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PHILADELPHIA, PENNSYLVANIA, USA, October 5, 2004: (HPI note: This article contains the usual list of accusations against the RSS, India’s largest social service organization. We’ve included the entire article so readers know how it was reported.) Despite numerous attempts by the University of Pennsylvania community to rescind his invitation, Ram Madhav, spokesman for the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, addressed a select audience Monday on the state of Indian politics. The speaking engagement was limited to 25 and closed to the press. Controversy surrounding the event stemmed from the history of the RSS in India. The RSS, a Hindu nationalist movement, is considered by many to be an extremist group. Its followers believe that Hinduism is the region’s dominant cultural feature and thus advocate a Hindi state. An ex-member of the RSS was responsible for the assassination of independence leader Mahatma Gandhi in 1948. The group has been banned several times in India, but is now gaining more prominence on the political stage.



There were strong objections to Madhav — who was invited to speak by Penn’s Center for the Advanced Study of India — from professors as well as students. Five Penn professors signed a letter addressed to the CASI Director Francine Frankel protesting Madhav’s invitation. “We write to register our astonishment, and our protest, at your decision to invite Ram Madhav, the official spokesman for the RSS of India, to speak on our campus,” the letter stated. Calling the history of RSS one of “orchestrated violence against non-Hindu communities,” the professors went on to write that “the founders of the RSS modeled themselves on Nazi practices, particularly their genocidal violence against Jews.” A separate protest occurred on the student level. A petition was circulated calling on students to “unequivocally denounce the invitation.” Doctoral candidate in Comparative Literature Thangam Ravindranathan, who handed out protest flyers at the event, criticized the University for allowing Madhav to come. “It shows a gap between discourse and the reality on the ground,” she said. “One has to draw some sort of line and think of what kind of message you send out when you ask someone like this to speak.”



Event organizers defended their decision to bring Madhav. In a press release given out at the event, Frankel acknowledged that “some members of the Penn community, and colleagues on other campuses, understandably have expressed concern about the appropriateness of hosting Mr. Madhav.” But she went on to explain that it is not possible to understand Indian politics without understanding the RSS, adding, “Today’s discussion, therefore, is in support of our mission to advance the study and understanding of such trends.” Organizers of the program refused to comment before or after the event. Some attendees leaving the lecture were surprised to find Madhav “inarticulate” and “very vague.” However, Political Science doctoral candidate Sreya Sarkar disagreed, saying, “Most of the questions were just reactions to his views, but the way he responded was fabulous. It was a good give and take.”



A transcript of the event will be made available on the CASI Web site, here. (HPI adds: The transcript was not available as of October 12, but searching “Madhav” on the CASI page brings up several related references.)

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