Author: Tarun Vijay
Publication: Google.com
Date: November 2009
URL: http://sites.google.com/site/hindunew/modern-hindu
Mr. Tarun Vijay, a former editor of Panchjanya, the official publication of
the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), which is an old Hindu nationalist organisation,
made a telling distinction between India and some of its neighbours at the
last meeting of the Club.
Significantly, the meeting was held at the
poolside of the Taj Mahal Hotel where the worst carnage by terrorists in India's
recent history was initiated just a year ago, on November 26, 2008.
Mr. Tarun Vijay said that over the last few
centuries Indian scholars, saints and seers went to several countries in Asia
carrying the message of love and compassion and of a caring and affectionate
God. In return, those countries feted their guests, honoured them and adopted
Sanskrit names for themselves and for their landmarks.
Not only were they proud of their heritage,
they were often surprised by the modern-day Indians' lack of knowledge about
their glorious culture and heritage.
It was this respect for ancestry that had
led to the new international airport in Bangkok (the biggest and most sophisticated
in the world) being named Suvarnabhumi, a chaste Sanskrit term. In fact, the
first visual to strike one on entering the premises was that of a 150-foot-long
mural of sagar-manthan, or the mythical churning of the oceans.
Similarly, the present King of Thailand was
known as Rama Navam (or Rama the Ninth). A brief chat with the Rajguru, the
King's teacher, revealed that the country followed the legacy of King Rama
and that all kings were known after him.
The full name of the present King of Thailand
was Bhumidol Adulyadej, also a Sanskrit name, and it was he who had christened
Bangkok airport as Suvarnabhumi, showing that the Thais were proud of their
heritage.
'People in East Asia are often surprised that
Indians are largely ignorant of their culture and heritage'
In complete contrast, said Mr. Tarun Vijay,
the barbarians who attacked the city on 26/11 came armed with sophisticated
weapons and other armaments to kill people - never mind that they did not
know any one of the people whom they had come to kill, or the fact that among
them were women, children and the aged, all of them unarmed and harmless,
leading normal lives in their own country.
Mr. Tarun Vijay, who gave a talk on "Global
mission of India", was introduced by Tarjani Vakil who said that he was
the Director of the Dr. Shyama Prasad Mukherjee Research Foundation, a centre
for civilizational values and policy research and an ideological think-tank
based on the nationalist school of thought at the headquarters of the Bharatiya
Janata Party (BJP) in New Delhi.
A prolific writer both in English and Hindi,
he had written over 2,000 articles and was a regular columnist for The Times
of India, Dainik Jagran, Maharashtra Times and so on. He had launched a peace
initiative between India and Pakistan along with the Daily Jung, a major newspaper
in Pakistan. That initiative had been appreciated on both sides of the border.
And, as Nanik Rupani revealed later, it was
Mr. Tarun Vijay who had put the ancient town of Ladakh on the tourist map
by organising the "Sindhu Darshan" programme that had gone on to
become a popular event. That one initiative had changed the entire economy
of Ladakh.
Mr. Tarun Vijay started his talk by pointing
out that it was a rishi from India who went to Cambodia 1,200 years ago, married
a local and settled down there who gave the country a name, "Kamboj"
(whence Cambodia), which later became a part of the Srivijaya Empire.
The biggest temple of Hindus was not in India
but in Angkor Vat in Cambodia. Even after the advent of communism, Communist
Cambodia remembered its Hindu and Indian heritage with respect and honour.
A UNESCO publication on that country showed
how Indians who left the shores of their land established their global footprint
on the basis of love, friendship and scholarship.
After referring to the naming of Bangkok airport
as Suvarnabhumi by Thailand's King Bhumidol Adulyadej, he said, "That
is the footprint of your ancestors, a legacy of your forefathers who spread
out and impressed the people with the power and the strength of knowledge
and character, the two major aspects of the Indian footprint… That is
the global vision of India, the global message of India even today".
Mr. Tarun Vijay said that the third chief
of the RSS, the late Prof. Rajendra Singh, who was the Head of the Department
of Physics at Allahabad University, had said to him in the course of his last
interview that he did not want to see India as a brutal military power or
as a dehumanised, prosperous country. On the contrary, he wanted India to
be known for its knowledge and character.
Speaking about his experiences in China where
he is a Fellow of the Sichuan University, he said when he went to see the
Leshan Buddha in Chengdu, he came across the largest Buddha sculpture in the
world. It was about 250 feet tall and had been made from one solid rock -
an entire mountain had been sculpted into a sitting Buddha.
And the very first statue visible on entering
the campus was that of Samantabhadra, another Sanskrit name. When he asked
about Samantabhadra, his interlocutors said it was surprising that he did
not know about him.
