Misreading Power: Western Amnesia, the RSS, and India’s Political Evolution
Misreading Power: Western Amnesia,
the RSS, and India’s Political Evolution
Much of the recent commentary
surrounding a The New York Times article has framed the growing influence of
the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) as a sudden revelation, particularly for
Western audiences. Independent journalists have analyzed the piece as though
the RSS has only now become visible, or as if it has recently embedded itself
within India’s institutions in some unprecedented way. This framing is
fundamentally flawed and reveals a deeper problem of historical amnesia.
The RSS has not suddenly emerged,
nor has it only recently become influential. More importantly, it is not
behaving in a new way. It is functioning today in essentially the same
structural role it played during British rule: as a useful intermediary within
a larger system of power. What has changed is not the mechanism, but the
beneficiary.
This is not a case of delayed
recognition. It is a case of structural repetition. To understand the present,
one must abandon the assumption that visibility equals novelty.
British colonial governance in
India was not sustained primarily through brute force. It relied on a
calculated alignment of economic extraction, political authority, and social
division. Religious and communal organizations were not accidental byproducts
of that era; they were actively encouraged, shaped, and leveraged to fragment
society and prevent unified resistance. Both Hindu and Muslim political
formations emerged within this colonial framework, including the RSS and the All-India
Muslim League. These organizations were useful not because they threatened
colonial power, but because they redirected social energy away from economic
solidarity and toward identity-based mobilization. Anger was contained.
Resistance was divided. Wealth continued to flow upward.
That function never disappeared.
It has simply been reassigned.
Today, the RSS operates in much
the same way, but the beneficiaries are no longer British administrators. Under
the consolidation of political power led by Narendra Modi and Amit Shah, and
alongside the extraordinary concentration of corporate power around figures
such as Gautam Adani and Mukesh Ambani, India has drifted back toward a
colonial mode of governance. It remains democratic in appearance, but
extractive and divisive in function.
Corporate capital now occupies
the position once held by colonial commerce. Political authority provides
access, protection, and regulatory advantage. Religious organizations and
identity-driven politics serve as instruments of division, ensuring that public
anger is directed sideways rather than upward. As long as society remains
polarized along religious, cultural, and identity lines, scrutiny of economic
concentration and institutional favoritism remains muted.
In this structure, ideology
itself is secondary to utility. The RSS does not need to govern the state
directly or impose total ideological conformity. Its value lies in keeping
society emotionally occupied and fragmented. Just as it once helped prevent unified
resistance to colonial extraction, it now helps prevent economic solidarity
that could challenge concentrated corporate power. This continuity is precisely
what many contemporary analyses fail to grasp.
For decades after independence,
this logic was constrained by political restraint. Leaders such as Atal Bihari
Vajpayee and Lal Krishna Advani were not unaware of the ideological flaws
within their own movement. They understood the dangers of allowing identity
politics to overwhelm institutional balance. Rather than dismantling the
constitutional framework shaped by the Indian National Congress, they operated
within it. Their objective was power and policy influence, not social rupture.
They recognized that while religious identity could mobilize voters,
normalizing hatred would ultimately weaken the state they sought to govern.
That restraint has been removed.
Under Modi, religious hostility
ceased to be a political liability and became a governing instrument. Open
antagonism toward Muslims and Christians was reframed as nationalism. What
earlier leadership treated as dangerous excess became normalized public discourse.
This shift matters more than institutional alignment, because institutions can
recalibrate over time. Social damage does not reset so easily.
This normalization closely
mirrors colonial practice. The British did not require loyalty from the
population; they required division. Today’s system operates on the same
principle. As long as society remains divided, the alignment of political
authority and corporate capital proceeds with minimal resistance. Public debate
is consumed by identity conflict, while economic concentration accelerates
quietly.
Western observers often misread
this moment by focusing narrowly on institutional “capture,” as though
influence itself were new. In doing so, they miss the deeper transformation:
the revival of a colonial governing logic within a sovereign republic. Corporate
capital has replaced imperial capital, and religious polarization has replaced
overt racial hierarchy, but the structure remains familiar.
This pattern is not unique to
India. Across the world, corporations no longer merely lobby governments; they
operate from within them. Money shapes law. Oversight weakens. Public assets
are privatized. Risk is socialized, while reward is concentrated. A supportive
upper layer of society defends the system, believing its interests are aligned
with elite success, while the majority is divided, exhausted, and distracted.
History shows where such systems
lead. When peaceful correction feels impossible, anger accumulates. Modern
violence no longer requires mass movements or standing armies. The events of
September 11 demonstrated that small groups, driven by humiliation and
grievance, can inflict global consequences. Today’s technologies compress the
distance between anger and catastrophe even further.
We already see warning signs in
fragments: executives targeted in acts of personal revenge, random violence
rooted in alienation, and school shootings born from sustained bullying and
powerlessness. These are not isolated anomalies. They are pressure leaks.
Scaled to millions, that same psychology produces rupture, not reform. And once
pressure breaks, neither corporations nor states get to decide how far it
spreads.
Indian institutions themselves
remain resilient. They have survived centuries of domination and upheaval. Many
ideological actors aligned with power today will adapt under a different
elected government, as bureaucratic loyalty in India has historically followed
authority rather than ideology. What does not disappear so easily is normalized
hatred. Division, once made ordinary, outlives political cycles.
History is unambiguous on this
point. Systems built on extraction and division eventually destabilize
themselves. Colonial rule collapsed not because it was inefficient, but because
it was unsustainable. Any structure that reproduces its logic, regardless of
who runs it, invites the same outcome.
The danger, then, is not that the
RSS has suddenly become visible, nor that Western observers have finally
noticed it. The danger is that an old tool is being used again, efficiently and
deliberately, in the service of concentrated power.
And history shows that when
societies realize too late that they are being governed like colonies once
more, correction rarely arrives gently.
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