipe for a prevention of the dual membership battle that brought down Morarji Desai's Government in 1979.

Ultimately, however, there is no alternative to the RSS actually practising its claim to be a purely cultural organisation. (Source: The India Today, 21 February, 2000)