The official accompanying him (in a China
ruled by the Communist Party) then told him that Samantabhadra was a rishi
from North India who crossed snow deserts and the Himalayas and survived to
live in Chengdu some 950 years ago. He learned the Chinese language and started
communicating with the King and the people.
Such was the influence of his brilliance,
intellect and scholarship that everyone started believing in Buddha and he
was able to inspire the people of Chengdu to build the Leshan Buddha sculpture.
"Even in the year 2009, it is the biggest
Buddha sculpture in the world. And it was done by your ancestors, by those
Indians who were brave and courageous and who never wanted to subjugate or
colonise other people.
"They took dharma with them. They were
not ashamed of their civilization, they were not ashamed of their past, of
their glorious heroes and of the great men and women who loved their language;
they translated the entire literature of China and East Asia into Sanskrit
and from Sanskrit into their language."
Mr. Tarun Vijay said the Rajguru of China
was Kumarajiva whose father was from Sinkiang and mother from Kashmir. When
he went there, the Han King of Beijing gave him the title, "Teacher of
China".
It was Kumarajiva who started the finest method
of translating the classics from Sanskrit to Chinese and from Chinese to Sanskrit
with a 17-tier arrangement. It started with literal translation, followed
by the first step of checking; next, ensuring that the main spirit of the
text was conveyed, and so on. It was only after 17 steps that the final text
of the original text from Sanskrit into Chinese and from Chinese into Sanskrit
was available.
Recently, when visiting the Indian Embassy
in Beijing, he met a man called Vijay Choudhary, a small trader from Jhunjhunu
in Rajasthan. This man revealed that he employed 1,000 Chinese in his diamond-cutting
factory in Kunming!
That was the distance that India had travelled
- from Samantabhadra to Vijay Choudhary - and neither of them had used a gun
to befriend the Chinese. Rather, they had won them over with the help of mutual
respect and understanding.
The Chinese cared for Vijay Choudhary because
he was bringing a lot of money into China and giving employment to the rural
people there.
This case, too, represented the spirit of
India whose teachers, professors, technologists and engineers were respected
icons of knowledge, scholarship, integrity and character.
And there was also the story narrated by Mr.
L.K. Advani of a Malaysian whom he had met in Kuala Lumpur. The man lived
in New York where he had his office and establishment. But what was he doing
in Kuala Lumpur?
He told Mr. Advani that he had to undergo
a heart surgery. When he learnt that an Indian doctor in Kuala Lumpur was
the best in the field, he had travelled from the USA to be operated by that
Indian doctor in Malaysia.
"We don't bomb the country that we adopt.
That's what everyone says about Indians. Everyone loves and accepts Indians.
Even if an Indian is a British, German or American passport-holder, they trust
him 100% - that he won't bomb their land. He will work for the country, fight
for the country and will never ditch it.
"That is your achievement, the blessings
of your ancestors; and that's the Indian footprint all over the world, that
of character, honesty, integrity."
Turning to Nanik Rupani, Mr. Tarun Vijay said
it was worth pondering over that several leaders from all over the world happily
came to India to accept awards presented by his Priyadarshini Academy. This
was no mean achievement and an endorsement of brand India.
The speaker next referred to the aftermath
of the "discovery" of America by Columbus who had actually set out
in search of India. He could not find India but reached the land that was
now called America.
"What happened after Columbus reached
America? More than four crores of the original inhabitants of the land, who
were known as American Indians, were brutalised, massacred. It was a holocaust.
And the originator of that holocaust was Columbus."
He had wanted to proselytise, to find gold,
to grab land, to get slaves, to subjugate the people; to take over their land
and to build his own buildings.
In comparison, the Taj Mahal Hotel was a symbol
of the indomitable, invincible Indian spirit represented by the tricolour.
For it was here that the mission of the barbarians who had attacked Bombay
on 26/11 was defeated.
Would we respect Rama or celebrate Diwali
had he played peacenik and allowed his wife to be taken away? asks Tarun Vijay
"Ask yourself, what kind of people must
they have been (those who attacked Bombay on 26/11). Compare your civilization
and the work done by your ancestors in the earlier years which gave you the
Hindu civilization, the Indus civilization, which left imprints all over the
globe, from Japan to Cambodia, Thailand, Vietnam, Laos, Korea, Brazil, New
Zealand. (You will find) respect and understanding for a different viewpoint.
"You will find a solid belief in pluralism,
in democracy and diversity. We are not those who want everything to be uniformly
same, who want all people speaking one language, reading one book, wearing
the same attire. No, we love diversity.
