It was then, when he was allegedly asked to join “a bomb preparation and training team” purportedly intended to attack mosques, that Yashwant Sahdev Shinde, a former Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) pracharak (preacher), quit the organisation and began campaigning against the RSS.
His latest letter to Karnataka Home Minister Priyank Kharge and Union Home Minister Amit Shah, demanding that the RSS, Vishva Hindu Parishad (VHP), and Bajrang Dal be declared “terrorist organisations”, has now made headlines.
In the letter sent in early August, Shinde has also called for the arrest and investigation of senior figures, including RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat, RSS leader Indresh Kumar, and VHP general secretary Milind Parande, alleging their involvement in a series of bomb explosions across India during the 2000s.
Shinde’s allegations are not new. He first made them publicly in 2022, when he submitted a sworn affidavit before a special Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) court in Nanded, Maharashtra. He claimed that he had attended meetings in which RSS and VHP members discussed plans for bomb attacks in different parts of the country.
According to his affidavit, Shinde was given bomb-making training under Parande’s guidance in 2003, alongside around 20 other people. His claims formed part of the proceedings in the April 2006 Nanded blast, in which an explosion at the home of alleged RSS worker Laxman Rajkondwar killed his son, Naresh, and Himanshu Panse, reportedly a VHP activist.
The CBI had described the incident as a “bomb assembly operation”, possibly intended to target a mosque in Aurangabad. Shinde sought to become a prosecution witness. Although his affidavit was initially considered by the trial judge, A.R. Dhamecha, the judge was transferred before the next hearing, and his successor rejected Shinde’s application.
On 4 January 2025, a Nanded trial court acquitted all nine surviving accused in the case.
Shinde has subsequently made further allegations concerning blasts in Jalna, Purna, and Parbhani, claiming that fellow trainees were involved in attacks intended to be blamed on Muslims.
He has also levelled accusations against Indresh Kumar in connection with the Ajmer Sharif dargah blast and against Colonel Prasad Purohit and former BJP MP Pragya Singh Thakur in relation to the 2008 Malegaon blast case. Both were ultimately acquitted in that case.