Naye Samaj Ki Khoj #9

There are two or three points worth understanding here.

1) First, even if man becomes worse than an animal, he is still a man. And the capacity to become worse than an animal is a human capacity; it is not an animal’s. Precisely because man can fall below animals, he can also rise above the gods. Both capacities belong to him. The animal has neither. The same ladder that can take you up can bring you down; a ladder can be climbed from either side. One person may climb up; another may climb down. But both potentials inhere in the same ladder. If we imagine a ladder that can only be climbed upward, man’s freedom would be lost. That he can also descend—this too is his freedom.

An animal is dependent—if it is good, it is in dependence; if bad, also in dependence. In an animal’s life there is neither good nor bad. Good and bad exist where there is choice, the power to choose. If a man is worse than animals, that is precisely why he can be superior to the gods—because only he could become worse than animals.

I would not want any human being to become an animal, because becoming an animal means you will no longer be able to be worse than the animal nor superior to the gods.

Then, a machine is better than an animal. An animal cannot do evil or do good in the moral sense; yet an animal can do something that brings itself suffering or something that brings itself joy. A machine cannot even do that. If we want to be rid of every difficulty, then it is better to become machines. Socialism will not only make you animals; socialism is fundamentally an attempt to turn man into a machine.

I cannot agree to that. I hold that man’s capacity to become animal is his great spiritual power. He can also do the opposite; he is free for both. And he should always remain free for both. The day man can only be good and can no longer be bad, that very day even the joy of being good will disappear.

A small child appears simple, innocent. But I cannot praise a small child’s innocence and simplicity, because the child has yet to become young and acquire the capacity to be bad. When an old man becomes simple and innocent, then I certainly praise him—because he left the opportunities for evil and became good. The child has not yet had the opportunity for evil; therefore the child’s innocence has no price.

If an old person becomes like a child, we say he has become the very image of God. But we cannot say that of a child—because the child has not yet had the chance for freedom, for choice. The occasions to be bad have not come, where his life could be tested—would he be bad or good? The test decides; the test is the touchstone. Only in a human being’s life is there a touchstone; in the life of every other creature there is none. Therefore the path toward God passes through man’s crossroads, and the path toward the animal also passes through man’s crossroads. Man is a crossroads from which the roads go both ways—forward and backward.

I will never agree that we should remove man from this crossroads and push him back. Perhaps in the animal’s life there would be less unrest—yes, it would be less; but peace too would be less. Perhaps in the animal’s life there would be less sorrow; but there would be less joy as well. In the very measure that suffering decreases, joy decreases.

To the friend who has said this, there is something worth considering. The important point in his statement is that it seems to him that man today has become worse than an animal. There is some truth in this. But understand it correctly: to say “today” he has become worse creates the illusion that earlier he must have been fine. That is a wrong idea. Man has always been like this. What we call evils have always been in man; and what we call virtues have also always been in man. And the choice between good and evil each person has to make for himself in his own life. Therefore we need a social order that gives the opportunity for freedom.

If someone forcibly makes us good, that will be worse than being bad. In a prison no one can steal, no one can murder; there is no freedom to do anything bad. Even so, we would not choose to live in a prison. Outside, there is freedom to do evil—along with it, there is freedom to do good. If no one can steal in a prison, neither can anyone there discover a way to take life higher. A prison is dependence.

Socialism can try to turn a whole country into one big prison. It has built prisons. And by making prisons, many conveniences do arise. But those conveniences are a very expensive bargain; we lose a great deal in them and gain nothing.

Therefore I would say: let man acknowledge his capacity to be animal, preserve freedom, and yet strive in the direction of not becoming an animal.

And why does man become animal? This too is worth thinking about. As life is, being a man seems very difficult and hard. Life does not seem to offer opportunities wherein it is easy to be human; being animal seems easier, more convenient. It seems that as animals we would live more successfully; hence man inclines in that direction.

If someone is lying, or dishonest, or ready to commit violence, it is not that anyone is born eager to be violent, nor is anyone born eager to be angry. No one, not even the worst person, truly wants to be bad; even in the worst person the seed of the longing to be good is always present. But if life all around is such that it compels one to be bad, very few are courageous enough to face that challenge and still remain good. Most people become bad.

Therefore we need a society that gives full freedom and does not compel one to be bad—that much is enough. There is no need to force anyone to be good; society should simply not force people to be bad—that is enough. A society that does not compel one to be dishonest.

But if today our society, from every side, compels us to be dishonest, very few will be able to resist; most people will become dishonest. If they must live, they will have to become dishonest. Then however much we condemn their dishonesty, nothing is solved. And those who condemn will also be almost equally dishonest. The only difference will be that some will be successful dishonest people whose dishonesty is not detected, and some will be unsuccessful dishonest people whose dishonesty has been caught.

Those whom we call leaders, who preach to people, “Do not be dishonest”—even the journey to becoming a leader is very difficult without dishonesty. But once a man reaches the platform, he begins to preach that dishonesty is a very bad thing. People also know this is the same man—he climbed the steps of dishonesty! But whoever succeeds, all his evils are suppressed and disappear; and whoever fails, all his evils become visible and exposed.

