The Hindu Business Line : Gandhian groups

ONE should not be surprised if in India there are as many organisations as there are statues bearing Mahatma Gandhi's name. They strive to keep his message and methods alive, clinging to an undimmed faith in his relevance. All honour to them that they are engaged in their efforts swimming, despite many handicaps, against the fast-flowing current of scepticism and cynicism. Barring one or two functioning at the national level, they are cash-strapped, and suffer from want of facilities such as proper accommodation, equipment, furniture and staff to maintain an office and carry on their activities to any noticeable extent.

The most serious problem faced by the less fortunate ones is finding persons of emotional and social commitment who have the time and energy and are steeped in Gandhian values to provide the kind of leadership that would steer such organisations in the right direction with dynamism and drive. Mostly the outfits are run by well-meaning persons past their prime, ploughing their lonely furrows as best they can.

If propagation of Gandhian precepts frequently looks like a forlorn cause, the blame lies at the door of the so-called Gandhians themselves. They fail to realise that they cannot carry conviction about their mission unless they attune their programmes so as to help people meet the challenges of the 21st century.

For instance, it is clear that Gandhi cannot be reinvented, as some organisations with access to resources seek to do, by means of un-Gandhian-like ostentatious celebrations of his birthday and death anniversary, and holding expensive extravaganzas in his name with the participation of the glitterati of the land. Nor is it possible to gain adherents for him by sticking to the same old stale brew of talks, seminars and workshops on hackneyed themes harking back to his life and times, and harping on importance of abstractions like truth, non-violence, satyagraha and patriotism. The only way to capture the imagination of both economic players and the intelligentsia is to work out concrete strategies for applying Gandhian concepts to current issues pertaining to, say, globalisation, governance, customer relations management, conflict resolution, conduct of negotiations, or trade union movement.

B. S. Raghavan

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