Preetam Chhabi Nainan Basee #6

Anand Maitreya,
Attachment is only a symptom that we have no inkling of our own inner wealth. Attachment is the absence of self-realization—just as darkness is the absence of light. Darkness has no independent reality of its own. Hence there is nothing you can do directly with darkness. Try to push it out, you won’t succeed; try to bring it in, you won’t manage. With darkness, nothing can be done. If anything at all is to be done about darkness, it must be done with light. If you want darkness, extinguish the light. If you don’t want darkness, light the lamp—because darkness is merely the absence of light. So is attachment.

The person who does not look within will have attachment in his life. The person who looks within, attachment disappears from his life. For whoever has peered within has found the treasure of treasures, the empire of empires! There is no joy greater than that, no experience more significant, no blessing beyond it. Because we don’t look within, it seems we are empty inside. It’s a delusion—yet it feels like inner emptiness, and we are frightened by it. How to fill this emptiness? From this very urge, attachment is born. With things, with persons, with ideas, with knowledge, with renunciation, with indulgence, with austerity—anyhow, let us stuff this void! Emptiness rankles. Emptiness bites. In emptiness we feel poor, inferior—“I, and empty! A hollow man! Not even pebbles inside, let alone diamonds and jewels!” So we start trying to fill ourselves.

Yet we never manage. You cannot be filled that way—and you never will be. Within, in truth, you are already full; there is not even space there. But outside you can pile up things, amass heaps. Then fear arises lest someone snatch them, steal them, grab them—so you clutch them to your chest.

People think that with money will come peace, rest. But the more money there is, the more restlessness grows; it doesn’t diminish. A new anxiety begins—that it might be taken away. At least the poor did not have the anxiety of being robbed! At least the poor could not be looted!

Pompeii, the famous city, perished in a volcanic eruption. At midnight the volcano burst. People ran. Whoever could, grabbed what they could—gold, silver, money, diamonds, whatever they had. Those who had less—one carried his bedding, another his furniture. People were lugging loads and running!

Only one man, a carefree village fakir, was twirling his staff as if out for a morning walk—just as he went every morning, so he went that night. Whoever saw him was astonished. “Couldn’t you save anything?” they asked.

The fakir said, “The fun is, I had nothing to save. No one in this town is happier than me. Everyone is weeping—for what is left behind. I had nothing, from the beginning. I was wise from the start. A volcano is bound to erupt—if not today then tomorrow; how long can you postpone it? Death will come! I was at ease that the volcano would come, so I gathered nothing. That’s why I am carefree. You are miserable, even as you stagger under burdens. The burden makes you suffer, and what you’ve left behind makes you suffer. And when you had it, I never saw you happy.”

People are not happy while they have; when it is snatched, they are unhappy—as if they have made misery their style of living!

Attachment is a symptom of a miserable man. Nonattachment is the aura of one who is blissful. That is why I do not tell you to drop attachment. How will you drop it until you recognize the inner wealth? My teaching is different. For centuries you have been told, “Drop attachment.” I do not ask you to drop attachment, because I know that even if you drop it, how will you drop it? And even if you do, it will be in the hope of a new attachment—heaven, heavenly pleasures. The scriptures say: donate one rupee here and you’ll receive a crore there.

Do you see? The scripture turns into a lottery! One rupee—and a crore there! Lotteries don’t give that much. And even in a lottery there’s no certainty—millions buy tickets and one wins. Here, whoever “invests” is guaranteed a return. The lottery opens in every name.

So those who donate here in the hope it will multiply a millionfold in the next world are not donating, they’re merely bargaining, doing business. They want to plant their feet in that world too. Even beyond death they are busy hoarding wealth. Not only here—there as well. Their attachment has not lessened.

Therefore I do not call your “mahatmas” nonattached. Their attachment is subtle; yours is gross. You clutch wealth and position; they clutch the afterlife. You grab in this world, and they consider you foolish because you grab the transient. They grab what they think will last forever. They are cleverer, more calculating. Inwardly they laugh at you: “Enjoy for two days and then you’ll repent; when we enjoy, you will be rotting in hell while we sit with celestial nymphs beside rivers of wine. After all, we renounced here, so we’ll get there!”

If you don’t drink here, mind you, there you will find rivers of wine. If you wish to be spared the rivers, better drink your little earthen cup here; otherwise there is no way to avoid those rivers!

If you leave women here, you’ll find apsaras there. Their bodies are of gold—gold does not sweat, so no odor. Apsaras never grow old. Urvashi is still sixteen. Thousands of years have passed and her age remains the same! How she reached sixteen is itself a puzzle—she grew to sixteen and then stopped, as if the clock froze, the battery died—forever young!

Be a little careful! Those so-called saints who renounce here are doing fine calculations within—“Whom shall I get—Urvashi, Menaka, who?”

A certain saint died. By coincidence, his chief disciple also died the same day, a few hours later—he could not live without his guru. The disciple, in high spirits, reached heaven. He thought, “Around my guru there must be Urvashi, Menaka. What delights he must be enjoying! If even I have reached heaven—me, a nobody, unworthy, just the dust of his feet—if mere service to him is my virtue, then what must be his fruits after such austerities, yogas, vows!” And when he arrived he saw indeed an extraordinarily beautiful woman—no beauty like her—sitting in the saint’s lap. The saint sat stark naked.