It seems that what we call society recognizes only one evil—failure—and only one virtue—success. Whoever succeeds becomes right in every way; whoever fails becomes wrong in every way.

We must change these values of social life. We must be concerned to create such a society—and how such a society can be created, I have said much about over the last two days. One thing I have said is that poverty is the root of all sin. And as long as poverty remains, you may talk about religion, but you cannot bring religion into life. Poverty generates so many sins that if we simply set about removing poverty, ninety percent of sins will collapse.

But we do not set about removing poverty; we set about removing sins. This is a fundamental mistake. We will not be able to eliminate sins until we eliminate poverty, because sins are only the flowers; the root is poverty.

We are the sort of people who, if someone in the house gets a fever and the body becomes hot, we get busy removing the heat of the body.

Heat is not the illness; the illness is somewhere inside the body because of which the body has become hot. The heat is only a symptom, a sign, a message that within there is some disease. You can keep pouring cold, icy water on the patient; the patient will die, the disease will also go—but it will take the patient along. Reducing the heat is not a cure; the heat is only the message that within there is disease. Remove that disease, and the fever will subside on its own.

In society today, all the lawlessness, the licentiousness, the corruption, the dishonesty, the animality we see—deep within it the illness is poverty. That illness is like a wound inside; the pus is oozing outside. We keep wiping the pus and applying ointments and bandages; it makes no difference. All our ointments and bandages split open, and the pus oozes out again from within. Until we remove from within that very cancer called poverty, we should not hope that we will be able to teach society religion and ethics, auspiciousness and virtue. We will not be able to teach them.

Our moralists are failing for precisely this reason: they keep telling people to fight sin, but they have no plan to uproot the root of sin. The root of sin will have to be removed; then sins will wither away on their own.

I am not saying that all sins will disappear. But the sins that arise from poverty will disappear. And the sins that arise from poverty impoverish the mind to such a degree that it defies all measure.

This too needs to be understood a little. First, if a poor man were truly dishonest, he might also have become rich. But if he has not become rich, it does not automatically mean he is honest. It may simply be that his dishonesty did not succeed. It may be that he did indulge in dishonesty, but his neighbor outdid him. It may also be that he wants to be dishonest but cannot muster the courage. Many “good” people only look good because they are weak.

If we could look into people’s hearts, we would be startled. Those we call good are often simply people who cannot gather the courage to do wrong. Even to do wrong requires courage, daring, guts; at the very least, it takes the courage to risk getting caught, to stake oneself.

Often in this country the person we call good is a weak person. And in a country where the weak are counted as good and the strong are counted as bad, nothing but misfortune can follow. Today the man with courage turns bad, and the weak man is called good. No society can be transformed by impotent “good” men; unless we turn the strong toward goodness, it will not happen.

But why should the strong turn toward goodness? If in the direction of goodness there is nothing but failure to be had, then even a good man begins to move toward success instead. The whole social setup is such that success is the only attraction. You too worship the one who wins.

There is an old saying that truth always triumphs. But to me there is a delusion in that saying; it seems to me that whoever triumphs, we start calling that “truth.” We honor success—no matter how it comes.

If we want to change this, we will have to change what we honor. Wherever we place our reverence, society begins to run in that direction. For example, in India we gave great honor to the renunciate, so India produced millions of renunciates. In other countries the renunciate did not receive such honor, so they did not produce so many. In France, millions of painters arise because the painter is highly honored. Nowhere else do so many painters arise, because nowhere else are painters honored so much.

So long as we keep honoring the dishonest in India, it will be very difficult for a current of honesty to spring forth. But today, whom do you honor most? Today the politician sits at the center of all reverence. Until the politician in India is brought down to earth, there can be no possibility of honesty. If there is a newspaper, it is about politicians; the news is about politicians; the conversation is about politicians; turn on the radio—politicians again; everywhere the politician looms. If even a temple is to be inaugurated, some minister will do it; if a yajna is to be inaugurated, the president will do it. If we arrange life so that the politician pervades it everywhere, then be sure of this: the paths of honesty in this country will be hard to find. For politics is the most cunning trade of all.

And now the politician says he wants control over wealth too. This is one reason I oppose socialism. The politician already holds the power of the state, and that is causing enough harm. If we also place economic power in his hands, then there will be no way to be free of him. With both powers in the hands of the state, the state becomes unchallengeable, beyond question. Then there will be no possibility, no means, of fighting the state, rebelling against it, or opposing the politician.

Today, at least, one can still fight the politician. That is why I support democracy and capitalism—because they leave us at least one way to contend with the politician. But if the nation’s wealth and the country’s entire property also pass into the hands of the state, there will be no means left to fight the state. And the day we snatch from individuals the right to their property, that day we will have taken away the very power of their lives, the essence of their personhood; that day the politician will become a god. The politician is trying to become a god.

If we wish to make the state a god and the politician a god, then we should stop opposing dishonesty and the like. Because in politics, dishonesty, theft, deceit, scheming—these are the very steps of the ladder. And those who climb these steps become the ones we honor.

