365bet娱乐

OUR CULTURAL HERITAGE
AND ITS MODERN ORIENTATION-II

(Continued from the last number)

The Modern Orientation

We were discussing the nature of that cultural heritage that we have from the past in India 鈥� how was that tremendous experiment in human culture started on this continent by great thinkers, great sages, great philosophers? What was its spiritual strength behind? We discussed all these things and towards the end I said, as we come to the modern period, we find a sagging of spirits, all sorts of weaknesses coming in. And one particular point I had made and that was our political heritage has been broken several times, but our spiritual heritage has remained strong and steady and continuous. In Sanskrit we call them Raja Vamsha 鈥� political heritage, Rishi Vamsha 鈥� spiritual heritage. Anyone studying Indian history can see this distinction that the spiritual continuity of India has been unbroken. The political continuity of India has been broken again and again. The importance of the modern period is to strengthen our political status as a nation and to give a body politic to our eternal soul. A strong, steady body politic. When you come to the modern period we come to our connection with a dynamic culture of the West. In the medieval period we had assimilated the great Islamic culture, its social equality and almost every spiritual teacher and saint of the middle ages 鈥� from Nanak up to the eighteenth century 鈥� they were all Islamic in their social policy and Hindu in their spiritual policy. Something tremendous took place in them 鈥� a beautiful synthesis of culture of values to create an egalitarian, progressive, spiritual, social order. But conditions were unpropitious at that time. So many political tumulus were going on, invasions were going on. Towards the end of the period came the British, bringing a new culture to our country. In the eighteenth century, we are entering the modern period. The modern West had developed remarkably during the spiritual sphere, philosophical sphere. India has invaded the rest of the world philosophically, spiritually, again and again. According to a famous British writer, E. J. Arwik鈥揾is book is called The Message of Plato 鈥搚ou can never understand Plato and Aristotle, without understanding the Upanishads. Study the Upanishads, you will find Plato and Aristotle clear to you. Otherwise you wouldn鈥檛 understand it at all. So India has influenced so many of these foreign countries throughout history, in the world of thought, in the world of ideas, in the world of culture. Look at that scene presented by Plato鈥揝ocretes is to drink poison. Even that event can never happen in India. Socretes, the noblest of men, was condemned by the Athenian democracy as one who was misguiding the youth of Athens. Therefore, he must be killed. He must drink poison and die. Can you imagine a man like Socretes being put to death in a country like India? He will be the centre of worship. We will honour him.

Even later when Jesus Christ was crucified in Palastine, what is it due to? Intolerance. Intolerance of any new idea. Here, if Jesus Christ was here, he would have been worshipped, even in his lifetime, as divine. That is India鈥檚 culture. But Bertrand Russell once said about such events like Socretes and Jesus Christ and others, 鈥淚f you teach the world faster than it can learn, you are in for trouble for yourself.鈥� That is what he said. Do not teach the world faster than they can learn. Socretes spoke something beyond the comprehension of Greeks at that time. Jesus did the same thing. Whereas such teachings are common to us.

When the Buddha spoke high ideas, highly metaphysical, highly rational, we all understood it, we accepted it at that time. Sankaracharya did it. Even today Swami Vivekananda 鈥� beautiful things he says鈥揷riticised our religion, our society. We did not kill him. We honour him. That is India. This wonderful country. That culture is behind us, that quality is there. And so you find throughout the ages, this wonderful idea, that particular last centuries not only in science and technology but also in political thought. India came in touch with this powerful culture of the West. It was a new experience. We had come in touch with Greek culture ages ago. That was also Western culture. But only just in the fringe of India. But this time India came under the political and cultural domination of the West through Britain, and Britain introduced the English language. We took up this English language. These are interactions between two great cultures鈥搊ne long but weak, the other fresh and strong. This is an interesting study in the history of nineteenth century India. That is where to find the British well settled, organising the whole country politically and creating what you find today the political unity of India. We had lost it again and again. Congeries of little States fighting with each other. That was the condition at that time. We have to thank the British that they politically unified the whole of India and gave us the English language as a medium to get some of the most important Western cultural values and thoughts which our people absorbed. The contact of the West with India had various consequences. In the early stages it was frightening to us 鈥� we may lose our culture, we may lose everything鈥搕hat feeling was there. Therefore, the first reaction to this Western culture was defensive. We shall not have anything to do with this. We shall stand on our own. That defensive attitude you can see. That was the beginning of the nineteenth century.

