Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham, Amritapuri Campus
Posts tagged india
Is there a need to REBUILD OUR NATION?
Mar 19th
The cultural scenario emerged out of the diversity of our country has many golden laces in the world history. The emotive threads of all Indians irrespective of their language and life have deep roots across lands and waters. The abundance of sweet and spicy resources attracted the west to east. Exploiting the hospitality of our grand fathers, the colonization process had become smooth, of course, even against some odd and isolated resistances. Gradually the guests became hostile to the hosts to grab the wealth of our country.
Amidst the colonization agenda of the British People miraculous infrastructure development had taken place throughout the nation. Indian Railway is one such accomplishment. But the development activities were not for the common people but to satisfy the needs of the British People.
The ambitious people of free India and her Leaders had a dream of new India with fresh flora and fauna. The Five Year plan of Jawaharlal Nehru, being a model propagated and practiced by the Soviet Republic was a shower in the dry lands of the country. The Industrialization through the public sectors enabled our country to run to the developing world with much confidence.
The slogan “Basic Education for all before 1960” inspired the common people. The green revolution projects made the farmers passionate and affectionate to the free India.
• What is the relevance of analyzing the glorious and struggle some past of our country?
• Did those revolutionary changes bring forth welfare to all common people in our country?
• Has the growth and development of the society become Unilateral?
• How did the wealth accumulation of free India Benefited a minority of the people?
• How did majority of the people are deprived of the basic needs?
The independent India after half a century sees the cry of crores of children with malnutrition. 25% of children have been devoid of primary education. 10% children die every year due to epidemics. 30% women are illiterates and gender equality of women propagated by our social leaders has become legal mirage. Human right violations upon the marginalized and oppressed people increase day by day. The frustrated and educated unemployed Youth turn to terrorist activities. Theological Fanaticism and communalism segregated the common people.
Do we have to inculcate the diversity and divergence in terms of the above disparities in our society?
As an engineering student who is supposed to be the architect of the society do believe that we have to rebuild a society with the creativity of the majority of the people in our country.
India and Pakistan!
Oct 5th
I heard this long ago …. not sure if true or fiction, but here it is:
In the 1960s.
A heated debate arranged at the U.N.O.
To ‘thrash out’ the Kashmir issue and to make a settlement.
The ambassador of Pakistan spoke first. It was a spirited four-hour argument vehemently claiming that India had no business to claim Kashmir as theirs, that it belonged to Pakistan. He came out with points 1 … 2 … 3 … 4… … … … … X…. His voice thundered – very few nations thought that the Indian ambassador would have anything stronger to say against these ‘strong, convincing’ points. The Indian ambassador who was to speak next had no chance against such a ‘clean’ claim.
The Indian ambassador, Mr Singh rose to his feet and congratulated his counterpart on his eloquence. Then he said, “I have very few words to speak, not a long discourse like my friend’s. But before that, I want to tell you all a story which I heard from my grandfather when I was only 8 years !…………. This name ‘Kashmir’ originated from the name of a great saint in the region, Kashyap Rishi. One day, this Kashyapa returned after his bath in the Indus and found that his clothes left on the bank of the river were missing! He looked around, but found no one. His clothes had been stolen by a Pakistani! The saint . . . . .”
Before the Indian ambassador could say another word, the entire Pak delegation was on their feet, protesting and screaming, “A lie..”, “A lie!”, and the Pak ambassador shouted, “It is impossible. We were NOT there THEN !!”
After order was restored by the UNO Chair, Mr U Thant, Mr Singh said, “That exactly is the point I wanted to raise before the Assembly. Friends, now, I find no need for even my short speech, and I rest my argument here. The Honorable Assembly can come to a conclusion from these last words of my counterpart. Thank you!”
………………………………………………………………………….. Is the ‘Ayodhya’ any different? 
We say the motherland is our mother…
Sep 16th
Bhavananda became smiling, eloquent, courteous of speech. He grew very eager to talk and made many efforts to open a conversation, but Mahendra would not speak. Then Bhavananda, having no other resource, began to sign to himself.
“Mother, I bow to thee!
Rich with thy hurrying streams,
Bright with thy orchard gleams,
Cool with thy winds of delight,
Dark fields waving, Mother of might,
Mother free!”
The song astonished Mahendra and he could understand nothing of it. Who might be this richly watered, richly fruited Mother, cool with delightful winds and dark with the harvests? “What Mother?” he asked.
Bhavananda without any answer continued his song.
“Glory of moonlight dreams
Over they beaches and lordly streams.
Clad in thy blossoming trees,
Mother, giver of ease,
Laughing low and sweet!
Mother, I kiss thy feet,
Speaker sweet and low!
Mother, to thee I bow.”
Mahendra said, “that is the country, it is not the Mother.” Bhavananda replied, ” We recognize no other Mother. ‘Mother and Motherland is more than heaven itself.’ We say the motherland is our mother. We have neither mother nor father nor brother nor friend, wife nor son nor house nor home. We have her alone, the richly-watered, richly-fruited, cool with delightful winds,rich with harvests – “
Then Mahendra understood and said, “Sing it again.” Bhavananda sang once more.
