Narendra Modi - Jyotipunj (Gujarati Edition)

During this journey of mine for refinement and transformation, I got an opportunity to come into contact with a small number of people as the world sees them, yet so exalted people in life. Their love, their association has been the reason of inspiration in my journey. The list of such people is quite long but it is not possible to mention each of them.

Few people are aware of this exalted tradition of sacrificing their life without expecting anything in return.

Such people who dedicate every moment of their lives and every particle of their bodies in the service of the Motherland are seldom remembered, but their fragrance surrounds us always.

At times, a new wave of inspiration is infused just by recalling the memories concerning such lives, and so, for the bliss of the inner-self, for the happiness of everybody, we have undertaken a humble effort to delineate the fragrance of these architects of the society.

Narendra Modi

The life of only those people in the world is purposeful who are able to dedicate a part or whole of their life in others good and service. Such great people have made special contribution in constructing the worlds history. Service-oriented people have been born in every country of the world, but it has been a high point of India, by which it has been able to preserve and sustain its history over such a long period of time. Other places cannot match the illustrations brought to the fore in India. The greatest name in this respect is that of none other than Maharishi Dadhichi. One devoted time and another youth, one gave up wealth and splendour and another faced the turmoil of imprisonment. The land of India is great, the Dharma here is great, and the gods here are great who inspired a seer to donate his entire body in order to destroy the demons. Go to a king and ask for land, and he will willingly give it. Go to a scholar and ask for learning, and he will teach you for twelve years. Go to a cloth merchant and ask for cloth, he will give you cloth to cover the body and money to sustain. We all have heard of donation of wealth, learning, cloth, land and even good deeds by the scholarly Brahmins, but nobody has ever heard of an individual who could donate his body, his life itself. Maharishi donated each part of his body, in all his sense, in all delight, to destroy the demon Vritrasur and other demons. It is hard to find such a strange renunciation in the world.

In these difficult times of modern age, this flow of tradition has not been impeded. With the blessings of the Almighty, a great person came to the fore, which is well known by people of the country. He is none other than the Man. Dr. Keshav Baliram Hedgewar, whom we call by the name of Dr. Hedgewar. He had an idea that there should be some people in the service of the nation. Who will build the nation if everybody is engaged in his own individual tasks of earning livelihood, living a personal life and procreating offsprings? Who will then guard the Mother India?

Many people those days were busy to serve these purposes from political viewpoint. We cannot negate their contribution, however, on the other hand, Dr. Hedgewar was of the firm view that politics ultimately leads to fragmenting the society, individual selfishness comes to the fore at one or the other stage. In it, good qualities are little spread, the people whose self-interests are not served, they make an effort to prove even the virtuous as evil. This concept must have resided in his mind; and this seems to be the precise reason that he kept away from politics and established the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh to achieve the exalted goals of nation-building and individual-building. At that time, he had the company of only a few people, but there is nothing great or small we must not think that way.

I got an opportunity to visit two places one is the banyan tree in Kolkata and the other Kabir Vat (banyan) on the banks of the Narmada. When I visited these two places, I wondered on seeing such massive branches and offshoots that were touching the ground. They had grown so much that it was hard to find the source stem, and I enquired this fact from an officer present there. He said that it was difficult to find out the source stem; perhaps the previous officers would be able to point it out. However, the branches had grown to such an extent that they all appeared to be the source stem. How fortunate must have been the seed of this tree, from which came forth a tree, and each branch that came forth from this tree transformed itself into a complete banyan tree. It is hard to know who sowed the first seed, nobody knows this man.

This banyan tree had not been created intently. A bird somewhere might have partaken of a fruit, and it might have felt the natural desire to discharge its faeces, and this discharge could have led to this creation. Man could not have done this; but a bird is very fortunate that it can perform such a great task though it is very small, very trivial. It can accomplish such a great task that even the seed in its discharge can become the greatest banyan tree. It is so wonderful. On seeing this banyan tree, an idea came to my mind that if an individual decides to do something with complete devotion and is determined to do it with complete resolve, his thinking too can become extensive in order to provide shade, peace and cool, just like the banyan tree that has grown from a small seed.

If we look at the life of Dr. Hedgewar from this perspective, we can find that his endeavour was like that of sowing the small seed in the ground which culminated into the massive banyan tree. He initiated his work with only five Swayamsevaks. The scope, capability, outcome and satisfaction derived from the work continued to expand and augment continuously, and this soon formed into a chain in which one linked with the next, and the next with his next. People are wont to proceed ahead with some selfish motive, but this was a wonderful incidence in which hundreds of people had resolved to dedicate their youth selflessly with the motive of building a society. We are aware that selfless people are seldom respected by the selfish people, and they propagate about them that they are useless beings wasting their time. We often claim such things about the saints and seers too.

Nari mui ghar sampati nasi,

Moond munday bhaye sanyasi.

(As one considers that after the death of wife, family and property vanish. Similarly, one becomes sage after shaving his head.)

This is what is said about the saints and seers. This couplet says that the wife died and there were no assets at home, so they got the head shaved and became a Sanyasi. Such accusations are common when it comes to the Sanyasis (hermits). But when we talk of Swami Vivekananda, Swami Ramatirtha and hundreds of others following the traditions of Shankaracharya, they are not those Sanyasis who shaved their heads only out of compulsion; rather they are the ones who shave others with the razor of learning and virtue. At that time, people expressed doubt if so few people could transform the nation. However, Dr. Hedgewar had complete faith in his mind that it is a national task, it is a divine task. Gradually, he came into contact with noble people. This was the reason that just the previous year, we all have celebrated the centenary anniversary celebrations in the honour of the Man. Madhav Sadashiv Golvalkar (Guruji) with complete vigour and enthusiasm. With the blessings of Almighty, I was appointed the Chairman of the entire National Programme, and I accepted this task in all humility. Nobody knew that Doctor Saheb would pass for the heavenly abode so soon, and he assigned this task to a teacher to take it forward.