Real Gems of Bharat!
Dr Pravin Togadia?
THIS week visiting remote areas of Bihar while meeting various locals, I met with a simple person. Not directly involved in organisation. This young Sadhu on his own every month arranges meeting of people and Sadhus to make them aware of the happenings around in Bharat. He manages to gather 70 to 200 Sadhus on his own. This Sadhu is an Engineering graduate and his dream is to ensure that Nepal (and Bharat!) is maintained as Hindu Rashtra.
In Himachal, I came across an artist who calls himself a ‘Cave Artist’. He is not a Cave Man; he studies cave paintings in difficult terrains, does research on them and documents details. He has started a wonderful museum of all this in Himachal.
Creating museum is really not his work as an artist; but he took it on himself to extend his grand experience of our ancient art to many!
In 1960, a farmer stayed near Somnath. He noticed that girls were not going to schools for studies. The poor farmer sold his little land, started a little school for girls. 5-6 girls attended it in the beginning; now there is a big school and education at that place grown out of this little seed.
There are many such examples. We all meet some such gems of Bharat at every step. They do something for the society what their kind, warm heart tells them to do. But following one’s own heart and supporting it with tireless efforts without getting dissuaded by anything is what makes these gems great. These gems do not do all this for any publicity, media coverage, political benefit or even social accolades. All they want is to complete the social dream they cherish and the fruits are reaped by the real needy!
At Nagpur, a little group runs ‘Platform School’. Kids who beg on platforms are gathered together for a little while daily and taught in this school. Similar school is being run even in Odisha.
In Gaya, a retired Government Surgeon visits his ancestral village once every week only to give free medical help to the poor there. In Kanpur, a retired head of the dept in medical college is running a free medical camp for the poor with the help of his students and friends. Many medical professionals do it. Some, once a while, some consistently; whichever way, the society benefits.
Near Haridwar in Bijnaur Dist, a school teacher went to 200 surrounding villages, located the people who were unemployed or were without any livelihood. He arranged self-employment for thousands of people. Their kids started eating regular food.
Near Jaipur in a small village, a farmer single handedly cleaned up thousands of acre Gochar (cow grazing) land, made arrangement to plant excellent quality grass there to feed cows and bulls in the vicinity.
In Bengaluru, a youth from a simple business family daily releases one cow minimum from the butchers, gives her to the Goshalas around and gives money to the Goshala for the cow’s fodder knowing well that the Goshalas can not afford many expenses.
An old father of a police officer near Bulandshahar in Uttar Pradesh daily gets out with a brave heart in a weak body, gathers youth around and chases away anti-social, jehadi elements from the vicinity. He has been doing it past many years and his son, a stout police officer, writes poems praising these efforts and saluting Bharat’s brave heroes like Maharana Pratap, Shivaji Maharaj and so on.
A committed Hindu, settled in America, daily spends his time and expensive net hours in spreading socially useful messages all over the world through emails. I am sure, he may be getting replies from some, but some never reply. Yet he does it tirelessly and at times cheers up people like us who get bogged down with some difficulties.
In Delhi, a simple person has taken it on himself to help poor families get their daughters married. He arranges for the place, food and other expenses for their marriages. What a solace to the poor parents! At the end of the wedding function, this fellow stands silently at a corner with his eyes full of tears as if his own daughter is leaving his home to go to in laws…
Many such examples you, we all know. In organic farming, cow saving, water conservation, environment, education, medicine, vocational training… many people are doing such work… I may not be able to give all their details here but they all are doing fantastic social work. Not many really! A few; but these are the lamp posts for all of us. Those who think that without govt aid, without organisational strength, without glittering publicity of development etc or without loads of money nothing can be done, these are the eye openers. This is the strength of Bharat as a society. They do not crave for Padmashree, Bharat Ratna or Nobel or any award. If many such people yet come ahead then it is not very difficult to transform the nation into a self-sufficient mighty strength!
In fact, every human being has a child within himself/ herself and similarly, every human being has a kind corner somewhere in the heart. All that is needed is a little rekindling and holding hands… Let us all together make a difference!?
