The RSS, Realpolitik & Modi & Hosabale’s Climb
For long, the RSS presided over the Sangh Parivar, which, although outwardly united, was clearly divided between those from the shakha system and the ones either deputed ‘outside’, or who made ‘lateral’ entry into the ideological fraternity. People within the shakha system, often synonymous with the Nagpur group (although many from outside Maharashtra were part of this lobby), considered themselves as dvijas or the ‘twice born’, who stayed away from the morally degrading influence of realpolitik.
The posture was unambiguously hypocritical: those deputed to other affiliated organisations were first incubated within the Sangh (or shakha) system and then sent out. Likewise, many who moved across the edifice and then began rising in hierarchy within the RSS, were inducted by the leadership in the first instance. It was like the proverbial ‘having the cake and eating it too’.
Likewise, although Hosabale spent the formative years as a…