 Summary of this article
- Tamil Nadu’s Self-Respect Movement built a strong foundation for social justice and pluralism, countering the RSS’s centralised, faith-driven nationalism.
- The state’s welfare-driven “coming together” model prioritises people’s agency over the RSS-BJP’s “holding together” model of power.
- Despite Hindutva mobilisation attempts—from Ayodhya to Murugan politics—Tamil Nadu’s cultural and religious pluralism has consistently checkmated the RSS’s appeal.
The year 1925 is significant because it gave birth to two directly opposite and contested ideologically driven political movements. In Tamil Nadu, Periyar (E. V. Ramasamy) established the Self-Respect Movement and in Maharashtra, inspired by Vinayak Damodar Savarkar’s emotionally charged Hindu supremacist ideas, Keshav Baliram Hedgewar founded the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS). The reason for taking two diametrically opposite political trajectories is to provide the historical context for why Tamil Nadu is not reflecting the national trend when it comes to religious identity, despite the fact that the rest of the nation has moved to the religious right since the December 6, 1992 demolition of the Babri Mosque at Ayodhya. |
