RSS leader Hosabale’s Pakistan remarks spark row: Why Sangh has long kept window for dialogue open
Over the years, the Sangh has paired a tough stance on terrorism emanating from the neighbouring country with advocacy for greater people-to-people engagement.
Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh General Secretary Dattatreya Hosabale (Express archives) Recent remarks by RSS general secretary Dattatreya Hosabale that India should not shut the doors on dialogue with Pakistan have attracted considerable attention, given the BJP’s foregrounding, in recent years, of the position that “terror and talks cannot go together”.
The comments have also exposed the saffron organisation to sharp Opposition criticism, with critics accusing it of belittling terror attacks such as the 2019 Pulwama attack by describing them as “pinpricks”, and alleging that advocacy of dialogue reflects capitulation to US pressure.
Asked how Pakistan should be dealt with, Hosabale, in a recent interview to PTI, pointed to the efforts made by PMs Atal Bihari Vajpayee and Narendra Modi to normalise the ties. “If the Pakistanis (are) trying to give pinpricks like in Pulwama etc., we have to answer wholesomely according to the situation because the security and self-respect of the nation has to be protected, and the government of the day should take note of it and take care of it. But, at the same time, we need not close the doors. We should always be ready to engage them in a dialogue. That’s why diplomatic relations are maintained, trade and commerce go on, (and) visas are being given. That we should not stop … there should always be a window for dialogue.”
“This (dialogue) can happen (if) more and more Pakistan citizens understand and non-government actors in Pakistan raise these things … like academicians, sportsmen, scientists, community leaders … The political leadership and the military leadership have developed some aversion to Indian politics. This (civil society) is one hope,” Hosabale further said.
Justifying his stance, he added, “I believe that civic society relations … because we have cultural relations, we have been one nation, so that has to be emphasised by some people at least. People of Pakistan, the civil society, various institutions … if that goes on, I think it can (improve relations). (People-to-people contact) should be tried more and more.”
The comments drew criticism from Opposition leaders, with Congress MP Manish Tewari asking what had materially changed since April 22, 2025, when Pakistan-based terrorists carried out the Pahalgam terror attack, that a dialogue was warranted. “Is it only because you are being nudged by some hyper-power which is today beholden to Pakistan for all the wrong reasons that you need to open a dialogue with them?” he asked.
While Rajya Sabha MP Kapil Sibal also hit out at Hosabale, calling his “pinpricks” remark “obnoxious”, Kashmir-based leaders such as Mehbooba Mufti of the Peoples Democratic Party and National Conference president Farooq Abdullah have backed Hosabale’s call for dialogue.
The Sangh’s position
An examination of the RSS’s past statements on Pakistan and India’s neighbourhood policy shows that Hosabale’s remarks are broadly in line with the organisation’s long-standing and nuanced approach towards Islamabad. The articulation has often combined a hawkish posture on terrorism with conciliatory messaging at different stages of Indo-Pak relations. On more than one occasion, the RSS has underlined the need for a “befitting response” to terror attacks even while advocating greater people-to-people engagement.
RSS sources said Hosabale’s latest statement was, in fact, an argument for dialogue through civil society and ordinary citizens rather than through heads of state. “We believe that public opinion needs to be created in favour of India among Pakistan’s citizenry so that it can push back against the military. This can happen only through greater people-to-people contact,” said a senior functionary.
The emphasis on shared history and culture has been a recurring feature of the Sangh’s approach to Pakistan, even as it consistently pushed for harsher responses to terrorism.
Months after the Pahalgam attack and Operation Sindoor, RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat, during his annual Vijaydashami address on October 2, 2025, described India’s neighbours as “part of our own family”. He stressed that the prosperity of neighbouring countries was in India’s interest and New Delhi must work towards it.
Without naming Pakistan directly, the RSS sarsanghchalak said, “These neighbouring countries are linked with Bharat on the basis of both culture and long-standing ties between citizens. … Peace, stability, prosperity, and ensuring comfort and well-being in these countries is a necessity arising out of our natural affinity with these countries, going beyond the consideration for protection of our interests.”
On August 28, 2025, during a lecture series at New Delhi’s Vigyan Bhawan, and barely two months after Operation Sindoor, Bhagwat had underlined shared civilisational history while speaking about the idea of Akhand Bharat.
