Whats nectar for secular US is toxic for secular India
Just came across S Gurumurthy’s brilliant critique on the recent BusinessWeek article on Karma Capitalism
As he says, “If the Indian management gurus did something similar in India it would attract the abuse of the seculars that they are toxifying even business and economics with saffron concepts! It (secular India) may even charge that the corporate America is becoming addicted to toxic saffron. That is the measure of its hate for thoughts and things Indian.”
Some excerpts:
“Just a century ago, Max Weber, declared that the Hindus and Buddhists remain backward because they believed in their ancient, faulty faiths!
Weber was a celebrated socio-economic thinker of the West. He counselled that belief in Karma – in which, he believed, fatalism hid – led people to accept their lot as their fate. He thus saw the Hindu-Buddhist faith in Karma as fatal to development itself. He diagnosed that Karma-centric faiths, which denied hopes to individuals, rendered their adherents unfit for modern development process.
Indian intellectualism, particularly in free India, carbon-copied Weber�s thesis and almost accepted that the traditional Indian beliefs are the nemesis of India. This turned the Indian establishment thinking apologetic about not just ancient Indian faiths but about ancient India itself!
…free India�s secular intellectualism…saw ancient Indian thoughts as its principal adversary, declare everything about ancient India – whether it was Patanjali�s Yoga or Krishna�s Gita � as saffron toxic and anti-secular.
Now…a full century (later)…the very idea of Karma, which Weber had diagnosed as the nemesis of India, seems to be emerging as the life vest of the West!
For secular India Bhagwat Gita and Karma Yoga are toxic substances to be kept out of the Indian discourse. The Indian management gurus and spiritual leaders are doing what Swami Vivekananda did over a century ago – namely proclaim that greatness of the Indian thought in the US and import it from the US to India. They are actually validating in the US what has been driven underground in secular India.
If the Indian management gurus did something similar in India it would attract the abuse of the seculars that they are toxifying even business and economics with saffron concepts! It may even charge that the corporate America is becoming addicted to toxic saffron. That is the measure of its hate for thoughts and things Indian. Yes the secular India dismisses as toxin what secular America realises as nectar.”
So true and so saddening…
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Image courtesy: http://www.lokvani.com/lokvani/article.php?article_id=2577
Dear Sir,
That is understood and accepted because we do not respect ourselves. When one does not respect himself how can he be expected to be respected. Swami Vivekananda gave the sumpreme call for creating this respect but we tended to ignore him as we were busy being Loyolites, Stephenians, and Xavierites not Indians with a background and culture which the barbaric west could not appreciate a century ago.
Today we have the reincarnation of Swami Vivekananda in the form of Swami Ramdev who is now accepted the challenge and creating an army of workers to bring back the self respect which we Indians have totally lost.
Even as of 17th January 2010, the Sunday edition of the Times of India, the celeberated Bhagvad Gits has been quoted to establish a a theory of the west.
Let us respect ourselves and we can taste the nectar. A bitter mouth cannot taste honey.
Regards,
vck
Well said, vck: Let us respect ourselves and we can taste the nectar. A bitter mouth cannot taste honey.