“RSS, an organisation that divides the country… At the time of independence, its leaders neither went to jail nor were ever banned by the British,” said the Congress in a post on X.

“A slogan about the RSS’s betrayal was on everyone’s lips… Those who were patriots went to fight, those who were traitors joined the Sangh,” said the post.

The party said the RSS created a communal divide between Hindus and Muslims. “That organisation… whose hands are stained with the blood of Mahatma Gandhi…it’s our country’s misfortune that workers of a communal and hateful organisation like the RSS are directly running the government,” it said.

“How can an organisation that was banned by Sardar Patel be honoured today by the Indian government?,” said party general secretary (organisation) K C Venugopal in a post on X.

The Politburo of the CPIM called the commemorative postal stamp on RSS centenary an “insult to the Constitution of India”. It said that “the postal stamp showing uniformed RSS volunteers at the 1963 Republic Day parade too falsifies history”.

The Aam Aadmi Party also criticised the government for glorifying the RSS. In a video message on X, AAP Rajya Sabha MP Sanjay Singh said: “Now we hear of the Prime Minister issuing commemorative tickets and of RSS history being introduced into academic syllabi, but there will only be in praise of the RSS, while its betrayal during the freedom movement will be hidden.”

People of the country must remember that for 52 long years, the RSS did not hoist the national flag at its own headquarters, he said.

“This is an organisation that believes in discrimination. That is why, to this day, it has never appointed a Dalit, backward, tribal or a woman as its chief,” Singh said. —With PTI inputs