If this country ever wants to take a step toward honesty, it must become very alert toward the politician. There is no need, no reason, to give the politician so much honor. If your Punjab has a minister, a food minister, his honor should be no more than what a good cook receives in a household. He is the cook for the whole province; there is no need to value him beyond that. He looks after the province’s food—he is the head cook. If he does it well, we should thank him; if he doesn’t, we should throw him out. There is no reason for any greater honor.

There is no sense in giving the politician such homage. Yet in the last twenty–twenty-five years in this country, we have made the politician into a god. Now the politician desires to seize wealth as well. Wealth is his one worry. If anything can jolt the politician, it is the independent power of a country’s wealth. Now he wants his hand on that too.

My understanding is that as long as wealth is distributed among many people, many can support many kinds of parties and keep them alive. But the day all the factories, all the lands, all the industries pass into the hands of the state, on that day no other party will remain in a position to oppose the party of the state. We must be alert to this.

I see the same difference as between the first stage of tuberculosis and the third—no other difference. Socialism is a somewhat pale, diluted communism; it is the first stage of the disease. And in the first stage the disease is not clearly visible, so it is easier to be taken in by it. That is why, all over the world, communism has started using the word “socialism.” The word “communism” has become notorious. And because of what communism has done to the world in the last fifty years, its respect has withered. In these fifty years, communism’s prestige has been dragged into the dust. So now communism has begun to use the word “socialism.” Now it talks of socialism and may even try to say it is different from communism. But there is no fundamental difference between socialism and communism—only a difference of words. Yet by changing the word we start imagining a great change. Change only the word and it looks as if something has changed. Nothing has changed.

Whether it is socialism or communism, one thing is certain: to erase the standing of the individual, to wipe out individuality, to end personal freedom, to snatch away private ownership of property, and to concentrate the entire life-structure of the country in the hands of the state.

But in a country like ours, where the state has proved utterly incompetent, if we hand over the entire arrangement of the country to the state, there will be no outcome except that the nation falls into deeper poverty and deeper sickness.

Today a friend told me a little story; I liked it very much. He said that a man, passing by a field, saw a very spirited, sturdy bull at work. It was drawing water and running with great pride. Its grandeur was a sight to behold, and so were its strength and its work. The passerby was full of admiration. He praised the farmer greatly and said, “The bull is extraordinary.”

Six months later the man passed that way again, but now the bull was walking very slowly. He asked the man driving it, “What happened? Is the bull ill? Six months ago I saw it so agile and strong!” The man replied, “News of its agility and strength reached the government, and the government bought the bull. Since the government bought it, it has slowed down—who knows, it has become ‘government’ now.”

After another six months the man passed again and saw the bull resting. It would not walk, would not get up, would not even stand. He asked, “Has the bull fallen completely ill—what’s the matter?” The man standing there said, “It has not fallen ill—its job has been confirmed; it’s now permanently government. Now it has no need to work at all.”

If a bull behaves like that, you can understand—but people too become like that the moment they enter government. There are reasons: where the chance of personal gain through effort ends, and where personal benefit becomes guaranteed anyway, the incentive to work disappears. All government offices, all government business, are engaged in the trade of swatting flies. The whole government of the country, from bottom to top, sits at ease. And we would hand over all the nation’s industries to them as well! Whatever they handle yields nothing but loss.

My own suggestion is that even what is already in their hands should be taken back. If India’s railways were in the hands of private Indian companies, they would offer more facilities, charge lower fares, run more trains, be more comfortable—and there would be no loss, there would be profit. Wherever the government has taken buses into its hands, losses have begun. A man with just two buses becomes a lakhpati, and the government, with lakhs of buses, does nothing but incur losses. It is a very astonishing affair!

I was in Madhya Pradesh recently. The head of the Madhya Pradesh Transport—now all the buses have become government-owned—told me that last year they incurred a loss of twenty-three lakhs of rupees. From those very buses others used to earn lakhs in profit, and from those very buses the government suffers lakhs in losses. And it will be so, because the government has no motive, no competition.

A second suggestion I would make is this: if the government is so eager to take business into its hands, let it enter the field directly and compete in the marketplace. Where a man runs a shop, let the government open its shop right opposite and then compete in the market. Where a person runs a factory, let the government open another factory, treat both equally, and then show by running its factory what it can do. Then we will know what the government can do.

The government can do nothing. In fact, the very moment something becomes government-owned, the motivation to work takes leave, and wherever the government enters, losses begin.

Both socialism and communism are ways of placing the organization of life into the hands of the state. What we today call capitalism is people’s capitalism—it is popular capitalism. And what is called socialism and communism is state capitalism. There is no other difference. The real choice is whether we want capitalism in the hands of individuals or in the hands of the state. In the hands of individuals, capitalism is dispersed, decentralized. In the hands of the state, capitalism will be gathered, concentrated in one place.

And remember: if capitalism is a disease, then it is better kept dispersed. A concentrated disease becomes more dangerous—nothing else is possible.

Some notions, if they are proclaimed long enough, we simply pick them up and forget to ask whether they are true or false. Capitalism does not exploit the worker. In fact, under capitalism the price of everything is set by its demand and supply.

