Kanakakunnu Palace in Thiruvananthapuram was the guest house of the Travancore kings, where important guests were housed and meetings hosted. The Travancore kings welcomed people of all faiths including Jews and Parsis and gave land and all facilities to build churches, mosques, etc. They ruled as dasas (servants) of Lord Padmanabha, surrendering everything at the feet of the Lord and His subjects. It was in this magnificent palace that a two-day seminar on ?Cultural Nationalism, Conflict or Confluence of Civilisations? was held on September 23 and 24 under the auspices of Shri Guruji Birth Centenary Celebrations Committee, Kerala.
Inaugurating the seminar on September 23, RSS Sarsanghachalak Shri K.S. Sudarshan said Shri Guruji accelerated the process of national rejuvenation started by spiritual stalwarts like Ramakrishna, Vivekananda, Aurobindo and other social reformers like Raja Ram Mohan Roy, Bal Gangadhar Tilak, Gandhiji, Ambedkar, and Sri Narayana Guru. He said the western concept of nation-state and state-nation basically remained a loyalty to a geographical area, which included conquered territories. ?The Hindu world view of a nation and its foundation is based on answers to three basic questions?who am I? What is the universe? What is my relation with the universe? Atma or I am beyond body, mind and intellect and Parmatma is a whole manifest world, which is beyond time and description. The relation between the universe and I is the relation between atma and Parmatma and atma has to pierce through family, society, humanity and environment to attain moksha or merge with Parmatma. This is the foundation of our Hindu nation. It has seen many ups and downs but has always rose up with new vigour.?
Shri Sudarshan further said from Alexander to Changez Khan, from Islam to Christianity and to the West have they all tried to bring India under its domination and efforts were made to change our boundaries, but have themselves got eliminated due to the strong foundations of our punyabhoomi, which believes in the concept of unity in diversity. ?The communist game plan to conquer us through material ideology and the US plan to bring India under its control, will meet the same fate of our conquerors. US is handling India like it did with Iraq and Afghanistan, but national aspirations are so strong that it will survive the US machinations,? he remarked. He said the West believes in the principles of survival of the fittest, exploitation of nature and weapons of mass destruction, whereas Bharat sees everything and everybody as a manifestation of God.
Speaking on the subject of Foundation of Our Nation, former Supreme Court Justice Shri K.T. Thomas said he is proud to be born in Bharat?a country of great heritage. He said Bharat is a punyabhoomi created by God for religions to survive and flourish and nowhere in the world can he enjoy the privileges of a Christian, which he is having here. The Jews and Parsis persecuted all over were treated with honour and dignity here, he said. ?The constituent assembly, which had 80 per cent Hindus, accepted a secular Constitution despite witnessing the genocide of millions of Hindus and rape and murder of lakhs of women because of the peculiarity and specialty in the concept of ?Sanatana Dharma?. Concluding his speech he said the foundation of our nation is strong but we have to reinvent ourselves as Japan did after its total destruction in 1945 and live up to the expectations of the world, which is looking up to us for leading the world morally and culturally.
Bharatiya Vichar Kendra director Shri P. Parameswaran said the nation'sconcept, which evolved in the West 300 years ago, cannot be applied to Bharat, which is more than 5000 years old. The Bharatiya rashtra concept is totally different from the western nation concept. ?Our concept of rashtra is embedded in the Prithvi Suktam, in 60 stanzas of the Vedas and evolved through tapas and deeksha of rishis. It has no expansionist or economic motives and is for total welfare of citizens. Prithvi Suktam is a prelude to Vande Mataram, a link to our civilisation. Similarly, dharma is misunderstood as religion. Our dharma is an umbrella or security for various religions. It has been the refuge of all persecuted people of the world. We see all faiths as path to god. Dharma can be partially described as ?national righteousness.? Quoting Samuel P. Huntington, Shri Parameswaran said world is returning to religion and a war is going on between crusade and Islamic terrorism. ?In the US only a white Anglo-Saxon Protestant (WASP) is considered the true inheritor of US culture. The communists who earlier considered India a union of states are slowly accepting the nation theory due to rise of nationalist spirit in India,? he added.
Delivering Shri Guruji memorial lecture Shri Ranga Hari, former All India Bauddhik Pramukh of RSS and one of the first pracharaks from Kerala, said Shri Guruji'slife should be divided into two parts. The period from 1906 to 1940 was a period where he was a creation of the yuga and the period from 1940 to 1973 where he was a creator of the yuga.
He said Shri Guruji had education consummated with his mission as his parents taught him English, Hindi, Sanskrit and our culture and traditions. Due to his father'sfrequent transfers he had studied in all places from Kashi to Tamil Nadu and when he completed his MSc in BHU and became a teacher, he had become flexible and prepared for a tough life. His spiritual and intellectual development coupled with discipleship of Swami Akhandananda brought out the service aspect in him. He studied the Koran and the Bible too.
He further said there were four mantras, which Shri Guruji accepted as his life mission: Nationalism as pivot of our existence, Bharat has a life'smission, Sanatana Dharma is our fountainhead and heartbeat and pride in our old nation and civilisation.
He said Shri Guruji was a master organiser who took the RSS to every nook and corner of the world. ?He evolved the pracharak concept and persons wanting to marry were asked to do so in the next birth.? Shri Guruji travelled in all vehicles except the man-pulled rikshas and stayed in homes of swayamsevaks and ate their food. He concluded by saying Shri Guruji was an akhand, amar, vichar tapasvi and parivrajak who gave new confidence to the Hindus and respect to Bharat.
Addressing the valedictory session Shri K.S. Sudarshan called for drafting a new constitution based on Bharatiya values and ethos and laying emphasis on decentralisation.
Papers on globalisation, terrorism, nation concept, etc. were presented by Dr S. Gurumurthy, Shri Ram Madhav, Shri M.G.S. Narayanan, BMS vice-president Shri Saji Narayanan, Dr Madhavankutty, Dr Radhakrishnan (Gandhian and from Harward University) and Dr Sankaran Ravindran of Kozhikode University. The elite delegates included Kshetriya Pracharak, Shri Sethumadhavan, Prant Pracharak Shri Gopalakrishnan, Shri J. Nandakumar, Shri O. Rajagopal and Shri A.R. Mohan.
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