He fell at his feet, “Blessed, Gurudev! I always knew. Who is the lady—Menaka or Urvashi?”

The saint said, “You damned fool, shut up!”

He said, “I can’t be quiet just now. You must answer one curiosity—which virtue earned you this? Tell me the secret so I too may gain such joy.”

The saint said, “You understand nothing, you’ve always been a fool. This beautiful woman has not come to me because of my merits; because of her sins, she has got me. This is her punishment.”

Saints too have their uses! If Urvashi or Menaka must be punished, how else will you do it? Send some ‘Akhandananda’ to sit on Menaka’s chest and pound her life into misery!

Attachment won’t end that way. Even if you drop one, you will create another. I do not tell you to drop attachment. I say: Know the self. Become self-possessed. The moment you become rooted in the self, attachment drops—without any motive, without any goal. Just as when there is light, darkness vanishes.

Consider the first point: attachment exists because we experience ourselves as empty. We try to fill that emptiness somehow—wealth, position, prestige—rushing about with schemes and tricks. No one has ever succeeded, yet hope persists that perhaps I will, perhaps I am the exception. The ego keeps whispering that you are the exception; rules that apply to all do not apply to you.

The wilderness-lute is sounding,
the dense forest whispers, sigh on sigh;
in utterly lonely solitude,
to whom shall we tell our tale?

Cradled in her veil the lamp,
the crescent’s evening went to the west,
handing me the lamp of remembrance,
and the burden of this dim night to the dark—
how long shall we keep singing?

Stars burn like dying coals;
this is the final hour between night and day.
Hand me your emptiness too—
even the night stands, turning her face, ready to go.
Where shall we go from here?

Everyone is bewildered, nonplussed. Each stands at a crossroads not knowing which way to go. No goal appears. What is worth attaining—no awareness at all. So there’s only one recourse: do what others are doing; follow the crowd. The crowd is busy—building houses of sand, floating boats of paper. We join the herd. We learn from those around us what to do. People run after money; so we think money must have some value, else why would so many run? So we run. Who has time to think? If you stop to think you fall behind; in that time, others go ahead. Who knows who might get ahead! “We’ll think later—first run, first get it; after we get it, we’ll think.”

But that auspicious day never comes, because life is short and desires are infinite. And it never comes for another reason: the more you get, the stronger the thirst becomes—like pouring clarified butter on a fire to put it out. The more we deepen attachment, the more we entangle ourselves outwardly. And once entangled outside, going within becomes difficult. Yet without going within, there is no way—never was, never will be.

We don’t even have the intelligence to see this outer failure. Our intelligence has been thoroughly crippled. A whole arrangement exists to kill it—society, politics, church, religious sects—all conspire to destroy your intelligence. For where intelligence is, there is rebellion. Where intelligence is, there is revolt. Where intelligence is, you cannot force people into blind obedience; you cannot make them follow foolish commands. If people’s intelligence were sharp, who would follow your idiotic politicians? And who would take religious knowledge from your two-bit pundits and priests? Your pundits are parrots. They repeat mechanically.

I’ve heard: Mulla Nasruddin went to the market to buy a parrot. He saw many. One was very beautiful—healthy, colorful. He asked the price and was stunned. “A thousand rupees,” said the shopkeeper. “A thousand? For a parrot? Ten or five I can understand—fifty perhaps, even a hundred—but a thousand? What’s so special?” The shopkeeper said, “Ask the parrot himself about his price.” So Nasruddin asked, “Parrot-ji, are you really worth a thousand?” The parrot said, “Is there any doubt about it!”

He said it with such force—“Is there any doubt about it!”—that Nasruddin had to agree. What’s the point of arguing with a parrot? The people in the shop laughed. “See!”

He paid the thousand and brought the parrot home. He asked, “Parrot-ji, your name?” It said, “Is there any doubt about it!” Nasruddin said, “I’m asking your name!” It said, “Is there any doubt about it!” Whatever he asked, it said only, “Is there any doubt about it!” That’s all it knew. Nasruddin slapped his forehead, “I brought you home—what a fool I am!” The parrot replied, “Is there any doubt about it!”

Your pundits are like parrots. Who will expect wisdom from them? They can quote scripture, yes—but where is original insight? Where is their own light? Where have they heard the music of the self? Where have they experienced the consciousness that pervades existence? Are these witnesses to the divine? And would witnesses to the divine be Hindus, Muslims, Christians, Jains?

Even after becoming a muni—one who is silent—a man remains a Jain. Silent—and still a Jain! “Muni” means one who has become silent. If silence has happened, what “Jain” now? To be a Jain was a matter of words. With silence, words are gone, scriptures gone. Yet they remain Jains—Shvetambar and Digambar, Terapanthi and Visapanthi—sects upon sects! Even after becoming silent, this nonsense continues!

They haven’t become silent at all. The monkhood is only on the surface; inside, the same clamor, the same shopkeeping, the same mischief, the same cunning, the same dishonesties—they haven’t gone anywhere, they’ve just retreated within. When they were outside, at least they were visible; now even that is not visible. Others can’t see—and the danger is, perhaps they themselves won’t see—those tendencies can slide so deep into the unconscious. Yet from there they continue to shape and agitate your personality.