If in a village there are ten laborers but fifteen are needed, those laborers will get higher wages—ten are available while fifteen are required. But if there are fifty laborers and only ten are needed, wages will be low, because there is an excess supply of labor in the market; the buyer will buy cheaply. Capitalism fixes the price of each thing according to its scarcity, its rarity. And there is no other sane way to set prices.

God does not send price tags with things—how much wheat should cost, or what the Kohinoor diamond should be worth. There is only one Kohinoor diamond, so its price can be in the millions. If tomorrow a hundred thousand Kohinoors were found, the price would instantly collapse to the thousands; and if one day mines were found with millions of Kohinoors, they would be worth next to nothing—anyone could buy one for pennies.

Prices are not determined in the sky; they are determined by scarcity here on earth. No capitalist is exploiting any worker. But where labor is abundant and the need is less, wages will be low. There is no other reason. If the number of buyers of cloth falls while cloth becomes abundant, would you say the buyers are exploiting the shopkeepers because they pay less? No—there is no question of exploitation. There is only one rule for price: how much is needed and how much is supplied—how many want it, how much exists. Labor is overabundant; there is more labor available than is needed. What would one do even if one bought up all that excess labor? And when someone goes to buy labor, if a worker is available for five rupees, he will not agree to pay ten. He isn’t crazy, and he doesn’t need to.

If you can buy something in the market for five, why would you insist on paying ten? If you can get it for four you’ll pay four; if for three you’ll pay three. What we perceive as exploitation is not exploitation; it is the outcome of labor’s oversupply. The country has an immense capacity for labor—some five hundred and twenty million people—but there is too little work; hence the price of work is low.

If you want wages to rise, abolishing the capitalist will not do it. Wages will rise when work increases; wages will rise when the demand for work grows; wages will rise when more people’s labor is actually used. But in this country there are too many people and far too little work. And we have never created work—we have been against it. We say: fewer needs, fewer necessities, simple living and high thinking. Keep your “simple living and high thinking,” but work will not increase. If work does not increase, people will starve; there will be no buyers for their labor.

The capitalist is not exploiting, though it appears that way to us.

I was leaving somewhere, on my way to Delhi. Near a very large mansion there were two or three tiny huts. A gentleman in my compartment said, “Look at this—the rich man has exploited so much that such misery is created! By exploiting those in the huts he has built this big house.”

I said to him, “Think again—you may be speaking without thinking. If we remove the big house, do you imagine these small huts will become big houses? If the big house had not been built on that land, these little huts would not be there at all. When a big house is built, ten small houses get built around it automatically. No big house is made by shrinking ten small houses. Because a big house is built, ten small houses also appear on the earth; otherwise they would not!”

We don’t notice this: if one person becomes a multimillionaire, ten people around him become millionaires; around those ten, thousands become thousandaires; and around those thousands, some people come to have hundreds of rupees. When one man climbs to the peak of crores, he cannot climb alone—the whole structure is like a pyramid. If we wish to build a very tall building, we must also fill in the foundation with stones. A rich man becomes the cause of livelihood for hundreds of middle-class people around him. Those hundreds of middle-class people become the cause of livelihood for thousands of poor laborers around them. But in the end it looks as if exploitation has occurred.

No one has been exploited. Go to the tribal regions—there is no Birla there. In Bastar you will not find a Birla, a Tata, or a Ford. Then the tribals ought to be very rich, for no one has exploited them. But there are no rich among the tribals. The poor mountain peoples of the world—no one ever exploited them. Why did they not become rich? They should have been the richest, for no one exploited them.

The amusing fact is that in Bombay, where supposed exploitation is greatest, the worker is better off than a primitive hill-dweller. And yet we say the worker is exploited while the tribesman is not. Think a little about what “exploitation” means. Is giving a person work exploitation? Then we should snatch away all work, shut down all factories, break all industries. Then no one will be exploited. Then live happily in your poverty. If the rich are exploiting you, why do you allow it? Don’t allow it. Keep your wealth at home and become rich yourself. Who is telling you to go get exploited?

But you will die if you don’t go to market to sell your labor. You will have to sell labor; there is no other way. And I too want wages to be higher. But they will not rise by eliminating the capitalist. Wages will rise by discovering new work, creating new work, setting up new factories, introducing new methods of farming, new industries. By industrializing the whole country, work will increase. When work increases, workers will earn more.

If work expands greatly and labor becomes scarce—if there is more work than workers—then workers will earn much more. If work grows so much that workers won’t agree to work unless made partners, you will have to make them partners; there will be no alternative. But that will come from the growth of work.

There is no exploitation. But somehow, over the last hundred years of propaganda, this idea has been planted in our heads that the rich exploit the poor.

The rich man is creating capital; he is not exploiting the poor. Exploitation could exist if you had capital beforehand. The capital that Ford or Rockefeller have today did not exist with anyone—it was created. Capitalism creates capital; it does not exploit. It does not pick anyone’s pocket; in fact, when it employs you it puts a little money into your pocket. Before you worked, your pocket was empty; now it has two rupees in it, and with that you gain confidence and begin to think, “Why not ten?”

