"Our resolve is to expose this deception": Salman Khurshid questions RSS' "social organisation" claim

New Delhi [India], December 28 (ANI): Senior Congress leader Salman Khurshid on Sunday sharply criticised the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), questioning its claim of being a "social organisation."
He asked whether, if the Sangh is truly non-political, it would attempt to influence institutions in a way that prevents others from functioning freely within a democratic system.
Khurshid said this is a question the Congress party is raising deliberately, and that the party is determined to expose what it sees as a deception being carried out before the people of India regarding the Sangh's proper role and message.
"The people of the Sangh say that they are not political; they are a social organisation. We also have some idea of what a social organisation is. If they are a social organisation, then why do they try to influence the system in such a way that other people cannot even function in a democracy? This is our question, and this is our resolve: to expose this deception that they are perpetrating on the people of India, the message they are giving to the people of India," Salman Khurshid told ANI.
He further stated that the Congress party aims to counter this influence by presenting an alternative vision, asserting that its ideas, values, and message are far superior.
"We want to put an end to it. We want to respond to it and create an alternative, because our answer, our thinking, and our message are far better than theirs," he said.
Khurshid's remarks come in the backdrop of Congress MP Manickam Tagore's statement, where he criticised Digvijaya Singh's praise for the RSS's organisational strength, calling it a "famous self-goal".
Speaking to ANI, Tagore equated the RSS with Al-Qaeda, stating that both spread hatred and emphasising that the Congress party, with its 140-year history, should be the model for unity and a people's movement, citing Mahatma Gandhi's transformation of the party.
"The RSS is an organisation built on hatred, and it spreads hatred. There is nothing to learn from hatred. Can you learn anything from Al-Qaeda? Al-Qaeda is an organisation of hatred. It hates others. What is there to learn from that organisation?" Manickam Tagore told ANI.
This comes after Digvijaya Singh shared a black-and-white photograph from the 1990s, found on social question-and-answer website Quora, showing a young Narendra Modi seated on the floor near senior BJP leader LK Advani at an event in Gujarat.
In a post shared on X, Singh noted that individuals who once worked at the grassroots level could rise through the organisational hierarchy to become Chief Minister and eventually Prime Minister. He described this as the "power of organisation", while tagging senior Congress leaders, including party president Mallikarjun Kharge, MPs Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, Jairam Ramesh, PM Modi, and the official handles of the Congress. (ANI)