No, if people had intelligence, they would not run after priests. Nor would Hindus burn Muslims’ mosques, nor Muslims break Hindus’ idols. Can a truly religious person do such foolishness? Whenever a little window of understanding opens in you, you too feel it is nonsense that Hindus and Muslims butcher each other. But that window cannot stay open long, because all the vested interests of society want to keep you stupid. Their status depends on your stupidity—then you will be obedient, slaves. You will say, “Yes sir, your command!”

An entire society of “yes-sirs” has been created. There is no greater conspiracy. It blocks the consciousness of the whole human race. That is why Jesus had to be crucified—he was a rebel. Socrates had to be given poison—he started telling people the truth as truth.

Truth is dangerous—dangerous to those whose vested interests are tied to falsehood.

Your intelligence is not allowed to survive. Every child is born intelligent. Look into any child’s eyes and you will find signs of brilliance—unprecedented signs! Every child has talent. Untalented children are not born. From the house of the divine, everyone brings talent. But as soon as society initiates them—makes them Hindus, Muslims, Christians—Indians, Pakistanis, Chinese, Brahmins, Shudras—prisons upon prisons are erected. Where that small, delicate consciousness disappears, no one knows. Where that innocent child goes, no one knows. In his place is produced a thoroughly stupid, completely other-directed person.

If intelligence were alive, you would turn within. With intelligence, you would first search inside before setting out on any outer journey. Before you begin stuffing your inner emptiness, you would first ask: What is this emptiness? And all who have looked into the inner emptiness have been astonished: it is not empty—there, God abides.

As long as you roam outside, the inside feels empty. Yes, there is no money, no houses, no positions there—but there is the supreme state and the supreme wealth. There is meditation, samadhi—the solution to life’s problems. There is peace, silence. There is the experience of eternal life—without birth, without death. Once you are acquainted with that, attachment drops.

Attachment is a symptom—and only fools treat symptoms, and make others treat them. Someone has a fever; the body is hot. Heat is a symptom. That does not mean you should dunk him in cold water, or dip him again and again in Mother Ganga! The illness may not go—the patient will. The body’s heat is not the disease; it is only a sign. It indicates that some turmoil has arisen inside, some conflict in the body. Because of that conflict, the body is heated. This heat is the news that treatment is needed within, the illness is at the root. The treatment must be within.

Human attachment is merely a fever, just the body’s heat. And your so-called gurus say, “Drop attachment.” That is like telling a fever-ridden man, “Drop the fever.” What will the poor fellow do? He might even agree. And if everyone says it, he won’t be able to deny it. He may even feel guilty—“How wretched I am, that I can’t even drop a fever when all the wise say, ‘Drop it.’ I must be unworthy. The fruit of karmas from many lives—I can’t drop it. I want to drop it, but I can’t. A blessed day will come when God’s grace descends, when fate permits—then I will drop it.” He will find all sorts of excuses—just to avoid seeing the simple truth that the advice “Drop the fever” is foolish—fundamentally wrong.

Fever cannot be “dropped.” Fever must be treated. Fever is only a symptom. Symptoms are not to be treated; they are your friends. By them you learn that some hidden disease exists. They bring the news to the surface. But people get entangled with symptoms. One fights anger—symptom. Another fights lust—symptom. Another fights attachment, delusion, greed—people go on fighting! All are symptoms. The disease is one: we lack self-knowledge. And until self-knowledge happens, none of these illnesses are going to depart. The more you suppress, the more they surge back.

Your life is a story of this failure. But you have no leisure to look back. No one wants to look at their failure. Even when a man fails, he blames others. If lust does not leave your life, you blame your wife—“What can I do? The saints have declared that woman is the gateway to hell! As long as this feminine species clings to me, how will lust go?” Scriptures give you cover. You hide behind them.

If women are dragging you to hell, who is dragging women there? Do you imagine women are in heaven? Women are more miserable than you, more harassed. You have made their condition worse still. You have given them no opportunity for growth, no freedom. You have snatched away even their right to consciousness. You have denied them the right to self-knowledge. There are religions in which they cannot even enter temples.

In the Jewish synagogue there is a separate balcony above for women. They cannot sit in the main hall, cannot enter it. Their presence would defile the temple. Astonishing! As if giving medicine to the sick would make the medicine sick! If the temple is defiled by them, how will it purify people? In the mosque, women have no right of entry. Jain scriptures say women have no right to liberation; only after taking birth as a man will they attain moksha.

Notice: Hindus accepted fish as an avatar, tortoise as an avatar—but not a single woman as an avatar. Animals will do—even half-man, half-animal like Narasimha will do—but a woman? Not acceptable.

Among the Jains there were twenty-four tirthankaras; one was a woman—Mallibai. But the Jains changed her name to Mallinath. A woman—and a tirthankara! She must have been a woman of extraordinary courage, extraordinary talent, with a majestic and dignified presence—so undeniable that they had to accept her. But as soon as she died, they changed the name. At least that much they could do. What could poor Mallibai do then? Afterward they began to say Mallinath.

I was born in a Jain family; from childhood I was taught the twenty-four tirthankaras. I had no idea there was a woman among them—how could “Mallinath” be a woman! I thought all were men. Only much later did I learn one was a woman.

Even deceit has its limits! If a woman becomes a tirthankara, men cannot accept her—so they instantly make her Mallinath, deny that she was a woman at all.

