‘Which freedom struggle did you participate in?’: Priyank Kharge takes on RSS again

Karnataka Home Minister Priyank Kharge launched a sharp attack on the RSS over its role in India's freedom struggle during an Independence Day speech on Saturday (August 15).

Kharge said he could list hundreds of Congress workers and leaders martyred in the freedom struggle against British rule and challenged the RSS to name even 50 of its own members who died fighting for independence. "My only question to the RSS is: In which freedom struggle did you participate in?" he said.

Questions RSS’s legal status

He also questioned the RSS’s conduct during the communal riots that followed Partition, asking what role the organisation played in protecting people at the time — rather than fuelling the violence.

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Kharge then turned to the RSS’s institutional status, noting that the organisation is not formally registered, and asked how an unregistered body could be banned under the law in the first place. Referring to RSS leaders’ repeated claims that the organisation “cannot be banned”, he suggested this was simply because it had never registered itself — leaving it outside the legal framework such action would require.

Kharge also defended the state government’s Government Premises and Public Property Use Control Bill, 2026, rejecting the BJP’s charge that it specifically targets the RSS. He pointed out that the Bill does not name any organisation, association or political party.

Bill adds new political flashpoint

He said the Bill's purpose is procedural: any group — registered or not — would need permission from the relevant authority before holding an event on government premises or public property. This, he said, would give legal backing to directions already issued by the Supreme Court and High Courts on the use of public spaces.

Kharge questioned why the BJP was opposing the Bill even before examining its provisions.

The remarks come amid an ongoing tussle between the Congress and BJP in Karnataka over RSS activities, the use of public spaces and the proposed legislation — with the freedom struggle, the RSS’s legal status and the new Bill now emerging as three intertwined fronts in the state’s political battle.

(This article was originally published in The Federal Karnataka.)