“Akhand Bharat is a truth. It is a fact of life. Those who are deliberately denying this truth, what is happening to them? Since the time they separated, look at their state now. Are they happy materially or spiritually? No. Many efforts have been made, but a solution could not be found. It could not be found because the limb that was part of this body has been severed. The only solution is to understand that culturally and historically, we are one. And then we behave accordingly,” he said.
“Once, most of Bharat’s neighbouring countries were Bharat. The geography is the same; the rivers are the same, the people are the same, the forests remain the same; only lines were drawn on maps,” Bhagwat added, stressing the need to deepen the sense of “belonging” among people across the region.
These remarks followed the Sangh’s congratulatory message to the government and armed forces after Operation Sindoor, which Bhagwat said had enhanced the “self-respect of the nation”. In public lectures across different cities, he also repeatedly argued that Pakistan understood only the language of retaliatory military action and sustained responses would eventually bring Islamabad to the negotiating table.
Following the 2019 Pulwama attack, too, the RSS had adopted a strong line. “It is a cowardly act, we strongly condemn it. We expect action in response to this incident … We have tolerated a lot and are still doing so, as seen from today’s incident … They will get a reply,” Bhagwat told reporters after the attack.
Conciliatory line after Pathankot
Before this phase, however, the RSS line on Pakistan had often been markedly conciliatory, even in the aftermath of terror attacks.
On the day of the terrorist strike on the Indian Air Force base in Pathankot, Punjab, in January 2016, the RSS underlined the need for “cordial relations” with Pakistan and had backed Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s surprise visit to Lahore weeks earlier to attend the wedding of the granddaughter of then Pakistan PM Nawaz Sharif.
Addressing a press conference during the Vishwa Sangh Shibir in Indore in late December 2015, Hosabale stressed the need to establish the Indian philosophy of “sahjivika (mutual coexistence)” with Pakistan. “This world is a kutumb. (Mutual coexistence) is necessary, necessary for all (countries). They will have to learn it,” he said.
Asked about criticism of Modi having a meal at Sharif’s residence, Hosabale said, “We don’t oppose it. Why shouldn’t he have had lunch?” He added that the RSS’s conception of “vasudhaiva kutumbakam (the world is one family)” was reflected in Modi sharing a meal with Sharif. “It is our duty to be cordial with people. That is the dharma of Bharat,” Hosabale said, adding that “it is the task of the Indian government to decide the nature of diplomatic relations. We want cordial relations.”
In September 2015, the RSS had similarly favoured engagement with Pakistan, describing all of India’s neighbours as having been “formed out of the same body”. The remarks came barely a fortnight after a scheduled NSA-level meeting between India and Pakistan was cancelled as Islamabad insisted on including Kashmir in the agenda and invited separatist leaders from the Valley for talks.
Hosabale had then brushed aside the acrimony between the two countries as disputes “within a family … between brothers”. “In Bharat, Kauravas and Pandavas were brothers. Efforts have to be made for dharma sansthapana (establishing order),” he had said.
Belligerence to calibrated engagement
Even before the Modi era, the RSS’s response to Pakistan shifted according to circumstances. The organisation maintained a strongly belligerent posture in the decades immediately after Independence, but softened it during the late 1990s and early 2000s, particularly during the tenure of former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee.
In 2001, a resolution of the Sangh’s Akhil Bharatiya Pratinidhi Sabha (ABPS) stated, “ABPS … wants to emphasise that a dialogue with those outfits that are really interested in peace through negotiations be started at the earliest, and at the same time insurgent terrorism be put down with an iron hand, giving the security forces freedom of decision and action, including the destruction of terrorist training centres in PoK.”
Similarly, during the Vajpayee-Pervez Musharraf talks, the Akhil Bharatiya Karyakari Mandal (ABKM) attempted to balance scepticism towards Pakistan with cautious optimism around dialogue.
“Despite doubts about the legitimacy of the present military government in Pakistan, ABKM welcomes the Vajpayee-Musharraf talks in the hope that Pakistan will positively respond to another opportunity for ensuring peace between the two countries,” it had said in a resolution.
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