One great teacher who came at that time, a great thinker, a great leader, one of the outstanding personalities of the modern period was Raja Ram Mohan Roy. So early in our history of modern period and yet, versatile in his genius. Many things he has touched and they have all flowered later on, including journalism. He was a person who asked us to become modern, to base India on our own Vedantic heritage but taking also positive ideas from the West. That was Raja Ram Mohan Roy. On an equal basis we can establish relations with the West. But he came too early. There was no talk of equal basis at that time. The West was dominant. The West was ruling over India. How can there be equality between a slave and a master? But towards the end of the century the same idea came; it was expressed by Swami Vivekananda. Swami Vivekananda you will find was taking in the best of our culture and living it in his own life鈥搃n a short life of 50 years.

Men like Romain Rolland who have written on Shri Rama颅krishna and Swami Vivekananda, refer to Shri Ramakrishna as the consummation of the two thousand years spiritual life of three hundred million people. That was Shri Ramakrishna. The whole life of India, its spiritual aspect was re-lived in Shri Rama颅krishna鈥檚 life. And, in Swami Vivekananda鈥檚, we found a dynamic personality with one wonderful quality 鈥� fearlessness and a spirit of acceptance of the modern West. We have accepted many cultural values from other cultures throughout our long history. And in this period Swami Vivekananda appeared with that attitude of acceptance. Our culture is not perfect. No culture is perfect. Every culture is an experiment.

Today, we have an opportunity to build a human culture on the soil of India. Whatever is weak in out culture we can strengthen with what is strong in Western culture. And he found all these cultures complementary, not contradictory. What we have developed, the West will need. What they have developed, we shall need. Thus taking in what we lack we shall make India modern, progressive, etc.

This kind of an approach you find in Vivekananda literature. So the nineteenth century saw the action, reaction of forces on the soil of India. According to Western thinkers of that time they were expecting India will die with the touch of the Western culture. By political domination, cultural domination, religious domination this aged India full of weaknesses will die, a new India be created there. In many letters written at that time during the early British period you will find this idea that India will die in a short time. They were expecting it. But the opposite happened! This contact with the West roused the dormant spirit of India 鈥� the tremendous energies that have been there in the heart of Indians. And that burst out into a tremendous awakening. We call it the renaissance of the nineteenth century. India becoming young and vital once again.

You can see during the last hundred years one remarkable phenomenon and that is an ancient nation, an ancient culture, has become young, vital and full of youthful energy today. That is something tremendous. One of the great thinkers of the modern period was Dr. Brajendranath Seal. He was a collegemate of Swami Vivekananda. A brilliant intellectual. The one who wrote the first book on India鈥檚 contribution to physical science. That book is called Positive Sciences of the Ancient Hindus.That is the first book of its kind. He has said about India鈥揳 beautiful expression, 鈥淚ndia is ever ageing but never old.鈥滸oing on ageing, never getting old. Getting fresh, getting youthful. What do you find in India today? Even demographically we are a young nation today. People between 15 and 35 鈥� they constitute a majority of the population of India.

So, this is something amazing. With the touch of a powerful culture, many old cultures have perished. They have disappeared. But in this culture of India there is a tremendous inner strength. That inner strength found expression in a galaxy of great personalities who came in the modern period. They assimilated Western culture, English language and then they made India stronger by joining that strength of the West to the strength of India. This is the story of the nineteenth century. We had many social problems, many other national weaknesses of the time. So this action-reaction process threw up a tremendous number of movements; social reform movements, various changes coming. In fact, the whole of the modern period can be characterised as a period of change. Revolutionary change, nothing old is staying in the same way; constantly changing, because of this new energy that has come into our culture.

It was in Swami Vivekananda that this modern renaissance achieved its maturity, its real fullness and he could say boldly 鈥淲e accept the great deliverances of Western culture.鈥� We threw a challenge to the West also that they need certain profound ideas of Indian culture. We shall have give and take on equal basis. That spirit you will find in the literature of Swami Vivekananda. That is why Prime Minister Nehru refers to Swami Vivekananda in a beautiful passage in his book Discovery of India: 鈥淩ooted in the past, with full of pride in India鈥檚 heritage, Vivekananda was yet modern in his approach to life鈥檚 problems. He was a kind of bridge between the past of India and her present.鈥� That is a beautiful tribute to Swamiji鈥檚 personality.

Men like Romain Rolland and Tagore, also have said that Swamiji represented the perfect synthesis of East and West. Every type of human energy, which has been canceling each other in every other culture, found a perfect harmony in Swami Vivekananda. Reason and fate, religion and science, ancient and modern, East and West, all found harmony in this remarkable personality. Romain Rolland concludes that para dealing with this subject by saying Swami Vivekananda was the personification of the harmony of all human energy. And he was a very young person. At the age of 29 he appeared at the Chicago Parliament of Religions. Literally, he conquered the mind and, heart of that powerful country. And this conquest is the conquest which India has been engaged in from very ancient times.