Who is taking women to hell, if women are taking you? But we are always eager to dump our responsibility on others. This is the fundamental flaw of the human mind—always shifting the blame. Men say, “Because of women we suffer.” Ask women and they will say, “Because of men our ruin has happened.” Whoever you ask will shift it to someone else.

Religion begins the day you stop shifting it to others; when you say, “Whatever I am, its cause must be within me.” With the acceptance of this responsibility, the revolution in life begins. Do not pass your failure onto others.

Light has fallen asleep; the darkness of ego has awakened.
A black shaft has pierced awareness through and through.
My flute is mute—like faith in silent death—
why should not the strings of the mind’s swoon be torn?

My pettiness glitters like fireflies for lamps,
like a worthless shell where no pearl can grow.
Alas, even the burden of futility, of emptiness,
has become bearable—life itself a monstrous load.

The ember-sun of evening sinks into the sea;
the thirst of the eyes does not drown even in tears.
Days end every day—yet nothing special ever ends;
the river of time flows on, the banks keep collapsing.

Live like a machine, inert—yet the machine is never inert;
again thrashed today, the empty mind does not weep.
Affection has dried up, yet the lamp of seeing keeps burning—
what hunger is this that swallows failure again and again!

We fail every day; still we swallow it, still we refuse to accept it—still we keep running! The horizon is never reached; it always looks near—“just a little more”—and we keep running. But the more you run, the farther the horizon recedes. The distance between you and the horizon remains the same, because the horizon is nowhere. You have ten rupees and want a hundred; a hundred, you want a thousand; a thousand, ten thousand; ten thousand, a lakh—this race never stops. It has never stopped for anyone. The horizon remains distant.

The one who sees this failure and accepts it—that person’s inner journey begins. The one for whom it becomes crystal clear that life outside is a total failure—only that person sets out inward.

Attachment is the outer race; nonattachment is the inner pilgrimage. Nonattachment does not sprout from merely renouncing attachment. But the moment you go within, the moment you become quiet, the moment you become silent, the moment you become a witness to your thoughts, the moment you sink a little into meditation—the fragrance of nonattachment begins to arise. Attachment disappears without your even noticing when.

And this does not mean that when attachment disappears you must leave your home, your wife, your children. When attachment has gone, whom will you leave? What will you cling to? You will live where you are. Yes, you will live utterly different, utterly new. Everything on the outside will be the same; only your inner sense and feeling will be new. Nothing will touch you. You will be like the lotus in water. This is my definition of sannyas: meditation, and the fragrance of nonattachment rising from meditation.

But nonattachment does not mean aversion. Aversion is merely attachment upside down. Your monks and so-called saints are men of aversion. Aversion means they became frightened of attachment and ran away. There is no real difference between the attached and the averse. Their language is one. One stands on one leg; one stands on his head—what changes? The averse is attached in a reversed manner. He is anxious, afraid.

There is a famous Chinese story. A woman served a fakir her whole life—thirty years. When she was close to death, she did a strange thing. She called the most beautiful courtesan in the village and said, “I have spent thirty years serving this fakir. Now I am near death. I want to know whether he has truly become nonattached or if he is still merely averse.”

The courtesan asked, “What is the difference between nonattachment and aversion?”

The woman said, “Aversion means attachment still exists and there is fear of it and an effort to avoid it. Nonattachment means neither attachment remains nor aversion remains—neither fear nor greed—both transcended; the duality transcended.

“So do one thing,” she told the courtesan. “I will pay you whatever you ask. Go to him at midnight. He meditates at midnight—has done so for thirty years. I want to know whether meditation has happened or not before I die. His hut door is only latched; no one ever goes there. Open it and go in. Whatever he says, notice every word and tell me. Go and embrace him—then come back and report. Before I die, I want to be sure that my service was not in vain.”

The courtesan went. She opened the door. The monk was startled. He opened his eyes—he had been sitting in meditation—and shouted, “You wicked woman! Why are you here? Get out! What need have you to come at midnight?”

But his tongue faltered; his body trembled. The woman had taken her money; she went right in. He cried, “Stay back! Why are you coming close?” He shouted so loudly that the neighbors might hear. But the courtesan had to finish her task—she went and embraced him. He leapt up and ran outside, shouting, “People of the neighborhood, catch this prostitute! She has come to corrupt me!”

The courtesan returned and told the old woman everything.

The old woman said, “Then I wasted thirty years. I served a fool. He is still only averse, not nonattached.”

Nonattachment means attachment has gone and aversion has gone. Attachment and aversion are two faces of one coin. One chases wealth; one runs from it—both have their eyes fixed on wealth. One runs after women; one runs away from women—both have their eyes on women. Both are runners! Directions differ, but both are running. And meditation belongs to the one who becomes still, who stops. When running ceases, there is meditation. The mind goes neither here nor there—neither for nor against. As one settles inward—still, steady—nonattachment flowers.

Nonattachment is incomparable; its beauty is unique. Aversion is ugly. Hence your so-called saints sink into a certain ugliness. They abuse gold and women twenty-four hours a day. They don’t abuse them because gold and women are at fault. What is the point of abusing gold? What has gold done to you? Gold doesn’t even know you. In truth, women don’t run after you either.

Mulla Nasruddin was sipping tea early in the morning; his wife was pouring from the kettle. A quarrel started—as it must where husband and wife are. Talk—and quarrel. Don’t talk—and quarrel. Someone once told Mulla, “My wife is amazing—just say one word and she talks for hours.” Mulla said, “That’s nothing. My wife talks for hours when you don’t say a word. She talks precisely on the point that I don’t talk!”

