Another mid-term election is on the cards. The greedy headstrong politicians, who are down right selfish and corrupt, have forced this on the Nation. It would cost the poor taxpayers another 6000 crores of rupees which the country can ill afford. To cap it, we have a neighbour who is hell bent upon seeing us in trouble one way or the other. Even the latter evil is the legacy of our self seeking, idealistic, and arrogant politicians, who have been responsible for this great country being divided on religious grounds. If only they had been magnanimous at that time we would had our country intact. No one in the world could have thought of bossing over us. Unfortunately we seem to live in our past glory only; and are not aware of the dangers lurking all round us now. Time was when we commanded great respect:



“ India conquered and dominated China for twenty centuries without ever having to send a single soldier across her borders.”

Hu Shih. Former Chinese Ambassador to the USA.



Unfortunately now our soldiers are all on our borders, defending their mother land with all their might!



Our hoary past and our great culture did not have any man-made boundaries of religion or any other divisive traits. People of all languages and religions inhabited this country and they were all to be treated equally according to our Vedic vision:



“Janaha naanaa vaachasam, naanaa dharmaanaam…..

Napaschuraanthi.



The western interpretation of our ancient literature has given rise to many misgivings, which have helped divide us into different castes and creed. On hindsight, I feel that they did it with a definite purpose of dividing us for ever, as they were afraid of our intellectual supremacy even in those days. Max Mueller’s version of the Vedic culture was responsible for most of our present day ills. Even scientists like Albert Einstein were aware of our greatness:



“We owe a lot to the Indians who taught us how to count, without which no worthwhile scientific discovery could have been made.”

Einstein.



The Aryan invasion theory, which is full of loopholes, has been the bane of our divisive tendencies between the Aryans and the Dravidians. The real issue is totally different. The so-called Aryans never came from outside India and they were the people of the Aaaryavartha, the plains of the great rivers of the north of India. The mistake could have occurred because of the misinterpretation of the Sanskrit language! The most important aspect of the Sanskrit language is the usage of several terms to denote one object or phenomenon, unlike the western languages where a word has one meaning.



The greatest curse that divides our society is the inhuman untouchability. This came from the misinterpretation of the word shuudra. In the correct sense everyone at birth is a shuudra, and then becomes a Brahmin by education (not formal education) and attaining the wisdom of love, compassion, universal brotherhood, and paropakaara (helping others). Unfortunately today we tend to treat people by their castes as separate identities. Brahmin does not become one by birth, but attains that status by his learning and actions only!



Similar is the misunderstanding about the multiplicity of Gods and Goddesses in our ancient culture according to the western scholars, copied by many of our so-called educated class. Most of the latter have had western biased schooling and very little genuine education. Again it is the misinterpretation of the Sanskrit language that is at fault. In Sanskrit the gender is not based on the meaning of the word as in English or other European languages. In the latter if the male person is indicated in the meaning of a particular word it becomes masculine gender and vice versa, whereas in Sanskrit the same words could have different genders depending on their use. To give one example Sun God is called Sooryadevataa. If we analyze this with the western concept it becomes a combination of masculine and feminine genders; soorya is masculine and devataa is feminine. The real meaning is in seeing the Godly characters in the sun. The devathva (divinity) of the Sun is called Sooryadevataa. Western scholars interpreted this as multiplicity of Gods. They thought that Indians were a crude idol worshipping class of uncultured race. On the contrary, the truth is that we did not have idols or temples in the Vedic wisdom at all. Temples came much later, may be in the seventh century, following the influence of Buddhism and Jainism.



The following stanza says it all:



Om bhuuh svaahaa agnaya idam na mama,

Om bhuuh svaahaa vaayuva idam na mama,

Om svah svaahaa suuryaaya idam na mama,

Om bhuurbhuvah svah svaahaa prajaapathaya idam na mama.

Agnikaarya Mantra.



A great Indian Sanskrit scholar, Late Sediyaapu Krishna Bhat interprets this stanza correctly in his book Discovery of Facts, published in 1996 by the Raastrakavi Govinda Pai research Centre, Udupi, thus:



“ Here the deities, agni, vaayu, and Surya are mentioned as the occupants of respectively the earth, the mid-region, and the sky, the oblation being offered to them with the word svaaha. Lastly, All of these are considered one, and the oblation is offered to the prajaapathi, the controller of the Universe, who is not perceptible to the senses. If we observe this mantra the secret behind the multitude of divinities praised in the Vedic hymns becomes clear. The propriety of selecting these three objects perceptible to the senses, namely agni, vaayu, and soorya is; the superbly radiant form which we perceive on earth is agni; a similar form in the mid-region is called vaayu, accompanied by lightening or Indra (because of the identity between vaayu and Indra, the latter is referred to as the giver of rains); the radiant form above this region is soorya, the sun. Among the three the nearest to us is the agni and we propitiate the great controller of the Universe who is not seen through agni kaarya. Idols have no place in the Vedic system of worship. We are not even simple people worshipping Nature, either. Recent researches in Mohenjadaro and Harappa have found many fire-alters in those ancient cities, but no temples with idols! This also proves that the Harappan culture was Vedic.”



