Sketches of Raj

Gandhi's principle of satyagraha (from Sanskrit, satya: truth, and graha: grasp/hold).Whenever I read his books, Autobiography and other related material, I used to scribble his great quotations in my personal book and with great difficulty I have to shortlist them to ten, which are like my 10 commandments.

Quotes of Gandhi:
1) The only virtue I want to claim is truth and non-violence. I lay no claim to superhuman powers. I want none. I wear the same corruptible flesh that the weakest of my fellow beings wears, and am therefore as liable to err as any. My services have many limitations, but God has up to now blessed them in spite of the imperfections

2) I am but a poor struggling soul yearning to be wholly good, wholly truthful and wholly non-violent in thought, word and deed, but ever failing to reach the ideal which I know to be true. It is a painful climb, but the pain of it is a positive pleasure to me. Each step upwards makes me feel stronger and fit for the next.

3) However much I may sympathise with and admire worthy motives, I am an uncompromising opponent of violent methods even to serve the noblest of causes

4) I claim to be a simple individual liable to err like any other fellow mortal. I own, however, that I have humility enough to confess my errors and to retrace my steps

5) An ounce of practice is worth more then tons of preaching. Intellect takes us along in the battle of life to a certain limit, but at the crucial moment it fails us. Faith transcends reason. It is when the horizon is the darkest and human reason is beaten down to the ground that faith shines brightest and comes to our rescue

6) A principle is the expression of perfection, and as imperfect beings like us cannot practice perfection, we devise every moment limits of its compromise in practice

7) A True soldier does not argue as he marches, how success is going to be ultimately achieved. But he is confident that if he only plays his humble part well, somehow or other the battle will be won. It is in that spirit that every one of us should act. It is not given to us to know the future. But it is given to everyone of us to know how to do our own part well.

8) There will have to be rigid and iron discipline before we achieve anything great and enduring, and that discipline will not come by mere academic argument and appeal to reason and logic. Discipline is learnt in the school of adversity

9) There is no human institution but has its dangers. The greater the institution, the greater the chances of abuse. Democracy is a great institution and therefore it is liable to be greatly abused. The remedy therefore is not avoidance of democracy but reduction of the possibility of abuse to a minimum.

10) It is good to see ourselves as others see us. Try as we may. We are never able to know ourselves fully as we are, especially the evil side of us. This we can do only if we are not angry with our critics but will take in good heart whatever they might have to say

Gandhiji had a great vision and foresaw the threats to Democracy, human weaknesses and gave suggestive measures to safeguard our democratic values in simple quotes.What is agonizing in today’s world is that we are in the path of slowly forgetting the great vision of Gadhiji and we are habituating to remember him only on October 2nd. It’s a great mistake and unfortunate happening.

Our President Dr Abdul Kalam Said, “India has knowledge, natural resources; what we need is planned integrated missions to achieve the target in a time bound manner. Let us all work for self-sufficient environment friendly energy independence for the nation”.