Prithvi deployment India's internal matter: RSS

The Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh on Tuesday criticised the United Front government for adopting a ''defensive'' stand on the deployment of the Prithvi missile and said it is an internal matter dictated by the country's security concerns.

Addressing a press conference in New Delhi on the conclusion of the three-day meeting of the apex Akhil Bharatiya Karyakari Mandal, RSS General Secretary H V Seshadri charged Prime Minister I K Gujral with going out of his way to deny recent American media reports about deployment of the surface-to-surface missile on the Pakistan border.

''Who is America to tell us whether we should deploy the missile or not? That is for this country to decide, keeping in view its security concerns,'' Professor Seshadri added. He said the strategic environment in the region was not conducive to India adopting a weak-kneed security policy. It was of particular concern that the defence allocation in real terms had gone down this year, he added.

Answering other questions, the RSS general secretary said the President's post should be kept above caste and other narrow considerations and a capable person appointed to it.

"The President is the representative of the entire country, not only of a particular community. To say that a person is being selected for the highest post in the country because of caste considerations is to dishonour the position," he added.

While not committing the organisation to any stand on the Women's Reservation Bill, Professor Seshadri said there was need for a wider public debate on women in Indian society.

On the compulsions of ''coalition politics'', the RSS chief said the ''negative opposition'' to the Bharatiya Janata Party would not be viable in the long run. Describing the present set-up at the Centre as ''unfortunate," he said no vital decisions were being taken and all efforts were being spent in keeping the government together.

Replying to a question on the BJP-Bahujan Samaj Party alliance in Uttar Pradesh, Professor Seshadri said while it could not be predicted how long the alliance would last, it had sent the ''right social message across to the people.''

Touching upon the resolutions passed at the three-day Karyakari Mandal meeting from July 4 to 6, the RSS leader said his organisation had resolved to celebrate August 15 this year as 'Bharat Mata Poojan Divas' (nation-worshipping day). It also urged its workers to conduct a seven-day campaign between August 15 and January 26, 1998, to carry the message of the freedom struggle.

It noted with regret that ''the divorcing of high moral and cultural norms of our national ethos has led to the overdomination of power and money in our public life resulting in all-round corruption, rampant casteism, vote-bank politics, etc."

The organisation also called for ending the ''divisive policy of minority appeasement'' and said special rights under Article 30 and Article 370 should be scrapped.

In another resolution, the RSS condoled the death of former Punjab senior superintendent of police Ajit Singh Sandhu and called upon the government to issue an ordinance putting an end to ''motivated cases and charges'' against security personnel who had fought a ''proxy war'' in Punjab and other terrorism-riddled states.

The organisation requested the President, who is the head of the security forces, to take necessary steps in this regard.

By a third resolution, the meeting complimented the Indian government for standing up to pressure of the affluent countries at the World Trade Organisation meeting on June 30 in Geneva. It urged the government not to retract from the nine-year limit to lift non-tariff barriers on 4,500 items in the agricultural and consumer sectors.

However, it charged the government with ''criminal negligence'' in not enacting a law to protect the country's bio-resources. Failure to do this had led to ''piracy'' of 90 per cent of the country's 45,000 plant and 95,000 animal species by the United States, which is going to patent them gradually, it added.