Saturday, May 31, 2014

Resurrecting Spiritual India, the NaMo way !


At the outset I join billion plus Indians and congratulate Mr. Narendra Modi for a spectacular victory! The credit is his entirely! After all ‘abki baar Modi Sarkar’! I am proud of the ‘thinking’ Indian voters who voted decisively and prevented the parliament from once again falling into the chaos of coalition politics and its inevitable adverse effects! Great job, India!

Soon the celebrations will cool down and so will the heat of having ‘arrived’ for Mr. Modi. He is at 7 Race Course Road, trying to settle down as the 15th prime minister of India. Sitting alone, provided he gets to spend some time with himself in the midst of the conundrum of hectic national politics and governance, I am sure he is going to look back at his life and feel proud of his life’s journey from being absolutely ordinary to becoming extraordinary. His transformation from an individual with a humble family background to becoming an idealist RSS pracharak to being regarded as a crucial cog in the BJP’s national politics to garnering his mentors’ – LK Advani and AB Vajpayee – confidence and completing successive successful terms as the Chief Minister of Gujarat and along the way getting national and global recognition for his Modinomics and Gujarat Model of Development despite the stubborn stains of post Godhra riots of 2002 and finally arriving in a grand style in Delhi to fulfil his national top-job responsibilities – is almost complete. Now the country and the world are waiting with their fingers crossed to see if this new butterfly will retain its beautiful colours and wings and for how long …

The world knows about the factors which led to the unstoppable rise of Narendra Modi in the Indian national landscape otherwise littered with political mediocrity all around, with a few bright spots nevertheless; and how he emerged as the most credible alternative for the prime ministerial post in a period when India was suffering a perpetually silent and subservient prime minister to an arrogant grand old party stalwarts, rampant corruption and unprecedented scales of scams being unearthed almost on a daily-basis and reeling with policy paralysis being served unapologetically under the garb of coalition compulsions. Therefore, in the 2014 General Elections the common agenda the voters of India followed was to get rid of the Indian National Congress and its equally inefficient allies. And whole-heartedly gave a thumping majority to the Bharatiya Janata Party under the leadership of Namo: ‘Abki Baar Modi Sarkar’ and ‘Achhe din Ayenge’ slogans caught the national imagination. So we have the Modi Sarkar; now the wait is on for the assured achhe din …

We Indians expect Mr. Modi to steer India to a magnificent future which he has promised to do so. How successful he will be the time will tell. So far, he has shown a grand start with an unprecedented show at his swearing-in ceremony with all SAARC nations heads’ presence, pulling a diplomatic coup smoothly. From Day1 he has made his presence felt strongly all across the world. He has articulated his intentions clear and loud both within the country and abroad, especially in the neighbourhood. He is being received with open arms by the global leaders. All of a sudden India has become a favourite destination for the powerful presidents and prime ministers. So, everything seems to be in place and progressing as per the plans and expectations. And knowing about Mr. Modi’s personality and characteristics as a political leader, I am sure that he will succeed and soon. His determination and aspirations will continue to drive him – and India – on the right path.

However, today I want to touch upon another less talked about aspect of his being elected which caught my attention in his Varanasi Victory acceptance speech. It was his pledge to take India back to its glorious era of spiritual splendour, besides economic dominance. And as a first step he prodded the people of the spiritual capital of India – now his constituency – to keep the country’s oldest city clean. He assured the Benarasi-babus and all fellow Indians that he will undertake Ganga-cleansing as one of his first few priorities as the prime minister of India. On that evening his short speech threw a never before seen spiritual side of his personality which if he is able to take forward he will re-catapult our country into the sphere of spiritual dominance alongside a strong economic place on the global high table.

I really don’t know how the majority of the Indians would have reacted to his promises of spiritual endeavours but I for sure was elated because as a proud Indian I want to see my great country once again shine in the world as the once-upon-a-time ancient Bharat i.e. Sone-ki-Chidiya with a spiritual core!

India’s unmatched spiritual legacy and treasures are known to the world but I feel those have got lost with majority of Indians, the blessed heirs of the heritage. As the land which gave humans their first life’s philosophy i.e. Vedic Philosophy which went on to evolve as a religion as Hinduism, and based on its spiritual teachings all the other religions of the world came into existence, it was not so long ago that India had retained its place under the Sun before its spiritual core started to get eroded with faulty religious interpretations and social ill-practices.

