LOVE, CARE, SHARE
If charity is to be practised, let us practise it today when so many of the welfare projects of the Ramakrishna Mission are being held up for want of funds, so many nation-building endeavours are being stalled on account of acute financial shortage when the men are ready but the means are not, a similar scenario to what it was at the very inception of the movement, although, in a much less pronounced degree, perhaps, for the nation since independence has, after all, made significant economic progress. However, the basic texture of the problem remains the same as it was during the days of Swami Vivekananda --- and, perhaps, it will continue to be so for generations to come, for such is the way the world works so far as dispensing with wealth for public charity is concerned --- that the men are ready but the means are not, that the hands to help are handicapped by the scarcity of resources and the poor go hungry by for this terrible lapse on our part.
I have been told by a very reliable source that Swami Vivekananda in one of his unpublished letters to Haripada Mitra had said, "There aren't provisions, supply provisions." I cannot vouch for the veracity of this statement as I have not been privy to this letter but I have been given to understand that these, indeed, were the stated words in this letter which the reporter is said to have witnessed at first hand. I have merely put in a gentlemanly faith in the lady who reported this to me. The exact words of Swamiji in the letter written to Haripada Babu in Bengali were as follows : "রসদ নেই, রসদ যোগাও |"
For me these words of Swamiji are a commandment to not only Haripada Mitra, his devotee and initiated disciple, but to all of us who are his followers and devotees in succeeding generations thereafter, a standing directive to abide by and execute as we attempt to fulfil his dream of national regeneration, a task bestowed on him by his divine Master, Sri Ramakrishna, which he laid down his life for to bring to fruition.
But nations are not built in a day as the Roman adage goes and India is taking her due time to come to maturity. The lapse time between the conception of this great ideal in Ramakrishna's mind, his transmission of it into the system of Vivekananda, the latter's assimilation of it through his life's experiences across the vast continent of the motherland, then in bondage and in a state of utter ruination, and the finality of its translation in terms of concrete programmes of national reconstruction is proportional to our investment of means and measures to give it shape. If we dedicate ourselves to Ramakrishna-Vivekananda in a befitting manner, our motherland will stand supreme in the comity of nations soon. But if we continue to act selfishly and desist from taking an active part in nation-building merely to suit our narrow individual interests, we will not only have failed the leonine Swami in the fulfilment of his grand dreams for India for the while but, in impeding its progress, will have actually caused incalculable harm to her prospects as a nation, her territorial security and the well-being of her billion blighted citizens who have waited for a millenium to see the light of day that they are due to see, now that India is free from foreign bondage that had cast over her the long shadow of a thousand years.
The success of an enterprise depends entirely on the energy brought in to play on its execution and the time taken to achieve the end is in inverse proportion to it. Now, here is a point to reflect on. Will we on account of our petty self-interest allow the Ramakrishna Mission to languish in its welfare projects and so delay national regeneration or shall we by our active and ever-increasing support supply the Mission with the wherewithal to build the nation on a war-footing and so save the countless millions of our countrymen from hunger, destitution and deprivation of the basic amenities of life that make earthly existence a meaningful experience?
The case has been laid before you, my friends. The study is yours, the choice thereof is yours as well and so is the decision to act or not to act in response to the Ramakrishna Mission's appeals for help for its countless philanthropic programmes of national development. Upon your decision depends the fate of these projects largely and with it the fate of millions of hapless Indians who with eager expectation are awaiting their arrival onto the centre-stage of national life for millenia.
Adieu from me, my friends, for the while. See you on a brighter morn soon. Till then, 'chew upon this' and we shall invoke the gods to grace us with vision, with the fortitude to fight on and with the generosity to share our wealth for our less fortunate sisters and brothers of India. Jai Hind!
Written by Sugata Bose
If charity is to be practised, let us practise it today when so many of the welfare projects of the Ramakrishna Mission are being held up for want of funds, so many nation-building endeavours are being stalled on account of acute financial shortage when the men are ready but the means are not, a similar scenario to what it was at the very inception of the movement, although, in a much less pronounced degree, perhaps, for the nation since independence has, after all, made significant economic progress. However, the basic texture of the problem remains the same as it was during the days of Swami Vivekananda --- and, perhaps, it will continue to be so for generations to come, for such is the way the world works so far as dispensing with wealth for public charity is concerned --- that the men are ready but the means are not, that the hands to help are handicapped by the scarcity of resources and the poor go hungry by for this terrible lapse on our part.
I have been told by a very reliable source that Swami Vivekananda in one of his unpublished letters to Haripada Mitra had said, "There aren't provisions, supply provisions." I cannot vouch for the veracity of this statement as I have not been privy to this letter but I have been given to understand that these, indeed, were the stated words in this letter which the reporter is said to have witnessed at first hand. I have merely put in a gentlemanly faith in the lady who reported this to me. The exact words of Swamiji in the letter written to Haripada Babu in Bengali were as follows : "রসদ নেই, রসদ যোগাও |"
For me these words of Swamiji are a commandment to not only Haripada Mitra, his devotee and initiated disciple, but to all of us who are his followers and devotees in succeeding generations thereafter, a standing directive to abide by and execute as we attempt to fulfil his dream of national regeneration, a task bestowed on him by his divine Master, Sri Ramakrishna, which he laid down his life for to bring to fruition.
But nations are not built in a day as the Roman adage goes and India is taking her due time to come to maturity. The lapse time between the conception of this great ideal in Ramakrishna's mind, his transmission of it into the system of Vivekananda, the latter's assimilation of it through his life's experiences across the vast continent of the motherland, then in bondage and in a state of utter ruination, and the finality of its translation in terms of concrete programmes of national reconstruction is proportional to our investment of means and measures to give it shape. If we dedicate ourselves to Ramakrishna-Vivekananda in a befitting manner, our motherland will stand supreme in the comity of nations soon. But if we continue to act selfishly and desist from taking an active part in nation-building merely to suit our narrow individual interests, we will not only have failed the leonine Swami in the fulfilment of his grand dreams for India for the while but, in impeding its progress, will have actually caused incalculable harm to her prospects as a nation, her territorial security and the well-being of her billion blighted citizens who have waited for a millenium to see the light of day that they are due to see, now that India is free from foreign bondage that had cast over her the long shadow of a thousand years.
The success of an enterprise depends entirely on the energy brought in to play on its execution and the time taken to achieve the end is in inverse proportion to it. Now, here is a point to reflect on. Will we on account of our petty self-interest allow the Ramakrishna Mission to languish in its welfare projects and so delay national regeneration or shall we by our active and ever-increasing support supply the Mission with the wherewithal to build the nation on a war-footing and so save the countless millions of our countrymen from hunger, destitution and deprivation of the basic amenities of life that make earthly existence a meaningful experience?
The case has been laid before you, my friends. The study is yours, the choice thereof is yours as well and so is the decision to act or not to act in response to the Ramakrishna Mission's appeals for help for its countless philanthropic programmes of national development. Upon your decision depends the fate of these projects largely and with it the fate of millions of hapless Indians who with eager expectation are awaiting their arrival onto the centre-stage of national life for millenia.
Adieu from me, my friends, for the while. See you on a brighter morn soon. Till then, 'chew upon this' and we shall invoke the gods to grace us with vision, with the fortitude to fight on and with the generosity to share our wealth for our less fortunate sisters and brothers of India. Jai Hind!
Written by Sugata Bose
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