Gandhiji’s Relevance Today
Yes. It may seem strange to think of Gandhiji today. With so much of water having flowed down since his assassination, so many advances in so short a time having come up, so many economic theories considered more sophisticated been pronounced and being enacted world over, and many, at times self-styled, champions of global peace springing from different corners of the world advocating world order, it is certain to raise an eyebrow when somebody speaks of Gandhi… I mean, Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi.
All philosophers from times immemorial have tried to understand the intricacies of human relations and the essence harmony amongst masses that generates and sustains a lasting peace. I submit here, we should not forget that the idea of world was different for different people across centuries. It has expanded to what it is today due to zealous human effort to contact, communicate and understand each other. Greed and avarice have taken precedence over this basic urge at a later date. But, within their own miniscule worlds, they tried to develop means and measures to bring about peace and harmony amongst the citizens. And anything, including support to the concept of God and religion, which preached a duty of the individual to his fellow men and to the state they live were welcomed and upheld.
And the single most contribution of Gandhi to our society which unfortunately we could not further an inch, is the harmony amongst masses taking no cognizance of caste, creed or religion. We sidelined his economic theory of wholesome village development for the overall development of the country. We relegated his ideas stamping them obsolete and outdated and unsuited to the times. We could definitely have stalled migration of people from villages, suicides and hunger deaths among artisans and rural labour for lack of work. And the sporadic eye-wash efforts of the governments that we see here and there are not out of any respect for his ideas or ideals but to create a grandiose image of an individual that can win them back to power at the ballot. Even the urban intellectuals (or should I call them masses too) are pathetically apathetic to the problems of the rural folk. They are engrossed in their own plethora of problems …of education and employment, comforts and commutation, housing and communication and what not. They take it for granted that rural folk are meant to toil in the sun to produce them the food they can buy across the counter. They continue to indulge in things of their own interest and insulate themselves from the hard ground realities. The issues that plague the farmer …like non-availability of seeds, water for the crops, fertilizers and pesticides, spurious drugs, no support price, no marketing facilities… are not their issues. Their issues are if there is delay in announcement of bonus, Pay commission, DA, if the budget proposes any new taxes that pinch their purse a wee bit, if such and such a day is declared a holiday or not, if there was an increase in bus fares, gas, income tax, etc, etc. Hunger deaths, migrations of rural folk make no news. They don’t even give a cursory glance to them.
But the WTO has opened the eyes of a few intellectuals at least. It has unveiled how shamelessly the so called protagonists of world order shut their markets to the others with an under current of patriotism. How brazenly they try to usurp the natural, human, and intellectual resources of other countries by every conceivable deceit to advance on the deserted sands of developing countries. It is time people awake. It is not too late to realize how relevant Gandhi is today.
Yes. He is perhaps more relevant today than he was in his times. It is time we urban learn how to erase this rural urban divide. How to estrange ourselves from the whirlpool of market economy and stick to the basics Gandhi had taught us. It is time we devote our time and raise our voice to the problems of the farmers and pool resources to help them. It is time that we realize that the things have come to such a pass that we shall have to look to heavens, literally, to raise crops very soon. It is time the urban are more urbane. It is time we work for the welfare of the rural populace if not in magnanimity, at least out of our impending necessity of survival.
I have few suggestions to make here which are neither new nor exhaustive and extensive. We can pool our ideas in this forum so that a platform can be created for people who are interested in working in this direction.
It is a common understanding that for majority of the rural population there is neither enough food nor sufficient work to earn food. It is this that should be attended in the first place. To create work for some of the village artisans… say potters, we should take a vow that along with our regular electrical gadgets we would also purchase earthenware for decorating our households. Let us consciously integrate them with our environs. We have a great tradition of artistic work that has become obsolete for lack of patronage. It is our bounden duty to breathe life into those remnants on the brink of extinction. Similarly let us take a vow that we include in our apparel at least one pair of shirts/ dhotis/saris etc made of handloom cloth. We should identify people living below poverty line and ensure they get at least one meal a day if not two. This we can ensure by providing them a means of survival. For that we can make an appeal to all good natured people to celebrate their birthdays, parties and functions by sponsoring 5 or 10 saplings of fruit bearing trees. These hybrid saplings can be distributed among the rural poor. They will be planted in their homesteads and the crop will be enjoyed by them. Sometimes, we may face resistance from village administration. To negate it, we should help the village administration too to generate revenue for the village. For that we should plant some important plantation crops on either side of the village approach road and the main thorough fares. There is so much of idle land available in the foreyards of people and they should be encouraged to grow ‘Jatropha’ plants so that they can augment their meager incomes. This the urbanites can do with a very little sacrifice.