"Let a million flowers with a million
fragrances bloom; if there can be any such place in the world, then that is
Hindustan. No other country can boast of this kind of legacy which is so supportive
of pluralism, respecting different viewpoints. We never had a Galileo hanged
for his beliefs."
Taking a dig at the growing tribe of peaceniks,
Mr. Tarun Vijay said Rama did not compromise with Ravana, telling him that
he could take Janaki to Colombo. And he, as a pace-loving person, would return
to Ayodhya where the people would be so happy that he had played peacenik
and left his wife behind, that they would welcome him and celebrate his return
as Diwali.
On the contrary, Rama cautioned Ravana and
when the latter remained adamant, he vanquished Ravana. That was the legacy
of India, that of not compromising with the wicked.
Narrating another experience, Mr. Tarun Vijay
said that the renowned businessman and philanthropist, Mr. Bob Harilela, had
told him that he never cared about India when he was a little boy. In fact,
he hated the heat and the poverty that he saw when he came here at the age
of 13.
But his mother told him that whatever he did
and wherever he went, he would not be able to erase the fact that he was an
Indian - it was "written" on his face. In course of time Mr. Harilela
bought an apartment in Bombay and now his largest spend on charity was in
India. He spent his vacations in India and had taught his children to respect
their heritage.
The children would always remain Indian, but
"not on the basis of a gun, or of gun powder" or colonisation.
"No one will remember a Gen. Dyer in
India with respect, or even Queen Elizabeth. But Bhagat Singh, who was only
23 years old when he went to the gallows? Yes… This land has always respected
those who have stood with their heritage, with their civilization, and those
who have stood up at times of crisis to fight the enemy, to fight the barbarians
so that peace, pluralism and democracy can be saved."
On a visit to Riyadh in Saudi Arabia, he saw
that not a single shop in the markets had a portrait of Osama bin Laden because
violence, extremism and uncivilized behaviour never won respect. History only
remembered those who spread the message of love and compassion and it was
such people who were respected down the ages.
Buddha was "still alive" in spite
of the fact that his sculpture in Bamiyan had been bombed out by the Taliban.
"The global vision of India cannot be
anything but to spread the message that the gun never achieves success or
does any good for the people. It is the power of love, compassion and character
that does so. And that's what I have learned in my organisation, in the RSS."
Finally, Mr. Tarun Vijay quoted a couplet
by Akbar Allahabadi:
Tere lab pe hai Iraqo Shamo Misro Romo Cheen
Lekin apne hi watan ke naam se waqif nahin
Arre sabse pehle mard ban Hindustan ke wastey
Hind jag uthe to phir saare jahan ke wastey
(A loose translation: The names on your lips
are those of Iraq, Egypt, Rome and China, but you don't seem to be acquainted
with the name of your own country; the first thing you need to do is to become
a man for Hindustan, and once you rouse Hindustan, then become a man for the
whole world.)
Answering questions, Mr. Tarun Vijay told
Trilochan Sahney that he did not agree that India was always populated by
invaders. In fact, even the theory of "the Aryan invasion of India"
had been proved false, what with American scientists finding that the genes
of the Aryans and the Dravids living in India since ancient times had a lot
in common.
On the contrary, India had always given shelter
to those refused shelter elsewhere and to every persecuted community in the
world. No other country could boast of such a record.
But he agreed that Hindu society was fractured
by the caste system. In this context the speaker quoted Swami Vivekananda
who had said that the only ideal before Hindu society was the ideal of Guru
Govind Singh.
Sitaram Shah pointed out that the word Hindu
did not appear in any literature. Where had the word come from? Secondly,
all that the speaker had said in praise of Hinduism was being maligned by
the very people who were talking of Hinduism.
Mr. Tarun Vijay said that the word Hindu came
from the Greeks. At that time Indians were called "Aryas", "Vedics",
or "Sindhuputras". But since the Greeks had difficulty pronouncing
certain consonants, it so happened that Sindhus came to be called Hindus.
However, changing the name of a city or a land could not change the basic
character of the people who inhabited that place.
"And the basic character of this land,
beyond the Indus, is that they love nature, they don't condemn it. When Bachendri
Pal became the first Indian woman to reach the summit of Mount Everest, she
did not set foot on it till she had placed vermillion and rice on it as a
ritual offering, thanking the goddess mother for giving her the strength to
reach the summit.
"On the other hand, Western mountaineers
write that they 'conquered' Mount Everest; the word 'conquered nature' does
not appear in the Indian language. This is the basic difference in the worldview
of our people. We have respect for parents, for family values, for pluralism.
That makes us different people. You may call them Hindus, Indians, Bharatiyas,
whatever, it means the same thing," Mr. Tarun Vijay added.
The vote of thanks was proposed by Nanik Rupani.