The quarrel flared. In anger the wife said, “I’m going to my mother’s.” She flung down the keys and said, “You were the one who chased me—I didn’t chase you!”

Mulla said, “That’s true. A mousetrap does not chase the mouse; the foolish mouse goes into the trap. You never chased me—that’s true. You are the mousetrap; I am the mouse. I got caught—and now I repent.”

By chance, Mulla Nasruddin’s wife died. Wives die with great difficulty!

You should know wives outlive husbands by five years on average. Women are stronger—it’s wrong to think they are weaker. If men live seventy years, women live seventy-five. And the gap widens because when we marry we keep four or five years’ difference. If the man is twenty-one, the girl is sixteen; or if the girl is eighteen, the man is twenty-two or twenty-three. Add those years and women outlive men by ten years. So men keep beating their heads, praying to God, “Oh Lord, please take her!” But what can God do—there’s that ten-year gap! Praying thus, they themselves go first. That’s why the world has many widows; widowers are rare.

Still, Mulla’s wife died. Sometimes good fortune does happen! I said to him, “Now be happy, distribute sweets, rejoice. What delay now? Take sannyas! There’s no obstacle left. Until now you used your wife as an excuse—she wouldn’t allow it, she would create a scene, she would defame me in the village, she’d make my life miserable. Now there’s no obstacle.”

He sat with his head down.

I asked, “What’s the matter?”

He said, “What’s the point of hiding it from you? I’m getting married again.”

I said, “You fool—you learned the wife was a mousetrap and you a mouse, and again another mousetrap!”

Mulla said, “What to do? Hope is triumphing over experience!”

Hope always triumphs over experience. It doesn’t take long. She hadn’t been dead long when… They say he was weeping at the cremation, beating his chest. His friends said, “Don’t cry so much! It was just a wife—dead is dead! Be a man. You’re still young. You’ll find another. Plenty of good girls are waiting without grooms. Why panic? Grief lasts four to six months—time heals all wounds.” They delivered their wisdom—time heals all wounds—“Just four to six months.”

Mulla said, “Stop the nonsense! Four to six months! What about tonight? I’m not crying for the one who died. I’m crying wondering when the next one will come!”

People begin arranging the next marriage even at the cremation ground.

Neither money runs after you nor are women so ill-mannered that they chase you. You are the one chasing them. And then one day when you become thoroughly frightened and miserable, drowned in gloom, you grab the opposite extreme. You start running away from wealth; you run away when you see a woman, as if a red flag has been waved before a bull—off you go! You don’t stop, you don’t look back. But this very running shows you are afraid, terrified. Otherwise, what need to run like that? A woman wouldn’t have eaten you!

Aversion is only attachment’s opposite state. Therefore I do not teach aversion. I want both attachment and aversion to leave your life. And that is possible only when self-experience happens and the fragrance of nonattachment arises. When the lamp of self-knowledge is lit, the light of nonattachment spreads; and the darkness—of anger, delusion, greed, lust—disappears. They all dwell in darkness; they are merely different chambers of the same night.

Karuna,
Prayer is not an act. So if you try to do it, whatever you do will be wrong. Prayer is not something you do; prayer is a state of feeling. In prayer one happens, one is immersed.

Prayer is not in the words you repeat—be it the Gayatri, the Namokar Mantra, or verses from the Quran. Prayer is not in those words. So many are repeating them! The whole earth is repeating. And do you see anywhere the festival of prayer? Anywhere the imprint of prayer? Do you sense the sap of prayer flowing anywhere? People repeat words, they have memorized them. But in the heart there is nothing.

Prayer is a state of feeling.
This is the first point I would like to engrave within you as deeply as possible: prayer is a state of feeling. It is not about words; it is about the heart. Prayer is a sense of gratitude.

Even the word “prayer” carries a small mistake. We ourselves have created this mistake. The very word makes it seem as if we are asking—“prārthī,” the petitioner, the one who begs. We pray only when we have something to ask for. When we have nothing to ask, we do not pray.

A teacher asked a little boy, “Son, do you pray at night before sleeping?”
He said, “Absolutely, I do it every night, as a rule.”
“And do you say your morning prayer when you wake?”
He said, “Never.”
She said, “I don’t understand. If you do it nightly as a rule, why not in the morning?”
He said, “At night I get scared; in the morning I’m not scared at all.”

In the darkness of night a child is afraid—natural. He remembers God: “O Lord, save me!” But why should he pray in broad daylight?

Children sometimes say exactly the right thing, perfectly right—things that reveal something about you. For childishness is in you as well. What is your prayer? Only a list of wants. Let this be given, let that be given. “O Lord, give me this. O Lord, give me that. You are the giver, I am the beggar. You are the bountiful, I am the poor. You are the ocean of compassion.”

All your praise is a kind of flattery. Praise, in this sense, means flattery. That is why in this country, which has for centuries been praising God, flattery and bribery began to move along so effortlessly. Bribery here does not feel improper; it appears almost a religious act. When even with God you maintain a relationship of bribery—“O Hanuman-ji, I will offer a coconut!”—and if Hanuman-ji can be appeased with a coconut, then what is the fault of the poor policeman if he, too, is satisfied with a coconut! From the peon to the president, everyone has a price. And you feel no hesitation in paying, because you have been habituated for centuries to the idea that when even God takes, what about others! Man, after all, is only man! And when there is no shame in taking at the level of God, why should a man feel ashamed? No man is above God!