It was Ashoka who gave expression to this idea of India鈥檚 expansion into other countries. Other countries expand through military means and imperialism-colonialism. India鈥檚 expansion is different. Ashoka said we shall silence the war drums. We shall now sound the kettle-drums of peace and harmony. That ancient message we have continued to uphold in India. I said, India鈥檚 impact upon the world has always been peaceful. That impact has been mentioned by Ashoka in his edicts and Swami Vivekananda gives it in modern language. It is a beautiful sentence in the 鈥淟ectures from Colombo to Almora鈥� of Swami Vivekananda. He says: 鈥淟ike the gentle dew that falls unseen and unheard, yet brings in the blossom of the fairest of roses.鈥� Such has been the contribution of India to the thought of the world. Silent, unperceived, yet omnipotent in its effects; it has transformed the world but we do not know when it was done. Because history records only violent conflicts, war. Silent influences are not recorded in history.

So, India鈥檚 impact on the world has been like this. In the modern period the same thing is continuing. Swami Vivekananda was going to America; and, though we were a slave nation at that time, he was able to impress upon the Western world about the wisdom of India, its high philosophy and spirituality. It has a tremendous message for all humanity. He initiated this wonderful exchange of ideas between East and West. He is a link between East and West. In the future ages it will be under颅stood that world history and Indian history became intertwined through Swami Vivekananda. He had that spirit of acceptance. Tagore particularly recognised this spirit of acceptance in Swami Vivekananda鈥檚 attitude and philosophy. When he met Romain Rolland in Europe in the 1920s, he found him deeply interested in India. He was writing a book on Mahatma Gandhi at that time. Then he said, 鈥淚f you want to understand India, study Swami Vivekananda. In him everything is positive, nothing negative.鈥� That was a tremendous statement. It impressed on the mind of Romain Rolland to study Swami Vivekananda. He had not studied much about him and he started studying and the result is those wonderful books 鈥� Life of Ramakrishna, Life of Vivekananda. Both of whom he presented to the Western world as the splendid symphony of the universal soul鈥揜amakrishna-Vivekananda. That was the maturity of the renaissance movement starting from the beginning of the nineteenth century, ending with Swami Vivekananda, towards the end of the century.

Swamiji inspired the nation to become modern, to develop scientific attitudes, to wash away that evil of untouchability and other caste exclusiveness, to uplift women鈥揳ll these things which we neglected for the last thousand years when our body politic was weak. All these Swamiji reminded us. This is how we can make India modern in this modern period. Particularly the common people. They have been neglected for centuries. In Vivekananda literature you find this wonderful spirit of humanity rousing the dignity of man, installing him in his high dignity as a human being. He has asked us to wipe off the blot that is on our society of neglected common people, neglect of women 鈥� all these must go. Some other sentences are tremendous both in his speeches as well as in his letters. In one of the letters from America to the people in India he writes, these upper classes of India, they have exploited our people, neglected them, millions of them. In that connection he says: 鈥淟ittle can you dream of the ages of tyranny鈥搈ental, moral and physical鈥搕hat has reduced the image of God, that is man, to a mere beast of burden, the emblem of the Divine Mother, which is woman, to a slave to bear children, and life itself a curse.鈥�

That was Indian society in the nineteenth century. We have been developing like this for centuries together. The nation had lost its strength, its vigour, even the great spiritual teachings of the sages we had watered down into petty little village superstitions. Religion which was such a noble thing in the past ages taught by Upanishads, Gita, the Buddha, Sankaracharya and others, that religion became watered down. I often compare what is religion in India now or the last century. Even today many people understand religion, as some doing this, some little ritual, some ceremony. There is no stress on the spiritual growth of man, high character energy. This is the nature of our understanding because the energy of the mind is lost during the last few centuries. A jaded mind cannot understand the mighty philosophy which you find in Vedanta, in the Gita, etc. Swami Vivekananda said: 鈥淐an a mosquito understand the strength of a lion? Only an elephant can understand it.鈥� So we had a very small mind.

What is religion to many people? Even today I find even a scholar will go to Rishikesh, pay five rupees to a priest, catch hold of the tail of a cow to go to heaven. Many scholars will do that even today. Where is the great Vedanta? Where is the great teaching of the Buddha and what is this religion which we call our popular religion today? And therefore, Swamiji came to rouse us to an understanding of the true spirit of religion which is character-strengthening. He calls it man-making religion, man-making education, nation-building faith. He aroused the nation to this understanding of the great spiritual heritage of India 鈥� rational, universal, practical, unifying humanity 鈥� not only in India but in the rest of the world as well.