All these things correctly show to the world our greatness which has been lost because of the misinterpretation of our hoary past by western scholars. We have been the slaves of western thought, because of our English education and the replicative type of schooling that we adopted in place of our Gurukulas or even the Greek Academia, where inquiry was the method of teaching and learning. Even the present West has gone to the replicative schooling system. Thinking western scholars like Socrates had questioned this even as far back as the Greek civilization. “Let not my schooling come in the way of my education,” wrote Socrates centuries ago.



In the political arena also, we think with the western mind. The communists are called the leftists. It makes a mockery of both their ideology and their moorings in our culture. The word was derived from its original meaning from the French Revolution of 1789. In the French Estates General the aristocracy sat on the King’s right, whereas the commoners (third estate) sat on his left. Subsequently in French and other European assemblies, the radical democrats, the radical liberals and socialists sat on the left of the President or the Speaker’s chair. The basis of the communists’ ideology and their revolutionary commitments of liberty, equality and fraternity are also French in origin! I do not understand the word left in our present set up, as many, other than the Indian communists, also claim to be democrats in our country. We could have an Indian name for these custodians of the rights of the downtrodden, which would give them their due share of importance and publicity, unless they want to keep their western identity.



Having borrowed the adult franchise system and the parliamentary democracy from Westminster, we did not realize that we are yet to mature sufficiently in our young democracy to benefit from them. While we have had excellent systems of governance in the hoary Indian past, we did not bother to take any lessons from there. Consequently, we have landed ourselves in this mess of frequent elections because of the inherent flaws in the Westminster system applied to our country. Whereas the debate is going on in some political circles about the present system vis-a-vis the American Presidential system, we seem to be bankrupt and are bereft of any original thinking about the best method suited to our culture and our vast geographic variations in this sub-continent.



It was Mark Twain who wrote:



“India is the cradle of the human race, the birthplace of human speech, the mother of history, the grandmother of legend, and the great grandmother of legend. Our most valuable and most instructive materials in the history of man are treasured up in India only.”



Unfortunately now we seem to be emulating the West in all walks of life and have become bankrupt already! In all our endeavours we follow the practice of the reductionism. We look at everything in bits and pieces and never look at the whole. This is now found to be the greatest mistake of even scientific thought of this century. While we encourage our younger generation to develop a scientific temper, we should lead the way in showing them the right scientific method of holism.



Recently while bringing down a performing government, the opposition should have thought of the whole country and its needs in place of their narrow sectarian, and personal interests. This reductionism is going to ruin us in the long run. The voter should now teach these politicians a lesson or two in basic human behaviour towards their brethren and fellow citizens who have given them the power in the first place. The politicians in India take it for granted that they are above the law of the land. I can not think of any politician in India who has been sent to jail for his offences ranging from looting the Nation to even for alleged murder.



Most of them who have not earned a penny during their working lives have become billionaires in no time, but they take it for granted that they are expected to make hay when the sun shines- and for many of them the sun never seem to set in the west! We read about CBI and COD raids on politicians, only to be forgotten after a couple of months. Some of them even defy the normal legal procedures, when the common man in India is not even supposed to sit with crossed legs in the courtroom, and is not even permitted to laugh inside the courtroom. The politicians are not even ashamed to flaunt their ill-gotten wealth in the most vulgar shows, like weddings etc. The criminal offences of their progeny would make the best thrillers for the motion picture industry.





We should choose wisely this time round, as we may not get another chance to send them to Delhi to look after the country, as they will have sold the country by then! The voters could easily make the errant politicians to see the writing on the wall and inject morality into politics through the power of their vote. Politicians should not play with the lives of the millions in the country who do not even know where their next meal is coming from, irrespective of whether they belong to the left, right or the centre. We need to have statesmen and not politicians in the government. I am sure the voter would set the anomaly right this time. Another wrong selection would spell anarchy in the country.



Just after the Cold war ended, military relations between India and the US eased a bit. The US defense department commissioned the Rand Corporation to study India’s future strategic role and power potential. George Tanham, their defense analyst, concluded that India lacked a strategic thinking and there were no strategic planning institutions in the country. The largest democracy in the world had no defense strategy in place till last year! This much for our rulers’ of the past having had the interest of the country at heart! The world’s judge, jury, and the policeman does not commit itself to disarmament, but forces us to do just that. The story in Iraq, Sudan, Afghanistan, and Yugoslavia are all frightening. We need a thinking government in place if we do not want foreign misrule again, like the British for two hundred years.



Mahatma Gandhi was right when he asked his followers to disband themselves after independence! Our politicians do not need Mahatma Gandhi now since he is not a vote catcher for them. Following Gandhian philosophy might even make them lose votes these days. Of course, they have rediscovered many others in India who could get them votes from time to time. Even the disciples of Mahathma Gandhi did not need him soon after they got power. They deluded themselves in their own magic power. We, as a Nation seem to enjoy sycophancy; the latter being the most fashionable political asset.



The negative psychology that brought Indians of diverse viewpoints and classes together was the anti-British feeling before independence. We seem to be continuing the same feeling against any good system in our own free country now. We will have to get out of that negative mind-set and start to think afresh positively with a holistic view of the country and its masses. We should stop our rhetoric and get down to business of really alleviating poverty with right earnestness, before the poor resort to a bloody revolution.



“If there is one place on the face of the earth where all the dreams of living men have found a home from the very early existence, it is India”

Romain Rolland, French Scholar.