Coupled with it came the cloak of secularism in a Hindu-dominated divided India, a large chunk of which was annexed by the departing Britishers leaving behind a bloody trail of mangled and lost lives among both Hindus & Muslims. To compound the situation further, as the politics became competitive over a few decades after Independence, political parties of all hues started to exploit secularism and democracy for their narrow gains and an unfortunate pattern of minority appeasement started which was nothing but fooling them into believing about their betterment. The result was further alienation of the people belonging to the smaller religious communities, Muslims relatively being in a worse state of existence due to their cocooned mentality and unwillingness to mingle with the rest of the country-folks. Their orthodox and closed religious approach and lack of proper education made them survive on the fringes of the society. The Hindu-Muslim mental divide was not easy to patch as the latter were strongly regarded as the ones being responsible for severe anti-Hindu activities by the Muslim invaders.     
Secularism also perpetrated a strange public behaviour among the so-called literate strata of the society which primarily comprised of England-educated politicians, bureaucracy, academics and the media; they tried to keep themselves away – in public - from anything having Indian-ness lest they got branded as ‘anti-secular’ because almost all things ‘Indian’ had strong essence of Hinduism. And why not because India has been a Hindu nation since its origin; the other religions as and when they came into existence also came to India and flourished due to the tolerant religious environment of the country, a scenario not seen anywhere else in the world then, and even now. Strangely, the same set of highly placed, educated class was deeply Indian in their private lives. The Great Indian Hypocrisy? 

Therefore, the biggest casualty of this post-Independence acquired characteristic of India was its age-old treasure of Spirituality. As Spirituality was the foundation of Hinduism and in a newly legally secular India, it became a sin to be seen or display one’s religion, primarily among its influential people – the elites and the powerful. Bizarre as it may sound but the truth is bitter. The ancient Holy Scriptures of India viz. Vedas, Puranas and Upanishads which were the foundational stones of the Hinduism were forgotten completely and with them we lost the immeasurable treasure of ancient wisdom and knowledge. The seemingly more popular and easier to read ones viz. Ramayana, Mahabharata and the greatest of them all The Gita were relegated into prayer rooms of homes, worshipped in private but seldom read or discussed in public. The Gita found another purpose in an Independent India; not yet convicted criminals were made to take oath of truth by putting their hand on the holy book of Gita: ‘Main Gita pe hath rakh ke kasam khata hoon ki main sach kahunga aur sach ke siva kuch nahin kahunga!’Ved-Vyasa would have never ever imagined even in his wildest dreams that his divine composition of the never-revealed-before universal wisdom by Lord Krishna to his blessed disciple Arjuna would be treated in this fashion in his own country!

In all countries of the world it is normal to teach and learn about their official state religion in their schools but not in India! However, in the same India, exceptions are the minority religion-based missionaries-run schools which unapologetically teach their about their religion to students. But just talk about including Indian Spirituality in the school curriculum and the entire country will come down tumbling with the fear of having seen to be so-called hurting the so-called sentiments of the so-called minorities! Why should any person feel hurt by having to learn about Indian spirituality when every Indian belonging to whichever religion is originally an Indian? Why should there be different standards of judgement in India for various groups of Indians, just because they practice different religions?

Mr. Modi has made the start to his spiritual mission by creating a new ministry dedicated to the mammoth and urgent task of cleaning the Ganga. But this is just one of the many initiatives he needs to undertake to resurrect the spiritual India.
Whenever anybody talks about India in a positive tone, he mentions about our country’s gift of spirituality; and the foreigners talk also about Yoga which is a spiritual method of attaining The Spirit. And besides the desire to see the beautiful Taj Mahal, majority of the tourists visiting India are here to experience its spirituality and learn yoga. Their favourite place is of course Varanasi, now the Prime Minister’s constituency.

Therefore, Varanasi was the natural choice of place for Mr. Modi to start his spiritual resurrection of India. Varanasi, or Benares as is its local name, is the oldest city of India, and the most evolved one. Mark Twain had once remarked reverentially that Benares is more ancient than anything ancient and yet more modern than any place on the earth! The city has been the center of spiritual evolution of India and has shaped the contours of Hinduism and Bharat - India. All the stalwart saints and philosophers of India, whether from south or east or west or north, have gained spiritual knowledge at Benares. Many of them made Benares their permanent abode as Gurus and many others spread across the country and taught and took the Vedic Philosophy to the core of every countryman. Still many seers chose the path of complete renunciation and headed towards the Himalayas to spend their life in search for the God through the path of meditation.