Some of the great utterances of his are highly inspiring for our people. We were sleeping for ages. He made us wake up from that sleep. His wonderful passage in his first lecture delivered on the soil of India was at Ramnad, near Rameswaram. Coming from America and Europe after four years of work there, he landed in Colombo, then Anuradhapura, then Jaffna, and finally landed on the Indian soil. This lecture he delivered in India and Ceylon. You get it as Lectures from Colombo to Almora, one of the best nation-building books we have in the modern period. In that opening lecture delivered on 25 January, 1897, he strikes this note of awakening to this gigantic nation of India, like a leviathan sleeping for ages, becoming politically a slave to every foreign conqueror. To that India he gave this message of awakening in the very opening para of that lecture. Here is that wonderful passage: 鈥淭he longest night seems to be passing away, the sourest trouble seems to be coming to an end at last, the sleeping corpse appears to be waking up India 鈥� this motherland of ours 鈥� 颅from her deep, long sleep. None can resist her any more, never isshe going to sleep any more, no outward powers can hold her any more for the infinite giant is rising to her feet.鈥�

In 1897 he uttered these words. Then reaching Madras he said we have confined our religion all to temples, images, etc. We have neglected man in our society. We couldn鈥檛 see God in man though our teaching of Vedanta is: God is in every human being. Shri Ramakrishna himself taught us this profound truth. Every jeevais Shiva, service of the jeevais the worship of Shiva. We never cared for all these ideas. We concentrated only on temples, on images, etc., neglected human beings, exploited him and we thought we are religious. So, with this at the ground, reaching Madras a few weeks later, he said, for the next fifty years let this be our keynote. This great Mother India 鈥� millions and millions of gods in the form of human beings 鈥� love them, serve them, worship them. Let all other vain gods disappear from our minds. That is the wonderful message that came to us which is Vedanta, as taught in the Upanishads and the Gita, as taught in the Srimad Bhagavatam. And the spirit of modern culture, the spirit of humanism, all that is what you call, consolidated in that great message he gave, a message of a human orientation concerned for man.

It is a beautiful passage in the teachings of Jesus where you find this: 鈥淵ou cannot love me whom you have seen. How can you love God whom you have not seen?鈥� First love man, across over there, your neighbour, serve him, work with him, then you will understand the true idea of religion. Swamiji, therefore, gave that human orientation to our tremendous spiritual heritage so that they can build up a new society, based on human dignity, human freedom, human equality. These are great Vedantic ideas and fortunately they are the ideas that came to us from Western culture as well. That is the work that is being done today.

The nineteenth century gave us the philosophical and spiritual framework of how we have to build this nation. Great ideas came to us and what happened? Swami Vivekananda passed away in 1902. Within three years we found expression of his profound message in political action 鈥� rousing of the common people鈥撀璦wakening of Bengal. Men like Romain Rolland traced later political movements to the energy imparted by Swami Viveka颅nanda. In that great message 鈥淲ake up India鈥�, there is great work to be done, you have to create a new culture, a new civiliza颅tion, new human society here and that society, he said, will be a beautiful blending of the best of Western culture and the best of Indian culture. They have stressed man, we have stressed God. We shall see God in man and achieve a new type of culture here which is deeply spiritual on the one side, deeply humanistic on the other. That we have missed for centuries together. Millions of people we have treated like animals.

Swami Vivekananda characterised that record of India as the blot on our society. Today you call it casteism, untouchability. Today you have communal conflicts. So many evils are there. In Swamiji鈥檚 time these things were brewing, and Swamiji took up this subject and threw light upon it. What we have to do as an awakened nation is to banish all these weaknesses that are there, and to create a progressive socio-political order. Immediately after came the political expression of this great spiritual idea. And the first thing that we needed was political freedom. How to shape our destiny in our own way? No foreign nation can shape our destiny. They are here for their own purpose. We are not their main aim. So the first expression of this great renaissance was fight for freedom. Gigantic personalities arose in the wake of this great renaissance of the nineteenth century. We had the Bengal agitation, Swadeshi agitation, then comes Tilak, then Gandhiji, then all the various political forces being strengthened and they are made to concentrate on political freedom. That is the great saga we had in the recent period.

Some of the generations of today are post-freedom generations but those who are older they can see what happened to India at that time. The whole nation rose鈥搈en, women, children鈥搘ith tremendous spirit of sacrifice, spirit of love for the nation, and they struggled, they suffered and they achieved political freedom. It is in this period we produced men like Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel. Their leadership qualities, their tremendous patriotism, their courage, heroic mould 鈥� they have been the inspiration of this national movement and all these presided over by the tremendous personality, Mahatma Gandhi. He had a wonderful quality, absolute fearlessness and no hatred towards anybody. It is a rare quality. We have praised it in our ancient literature. In the Gita there is a beautiful sloka which represents in today鈥檚 time Gandhiji鈥檚 character as we saw it in our time: 鈥淵asmano udhyujateloko lokanudhyujate jayaha.鈥� 鈥淲ho is my true devotee?鈥� Krishna is asking. 鈥淭hat man who is not frightened by the world and who does not frighten the world, that man is my true devotee鈥� Gandhiji exactly represented that spirit. He was so strong. None could frighten him. He was so gentle, nobody need get frightened by him. That is the quality of character we missed for centuries together except in a few saints and sages. Today it must become a universal trait of humanity in India. The heroic age of Indian history must be started once again. And so, in the modern period, we threw up heroic people. In every department they were heroic 鈥� whether it is politics social reform, scientific research 鈥� everywhere. Batches and batches of great people appeared on the scene and the first fruit of their great work was this freedom that we achieved in 1947.