Praise has been the natural pattern of our life. Hence we are so skilled in sycophancy. The kind of “yes-men” we produce in this country, no one produces anywhere in the world—so adept! And we indulge in forms of praise that carry not even a grain of truth—nothing but falsehood!

But we have become accustomed to lying. You have no knowledge of God—first of all. Even so, you pray to God. Here begins the lie. You have no experience of God, and yet you sit with folded hands, you ring bells. For whom are you ringing the bell? You place flowers—before whom? One of whom you have no address, no experience. Does he even like bells or not? That too is a question. I don’t think he would. With so many bells being rung all over the land, his skull must be splitting. If there is some God somewhere, either he must have died by now or fled so far that he doesn’t look back—just keeps running. Because these devotees are doing all sorts of nonsense! He must have to endure it all.

A certain devotee died and was being taken to hell. He grew very angry, saying, “I am a devotee—I practiced devotion all my life—and this injustice to me! We had heard: there may be delay, but not darkness. Here there is both delay and darkness. A lifetime has passed in waiting—such delay! And now this darkness that I, who chanted ‘Ram-Ram’ twenty-four hours a day until my lips cracked, my throat dried, my life dried up—all sacrificed for you—and I am being sent to hell! Before you take me to hell, I must meet God.”

He created a great ruckus—as devotees do. He made a big scene, sat in a full-on dharna. At last, God had him called. He spoke with great indignation: “This is the limit! A whole life of Ram-Ram, chanting your name—my lips parched, my throat parched, my very life dried up, all for you—and now I’m being sent to hell!”

God said, “If you want the truth, that is exactly why you’re being sent. You ate my brains. My head was cooked! And if you must live in heaven, then I’ll go to hell. I can’t stay next door to you. Either you stay here, or I do. When from so far away you tormented me so much, what havoc will you wreak on me if you’re right here!”

Don’t even ask about devotees: they put up loudspeakers! They don’t just do their own devotion and singing, they make the whole village do it. They organize nonstop recitations. It goes on through the night, too! And they think they are bestowing great grace on the village. No one can sleep; the entire village is cursing them. Not only them—it’s cursing their God too. But they are absorbed in their devotion. They are arranging to ferry even the atheists across—whether those atheists want to go or not!

A frenzied fellow was shoving an old woman. A crowd gathered. Someone finally asked, “Why are you tormenting this poor old lady?”
He said, “I’m not tormenting her—I’m helping her cross the road. But she just doesn’t want to go. And the pastor in church told us we must do some good deeds. So I asked, what kind of good deeds? He said, for example, if an old woman needs to cross the road, help her across. I’ve been standing here since morning—no old woman wants to cross! But I have to do a good deed! I won’t leave this one.”

He didn’t let go until he had forced her across. She kept screaming—let her scream! The one intent on service, on religion, on earning merit, isn’t going to stop because of a little screaming! Such obstacles naturally arise on the path of virtue! He got her across, and only then did he go away content, “Now I’ll go do the next good deed. Am I to stay stuck in this one? Every old woman I ask says she doesn’t want to go that way. What’s wrong with old women today! No one wants to cross. The day I resolve to do a good deed, not one old woman wants to cross!”

Your religious folk are hell-bent on doing “merit”—without any concern for what merit is. They are busy with prayer and worship, ringing bells, raising a racket. Repeating hollow words that carry no resonance from their life-breath. Beating century-old tracks. Carrying dead scriptures on their heads.

No, Karuna, prayer is not done. If you do it, you will miss. Prayer is a state of feeling, a state of silence. There are no words in prayer. Bow into a wordless mood—without cause, without reason, without asking for anything. For so much has already been given; at least acknowledge the grace! Life has been given. You needn’t know God—no problem. But some unknown energy has given life; that much is certain. This heartbeat in your chest says something. This breathing says something. Some unknown hand, some unknown power is gifting you life at every moment. At least offer gratitude to that!

But gratitude cannot be in words. Words are small, very small. The grace is vast. Therefore only in wordlessness can there be prayer. Bow down in a wordless feeling. Forget “God.” This very existence spread all around you is His manifest form. These trees, these stars, these birdsongs, these waterfalls, these mountains, these people—everything that surrounds you—bend before it in gratitude—silent, empty, serene. And in that serenity, that which is the beating of your heart—that is prayer. The coming and going of the breath—that is the turning of the rosary. What better rosary could there be! This incoming and outgoing breath—that is the circling of the beads. This throb-throb of the heart—what song could be dearer! What music more melodious! And within you, seated in the void, the witness—suffused with the feeling of grace—filled, brimming, overflowing!

Prayer is not words—it is wordless silence, wordless witnessing. For me, “prayer” and “meditation” are two words pointing to the same state. Call it meditation, call it prayer.

I am enamored of colors, not of flowers.
When golden dawn scatters the splendor of life,
When the silver night sings songs of love,
When in the blue sky absorption stirs and sways,
When in green nature a new grace smiles,
Then dreams begin to rise in these eyes;
I am enamored of colors, not of flowers.

