For Arjun, CPM loads ammo against RSS

HRD Minister Arjun Singh has a steadfast ally in his battle against the RSS — the CPI(M). The Marxists have come out in open support of...

HRD Minister Arjun Singh has a steadfast ally in his battle against the RSS — the CPI(M). The Marxists have come out in open support of the minister and said if the RSS sued him, they would become a party to the case. In an editorial to be published in People’s Democracy on Independence Day, the CPI(M) has reiterated that the ‘‘RSS was not merely involved but was the inspiration for this (Gandhi’s) assassination’’.

Every paragraph of the editorial is loaded with strong words in favour of what Arjun has done after assuming charge of the HRD Ministry. On the contrary, the walkout of the BJP ministers from the meeting of the Central Advisory Board of Education (CABE) two days ago, it says, is ‘‘illustrative of its (BJP’s) belligerence in pursuing its communal agenda’’.

The CPI(M) has taken on the BJP for ‘‘refusing to reconstitute CABE all through its six years in office’’, choosing to ‘‘ride roughshod over…our federal education’’.

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The editorial argues that CABE was disbanded in Murli Manohar Joshi’s time ‘‘to unilaterally impose its (the BJP-led government’s) communalisation drive in accordance with the RSS vision of converting the secular democratic character of the Indian republic into a rabidly communal and Fascist Hindu Rashtra’’. With CABE out of the way, it could go ‘‘about the task of rewriting the textbooks without any consultation with the states and in defiance of an open and public campaign by… educationists who saw the effort of the BJP government as brazen communalisation’’, it says.

The CPI(M) has also contested the BJP argument that their education system were upheld by both Supreme Court and President. The SC had only said syllabi changes need not have the approval of CABE legally. ‘‘It, by no stretch of imagination granted the seal of approval to the content of the changes…’’

The CPI(M) says it takes as a compliment the BJP line that Singh’s ‘‘detoxification’’ campaign is at their behest.

It concludes with Singh’s dare to RSS to sue him. ‘‘So do we. All those who cherish the secular democratic character of Indian republic must implead in this case not merely to call the RSS bluff but to reaffirm the commitment of India and its people to …our Republican Constitution,’’ it said.