It is a great day, exactly 50 years after Swami Vivekananda鈥檚 speech at Ramnad on 25 January, 1897, this country became free. Then came the great problem. What shall we do with this freedom? It is there we have yet to learn many more lessons from Swami Vivekananda and other great teachers. Freedom was a great achievement. We were all excited on that day. In fact I often speak to our people in various parts of India of 15 August, 1947. The whole nation was in ecstasy. Freedom came. Though it came with a tremendous evil of partition but yet it was freedom. We have got a chunk, the bigger part of India. We can build up the hundred millions and millions that are there. So let us hope we started with ecstasy but very soon the ecstasy vanished. People began to forget the nation, forget the people, became self-centred, simply money-making for oneself. All the evils that have come thereafter can be traced to this kind of attitude that came. We could not sustain that attitude of patriotic dedication. How many people suffered for freedom. But once freedom came we lost that idea. Why should I suffer now? Let me take the best of this. But what about the millions who are there.

Swamiji told us, 鈥淪o long as the millions live in hunger and ignorance I hold every man a traitor who, having been educated at their expense, pays no heed to them.鈥� That was a great utterance. If you don鈥檛 pay heed to the common people, and you have been educated at the cost of the State and you have become selfish, that is treason. We have got too many traitors in India. In one letter Swamiji wrote, 鈥淭hey alone live who live for others. The rest are more dead than alive.鈥� Before independence we had more live people. After independence we have more dead people, self-centred, not caring for the nation. So many of the evils we had during the last thousand years, which we just removed from our minds during the freedom struggle, those evils returned to our nation. Smallness, pettiness and narrow attitudes 鈥� that all national attitudes began to disappear. Regional, caste, communal, linguistic鈥揳ll these inequalities came in the modern period. But before that we had already consolidated this nation. It was all scattered in a hundred kinds of pieces of States.

It is there Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel had the greatest contri颅bution to make. Freedom came, partition came, but India was a congeries of States scattered here and there. They had their own claims as Princes and here came our Vallabhbhai Patel to consolidate this nation, consolidate that freedom. He was served by very great administrators at that time. That was a great period of integrating this nation. The British left leaving everything to our use. Have we the wisdom? Have we the training 鈥� to build up the political structure of India? Politically we have been a failure, several times in our history. But Sardar Patel showed us that in politics also we can have far-sight, foresight and tremendous wisdom. That is why that part of out history is so great. If we had continued in that spirit of con颅solidation we would have become much more progressive than what we are today. But he did his work, he consolidated this freedom that came to us. India became a unified nation.

In 1950 we gave ourselves a remarkable, progressive Con颅stitution. That is a great work. The Constituent Assembly in which we had very distinguished people, great intellectuals, great patriots of all communities 鈥� we got a Constitution from that Constituent Assembly, and this was piloted by a remarkable personality, viz., Dr. Ambedkar. He is a remarkable personality of modern period. One who suffered so much from our society, its orthodoxy, its casteism, its untouchability, and yet he rose to the highest level of intellectual strength. And then came I the generosity of men like Jawaharlal Nehru. Though Ambedkar did not take part in the freedom struggle, but once freedom came, Jawaharlal Nehru had a greatness of mind to invite him to take up this great work of piloting the great constitutional struggle in the Constituent Assembly and it was a wonderful combination of the best minds of India at that time. And he rose to the occasion, this great Ambedkar. We can never forget the greatness which is Ambedkar, as we don鈥檛 forget the greatness which is Sardar Patel, the great Nehru and others.

So that is the time of gigantic personalities 鈥� everything great about them, nothing small, nothing petty 鈥� they spoke of man, they spoke of the nation, they spoke of the whole world. That is how we started our career as a Sovereign Democratic Republic from 26 January, 1950. The Constitution contains profound ideas. It reflects the spirit of the ancient Upanishads, the dignity of man, the unity of the nation, the freedom and equality of all human beings, equality of women, all these beautiful ideas are there, for the first time in a Constitution. I generally characterise the Indian Constitution as the new smriti. We have been governed by smritisin India for ages and smritisare very discriminatory. They speak ill of the untouchables, the lower class, even women. So much of discrimination you will find in the smriti. That smritihas been abolished. We have got this smriti. This Constitution where you have got a new smritiand our Indian tradition tells us that the smritiwill remain for all time because it contains eternal spiritual truths, very progressive, dealing with unity of man, the equality of man, that is the spirit of shruti, viz., the Upanishads. But the smritiscontain discriminatory ideas. According to orthodox tradition in India wherever there is a conflict between shrutiand smriti, smriti has to go shrutialone will remain.