(from Bankim Chandra Chatterjee’s Anandamath – translation by Sri Aurobindo)
Recollecting Ourselves
Sep 16th
Nature has endowed India with the most fertile lands in the world, and this land of plenty has been enclosed within the most secure natural borders. In the vastness of her fertile plains, in the greatness and ubiquity of her rivers, and in the abundance of her rains and sunshine, there is just no other region of the world that can be compared with India. It is indeed to express their gratitude for bringing such abundance to our lands that Indians having been paying perpetual obeisance to the Himalayas; to Ganga, Yamuna, Godavari, Sarasvati, Narmada, Sindhu and Kaveri; and to the gods of sun and rain.
Having been blessed with such plenty and natural security, Indians have created a civilization that is unparalleled in its spiritual as well as material affluence and sophistication. They have learnt and taught others to live in harmony with, and to solicitously care for, all sentient and insentient beings. They have evolved a social system that, with its anchorage in the family and community, is self-disciplined and self-regulating. And they have acquired extraordinary skills in agriculture and industry to convert their natural endowments into such material wealth that foreign observers, from the time of Alexander up to the beginning of the nineteenth century, have marvelled at their riches.
India is a vast country. From the northern borders of Kashmir to the southernmost tip at Kanyakumari, our land extends over 3200 kilometres, and from the eastern boundary of Assam to the western border of Baluchistan, it extends over 3500 kilometres. Total area of what has historically constituted India is 423 million hectares! The fact that Indian Ocean is the only one in the world that is named after a country, speaks volumes about the tradition of Indian opulence and abundance and the Indian discipline of sharing over the successive ages in history from the ancient most times.
Uttaram yatsamudrasya himadrescaiva daksinam.
Varsam tadbharatam nama bharati yatra santatih.
With rich soils, climate and water, it is not surprising that India supports an extraordinarily great variety of flora and fauna. There are about 45,000 species of plants including shrubs in the country. Of these 35 percent are endemic to India, and are not found anywhere else in the world. India supports 75,000 species of animals, birds and insects. This forms one-twelfth of the known fauna of the earth, though in terms of geographical area, we are only one-fortieth of the earth.
India’s great mineral wealth makes her probably the third most gifted of the world’s regions with respect to industrial capacity. Having blessed with such extraordinary natural wealth it is not surprising that Indian lands have always supported vast multitudes. But we have not only been blessed with a land of rare fertility and wealth, but also the gods seem to have conspired to make this land into an impregnable fortress. Indians have been the largest civilisational group in the world till almost the modern times.
India lives in harmony with all creation and sees unity and order in all. Sharing and caring is the essence of Indianness. These basic tenets of Sanatana Dharma brought students from all over the world to the shores of India to study the people of this land and their philosophy and culture.
Indian civilization has not only comprehended the essence of the universe; it has also evolved a social order appropriate for leading life in conformity with that comprehension. The Indian social organization is thus as peculiarly Indian as the larger view of the universe. The grihastha, the householder along with his family, and not the individual, forms the basic unit of Indian social, economic and moral order.
The Dharma Rajya: much of what a modern State is expected to do in the sphere of public polity is in India accomplished through these social groupings – of the community – the grama and the sampradaya – in their respective domains and in their mutual interactions – with the king who sits at the apex of this self-generating and self-regulating polity regulating harmonious functioning of these diverse groupings and institutions of the society in their different domains and roles.
But it was not just the socio-political institutions of this land and their ethical tenets or the view of cosmic oneness and the rich philosophy and culture of its people that brought the foreigners and marauding invaders into India, but it was India’s excellence in the fields of agriculture, industry and enterprise that resulted in her overflowing opulence. Textile was not only the great industrial enterprise of India but her greatest craft too. India excelled in iron and steel making also.
India entered a phase of eclipse with the coming of the British; the darkness had probably begun to set in earlier, since about 1000AD. However, this period of subjugation to alien rulers constitutes a miniscule part of the long civilisational history of India. With independence, India has begun to come into her own. India has achieved much in the frontier technologies of today. We have established a strong infrastructure and knowledge base for a great industrial revival. The families and communities of India have begun to participate in this revival using their long established civilisational strengths and skills.
Mahatma Gandhi had reawakened the spirit of India. Under his great and dynamic leadership India aroused great expectations in the world.
On gaining Independence, we could not entirely fulfill the high expectations the world had from us. But, we began the task of restoring our lands and our society to some state of health in earnest. People of India began to improve their lands and their agriculture. The craftsmen and artisans began reviving the manufacture and industry. The State began to pay attention to rebuilding the infrastructure.
The fact of being Independent, and the invigorating experience of having participated in the great and righteous struggle for freedom, restored the initiative and the dignity of the Indian people, and they began a revival of their country and their society.
The revival however is constrained by the failure of modern metropolitan elite of India to recognize the strengths of India and of the people of India. The elite India so far has failed to enter into a proper partnership with the ordinary India that is organized around self-discipline and self-regenerating families, communities and localities and is anchored in the Indian civilisational genius.
The national effort should be aimed at facilitating this partnership between metropolitan elite and the families, communities and localities of the people of India. Once the partnership is restored, there would be nothing to stop India from achieving the glory that is rightfully hers.
VIDYUT-2011 Registration is open.
Please visit
