CPM general secretary Sitaram Yechury on Tuesday accused Prime Minister Narendra Modi of emulating what Hitler did in Germany by trying to control the education system to foster irrationality and destroy progressive attitudes, often through the agency of the state governors.

“We must understand how Hitler managed to ideologically persuade the German people who were the inheritors of the most scientific, progressive philosophical traditions of Hegel, Marx and all the progressive and rational thinkers,” Yechury told a massive protest held in Thiruvananthapuram against governor Arif Mohammed Khan’s interventions in administration and the universities.

“Everything was reduced to blind faith, personality cult and to accepting what the leader said as the truth. That’s exactly what’s happening under Modi.”

Khan and Kerala’s CPM-led Left government have been at loggerheads over several issues, including the appointment of vice-chancellors to state universities.

While the state government claims that all the VCs were appointed according to the laws under which the universities were established, the governor has cited the violation of UGC regulations.

Protests were held in all district headquarters in Kerala on Tuesday against Khan’s “interference” in universities and his stalling of several key legislations.

Yechury accused the BJP-RSS of launching an onslaught on the education system to push its Hindutva agenda, and urged all non-BJP governments to unite and resist it.

“This assault on reason and rationality is what brought fascism to Germany, and it is this assault on reason and rationality — through the destruction of higher education — that Modi aims to carry out in India. That is why this is not a small battle. This is part of a much larger battle concerning the future of India,” Yechury said.

He cautioned that the RSS was trying to destroy the progressive education system in Kerala that had helped overcome religious and caste divisions.

He claimed that Kerala’s higher education system was an obstacle to the plans of the RSS.

“Everybody is educated, everybody has access to higher education and therefore everybody’s own creativity can flourish. This is the exact opposite of the RSS project of a fascistic Hindu Rashtra,” he said.

“They want mind control. They don’t want creativity. They want people to think in a backward, obscurantist manner (and become) victims of superstition and blind faith so that their project can succeed.”

Yechury said the New Education Policy — viewed by many as a push towards privatised, online education that would hurt the poor — was a tool to destroy any progressive education system anywhere in the country.

“Controlling education is a very important matter for the BJP-RSS design to convert a secular, democratic India into a fascistic Hindutva Rashtra,” he said.