Today we have accomplished that task. Our new smriti, the Constitution, is of the nature of the shrutiin content. It recognises human dignity, human equality, human freedom, banishing all these untouchability and other things. That is the greatness of this smritiand the one who piloted it was the one who suffered most from the previous smritis, viz., Ambedkar. It is only an event that can happen in a society like India. In other countries it is difficult to have this kind of a phenomenon, that an untouchable becoming the pilot of a big constitutional process in India; and I call it, therefore, the Ambedkarsmriti. If Manusmriti, Yagyaval颅kyasmriti all these have inflicted discrimination on other people, here you have an Ambedkarsmriti where this great idea of equality is proclaimed. All the wisdom of India went into making of that Constitution. It has been provided with provisions of chang颅ing amendment whenever that is needed鈥搉ot a rigid kind of a Constitution.

So, we have the Constitution. But what is the Constitution? It is just a piece of book, it is a promise, it is a hope. We have to translate it. It is there. We have not succeeded to the extent we could have succeeded. That is the post-freedom story of our history. But the State we have established today has a uniqueness which we never had before, viz., it derives its sanction from the people of India. Till now our States were based on one Emperor, one military conqueror, strong person, may be indigenous, may be foreign鈥搒uch States we had. They covered some part of India. People were all subjects. They had no particular part to play in these matters. But today for the first time in the five-thousand-year history of India we have established a Republican Democratic State which derives its sanction from us, the people of India. That is the language of the Constitution. Assembled in this Constituent Assembly, we, the people of India, give ourselves this Constitution for the unity of the nation, for the dignity of the individual. That is the language of the Constitution.

I wish every student studies the preamble and the fundamental rights portion of our Constitution and develop the will to translate these promises into social realities. That will is lacking today. That is why, in spite of all the great promises, we have not been able to implement many of them at all, because, after freedom people became a little cozy, a little comfortable, self-centred. The gigantic personalities who built up this Constitution and Jawaharlal Nehru, who established the firm base of our democracy, when they all went away, we are not able to find people who can strengthen this resolve of the people to translate ideas and visions into social realities. It is there we have failed, it is there we have to work harder to bring about this very change in our society, banishing of poverty, illiteracy, social exclusiveness, caste pride and superiority and the conflict arising therefrom. And above all communal conflicts.

These are the great problems that are facing us today. We are developing an industry. We are developing our political institu颅tions. Our democracy has survived so many difficult situations. In fact among all the free nations we can say our democracy is quite strong. During the general elections you can see how many millions and millions of people go to vote. When I speak in America I often tell them that more than the total population of America will go to polls in Indian elections. What a tremendous thing it is鈥�230 or 240 million people going for general elections to vote. That is India today鈥揳 gigantic political experiment. But what we lack today is that human concern, that patriotic dedication, that work efficiency, by which we shall be able to wipe the tear from every eye, as Gandhiji beautifully put it. That spirit must come to the nation today. Our idea of religion also must become practical, leading to character development, spiritual awakening, spiritual growth.

Religion has two dimensions, ethnical and scientific. Ethnical is the religion in which you are born. You have no say in the matter. Spiritual and scientific is what you seek; what you choose is called science. Nobody is born in science, nobody is born as a physicist, or a chemist. You choose this subject. So in science you choose. In the science of religion also you choose. Then you grow spiritually. Whereas in ethnical religion you remain what you are. If you are selfish in the beginning you are selfish in the end. If you are petty-minded in the beginning, you are petty-minded in the end. A few do鈥檚 and don鈥檛s only you observe, the world of religion is merely ritual and ceremony. Man鈥檚 development of character doesn鈥檛 come along with this. That is why the stress has to come.

Shri Ramakrishna, Swami Vivekananda and others today stress this aspect of religion. Have you grown spiritually? You go to a temple, you go to a church, you go to a mosque, you go to a Gurudwara, you go to any religious place, or you sit in meditation, beautiful. But after finishing it you ask this question: Have I grown spiritually? That is the meaning of religion. The Divine in man must find manifestation. Out of that alone will come character, energy. That is what we are missing today in India since independence. We all deplore today the erosion of ethical and moral values, in our society. The amount of evil that has come to our society is immense. Is it for this that we achieved freedom? So much of social malpractices, corruption, evil, etc. So the re-shaping of India in the modern period should be based upon those fundamental values, which alone make man really an individuality of dignity and glory. That is not there. If I can鈥檛 wipe the tears of the people around me, what is my strength? What is my humanity?