That thought is fine—try for the ten—but don’t think someone has stolen your missing eight. Because when no one had stolen anything, there were not even two rupees in your pocket.

Marx’s entire perspective on exploitation, handed to the world by Marx and the communists, is fundamentally wrong. If these few people whom we call capitalists shut down all their enterprises—if their enterprises were destroyed—we would not all become rich. Yes, we would gain one relief: we would all become equally poor. No rich man would be in view, and the heart would find a certain peace. Our poverty would not go away. But the human mind is strange: we suffer less from our own suffering than from another’s happiness. The human mind is built very strangely!

I have heard a story. A man prayed intensely to God. In time, so the story goes, God told him to ask for a boon. The man said, “I will ask for only one boon—because once I ask I may not get a second chance. Give me this: whenever I ask for something, may I receive it.” God said, “So be it. Whenever you ask, you will receive. But I grant you one more boon from my side: whatever you receive, your neighbors will receive double.”

A weight fell on the man’s chest—the boon seemed worthless. He was in a great fix. He went home and asked for a hundred thousand rupees, but he did so with tears. A hundred thousand fell into his house at once—but two hundred thousand fell into each neighbor’s house. When he had nothing, he was poor; now he was poorer than before because his neighbors had become twice as rich. He had a hundred thousand, but he became utterly poor. He had never been so miserable—not even when he had nothing. Now his misery had no limit. With the boon he built a mansion; the neighbors’ mansions became twice as big. He beat his chest and wept. His wife said, “We have such a nice house now!” He said, “Foolish woman, you see only our house? Look—the neighbors’ are double! God has tricked me.”

At night he hatched a plan after much brooding—perhaps he invented it, or perhaps he consulted a politician. He decided to ask for boons that would put the neighbors in trouble. He prayed, “God, please blind one of my eyes.” One eye went blind—and he danced all night. The neighbors lost both eyes. He said, “God, build a well in front of my house so deep that if I fall in, I die.” A well appeared before his house; in front of the neighbors’ houses, two wells appeared—twice as deep. And when the blind neighbors began to fall into their wells, his joy knew no bounds.

The human mind is very strange. This talk about socialism is less a longing for equality and more a craving of jealousy. What is being fanned in the name of socialism is not a zeal for everyone to be equal; nor is it a zeal for everyone to become rich; nor is it a zeal to labor and create wealth. No—the human mind can be incited. It is easy to inflame people to seize from those who have more. Today land is being seized; tomorrow houses will be seized; the day after, clothes will be seized. People can always be persuaded to erase the other.

Socialism is a destructive philosophy. It has no creative perspective. It is merely a device to rouse people against others. That is always easy. If you tell a person, “Work hard and you will become rich,” he will not agree. Tell him, “Do a little effort and your neighbor will become poor,” and he will agree. The human mind is sick, and this sick mind delights in the idea that the rich should be split up.

In India we think the rich should be divided. Go ahead—do it. It will make no difference. A few rich will disappear, and the poor will not be affected. Yes—only this: a few more poor will be added to the number already poor.

There was a great millionaire in America, Rothschild. A socialist went to see him and said, “You have exploited the whole world. You have grabbed all our wealth.” Rothschild said, “I’ve never even seen you—how could I have seized your wealth? Still, let me ask: how much wealth did you have that I grabbed? How much was yours? Take it back from me—though I’ve never even seen your face, let alone come to snatch it. Still, how much was yours?” The man said, “Well, I didn’t actually have anything, but you surely grabbed everyone’s.”

Rothschild said, “Forget that. You had nothing. But divide my wealth equally among all the people in the world and take whatever falls to your share.” The man’s portion came to six annas. Rothschild gave him the six annas and said, “Let whoever wants his share come and take it. But may I ask—how long will six annas last? What impact will six annas make? Will six annas turn you into a Rothschild? Will six annas make you a billionaire?”

If we gather all Indian capitalists and distribute their wealth, perhaps even six annas would not fall to each person. What will you do with such a sum? Buy a cigarette, or watch a movie for a day? Is that the plan? Go see a movie for a day, and the country becomes socialist? Then we will all be equal.

And those millions that were concentrated with one person were funding production; with your six annas, nothing will be produced. And note: if you were someone who could produce, you would already have done so—you would not be seeking alms of six annas from redistribution.

But we are strange. Our minds feel it would be good if at least the neighbor’s mansion fell—even if our hut does not rise. One advantage: if the mansion falls, a hut no longer looks like a hut; a hut looks like a hut only in contrast to a mansion.

Recently in Bombay I was passing by. Slums—filthy huts built in water and mud—enough to make your heart tremble. The people in the car with me said, “See how much filth! So many huts!” Instantly we think that those who built big houses caused these slums. That is not true. The day there were no mansions, there were still huts. Bombay was a small fishing village. The very name “Bombay” comes from a small fisherfolk goddess, Mumba Devi. A little fishing hamlet where people caught fish and lived in huts. When there were no mansions, it wasn’t that fishermen lived in palaces—they lived in the same filth. But that filth wasn’t visible, because for filth to be visible, some cleanliness must be visible nearby. Otherwise filth is not seen.