Taking cue from the Bhoodan movement, though we may not imitate or repeat it, we can request the big land lords and generous land holders to permit use the bunds of their fields by the poor to plant their own saplings. While the land lords can enjoy the crops they raise, the poor can enjoy the yields from the plants they grow on the bunds. The local governments (Village Panchayats) should be encouraged to utilize the lands under their authority for the public good… like schools, clinics, permanent pastures for the cattle to graze freely, for drinking water wells etc. The concept of “Total Cultivation” which envisages every inch of the land is put to some useful purpose should be encouraged and help implemented.
Here comes another major hurdle. The great majority of village folk are landless and agricultural labourers. And the land is divided into many holdings and is rain-fed. Thereby, most of the cultivable land is left fallow. So it is a challenge to intend to implement the concept of ‘Total Cultivation.’ It is here that agricultural scientists can make the greatest contribution by disseminating their knowledge… not as government servants do these days perfunctorily, without conviction, and at a price…but with a sense of service to the people. At least some of the retired government servants motivated in the last leg of their life to do some public good can do it or their services can be utilized. The advanced techniques of dry-land farming, multiple cropping can be widely advocated and seen implemented.
It is well known that this country was once famous for bovine and ovine, but their number has rapidly dwindled for want of proper rearing and disappeared pastures. Though in some places operation-flood-project-encouraged dairy farming has restored some sanity, it is not enough. Here the attempt to multiply the breed of ovine and bovine serves many purposes. First it helps the poor have a regular source of income, a steady supply of milk for the city, cheap alternative fuel in the form of dung, a natural manure for the farm lands, a pesticide in the form of ash from dung cakes, (and recently there is an interesting article I read about some research going on testing the medicinal properties of cow urine) etc. etc.
But as urbanites we can do positively contribute in some of the ways:
1. A group of 10 people (or households), say, can combine together to adopt a farmer household from a village. In so doing they would raise a pre-agreed amount of say, Rs 500/- per person (or household) and the amount will be given in appropriate installments to that household to invest in agriculture with the understanding that a pre agreed number of bags of paddy/ pulses/ dairy will be given to these 10 persons/ households. Bridging the producer-user gulf ensures the farmer need not have to run to money lender for small loans at high interest rate (and even without any support price from government he is assured of sale of produce at a reasonable rate); The urbanite need not have to cough up high price for small quantities and can get a reasonable return for his investment. The concept of mutual cooperation can be implemented in spirit. The worst that can happen is by the vagaries of nature the yield would not be as much as expected or some too clever farmer may dupe. We should start with a positive frame of mind and when it comes to loyalty to someone who helps, certainly the villagers score over the urbanites.
2. If one witnesses the extent of charitable support the newspapers, channels and organizations like Red-cross, Ramakrishna Mission etc., receive from public in times of natural calamities, one would really feel there is still that flicker of ‘good-Samaritan’ism in people and only they look forward to some trustworthy creditable organizations to do the job. There are fields of education, health that the urban unemployed can take up with zeal and a sense of satisfaction in doing a great job.
3. In the field of education, it should be seen that all responsible citizens try to free the education from the clutches of the corporate sector. This is a strange case of getting royalty for intellectual property over which they never had any rights. To achieve this people who can spare their time to teach should do so by teaching the subject(s) of their liking or interest in their homes for the children of their neighbourhood for at least one hour in a day or for few hours on holidays. Here some organizations should take initiative in pooling such knowledge banks and deliver the goods to the needy. It is by making education free and easily accessible for all that we can inculcate the derailed value system into the Indian psyche. There are some good departmental clubs that venture into such exercises as helping the poor with clothes in winter or feed them on auspicious days etc. They can better do by adopting a certain government or local-body run school from a nearby area and see that the children are provided good wholesome milk / food / stationery/ compass/ maps and charts/ scientific equipment. Some of them, as I already explained above, may even choose to give guest lectures to clarify some of the important concepts in their curriculum by virtue of their experience.
4. Medicine and insurance are some of the other sectors neglected for the rural poor and here again a lot of work can be done. Collecting a nominal fee that never exceeds 10 or 15 rupees per month from each rural household medical facility should be provided at the village proper. One or two important organization can partner to meet this target.
5. Horticulture is a growing industry these days and this can be integrated into the scheme of things in providing the rural poor the sustenance. Each of a set of selected rural households can be provided with a dozen each of flower pots and should be supplied with seeds of hybrid varieties of flowers of the coming season. With the cost of a chrysanthemum touching half a rupee a flower, it fetches a substantial amount to each household. So is the case with different varieties of jasmine.
6. By teaching them economic use of both potable and used water, teaching them the pride of doing things fine, teaching them not to depend on governments but on their own skills, the desired results can be achieved. Of course it is a tall order as it seems now. But somebody must make a beginning to turn back the evils of WTO gripping this country and the mind set of less-urbane urbanites.