When full-laden clouds gather in the sky,
When the ocean heaves with the restlessness of motion,
When in the heart of lightning the throb repeats,
When stormful sighs collide and clash,
Then the beating of my heart grows faster;
I love the current, not the banks.

When enthralled feeling trembles with the Malaya breeze,
When pure consciousness is tinged with fragrance,
When, with languid dance, the grove bursts into laughter,
Then my mind grows apprehensive—
Lest my thunderbolt-like feet should prick the buds;
I fear the buds, not the thorns.

When I hear the words of hard truth,
When the nights of slander break into sobs,
And before the unbound, the free human being
The well-ordered ranks of propriety get stuck—
Whatever is cramped by limits and stained by shame,
It is that “knowledge” that torments me, not mistakes.

Become unburdened of knowledge. Become unburdened of scripture. Become unburdened of words. And the flower of prayer will bloom within you—it certainly will! Wait. And keep trust. Spring will come; it always has. Only the one who has waited has attained.

But haste will not help. It is not something for you to do. What will you do? Sow the seeds—and now wait. In due time the sprouts will break forth. Then spring will come, buds will appear, flowers will bloom, and fragrance will fly into the sky.

Prayer is such a dimension where one sows the seeds of silence and waits quietly.

But beware of your “knowledge.” Do not turn your knowledge into prayer.

You tell me, mind—how long shall I wander along with you?
Like a bee, a butterfly on tender buds, how long shall I stick and hover, mind?
How long shall I call beguiling Maya my beloved?
Making my own corpse a boat, how long shall I drift the torrents?
Because of you, like a dead snake, how long shall I hang, mind?

No longer am I the old self, enamored of Maya, mind;
Petitions and denunciations—those are her styles of acting.
How long shall I keep banging my head at the actress’s feet, mind?

That bewitching Maya is not yours—she is Ram’s maidservant!
My filthy, beggar’s body has become your couch!
In the world’s eyes, and in yours, how long shall I keep pricking like a mote, mind?

Do not make me a garland for a courtesan, but for Hari’s handmaiden!
I am the trident of the Trident-bearer, not a play-flower!
I am Brahman’s I-am—how long till I snap you off, mind?

Have you not tired yet of dancing on the dancer’s fingertip?
Have you not bowed your head at the feet of the Enchanter who inspires you?
How long shall I keep swaying to Maya’s rotations, mind?

Ask your mind: how long will you keep wandering? How long will you keep getting stuck in words? How long will you keep living in desire? Because your prayer too is desire; if there is asking in it, there is desire. And where desire is, what kind of prayer can there be? You have lived with the mind long enough; now live even without the mind. At least for a moment, be without the mind—be no-mind!

Kabir, Nanak, and Farid have called prayer the state of no-mind, where the mind is not. Where there is no knowledge, no words—there the mind is not. Where there is no desire, no craving—there the mind is not. And where the mind is gone, something ineffable happens. The very name of that ineffable is prayer.

And when your heart is filled with prayer, then God is near—nearer than the nearest. When your heart is suffused with prayer, that is God’s direct proof. There is no other proof beyond it. Everything else is a net of arguments.

Those who prove God by arguments are as uncomprehending as those who disprove God by arguments. God is neither proven nor disproven by logic. The theist and the atheist are entangled in futile disputes. Only the one who knows prayer knows God.

Narayan Das,
once, at one place, a few dogs
were eating leftovers
in great peace—
not barking,
not growling.
Surprised, I asked,
“Why don’t you fellows
fight among yourselves?
Why don’t you pounce on each other?”
Their leader said,
“We no longer fight among ourselves—
out of shame.
In this art,
we’ve been badly beaten
by human beings.”

Even dogs feel shame! Donkeys, too, lower their heads! A human being displays his greatest restlessness, pettiness, hollowness in politics. Politics is man’s naked state. Whatever a man is inside, in politics it all comes up to the surface—the whole trash heap!

Don’t imagine that those who aren’t in politics are much better than politicians. Their trash is just inside. They have their little politics. The husband is trying to dominate the wife, the wife is trying to dominate the husband—that’s their politics. They just don’t have a big ledger. A father pushes down his son; the son, too, invents tricks to push back at the father.

Even very small children become adept at politics! The little boy knows: make a racket, create an uproar, and you’ll get money for a film. The father’s first answer is always no. And if you accept that no, you’re finished. So kick up a fuss! Every son knows the limits of his father’s endurance. He keeps it up till the father’s capacity snaps. Finally patience ends, the father panics and says, “Here, take the money—get me off the hook! Go to hell if you want! Just get out of my sight.” The boy has played politics. He put pressure on the father—stamped his feet, jumped, tore a book, broke a slate—till the father saw this disturbance wasn’t going to stop.

Wives create disturbances. The day they want a sari, more plates break in the house, dishes slip, the children get a beating. In the end the husband understands that without a sari, there will be no peace. The day the husband comes home with a sari, with ice cream, that very day the wife understands: something’s fishy; there’s something black in the dal. Looks like there’s some affair with the typist. Otherwise, bringing home a sari all of a sudden—what does that mean? We bang our heads and die, and a sari doesn’t even come to mind; and whenever we mention a sari, a quarrel erupts. And today you walk in with a sari on your own!

