Secret of Action

Inevitability of Action:

Now-a-days under the modern system of education, when a young man comes out of the university, there seems to be a misconception in him that the higher the standard of living rises, the less should a man work in the world outside. Thus mathematically, higher the standard of living, according to this misconceived notion, the less the work, and ultimately what would be the highest standard of living? No work at all! So, no work, maximum recreation, all sensual enjoyment, living 365 days in holidays - this is the highest standard of living. This seems to be the conception of our youngsters today when they enter into the field of action.

There seems to be an unhealthy competition today among the workers. I have been mixing with the workers all over the country and I have noted that among themselves there is almost a competition like this: "How much did you work today?" "Three letters"! "Three letters you did! I did only one letter". Thus the former decides that if the latter had done one letter, "Dekho, Tomorrow I will do not even one". Thus there is a competition in the wrong direction today, because of this false notion "I give my proprietor the minimum, and eke out of him the maximum"

This is nothing but a reaction.

When the foreigner was in the country, under the medieval economic setup of this country, the kings, the landlords and the art proprietors - a few in number - learnt the art of squeezing the maximum out of ordinary people and arrogated all to themselves. Now, therefore, we find this reaction in the society that the average man or middle class man wants to get everything from the rich or the Government without returning anything to the Government or to the proprietor. This is a natural social incident which happens inevitably in the context of our history, emerging out from slavery to freedom.

But in this context, at this moment, when our nation's progress is at stake, if the young men that have come now - who are no more the children of the slaves but who are the proprietors of a new chance given to them by history - want to make their life and their country progressive, there must be a new philosophy of action in their hearts. Thus after years of freedom, slowly the Government and the industrialists have started realizing, this, and great men, specialists from Africa have come to the country, and they give to the people in the country - the workers as well as the clerical staff - the ideas of the sanctity of work, etc., as if it is not in our culture or in our scriptures. It is already there but the Pundit-class were not bringing it out in the context of an independent country, panting to build up its own destiny.