Entrepreneur and author Rashmi Samant has urged readers to understand the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) through its century-long record of service work rather than through a political lens, saying that those who have engaged directly with the organisation have consistently come away with a positive experience. Samant was speaking in the context of her new book, 'Hundred Years Young: Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh', released during the RSS centenary year.

What the book sets out to do

Samant said the volume brings together essays by 20 young contributors — most of them under 30 years of age — who approached the RSS with initial scepticism and recorded how their perceptions shifted after direct engagement. 'My approach was to bring forward people who have worked with the organisation and observed it closely,' she said. 'They joined later, saw how the Sangh functions, and then their thinking changed.'

The contributor base is deliberately diverse: the book includes writers from Britain, Israel and the United States, as well as voices from Christian, Muslim and Jewish backgrounds, and members and supporters of the LGBTQIA+ community. Samant said the intent was to make it possible to view the RSS 'from every perspective, rather than through a particular prejudiced lens.'

Service as the RSS's defining identity

A central argument in the book is that the RSS is, at its core, a seva (service) organisation, and that its political associations — particularly its ideological links to the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) — have obscured this dimension in public debate. 'The RSS is often viewed through a political lens, but in reality it is a service-oriented organisation where service is the highest duty,' Samant said. 'Without understanding this, no one can truly comprehend the RSS.'

She pointed to specific historical episodes as evidence: during the 1962 India-China war, when civil police were redeployed to the border, RSS swayamsevaks reportedly managed civil administration and traffic across the country. She also noted that then Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru invited the Sangh to march in the 1963 Republic Day parade, with 3,500 swayamsevaks participating — a fact, she argued, that is largely absent from mainstream discourse. During the Covid-19 pandemic and the Gujarat earthquake, she said, RSS volunteers reached affected communities before government relief machinery arrived.

RSS Chief Mohan Bhagwat's foreword and the 'middle path'

RSS Chief Mohan Bhagwat has written the foreword to the book. According to Samant, Bhagwat acknowledges that the organisation has attracted both excessive criticism and uncritical praise, and that the book charts a middle course — one grounded in lived experience rather than ideology. 'It is not about viewing things through the lens of a particular ideology; it is simply about experiencing the RSS and its activities and writing about them,' she said.

Samant added that international academics — including scholars from Britain, Germany and a German parliamentarian — have contributed research-based perspectives on the RSS, which she said helps situate the organisation within a global frame rather than a purely domestic one.

On youth politics and the CJP protests

Samant, who is 27 years old, also commented on recent protests by youth political groups, including the Cockroach Janta Party (CJP). She argued that the protest leadership — whom she described as largely above 29 or 30 years of age — does not represent the true Gen Z demographic. 'India's youth population is between 30 and 40 crore. India's real Gen Z are actively engaged in creative work — nation-building, positive initiatives, impactful efforts,' she said, citing the example of Skyroot, which launched India's first privately built space vehicle.

She expressed concern about a statement attributed to CJP leadership — 'Let a hundred Jantar Mantars bloom' — which she described as a variation of Mao Zedong's slogan 'Let a hundred flowers bloom,' a precursor, she argued, to the Cultural Revolution and the Great Leap Forward. 'Ideologies which seek to spread anarchy today while promising a better tomorrow are fundamentally undemocratic,' she said.

The road ahead: dialogue over street politics

Samant said she hopes the current atmosphere of political confrontation can give way to constructive dialogue, noting that the RSS has 'continuously learned and evolved' since its founding in 1925. She acknowledged that the organisation's reluctance to self-promote — rooted in its seva ethos — works against it in terms of public perception in the social media age. 'My humble appeal is that people should not form an opinion about the RSS without understanding its actual work,' she said. The book, she added, is intended as a starting point for exactly that kind of informed engagement.