RSS' chief Mohan Bhagwat's Hindutva claim a challenge to secular India: CPI(M) General Secretary Prakash Karat

The claim of RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat that India is a Hindu nation and Hindutva its identity is a "challenge" to the concept of secular India, CPI(M) General Secretary Prakash Karat said in Chennai on Wednesday.

"RSS head Mohan Bhagwat has repeated his claim time and again. It is a basic challenge to the concept of a secular India," he told party workers at a meet organised by party magazine 'Marxist'.

The Indian citizenship, according to the view of the Left, was defined not by religious affiliation and "anyone who was born and lives in the country irrespective of caste or religious origin is a citizen and that (character) is challenged and questioned by the RSS," he noted.

Hitting out at the RSS, he said its project of "making India a Hindu rashtra that is Hindtva" is contrary to the tenets of the Indian Constitution. The definition of citizenship under the Constitution itself was not acceptable to the RSS, he claimed.

"This politics and ideology of Hindutva is sought to be imposed over the country and we see efforts to target minorities," he said. What was happening in Uttar Pradesh was an attempt to 'recreate Gujarat' and there have been 27 incidents of communal clashes in UP after the Lok Sabha polls, he said.

"The communal poliarisation in UP before elections is sought to be carried on so that the BJP and RSS can establish their political hegemony over the biggest state in our country," he alleged.