These mansions did not create the slums of Bombay. The mansions have eliminated slums from most of Bombay; a few pockets remain. Those too can be eliminated. But by demolishing the mansions, the slums will not vanish; demolishing the mansions will increase the slums.

My understanding is that capitalism did not make anyone poor; we were all poor. Capitalism, for the first time, made us conscious of our poverty. That is a good sign. If we become aware of poverty, we can remove it. But there are two paths: either we eliminate the rich—then we will all be equally poor and the problem is over—or we set about eliminating poverty.

I say: eliminating the rich is no path. Eliminating the poor is the path; we should labor to end poverty. Then a day can come when the country has neither poor nor rich, but a prosperous, well-to-do middle class.

Marx declared that there are three classes in the world: the rich, the middle class, and the proletariat; and that as capitalist exploitation grows, the rich will become richer, the poor poorer, and the middle class will split—some moving up to join the rich, the rest falling down to the poor. Society will divide into two classes. On that day the poor will seize the rich and establish socialism or communism.

This has proven false. In America, where capitalism has fully developed, a new phenomenon has occurred: the very top multimillionaires are becoming fewer, the bottom poor are becoming fewer, and the middle class is growing. It appears that in fifty years the middle class may become the only class in America—yes, with higher and lower ranges within it. The middle is expanding and both extremes are shrinking. Thus communism and socialism have no appeal in America; it is hard to incite anyone. Even the poor have something; the poor in America are not “poor” in our sense. When you tell them everything will be seized, they don’t enjoy the idea—because they have their own property too; that would be seized as well.

If India is to be saved from Naxalites, communists, socialists—these diseases—then we must immediately give the poor some property, a measure of prosperity. As long as the poor have nothing, they are a very dangerous force. One who has nothing has nothing to lose; he enjoys seizing from others.

Marx wrote a very fine closing line in the Communist Manifesto: “Workers of the world, unite! You have nothing to lose but your chains.”

Indeed, he who has nothing to lose has no fear. He cannot be harmed by fighting; the harm will come to those who have something. In India the state of the poor is dangerous. The poor can be inflamed, because they have nothing. Their having nothing is the strength of communism. Communism will line up India’s poor behind it. It will say, “You have nothing; we will take from those who have and distribute.”

India’s wealthy and India’s middle class must think and understand: if we keep the poor at the bottom poor for too long, the country has no future. The poor must have something to lose. He must have enough that, when told “all property will belong to the state,” he thinks: my land will go to the state, my small cash box will go to the state, the little money I saved will become the state’s.

The strength of communism in this country is not communism’s own strength—it is the magnitude of poverty. Poverty is so great it can be inflamed; it is almost inflammable—like the sign on a petrol tank: “Fire can ignite.” Such is the poverty of this land; it can catch fire. It has already begun to catch here and there. Wherever it flares, it will be hard to control.

And the amusing fact is that from that fire, the poor will suffer most—more than anyone. The rich will suffer, but how many rich are there? The least aggregate loss will be to the rich, because they are very few—countable on fingers. Very few in India can be called rich; losing a Birla or not makes little difference. The greatest loss will be to the middle class; and greater still to the poor, because they are the largest class.

But who will explain this to them? It is easy to inflame, hard to explain. You all know—getting two people to fight is easy; stopping a fight is very hard. To provoke a fight takes a small pretext; to create friendship between two who have started fighting is a long, difficult affair.

India’s future is very dangerous. The greatest danger is that hostility has been planted among the poor, the middle class, and the affluent. Now it seems that if we can somehow annihilate the other, all will be well.

Nothing has ever been fixed by annihilating the other.

Therefore, whether it is socialism or communism—whatever their names—I consider them one disease. In my view, India should commit itself for the next hundred years to the most vigorous development of capitalism.

Does this mean I say capitalism should remain forever? No. Capitalism has a historical task: to create so much wealth that scarcity ends. The day scarcity ends, personal ownership loses its meaning. Air is so abundant no one claims, “It is mine.” Today we say “my car.” If tomorrow cars become overabundant, the “my” will lose its charm. The thrill of “mine” depends on scarcity.

It is a strange thing. In India if someone passes in a big car, people crane their necks: “Who is that?” And he too sits differently—“a special person.” But in America? No one even looks at a man in a car, nor does the man in the car look stiff—because everyone is in a car. Even the chauffeur in front arrives at the owner’s house in his own car. He drives all day; in the evening he returns in his own car.

A friend of mine went to America as a professor. An Indian—he started earning well, but intelligence doesn’t change overnight. He bought an old car. To buy an old car there is madness. He didn’t know how to drive, and driving in America can be dangerous, so he hired a driver. Next morning the driver arrived in his own car—shining, a new model. He parked it in my friend’s garage and drove my friend’s old car all day. In the evening my friend told him, “I beg you—don’t come again. Seeing your car causes me great pain. Either I’ll hire a driver when I can buy a good car, or I won’t keep a car at all; better to use a taxi.”

Where the driver arrives in a new model, there the owner has no need to puff up in a car.

