A century of volunteers, one enduring idea — BJP leader Smriti Irani marked the Foundation Day of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) on Tuesday, 20 October 2026, with a Sanskrit-laced tribute that saluted the organisation's near-hundred-year march from a single nagpur shakha to what she called the world's largest voluntary organisation.

Posting on X and tagging @RSSorg, Irani offered warm wishes to all swayamsevaks, invoking the Sanskrit verse 'param vaibhavam netum etat svarashtram' — (lead this nation to supreme glory) — before grounding her message in a sweep of institutional history. She described the RSS as an 'intellectual force' (vicharashakti) planted by its founder to rid society of forgetfulness and build an organised, empowered nation.

From Hedgewar's vision to a 'vast banyan tree'

Dr. Keshav Baliram Hedgewar, a physician and social activist from Nagpur, established the RSS on Vijayadashami, 1925, with the explicit aim of consolidating Hindu society around a culture of discipline and service. Irani's post describes his foundational idea as having grown into a 'vast banyan tree' (vishaal vatvriksha) — a metaphor for an organisation whose roots and branches now span every district of India.

The RSS counts its volunteers not in thousands but in millions across its network of daily shakhas, and the organisation's reach into education, disaster relief, and tribal welfare has made it one of the most studied civil-society structures in the world. Irani's use of the banyan metaphor is deliberate: the banyan grows new roots from its own branches, a living symbol of continuity across generations.

The centenary milestone and the language of sacrifice

Irani's tribute lands at a moment of particular symbolism — the RSS is in the final lap of its centenary journey, approaching the 100-year mark since 1925. She describes this journey as being 'irrigated' (sinchhit) by the sacrifice, dedication, and devotion of swayamsevaks generation after generation, and frames the organisation as 'a continuous source of inspiration.'

Senior BJP leaders routinely issue public messages on RSS Foundation Day, a practice that reflects the party's deep historical and ideological roots in the Sangh Parivar. Vijayadashami — the Hindu festival that marks RSS's birthday — serves as an annual occasion for the organisation's chief, the Sarsanghchalak, to address the nation from Nagpur, with attendance from across the political and social spectrum.

For Irani, who has consistently positioned herself as a voice of cultural nationalism within the BJP, the greeting is both ritual and conviction — a reminder that the party's electoral machinery and the RSS's grassroots mobilisation remain intertwined threads in a single, decades-long project.

As the RSS steps into its centenary year, the question is not whether the organisation endures — it is what its next hundred years will look like in a fast-changing India.