Address at the Annual Convocation of the Women?s Christian College, Chennai, Tamil Nadu

Chennai : 23-02-2007

Beautiful Minds

"Small aim is a crime"

I am indeed delighted to participate in the Annual Convocation of Women?s Christian College, Chennai which imparts education exclusively for women in Arts, Science, Commerce, Management and Information Technology. While I am with you, I would like to recall the words of Founder-Principal of this college Dr Miss Eleanor McDougall who said -"We can do no better service to India, than to liberate the energies of wisdom and devotion which are latent in a woman?. The college has grown in strength from 41 students and 7 faculty members in 1915 to 2760 students and 141 Faculty members in different disciplines today. I am happy that the college aims to provide a complete, meaningful and relevant education to women so that they are intellectually well-trained, morally upright, socially aware and spiritually inspired. I greet all the pioneers who have contributed in establishing and growing this College to its present state. During the last nine decades this college has produced many distinguished personalities who are contributing in different disciplines in India and abroad.

My greetings to the Principal, faculty members, and other distinguished participants and students of this college.

Working towards Excellence

Apart from language, science and humanities courses, I find that the college has instituted Vocational Training Courses in Industrial Microbiology and Biotechnology, Nutrition, Food Service Management & Dietetics courses. The College has also started specialized courses in commerce, Corporate Economics, Visual Communication, Biotechnology, Information Technology and Computer Science & Technology.

I am happy that the college has educational linkage with many institutions both in India and abroad. The College has generated large number of graduates and postgraduates who are functioning in many reputed institutions in India and abroad. My Greetings to all of you.

National Prosperity Index

Dear Friends, I would like to share with you certain experiences which I had while interacting with unique personalities. Last week I was with Prof. John Nash who got his Nobel Prize in 1994, for his work on application of Game Theory to the field of economics. We had an interesting discussion regarding the concept of GDP. Prof. Nash?s theory on the subject of economics and most of the theory of the subject of economics throughout the world, consider GDP as an important indicator of economic growth of a nation. During my discussion, I said the GDP indicates only one portion of the growth of the nation. I have designed a new inclusive concept which I call as National Prosperity Index.

While we are happy that our economy is in the ascent phase and our GDP is growing at nearly 9% per annum, it is evident that the economic growth is not reflected in the quality of life of large number of people, particularly in the rural areas and even in urban areas. Hence, we have evolved what is called ?National Prosperity Index? (A); which is a summation of annual growth rate of GDP (a); plus minimum level of quality of life for the citizens of the country (b); plus the value system derived from our civilizational heritage (c); which is unique to India. That is A=a+b+c. Particularly, ?b? is a function of availability of housing, good water, nutrition, proper sanitation, quality education, quality healthcare and employment potential. ?c? is a function of promoting joint family system and creation of the spirit of working together and above all leading a righteous way of life. All our measure of economic performance should be towards improving the National Prosperity Index.

I had intensive discussion with Prof. Nash on the subject of National Prosperity Index. To achieve this, we have a vision of transforming India into a developed nation before 2020, ( ) energizing and igniting the minds of all Indians. Students should have an important role in realizing the missions of Developed India. You may debate and come out with a comprehensive quantitative definition on all aspects of National Prosperity Index.

In my discussions I have not highlighted the silent mind of Dr. John Nash for over 30 years. How many of you have seen the movie ?Beautiful Mind?, How many of you have read the novel? Why is it called ?Beautiful mind?? Who has the Beautiful Mind? What I mean by the thirty years silence is that Prof. John Nash, after the Nobel class of work in Game theory, suffered from Schizophrenia. How he recovered is a miracle. It was due to the efforts of his wife Mrs Alicia and his institution Princeton University. I met the beautiful minds recently. I realize that the institutions have to own great minds even when the mind goes through a setback. So far I have discussed with you friends, the importance of National Prosperity Index in evolving good human life. The human life itself has its dynamics. Let me share with you.

