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RSS-BJP meet: Modi's appraisal in 'Samanway baithak', Sangh asks BJP to resolve OROP issue

By FnF Correspondent | PUBLISHED: 02, Sep 2015, 16:20 pm IST | UPDATED: 02, Sep 2015, 16:24 pm IST

RSS-BJP meet: Modi's appraisal in 'Samanway baithak', Sangh asks BJP to resolve OROP issue New Delhi: A key three-day coordination meeting between the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) began in the national capital on Wednesday. The meeting was attended by other outfits like Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) as well.

Top Union ministers and leaders of the ruling BJP are attending a crucial three-day coordination meet of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) and its affiliates in New Delhi to review the government's performance in the last 15 months.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi is expected to participate with a host of issues, including those confronting the Centre, likely to come up for discussion.

The VHP raised the issue of Ram Mandir at the meeting, demanding that a positive message about rebuilding the same should be sent by the Narendra Modi government.

Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj, Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar, Transport Minister Nitin Gadkari, Urban Development Minister Venkaiah Naidu, Chemicals and Fertilisers Minister Ananth Kumar, Health Minister JP Nadda and other Union ministers are also attending the Sangh meet, apart from BJP president Amit Shah.

The meeting has acquired significance as it comes against the backdrop of the ruling BJP involved in a bitter confrontation with the Opposition over the contentious land bill and the upcoming Bihar polls.

93 main functionaries of the Mohan Bhagwat-led RSS and its 15 affiliates are exchanging notes over relevant issues during the meeting. The participation this time is almost double the attendance at such events in the past.

However, sources said that the main focus of the key meeting remained the upcoming Bihar Assembly elections and the issue of communicating the pro-poor welfare schemes undertaken by the BJP-led NDA government.

Another important issue on the agenda of the meeting is the implementation of One Rank One Pension for ex-servicemen.

Sources said that the RSS has asked the BJP to resolve the OROP issue. The representatives of the RSS were briefed on the issue by Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar.

The top brass of the RSS is also holding separate meetings with ministers of the Narendra Modi government on the issue of One Rank One Pension. It was attended by BJP president Amit Shah, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, Home Minister Rajnath Singh and Parrikar.

Meanwhile, sources said that the government communicated to the RSS that it wishes to change the perception that allowing land ordinance to lapse was a U-turn.

India Today report claims what to expect at the three-day meet at a resort in posh Vasant Kunj in South Delhi:

Day One: Economy

The appraisal of the Modi government will begin with Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, Commerce Minister Nirmala Sitharaman and Agriculture Minister Radha Mohan Singh, who all are expected to share with their ideological mentors what they have done in the last 15 months. If it is economy, we know there is not much to show with the Sensex and the Rupee spiralling downwards for weeks now and the inflation refusing to stop.

The hard-nosed right-wing RSS pracharaks have already expressed their displeasure with the proposed Foreign Direct Investment in retail, despite the BJP mentors' earlier promise that they will interfere only in its core issues, mostly cultural, for two years. The much-anticipated and now stuck-in-Parliament, Goods and Services Tax Bill, is also likely to come up in the deliberations.

Day Two: Culture and Society

Now, this is the core RSS territory. The contentious issue of caste-based reservation, which recently saw the rise of a 22-year-old Hardik Patel emerge as a national headline-maker, is expected to be discussed by Bhagwat and his men.

While there are rumours about Patel's proximity with Vishwa Hindu Parishad leader Pravin Togadia and thereby him being a right-wing ploy to get rid of reservation altogether, some in RSS believe that an agitation like the Patels in Modi's Gujarat is a threat to the unity of the country.

Day Three: Education

Now this is another favourite area of the RSS, which runs a number of educational organisations under its wing. The mentor to the BJP has repeatedly accused the Leftists in India of hijacking the Indian education system under the watch of the Congress, which has ruled India for almost 60 of the 69 years of independence.

With Modi at the helm now, the RSS wants a more nationalist (read saffronised) version of education at the schools controlled by the state. Human Resource Development Minister Smriti Irani is already under fire for hosting a number of right-wing ideas and incorporating them into the mainstream.

The two-month long FTII row over the appointment of BJP memnber and actor Gajendra Chauhan as its chairman is only an example of many controversial postings done in the last one year.