Issue Brief on “Sewa International: RSS charity wing promotes Hindutva Ideology”

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Sewa International, the international charity wing of Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh RSS was established in 1989 by Madhukar Deoras. The prime objective of the RSS charity wing is to collect funds from Indian diaspora in a bid to promote Hindutva ideology. A London based organization Awaz- South Asia Watch Limited researched Sewa International. The research unveiled that the organization was “dedicated to building a Hindu nation based on Hindu extremist ideas, glorifying the RSS, recruiting for the RSS and expanding RSS physical and ideological training cells (shakhas) in India.”[1] The organization as far as the research of Awaz- South Asia Watch Limited is concerned was also responsible for arranging training camps in different countries to indoctrinate Hindutva ideology. Though the organization portrays itself as a well-intentioned philanthropic effort for humanity abroad, the world is still incognizant of the fact that Sewa International uses a philanthropic card to promote RSS fascist ideology.[2]

Sewa International has a strong presence in the United Kingdom. The organization for the victims of the Gujarat Earthquake in 2001 in the UK collected nearly 4.3 million pounds. Surprisingly, one-third of the total finding under the organization in the name of rehabilitating victims of the earthquake went into the construction of RSS schools. Schools, under the influence of RSS, brainwashed the young students with an extremist nationalist ideology of Hindutva. The textbooks of the Vidhya Bharati schools in India are lucid manifestation of anti-Muslims and anti-Christian sentiments.[3] Sewa International has numerous charity organizations across the world. In the pretext of charity and welfare work, the organization is obsessed with the “consolidation of Hindu society”. Under the guise of rural development work within India, the organization mobilizes the Hindu community against the oppressed minority groups.[4]

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