The Congress party, in its manifesto released ahead of the Karnataka Assembly Elections, equated the banned Popular Front of India (PFI) with Bajrang Dal, youth wing of the Sangh-affiliated Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP), saying it will “ban” organisations “promoting enmity or hatred, whether among majority or minority communities”.
We will take decisive action as per law including imposing a ban on any such organisations, read the Congress manifesto released by party chief M. Mallikarjun Kharge in the presence of former Karnataka chief minister Siddaramaiah, the KPCC President D.K. Shivakumar and Congress spokesperson Pawan Khera in Bengaluru on Tuesday.
The Congress party is committed to taking firm and decisive action against individuals and organisations spreading hatred against communities on the grounds of caste and religion, it read. “We believe that law and Constitution are sacrosanct and cannot be violated by individuals and organisations like Bajrang Dal, PFI or others promoting enmity or hatred, whether among majority or minority communities,” it added.
Launching a blistering attack on Congress, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who hit the campaign trail in poll-bound Karnataka on Tuesday, said that Congress has always sided with anti-nationals, terror-backers during elections and shielded them by taking back cases filed against them. He further alleged that the opposition party which had “locked up” Lord Ram now wanted to target those who worship Lord Hanuman.
On Wednesday, PM Modi began his speech with ‘Bajrang Bali’ chants during a poll rally in Mudbidri, Karnataka. After raising ‘Bharat Mata Ki Jai’ slogan, PM Modi said,”Bajrang Bali Ki” and the crowd responded with “jai”.
While the saffron party claimed that Congress had insulted Lord Hanuman and the people of Karnataka will give them a befitting reply in the elections, the Congress retorted saying that it was Prime Minister Narendra Modi who had hurt religious sentiments and insulted the deity by “equating” him with the Bajrang Dal, and demanded an apology from him.
On Tuesday, BJP leaders in Karnataka said that the proposal to ban Bajrang Dal will boomerang on the grand old political party. Minister for Social and Backward Classes Welfare Kota Srinivas Poojary said in Kota in Udupi district that the Bajrang Dal is not an anti-social organisation. It does not have any links with terrorist organisations. It is a “rastra bhakta” organisation having presence all over India.
“If the Congress bans it, it will be a challenge to Hinduism,” the Minister said, adding: “We will face the ban and will also retain the Bajrang Dal”. The minister said that as the Union government has already banned the PFI, there is no question of banning it again.
Speaking to reporters, VHP spokesperson Vijay Shankar Tiwari said that the Bajrang Dal is an outfit which ignites the flame of nationalism, saves the modesty of lakhs of women, protects gau mata (mother cow) from slaughter and donates blood to save lakhs of people in the country. “Bajrang Dal is the pride of the country and the Congress compares it with the banned terror outfit PFI,” he said.
Delhi VHP secretary Surendra Gupta said that the Congress should either change its “mindset” or accept that it is “anti-Hindu”. “The Congress central leadership should intervene and withdraw the party’s poll promise, else we will launch a massive agitation across the country,” he told news agency PTI.
What is Bajrang Dal?
Founded on October 1, 1984 to guard a Shobha Yatra launched by the VHP as part of the Ram temple movement, the Bajrang Dal claims to be a nationalist and religious organisation but has also been linked to a variety of violent acts over the decades. The outfit comes under the umbrella of the Sangh Parivar, an umbrella group of Hindu nationalist organisations which have established schools, charities and clubs but have also allegedly been associated with incidents of communal violence. It is claimed that Bajrang Dal, the youth organisation is dedicated to advancing a rigorous and revivalist version of Hinduism.
Here are some unfortunate cases of violence that the Bajrang Dal is associated with:
Graham Staines murder
In early 1999, Manoharpur in Odisha made headlines when a 58-year-old Australian Christian missionary, Graham Staines, was burnt to death along with his two young sons – 10-year-old Phillips and seven-year-old Timothy – on the intervening night of 22-23 January. Staines and his sons were sleeping in their station wagon in front of a church in the village, when the car was attacked by a mob led by Dara Singh, a local leader with alleged links to Bajrang Dal.
The Wadhwa Commission, led by Justice DP Wadhwa, was constituted to investigate the facts and the circumstances of Staines’ and his sons’ murders, and to determine the role, if any, played by authority, organisation or individual in connection with the murder. The Commission held Dara Singh guilty of the murders, but dismissed allegations that he was affiliated with the Bajrang Dal even though there was plenty of evidence linking Singh to Bajrang Dal..
After the Wadhwa Commission report, the National Minorities Commission inquired into murders and highlighted Dara Singh’s links with the Bajrang Dal.
Karnataka church attack 2008
In September 2008, soon after the BJP was voted to power in Karnataka, churches and Christian institutions in coastal Karnataka were attacked. The BJP government led by BS Yediyurappa set up the Justice BK Somashekhara commission to investigate the attacks.
In its interim report placed before the then-government in September 2009, the Justice BK Somashekhara commission, which was set up by the BJP government led by BS Yediyurappa to investigate the attacks, found involvement of right-wing groups like the Bajrang Dal. Apparently, Bajrang Dal leaders had held a press conference to claim responsibility for vandalizing churches in the Mangalore region.
National Commission for Minorities on Bajrang Dal
In September 2008, the National Commission for Minorities (NCM) blamed Sangh Parivar outfit Bajrang Dal for the communal violence in the NDA-ruled states of Karnataka and Orissa. “Our teams have returned from both the states. Activists of Bajrang Dal are involved in these attacks in both places. NCM will send reports on the whole gamut of communal clashes in the twin states to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh soon,” NCM Chairman Md Shafi Qureshi was quoted in media reports.
‘Militant and dangerous’
In its 2018 edition of the ‘World Factbook’, the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), the intelligence wing of the US government, named the VHP and Bajrang Dal as “religious militant organisations”.
In 2020, Facebook’s safety team flagged Bajrang Dal as a ‘dangerous organisation’, which incites violence against minorities through its posts, and urged the social network to ban the group from its platform.
But the group was allowed to thrive on the social media platform because Facebook Inc allegedly feared that banning the organisation may hurt its business prospects in the country and the network also feared for the safety of its staff, Wall Street Journal (WSJ) claimed.
Bihar Sharif violence
The Bajrang Dal was also involved in the violence that broke out during a Ram Navami procession in Bihar Sharif on March 31 this year. According to the police, the violence was well-planned on WhatsApp and the mastermind was the Bajrang Dal convener of the Nalanda district. A WhatsApp group of 457 people was active before the festival and a conspiracy was being hatched through messages, the police added. Bajrang Dal convenor Kundan Kumar surrendered as the mastermind of the group.
Asked for a response, the VHP said the Bihar government headed by Nitish Kumar was implicating Bajrang members.
RSS ban
Incidentally, the RSS, which is the leader of the Sangh Parivar, has been banned three times since it was established, including after Mahatma Gandhi was assassinated by a former RSS member in 1948.