Origin of Life

Ancient human history has been revealed beautifully by Paleo-anthro-pology. Life originated in this globe 600 million years ago and continental drift occurred 200 million years ago making our one land into five continents. Mammals evolved 140 million years ago, Homi-nid (human type) evolved 26 million years ago but the modern man only some 200,000 years ago. That too he emigrated and colonized the rest of the world only since 50,000 years. Spoken language was some 10,000 years old while written only a few thousand years old. All the phenomenal progress of Man was thus only within this short span of 400 -200 generations (i.e., 10,000 -5,000 years). So far human society, from origin until now has always been at war within and between groups and has led to two World Wars. Presently, terrorism and low intensity warfare are affecting many parts of the world. In this context, is it possible to have happy, prosperous and safe planet earth.

Evolution of enlightened citizens

Dear friends, I know you are all concerned how do we bring peace to the world, can terrorism be eliminated? Is it possible to aim at a peaceful, prosperous, happy and safe planet? I would like to put forth to this intellectual gathering, an action oriented solution for evolving a happy, prosperous and peaceful society in our planet, which I call as ?Enlightened Society?. How do we create such an enlightened society, which has three components (a) Education with value system (b) Religion transforming into spirituality and (c) Economic development for societal transformation? Let us discuss.

(a) Education with value system: The best part for a person is his or her childhood and the learning period in school. The prime learning environment is five to seventeen years of age. Of course, at home, love and affection are imparted. But again most of the time in a day is spent in preparing school's homework and study, eat, play and sleep. Hence the school hours for children are the best time for learning and need the best of environment and mission oriented learning with value system. During this stage, they need value based education in school and at home for them to become good citizens. This reminds me the echo from a great teacher's saying, "give me a child for seven years. Afterwards, let the God or devil take the child. They cannot change the child." This indicates the power of the great teachers. For parents and teachers, school campus and home have to have an integrated mission that is education with value system. They must inculcate moral leadership amongst children which involves two aspects. First it requires the ability to have compelling and powerful dreams or visions of human betterment, a state of things in which human beings could be better off in the future than they are now. Secondly, moral leadership requires a disposition to do the right thing and influence others also to do the right thing. If the child misses the value based education in the school, no government or society can establish a transparent society or a society with integrity. During this period, it is essential to elevate the young minds through a moral science class at least for one hour each week, delivered by great teachers. That will elevate the young minds to love the country, to love other human beings and elevate the young to higher planes. Throughout the world in every school till the age of 17, it is essential that moral science is taught. Such enlightened individuals will definitely promote peace and harmony in the planet. Now, I would like to share an experience that I have witnessed regarding religion transforming into a dynamic spiritual force.

(b) Religion Transforming into Spirituality: Universal Mind

I would like to recall an incident which happened four decades ago. Prof Vikram Sarabhai is the visionary of space programme in India. He is well known for his cosmic ray research area that led to evolving the space research programme for the nation. Prof Vikram Sarabhai was looking for a site to establish space research station in the equatorial region. He visited a number of places. Thumba in Kerala was selected by the scientific community for space research as it was near the equatorial region and was ideally suited for ionospheric research in upper atmosphere apart from study of atmospheric structure. When Prof Vikram Sarabhai visited Thumba, the locality had series of villages and thousands of fishermen folk were living in that area. It also had a beautiful ancient church, St Mary Magdalene Church, Pallithura and a Bishop's House. Prof Vikram Sarabhai met many politicians and bureaucrats to get the place for the work of space science research. It did not move further because the nature of the place. He was asked to see the Bishop of Trivandrum, at that time in 1962, Rev Father Dr Peter Bernard Pereira. It was a Saturday when Prof Vikram Sarabhai met the Bishop. The Bishop smiled and asked him to meet him the next day, ie Sunday. In the morning after the Church Service, the Bishop told the congregation, "my children, I have a famous scientist with me who wants our church and the place I live for the work of space science research. Dear children, science seeks truth by reasoning. In one way, science and spiritualism seek the same divine blessings for doing good for the people. My children, can we give the God's abode for a scientific mission?" There was a chorus of 'Amen' from the congregation and the whole church reverberated. Subsequently, the big event took place in 1962. Rev Dr Peter Bernard Pereira, the Bishop of Trivandrum, took the noble decision to dedicate the church in recognition of the national goal for the establishment of the Indian Space Research Organisation at Pallithura, Thumba. That was the church where we had our design centre, started rocket assembly, design of filament winding machine for FRP product and the Bishop's house was our scientists' place. Later, the Thumba Equatorial Rocket Launching Station (TERLS) led to the establishment of Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre (VSSC) and multiple space centres throughout the country.