It was Swami Vivekananda who first drew our attention to this weakness of our understanding of religion. He said, even if a dog is hungry in my country, my religion is to find food for that dog. We never thought in these terms before. Even if somebody is sick or starving in India, something is wrong with me, in my philosophy. That philosophy has to change: How to take in all others in my thinking. That is a wonderful new idea. We have to develop it. It is there in our spiritual literature. See God in man, love him, serve him. That is true religion. Meditate and discover him within you and also see him outside there. This was the teaching that we have in our ancient literature and in modern teachings from Shri Ramakrishna, Swamiji and others.

Therefore, this kind of acceleration of human development must come from a generation of this new energy of character. Character energy is a tremendous energy. Today the greatest problem in India is to develop high character. Money we have, many things we have, resources we have, but development is not commensurate with all these things. Compared to many countries like Japan, we have plenty of natural resources, we have got intelligence in our people. We should have been developing very fast. All this poverty should have gone long ago. All this illiteracy should have been vanished long ago. But we have not achieved it, because in spite of the other areas of development within us, we don鈥檛 have that character energy, that alone can trigger all these into action. That is what we have to concentrate hereafter in the making of modern India.

Our India is taking shape but the people of India must become more and more concerned with each other 鈥� what we call today the concept of citizenship. The day we established our Republic, our status has gone up. We are no more subjects of an Empire. We are citizens of a free democracy. As citizens we have a social responsibility and national responsibility. We don鈥檛 realise that responsibility today. We are irresponsible. When it comes to the nation, when it comes to the people, when it comes to the public good, we are nowhere. Our own good we know, our own welfare we know. That attitude has to completely change if we are to satisfy the requirements of the modern period of Indian history. We must become modern, in the true sense of the term. I am sorry to say, many people in India have a very wrong understanding of being modern. Using modern gadgets does not make us modern. In that case even the monkey and the bear in Delhi zoo will be more modern than you and me. They get air-conditioned accommodation. That doesn鈥檛 make a man modern.

There is a modern mind. First scientific, rational; second intensely human, humanistic, tremendous concern for others. Everyone must ask this question. Why after 39 years of freedom 750 million people are so poor and ward? Why so many millions are illiterate? It is my responsibility. That attitude must come to our people. That is the legacy of the freedom struggle. All those who fought for our freedom, had this wonderful idea. That we have quietly forgotten. We began to take the fruits of freedom, never sharing it with others. This is the problem that faces us today. We have the evils of caste and communalism even today. In spite of such great leaders coming in the past ages, we have so many pockets of feudalistic thinking, caste-ridden attitude, caste conflicts and communal conflicts. The most shame颅ful thing in free India today is caste conflicts, communal conflicts, apart from bribery, corruption, other social malpractices. These are a blot on a free nation. We can鈥檛 develop based upon these weaknesses that are there. Our people must develop tremendous humanistic passion.

Communal differences will be there in every society. We are provided for it in our culture and in our philosophy. As I said we developed a culture in India based upon the vision of unity in diversity. We never destroy diversity. We did not want mere uniformity. We want this diversity. Diversity makes for richness and in the diversity there is a thread of unity as well. We have built up a culture based on that. It has gone on for all these five thousand years. Even today, therefore, we must stress the concept of diversity. Every religion, every culture, every language has a place here. But they should not become a means of conflict, destroying the unity of the nation. This wisdom must come to us today. Particularly, in the caste conflict area, we have to get a new education.

In fact, in many of my lectures I have referred to this. We are educated people and we all need a re-education. A re-educa颅tion with respect to our concern for the people. How to make us the servants of the nation? That is the great contribution of Vivekananda literature. He will ignite the humanist passion in the hearts of our people. Those who have studied Vivekananda literature thoroughly, they will love this country with a passion which will be rare in our history. Mahatma Gandhi said it in a lecture at the Belur Math, headquarters of the Ramakrishna Math and Mission, when he visited that place in 1921, on Vivekananda鈥檚 birthday. He said, by reading Swami Vivekananda鈥檚 works, 鈥淢y love for India became thousand-fold. I appeal to you young people who have come to this Belur Math to take something of that inspiration from where Swami Vivekananda lived and worked.鈥� Now that spirit must come to us today. A love for the common man, irrespective of caste, creed or colour. Build up India based upon that unifying vision. It is young people that must re-educate themselves in this field. It is re-education as we call it. We are educated in colleges, we get a degree, we get a job, we forget everything else. We are only concerned with ourselves. That passion for the people, for the nation, that has become weakened a good deal.

