LOVE AND COMPASSION IN THE AGE OF TERROR AND VIOLENCE

 LOVE AND COMPASSION IN THE AGE OF TERROR AND VIOLENCE

To our dearest loving parents and the world,

Simeone and I are celebrating the New Year at a café on the banks of this beautiful lake and are penning our finals thoughts. We are well aware that despite a modern outlook and your liberal values, both our families will never approve of our relationship.  

Today, despite the gizmos in a wired world, the global village is on the cusp of ultra–nationalism, where an ‘exit mode’ from our cherished values is on the menu card. Simeone remarked wryly that nationalism and ultra-nationalism need to be served on the platter and perhaps could have been priced at a universal currency which unfortunately is not possible. Goods and services would have then been so very inexpensive.

Meanwhile, the two of us and forty other revelers are caught in a crossfire between a group of ultras and commandos. The terrorists are spraying bullets all over the place and slicing the throats of those who do not believe in their faith. One by one all the party goers have been felled. The commandos with the wherewithal at their disposal have achieved success and have overpowered all the militants. I gasp for breath and now write with blood stained hands as my life too is ebbing……. Simeone lies besides me sporting a beatific smile on his face. He has met his maker. I will meet mine in a few moments……

Deepest Regards,

Waheeda and Simeone

In this age of emails, Waheeda from India wrote this poignant letter after a long time, addressing it to her parents as well as Simeone’s. She had been pursuing Masters in English from Oxford University (which had recently voted for Brexit) and Simeone from Argentina (where some have clamoured for Mexit once Argentina lost to Chile in Copa- America after Lionel Messi failed to score a penalty) was majoring in Business Administration from Cambridge. They met during an exchange programme, fell in love and were planning to get married in the fall much to the chagrin of their parents. The levels of intolerance are sweeping from stadia to the political world.

Photocopies of the letter along with the coffins were handed over to the distraught parents by an empathetic and compassionate civil servant.

‘Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high…….. ,

Into that heaven of freedom, my father let my country awake…..,’ wrote Gurudev Rabindranath Tagore several decades ago. The clarion call was not just seeking emancipation from the foreign yoke but freedom from rigid thoughts, which constrain the passage of visionary thought process in the apertures of our minds.

Love and compassion are two words which seem to have lost their relevance in this frenetic paced world which is now determined by indoctrination of a set of ideas and ideologies, xenophobia, religious and spiritual exclusiveness, ossified thinking patterns, a clash of civilizations, ego-centric attitudes, abhorrent dogmas, the I, Me and My syndrome, the rapacious desires of man to garner more and more and to exploit everything available on planet earth have all compounded the problem. Economic problem of shortages, concentration of wealth in the hands of a few have taken a religious colour adding to the woes of people like Waheeda, Simeone and millions of others.

‘MY’ religion, ‘MY’ country, ‘MY’ ideology, ‘MY’ traditions, ‘MY’ customs are at an exalted position as against those of ‘YOURS’ is playing havoc in our decision making process.

The pristine beauty of simplicity and goodness has been sacrificed at the altar of crass commercialization and distortion of history.

Compassion is a feeling of deep sympathy for another’s suffering or misfortune. And love signifies a feeling of being profound tender and personal attachment towards even a stranger. Sadly, compassion has been replaced by competitive cacophony and love by loutishness.

Let us contrast a flowing river with a stagnant lake or a pond. The former flows rhythmically in harmony, while the latter only emits a stench. Our thoughts need to flow in harmony like a river and not get caught in a marshy swamp.

The goal posts have altered today where freedom of thoughts have hibernated in dreary deserts of stultified thinking. ‘Aa No Bhadra Kratvo Yantu Vishwataha - let noble thoughts come from all directions, is what the Rig Veda says. But when artificial boundaries get erected how will noble thoughts circulate and permeate into our societies?

It is indeed enigmatic and unfortunate that in the present age of technology, concepts and metaphors such as rationalism, multiple culturalism, exclusiveness, democratic traditions and tolerance have been hijacked by agent-provocateurs and groups of ultra-nationalists whose agenda is merely to disrupt harmony and perpetrate wanton killings in the name of rabid ideology.

These groups are not a happy, joyous and radiant people, but a group who live miserable lives, trying to fatten their coffers, by red flagging existing mores of the society and masquerading their true selves. They are children of a bloody revolution whose only ideology is spewing venom and destroying the harmonious values embedded hitherto in society. The Divine valentine has been replaced by fiendish doctrines which is resulting in bloodletting and mindless violence.

The boisterousness and rambunctiousness in the minds of perpetrators of these grisly ideologues and those of their blindfolded followers can be countered by spreading the message of peace, compassion and love as was done by the Buddha, Shankara, Jesus, the Prophet Mohammed and Lord Krishna among others. All these epochal personalities enunciated the principles of love, truth, compassion and universal brotherhood as against demonic forces of bigotry and violence.

Like the situation today Gautam Buddha too lived in interesting times and was confronted with the violence in the republics. Upon attaining enlightenment, he proscribed four simple steps to be followed:

Observe the body (Kayaanu Paschana), observe the sensations (Vedananu Paschana), observe the flow of mind (Chittanu Paschana) and observe your true nature (Dhammanu Pashana). His eight-fold path, observation of noble silence and noble truths had a salutary effect on similar wrongdoers who then eschewed violence and joined the Sangha.

Only deep meditation by the Sangha can engineer what is called the ‘Maharishi Effect’. That is, when tens, hundreds and thousands meditate in a group then there is harmony and synergy. The energy generated has an efficacious effect on the minds of such people and transforms the brain waves, enabling the flow of peace to blossom.

Sri Sri Ravi Shankar in modern times has been stressing incessantly on forming Sanghas and practicing group meditations to modify the thinking of these people with Sisyphean thoughts.

This can be the trigger to once again to build ‘Vasudeva Kutumbakam’ or else coffins and blood-stained letters of several Waheedas and Simeones will land at our doorsteps.