Now, in America, things have reversed. A truly big man goes out walking; then people look, “Who is this?” Anyone walking must be wealthy—poor people no longer walk; they ride in cars. Only the rich can afford to walk. Life is very strange. In America, when food has amassed to its peak, the cult of fasting spreads—thousands go to fast. Everywhere there are fasting centers of naturopathy—people fasting. One might ask, “Are you crazy? We starve here, and you torture yourselves to fast?”

But when a nation has too much food, its rich begin to fast. That signals wealth—he can afford to fast. Having sat in the car too much, he now walks. Having rested too much, he exercises and runs in the morning.

Life is inverted. If we want to find ways to create wealth in this country, we must use capitalism continuously for a hundred years. And when we have created sufficient capital... If America can do it, why can’t we? If England can, why can’t we? If Belgium can, why can’t we? If the whole world can create capital, are we the only ones with a contract to remain poor?

But we must change our method of creating capital. The spinning wheel and spindle will not create capital. We must bring technology—use the newest technology, the newest machines. A lone human can at most earn his bread; he cannot create capital. Capital is created when a machine is joined to man. Until we saturate the nation with big machines, we cannot create capital.

But we in this country are peculiar. We have people who teach that big machines are not needed. A great, extraordinary man like Gandhi was against the railways; he said we don’t need trains. He was against the telegraph and the telephone. He said we don’t need big machines; the spinning wheel and spindle are the ultimate machines on which man should stop. He not only said big machines aren’t needed—he said they are sinful.

This is sheer madness! However great a man he may be—that does not change it. Such madness will ruin the country. Gandhi’s spinning wheel has harmed the country incalculably! The people nurtured around Gandhi have sat on the nation’s chest; they keep speaking foolishness.

If the nation is to create wealth, it cannot be done without machines—big machines. We must pour our strength and capacity into immersing the nation in a network of machines—flood it with machines. Whatever resources we have must be devoted to machinery. There is no reason why we cannot, in twenty years, amass heaps of wealth.

But we speak the opposite. We have abandoned the concern of creating wealth and worry about distributing it—without asking where the wealth is to be found to distribute! Socialism is a plan for distribution; capitalism is a plan for creation. Capitalism is the idea of producing wealth.

And remember, capitalism produces wealth because it is competitive. If ten people in a village compete to produce wealth, they throw in their lives.

I read a delightful incident from Ford’s life. Ford himself was poor, yet he generated billions. Henry Ford once came to England. At the station he asked the clerk at the inquiry, “Where is the cheapest hotel in London?” The clerk looked up—recognized the face from the papers: Henry Ford, the richest man in the world. He said, “You look like Henry Ford, and you’re asking for a cheap hotel! When your sons come, they ask for the most luxurious, the most expensive hotel!” Ford said, “I am the son of a poor father; my sons are Henry Ford’s sons. I still don’t have the heart to stay in an expensive hotel. I’ll find a cheap one—I’m a poor man’s son.”

In his autobiography Ford writes that his secretary once asked, “It’s amazing—your peons arrive at ten, your clerks at ten-thirty, your managers at eleven, your directors at one. The directors leave at three, the managers at four, the clerks and peons at five. You arrive at nine in the morning and stay until seven at night. Your condition is worse than peon, clerk, manager, director.” Ford said, “They are all employees; I am the owner. They have no one to compete with; my competitor sits next door. If he arrives at nine, I must arrive at nine. If he leaves at seven, I cannot leave before seven, or I will fall behind in the race.”

Capitalism is a competitive race.

When thousands compete, wealth is created.

Today, in Russia, wealth is not being created. In the last ten years Russia has fallen behind daily. Now no one agrees to work—why should he? There is no competition. For forty or fifty years many areas have not developed—development comes from competition. If one company makes soap and another makes it cheaper, competition and development occur. In Russia one soap can continue for fifty years—development doesn’t arise, because the factory is state-owned. One toothpaste can continue for fifty years.

You’ll be surprised—Russia managed to reach the moon, yes, racing for the skies; but in cars it is forty years behind America. They invited Ford to help set up auto plants; finally they made a deal with Italy to arrange car production. Think about it: a country that could reach space, why couldn’t it make cars?

The reason is clear. In space there was competition with America—so Russia ran the race. At home there was no competition with anyone—so cars fell behind. Russia could not make a good car; but it could make a good spacecraft because there it had capitalist mentality—external competition. Inside, on cars, the mentality is socialist—so there was no development.

Where socialism is established, competition ends.

Where competition ends, development ends. All development is competition. The more people compete, the more they try to outdo each other, the more they bring cheaper goods to market, the more they bring better goods—then development comes like an avalanche. But this is not possible in socialism.

Therefore, for a poor country like India, talk of socialism is suicidal. If socialism comes here, we, already lethargic and half-dead, will become more lethargic and die. We will sit where we are, spinning our spindles and wheels. But the whole world has changed; there is no future for the spinning wheel. The future belongs to ever-larger technology. If the nation is to remain alive, only large technology can keep it alive. Food will no longer come from the soil alone; machines will produce it. Milk will no longer come from cows alone; machines will produce it. Clothes will no longer come from fields; machines will produce them. Medicines will no longer come from herbs; machines will produce them. Apart from machines, man has no future.