Therefore, in the making of new India everyone of us has a part to play. Till now we were passive subjects. We have to become active, dynamic citizens of free India. We always say that Government will do. What about myself? I have a great contribution to make. I am a proud citizen of India. Very often when I speak to secretarial staff, in various parts of India, I find there is no concern for the people, no papers move because they are not concerned. It doesn鈥檛 concern them. When it concerns them, they are very active. When it concerns others, they become absolutely careless and that is an evil we have to fight against. We have to have more of public spirit, more of concern for others鈥搘hat Swami Vivekananda called, the spirit of service. Renunciation and service are the twin ideals of India. Intensify her in those channels, the rest will take care of itself. This is a profound utterance in Vivekananda literature. 鈥淭测补驳补 and Seva鈥� this little 鈥淚鈥� must go. In a citizen the little 鈥淚鈥� should become a big 鈥淚鈥� because of the sense of responsibility. As a citizen you are responsible for the good or bad that takes place in India. As a subject you are not. When the British left, you are no more a subject. You are a citizen.

Therefore, this tyagaand its concomitant Seva must go together. That is a great work that demands our attention today. Then we can set fire to all these鈥揷aste conflict, communal conflict, all these evils that are there. This land is a land of harmony. It must be made once again the land of harmony. Political changes have to come. Political parties also must discuss these ideas, particularly with respect to communalism. It is an evil specially connected with India. We have many communities, many religions, many many sects. For thousands of years, they have lived in peace here. Why this trouble now? We have to make necessary political changes.

One of the important political changes we have to make and the truth which we have to realise today is that our secular State and communal political parties can never go together. A secular State should have only secular political parties at all levels鈥揚arliament, Assembly, Panchayats, everywhere. Because every candidate to an election must be able to represent the interest of all the communities in that area. Then only our secular State is truly secular. Today it is not. A secular-minded national individual has no opportunity to rise up to the top today, because of the wrong political policies we follow. So, it is for the political parties to discuss this subject鈥揾ow to make our State truly secular by delinking the political forces from communal and religious affiliations. That is the most important work we have today to achieve鈥搉ational integration.

When Sardar Patel integrated the States, he was only setting in motion a particular activity to integrate the whole nation. He wanted an integrated nation in India. We can feel oneness with each other. I can trust you to represent me because we are all fellow-citizens of the same political and social interest. Why not a Muslim represent Christian and Hindu social interest? This attitude must come to us. Then only our secularism becomes true, our democracy becomes strong. Religion also becomes pure by delinking politics from religion. Politics makes for selfishness, violence, all sorts of evil.

Our religion must become pure, building character in us. Then only religions come to their own selves. Today religions also have become as Swami Vivekananda said, 鈥榣ifeless mockeries鈥欌�搕hat is what he said. In the name of religion I can become a devil even and yet we call it religion. So, to purify our religion we need to separate politics from religion. Political life must be beyond all these sectarian religions. It is a national attitude. In this way we have to purify our public life that must be coming from thinking, from discussion. We are a democracy. We don鈥檛 want to cut the head of anybody, but we want to educate the head for national attitudes. That is what we have to engage ourselves in the remaining years of this great century.

This has been a great century, century when great scientific discoveries came, century when colonialism was ended. India became free. Many nations became free. By the end of the century we must be able to say we have built up an integrated nation, banished, conflicts, communal and caste, from our country, banished proverty, illiteracy from our country. All these can be done only by an awakened humanity. It is that awakened humanity that must come from hereafter onwards so that we take full part in nation-building. That is the meaning of democracy.

Swami Vivekananda has given a beautiful message to our people in a beautiful sentence. He says: 鈥淭each yourselves, teach everyone his real nature. Call upon the sleeping soul, and see how it awakes. Power will come, glory will come, goodness will come, purity will come. Everything great and glorious and excellent will come when this sleeping soul is roused to self-conscious activity.鈥� Physical science deals with physical possibilities. This science deals with human possibilities. What are the possibilities hidden in that human child? Vedanta says infinite possibilities are hidden in every human being. Let us face ourselves on that concept of man鈥揳 centre of infinite energy, unfolding that energy, developing high character鈥搕hen will come the flowering of India. Great saints, great sages, great intellectuals, great scientists, great humanists will appear in this country. Great artists will appear once again in this country when the sleeping soul is roused to self-conscious activity. That is called practical Vedanta by Swami Vivekananda. We have that possibility today. We can write a most glorious chapter in India鈥檚 long history. We are creating history today.

Swami Vivekananda created history. Gandhiji created history. We have to create history today. That is the beauty of modern period. We never had this opportunity before. Today we have all the 750 million people of India who can be well fed, can be educated; all distinctions between man and man can be eliminated, if people are awake. It is that awakening that is the central message of Vedanta as given by Swami Vivekananda. I quote his wonderful sentence which is an adaptation of the famous verse of the Kathopanishad: Uttishtatha, jagratha, prapyavaran nibodhatha 鈥� 鈥淩ise, awake and stop not till the glory is reached.鈥