Ernakulam: Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan on Saturday strongly criticised the Southern Railway for making schoolchildren sing an RSS song on board the newly inaugurated Vande Bharat Express running from Ernakulam to Bengaluru. In a statement issued by the Chief Minister’s Office (CMO), Pinarayi Vijayan said that such an incident deserves strong protest. Television visuals showed students performing the song which is associated with the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), during the train journey.

"Including the song of the RSS, which allegedly constantly spreads anti-religious hatred and communal divisive politics, in the official programme of the government is a violation of constitutional principles," he alleged.

The CM further accused the Sangh Parivar of misusing the Indian Railways, one of the country’s largest public sector institutions, to advance what he described as a communal political agenda.

He also criticised the Southern Railway for sharing a video of the incident on social media with the caption “a patriotic song.” Such actions, Pinarayi said, mocked both the Southern Railway and India’s national movement.

“The Railways, which once stood as a pillar of India’s secular nationalism during the freedom struggle, is now being used to promote the RSS’s communal agenda — an organisation that had betrayed the freedom movement,” the CPM leader alleged.

He claimed that “narrow political motives” were behind the inclusion of “extreme Hindutva politics” in the Vande Bharat inauguration event and urged people to recognise and protest against such attempts to undermine secularism. Following widespread criticism, the Southern Railway reportedly removed the social media post featuring the students singing the RSS song.