When I think of this event, I can see how enlightened spiritual and scientific leaders, all converge towards giving reverence to the human life. New church and new schools were established in record time. Of course the birth of TERLS and then VSSC gave the country the capability of design, development and produce world class huge rocket system and subsequently, India has the capability of launching geo-synchronous, sun-synchronous and meteorology spacecraft, communication satellite, remote sensing satellite thereby provided fast communication, weather forecasting and also locate water resources for the country. Today, among us, Prof Vikram Sarabhai is not there, Rev Dr Peter Bernard Pereira is not there, but those who are responsible for creation and make the flower blossom will themselves be a different kind of a flower as described in the Bhagwat Gita: "See the flower, how generously it distributes perfume and honey. It gives to all, gives freely of its love. When its work is done, it falls away quietly. Try to be like the flower, unassuming despite all its qualities". What a beautiful message for all generation of this nation, on integration of minds and universal mind. No where in the world a church has been given for scientific research, it has happened in India. It is a great message to be spread. The message is, the best component of the religion can be transformed into a spiritual force that will shape the society. Let me now discuss with you the third component of the enlightened society for transforming the developing nation into a developed nation through achieving economic prosperity, so that large societal imbalances can be removed. In this connection, let me take an example of India, which has one sixth of the global population.

We have a population of over one billion people of which 220 million are still living below the poverty line. They need education, they need habitat, they need health care, and creation of employment potential. To meet their needs we have the second vision of transforming India into a developed nation by the year 2020. We have identified five areas where India has a core competence for integrated action: (1) Agriculture and food processing (2) Education and Healthcare (3) Information and Communication Technology (4) Infrastructure development such as power, transportation, communication and including Providing Urban Amenities in Rural Areas (PURA) network and (5) Self reliance in critical technologies. These five areas are closely inter-related and if implemented in a coordinated way, will lead to food, and economic security, and national security. A strong partnership among the R&D, academy, industry and the community as a whole with the Government departments will be essential to accomplish the vision for a developed India. Indian GDP is growing at an average rate of 8% p.a. whereas the economists suggest that to remove the poverty of 220 million people, we have to grow at the rate of 10% p.a. consistently for over a decade. One of the components through which the rural-urban divide will be bridged and prosperity will be brought to the seven hundred million people living in six hundred thousand villages is Providing Urban Amenities in Rural Areas (PURA) in seven thousand clusters.

Conclusion

We have discussed the concept of National Prosperity Index as an indicator of quality of life of citizens. We went through the history of evolution of human life and discuss model of ?enlightened society? to evolve a happy, prosperous and peaceful society. This will have three major components: creation of enlightened citizens through education with value system, religion transforming into spiritual force and nations achieving higher National Prosperity Index. You may focus on the mission of transforming the planet into a peaceful, prosperous and happy place to live. Development of a conflict free society will be a major turning point in human evolution. All of you assembled here may reflect how each one of you individually and collectively can contribute in this mission.

Now let me administer a Seven Point Oath for all you. Can you repeat with me?

Seven Point Oath

1. I realize, I have to set a goal in my life. To achieve the goal, I will acquire the knowledge, I will work hard, and when the problem occurs, I have to defeat the problem and succeed.

2. As a youth of my nation, I will work and work with courage to achieve success in all my tasks and enjoy the success of others.

3. I shall always keep myself, my home, my surroundings, neighbourhood and environment clean and tidy.

4. I realize righteousness in the heart leads to beauty in the character, beauty in the character brings harmony in the home, harmony in the home leads to order in the nation and order in the nation leads to peace in the world.

5. I will lead an honest life free from all corruption and will set an example for others including my home to adopt a righteous way of life.

6. I will light the lamp of knowledge in the nation and ensure that it remains lit for ever.

7. I realize, whatever work I do if I do the best, I am contributing towards realizing the vision of developed India 2020.

Once again let me congratulate all the students passing out of Women?s Christian College today. My best wishes to all the members of WCC for success in their mission of empowering the women through quality education with value systems.

May God bless you.