The World Indigenous People’s day observed on August 9 has no relevance for India since all Indians, including tribals, are indigenous to the country, the chief of Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh affiliate Akhil Bharatiya Vanvasi Kalyan Ashram said on Wednesday, reported PTI.

The World Indigenous People’s Day was meant to extend the rights and self-respect to the struggling indigenous peoples of America, Africa, Australia, New Zealand and Canada, Akhil Bharatiya Vanvasi Kalyan Ashram president Satyendra Singh said.

The Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, a Hindutva group, is the parent organisation of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party.

Singh alleged that “some external forces” and Christian missionaries in India are behind a large-scale conspiracy to divide the society in the name of Indigenous People’s Day.

“Unfortunately, some organisations working among the tribal communities have also started observing the day as ‘Adivasi Diwas’,” he alleged. “Youths are being motivated against the true spirit of the day and a sense of separatism is getting rooted among them.”

Singh claimed that the day holds no relevance for India since the country is now free from colonial forces.

He added that India had signed the United Nations declaration in 2007 expressing its view in obvious terms that all Indians are indigenous people of India.

“When we talk about indigenous people, Kalyan Ashram emphatically believes that all Indians are indigenous people,” he said. “We believe that the tribal communities are part and parcel of our Sanatan society.”

Also read: Why Hindutva groups want to reshape Birsa Munda’s legend