Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh
Indian Hindutva paramilitary organisation
The Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS; lit. 'National Volunteer Union' or 'National Volunteer Corps') is an Indian right-wing Hindutva volunteer paramilitary organisation. It is the progenitor and leader of a large body of Hindutva organisations called the Sangh Parivar (Hindi for "Sangh family"), which has developed a presence in all facets of Indian society and includes the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), the ruling political party under Narendra Modi, the prime minister of India. Mohan Bhagwat currently serves as the sarsanghchalak (transl. Supreme Leader – transl. Chief) of the RSS, with Dattatreya Hosabale serving as the sarkaryavah (transl. General Secretary).
Founded on 27 September 1925, the initial impetus of the organisation was to provide character training and instill "Hindu discipline" in order to unite the Hindu community and establish a Hindu Rashtra (Hindu nation). The organisation aims to spread the ideology of Hindutva to "strengthen" the Hindu community and promotes an ideal of upholding an Indian culture and its "civilisational values". On the other hand, the RSS has been described as being "founded on the premise of Hindu supremacy". The RSS has been accused of an intolerance of minorities, particularly Muslims.
During the colonial period, the RSS refrained from adversity with the British Raj and stayed away from the Indian independence movement. After independence, it grew into an influential Hindu nationalist umbrella organisation, spawning several affiliated organisations that established numerous schools, charities, and clubs to spread its ideological beliefs. It was banned in 1947 for four days, and then thrice by the post-independence Indian government, first in 1948 when Nathuram Godse, a member of the RSS, assassinated Mahatma Gandhi; then during the Emergency (1975–1977); and for a third time after the demolition of Babri Masjid in 1992.
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Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 22, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q1296075. VIAF identifies the subject as 146550701. The Library of Congress control number is n50061921. 4 of 4 selected statements include explicit references; 1 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1925, 1947, 1948 and 1975.
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This entry incorporates text from “Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.