And the more machines increase, the more man becomes free. As machines grow, the burden of labor on man’s mind is lifted. The day machines do all the work, the burden on the human brain will decrease greatly. Culture, religion—everything of value—arises when the burden of labor is removed.

One last point, then I’ll conclude.

Reflect: everything precious in the world—sitar, music, poetry, religion, liberation—has arisen from people who were “free,” not unemployed in the sense of destitute, but free in the sense of leisure, with no compulsion and with means. Tansen thrived in Akbar’s court. Mahavira was born in a royal home, Buddha in a royal home, Rama in a royal home, Krishna likewise—all of them from royal families. They had no work, and ample means. What would they do? They did not have to produce bread or cloth. So they produced music, painted, sculpted, searched for God, meditated, prayed, worshiped, explored religion, journeyed toward liberation—man must do something; he cannot be idle. When the lower needs are fulfilled, the higher quest begins. Until the lower needs are fulfilled, the higher quest never begins.

Therefore, however much we talk religion in this land, we are not truly religious. We cannot be—religion needs facility; religion needs luxury. Religion is actually man’s ultimate luxury, his final indulgence. When nothing earthly remains to be done, then one can engage in the works of the sky.

Hence the Jains’ twenty-four tirthankaras are princes; the Hindus’ avatars are princes; Buddha is a prince. There is a reason: everything has been attained; nothing remains to be sought here.

So I tell you: not in India—the next ray of religion will descend in America. It will. Because America is becoming “free” in another sense: it has everything, and the need to work diminishes daily. American economists worry that in twenty years, if someone asks for a job, where will we find work? Machines will do it. Our world is strange—here we worry how to give people work; in America they worry that if people ask for work, we cannot give it. So American economists say we will have to persuade people to accept salaries without work: “Take the pay, but don’t ask for a job.”

One economist has said it may be possible, before this century ends, that those who do not ask for work will get higher pay, and those who ask for work will get less—because they are asking for two things at once: pay and work. If machines take all the work, where ten thousand worked, ten will press buttons. What of the other nine thousand? They will have no jobs. They must be paid nonetheless—because goods will be produced; who will buy them? If you don’t pay them, how will the factories run? They will have to be paid—unemployment pay—“Take your salary and stay home.”

Surely when such a state arrives—and it is arriving—religion will flower in America for the first time. People will have leisure as never before; what once a prince might have had, an entire populace will have. They will create literature, write poetry, paint, engage in leisurely pursuits without compulsion—and they will also seek religion.

In my view, if India lags in capitalism, it will lag in religion as well. Socialism is an irreligious arrangement. When capitalism fully develops, it inevitably gives birth to religion. But we made a mistake in the past—we became opponents of materialism, without understanding that materialism is the foundation stone of the life of God.

One can build a temple with only a foundation and no spire, but one cannot build a temple with only a spire and no foundation. One can plant a tree with only roots and no flowers, but not a tree with only flowers and no roots. The higher depends on the lower; the lower does not depend on the higher. Without foundation stones you cannot raise a golden spire; to raise a golden spire you must lay the stones. Yes, you can lay the foundation and leave it—without raising a spire.

Materialism alone can run; spiritualism alone cannot. We erred by attempting pure spiritualism; we got into trouble. We thought we would be only soul, not caring for the body. We imagined we would accept only God and call the world illusion. That put us in great difficulty.

This world that we call maya is also true; it is not false. The body is as true as the soul. It is possible for a person to live only in the body and ignore the soul, but no one can live only in the soul and ignore the body. Care for the body is necessary. The body is the base, the foundation—lower, yes, but the base.

India needs a hundred years to strengthen its body, increase its wealth, expand its materialism. There is no need to be afraid of this.

For me, religion is not the enemy of materialism. And any religion that is the enemy of materialism is a religion that is against life. Such a religion is of no use to life. A religion that says, “We do not accept materialism,” has neither the chance nor the right to live; it should die. Because there is no way to live without the material. To breathe is material, to drink water is material, to eat bread is material—life is material.

This does not mean that life is only material. The house of life is material; its resident is spiritual. The home is material, but the one who dwells within—the guest, the visitor—is non-material. Yet if you are to host a guest, you must feed him. If a guest comes to your house and you are a spiritualist, the guest will be in great difficulty; he won’t be able to stay long. Because you will say: “We cannot give you bread—that is material; we cannot give you water—that is material; we cannot give you a bed—that is maya; we cannot give you a roof—this whole world is false, a dream.” Then the guest cannot stay long.

The soul of India got into trouble because of its excessive spiritualism. This “too much spiritualism” proved poisonous for us. In life, everything has proportion. Even nectar, if drunk in excess, becomes lethal; and poison, if taken in the right measure, can revive. Everything in life has a limit, a measure. We overdosed on spiritualism; hence our distress. For five thousand years we died in slavery and poverty—we drank the medicine of spiritualism a bit too much. We dissolved the rishis and sages and drank them so thoroughly that nothing remained but to die.

No—life should not be opposed to spiritualism, but there is no need to be opposed to materialism either. The true religion of life is the union of both the material and the spiritual.