Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) has sought to reach out to Muslims ahead of the next Lok Sabha elections scheduled to be held in May 2024 saying that India belongs to the Muslims as much as it belongs to the others.
''Muslims are also ours.....they are not separate from us.....only their way of worshipping has changed.....this country belongs to them as well,'' RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat said at a meeting of the Sangh functionaries and intellectuals here recently.
He said that RSS wanted to unite the entire society and that those who opposed the Sangh should also be taken along.
According to the sources close to the Sangh, a few prominent Muslim leaders were present at the meeting. Those, who were invited to attend the meeting, included well-known Lucknow-based mango grower Kaleemullah, who was the recipient of several national and state-level awards for growing new varieties of mangoes in his orchard.
Bhagwat also said that India should help the countries which were opposed to Pakistan. ''We should help the countries which oppose Pakistan just as we had helped Bangladesh,'' he said.
He also slammed the critics of the 'Sanatan Dharma' and said that those criticising Hinduism actually did not know about it. ''There have been numerous examples when the people who used to criticise Hinduism became its admirer after they got to know about it,'' he added.
Bhagwat, who was on a four-day visit here, held a series of meetings with the Sangh office bearers and asked them to reach out to every section of the society. He asked the RSS workers to especially focus on the regions were ''anti-national'' elements were active.
The RSS chief's Muslim remarks came amid attempts by the BJP to woo the 'pasmanda' (backward) Muslims ahead of the next year's Parliamentary elections.
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