Benares is the holy city which saw emergence of the spiritual greats of our country: Babaji – Guru Nagaraj, Shankaracharya, Patanjali, Lahiri Mahasaya, Sri Yukteswar Giri, Paramahansa Nikhileshwar Giri, … There are hundreds of exalted spiritual gurus whose names I do not know or remember now, for which I offer my sincere apologies.

So, as we know, Benares is the spiritual headquarters of India. Every part and path and corner and monument and Ganga ghat and temple and ashram reflects spirituality. But Benares is not religious; it is hard core spiritual. And this is the prime reason that we see the city retain its spiritual structure in spite of repeated attempts by Muslim invaders to destroy it. In fact, the influence of Benares was so strong that the Islam also got integrated into the city’s spiritual way of life. The foundation of a Secular India was laid at Benares by its spiritual gurus and the legacy carried forwarded by their followers.

So, simultaneously to cleaning the Ganga and restoring the city of Varanasi to its ancient glory, Mr. Modi has to take Benares – Varanasi – to the world, and to the rest of India. I suggest he creates a special ministry for this noble mission – Ministry of Spirituality under his direct supervision. He should set up spiritual centers all across the globe. He should also integrate the already established spiritual centers in India and abroad. He could make the start by taking the help of the immensely popular Yogoda Satsang Society founded by Paramahansa Yogananda, with its headquarters in Ranchi in India and in California, US. The association of Mr. Modi’s spiritual mission with Yoganandaji’s YSS-SRF would give it the best start and acceptance globally.

Paramahansa Yogananda is one of the two Indians revered and followed by the world population; the second figure, of course, is Mahatma Gandhi. Yoganandaji took the ancient form of scientific meditation, Kriya Yoga, taught by Lord Krishna to Arjuna but got lost over centuries, to the West under the spiritual guidance and blessings of the greatest of all Indian Gurus – Babaji and his line of disciples Lahiri Mahasaya and Sri Yukteswar Giri. Babaji was born a couple of centuries in BC and has retained his human form and lives in the Himalayas.

Mr. Modi has to boost spiritual tourism back home.
  • He has to ensure that all spiritually aligned cities are neat and clean with good infrastructure and connectivity, coupled with the assurance of security and safety of visitors.
  • Dedicated websites with complete information about the Vedic Philosophy in various global languages have to be created.
  • The Holy Scriptures – Vedas, Puranas, Upanishads, Gita, Ramayana, Mahabharata - and thus the vast wealth of spiritual knowledge need to be translated and made accessible to the global seekers, both as static information and through regular distant learning courses.
  • The social networking sites – Facebook, Twitter, Blogs - have to be utilized to their full potential.
  • Spiritual international bestsellers like Autobiography of a Yogi and The Gita should be used as a tool to initiate the beginners. Movies, television programs, newspaper columns, advertisements, plays, music and books should be used as mediums to spread Indian spirituality.
  • Yoga and meditation being integral parts of spirituality, these should be taught at all spiritual centers.
  • Credible ‘living’ gurus should be made spiritual ambassadors and spiritual speakers for lecture tours and road shows abroad.
  • Spiritual literary festivals should be organized globally.
  • In fact, every Indian embassy and high commission should have a spiritual consulate in-charge of the spiritual mission.
  • International Spiritual Congregations and Conferences should be held and participated in, with celebrations of special spiritual occasions.
  • Spiritual theme parks, spiritual museums with wax statues of ancient founding spiritual gurus, spiritual theme cafes should be set up all across the world.
  • Spiritual souvenirs – mugs, fridge magnets, albums, post cards, t-shirts, bags, pens, paintings, photographs, figurines, handbooks, calendars, diaries, DVDs, CDs, wrist bands, pendants, shawls, wall hangings, ties, notebooks, writing pads, mobile phone covers, umbrellas, stickers, tattoos, etc. – should be merchandised in these centers and also online.
  • Simultaneously, all these spiritual efforts should be replicated back home. Because, if anyone needs a strong dose of spirituality to infuse ‘life’ in living, it is an average Indian, who is today bereft of the benefits of his ancient heritage!

Well, if the prime minister Mr. Narendra Modi ever gets to read my spiritual suggestions, I am sure he would find something good and implementable from the list of probable initiatives and adopt them to resurrect the spiritual India … I wish you, Mr. Modi, all the Divine Blessings in your – our, every Indian’s – spiritual mission … Aum … :)    

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