Mulla Nasruddin always used to complain about his wife: she’s perpetually miserable. And when she’s miserable she eats my life. I sit in the tavern late at night because of this; I keep drinking because of this. I said to him, “Do this… Have you ever given your wife any love? Could she be tormented merely for lack of your love? Try this someday: buy a sari, take flowers, take ice cream, take sweets. Walk in and embrace her, right away, and praise her beauty at once. How long has it been since you praised her beauty?”

He said, “Thanks for the reminder! It’s been ages. Back in the early days, when we met on Bombay’s Chowpatty—along with bhel-puri—some words did come out… Now I don’t even remember what all I said in those days! And we’re still living the consequences of what I said then. Now you want me to start saying such things again?”

I said, “Just try it once. If you give love, this upheaval might quiet down.”

He said, “I’ll try it today.”

So he did… bought a sari, sweets, flowers, a bouquet, ice cream—and came home loaded. He opened the door; his wife was stunned. This had never happened! Mulla at once embraced her and said, “What are you? A piece of the moon!”

Wife stared, bewildered, then suddenly sat down and began beating her chest.
“Hey!” Mulla said, “What are you doing?”
She said, “What should I do? The maid hasn’t shown up since morning. Our son fell and broke three teeth. The daughter just returned from university—she says she’s pregnant. And now you come! How drunk are you? My life is hell!”

If a husband suddenly shows up with a sari and garlands, the wife will suspect he’s drunk, or something’s wrong, that he’s not in his senses—what’s the matter!

Everyone’s running little politics. In the office, the boss pushes his subordinates. The peon pushes the junior peon. The senior clerk pushes the junior clerk. The headmaster pushes the teachers. The teachers push the boys. The boys push those younger than themselves. Politics everywhere. If you look closely, it’s not only professional politicians who are political. From these small-time politicos, the big politicians are born. This is the training ground. Life is one long rehearsal. Those who become highly skilled in this craft go on to play the higher games; they then create a ruckus in state capitals—lay siege, sit in dharna, go on fasts, call strikes. The bigger the rabble-rouser, the sooner he reaches Delhi. And if a party comes to power, the most unruly ones have to be made cabinet ministers; you have to make them ministers. If you don’t, they will create trouble; if you don’t, they will engineer splits and smashing.

Party-hopping is the vandalism of the disgruntled—the ones who hoped for office and didn’t get it. And in this country there is no kind of loyalty. Intellectual or ideological loyalty never was here, nor is it today. There is no respect for thought in this country. We like to call ourselves highly spiritual people, but you’d be hard pressed to find anyone more materialist on earth than us. We are sheer materialists. Our whole way of thinking and understanding is materialistic. Our talk is very lofty. We’ve become very skilled at talk—only that; it’s just our knack. Under those lofty words, what we actually run is entirely different.

Those you take to be leaders, from whom you expect fidelity to ideas—your expectation is wrong. They are not leaders for the sake of ideas; they are leaders to rule, to own you, to lord it over you. Ideas and the rest are pretexts—mere slogans. If socialism is in the air, shout the slogan of socialism, because it will fetch votes. If something else is in the air, quickly go with the wind. The one who can read the direction of the wind—he is called a clever politician.

But I understand, Narayan Das: yes, they are ruining the country and will keep ruining it—because you, too, have no ideological fidelity. There is no thought. Without intelligence, where will thought come from? Does anyone think in this country? Does anyone live thoughtfully?

A woman got into a jeep, going on a picnic with seventeen or eighteen children. The driver had had a drink. One, he’d drunk; and two, he was an Indian driver! Indian drivers believe in absolute freedom: wherever there’s a gap, they slip through—neither left nor right; they are middle-path people. Didn’t Lord Buddha say Majjhima Nikaya—walk the middle way! So they drive right down the middle. He was going any which way. The woman was panicking, the children were tumbling, their heads getting bumped. Finally she said, “Brother, drive carefully!” The driver looked back and said, “Madam, are all these children yours?” She said, “Yes.” He said, “When you couldn’t keep your wits, why should I keep mine! First keep your own wits, then educate others.”

How many children you keep producing—have you any sense? And you say the country is being ruined. Such crowding! In Buddha’s time India’s population was twenty million; naturally people were happy. For twenty million, this land was abundant. Naturally, there was food, there was milk, there were provisions; no obstacle. Today the population is approaching seven hundred million. And the land is the same—actually less; large parts were cut away. If you add Pakistan’s and Bangladesh’s populations, it’s near nine hundred million. About fifty times the population, and the land the same!

And the soil’s fertility has kept declining—because you never cared. You thought: just spread cow-dung and all will be well. Your faith in cow-dung is so devout that if the country is filled with dung-deities, I wouldn’t be surprised. All sons of the cow, descendants of Mother Cow! You never paid attention to the earth—that if we take so much from her, we must return as much. In twenty-five hundred years, you have sucked the earth dry. Nothing is left; the soil has become barren. And the numbers keep rising.

In this mess, the politicians you send to power give assurances; they know they cannot fulfill them, and if you have any sense you, too, know they cannot fulfill them. It’s not even anyone’s personal fault; your problems are so large that they cannot be fulfilled. Whoever you send to power will make promises, and within four or six months you’ll feel, “This has gone wrong.” But then wait five years.

In those five years you’ll add another hundred million. After five years, the politician who promises will be in even deeper difficulty. But he wants power. He wants to enjoy office. He doesn’t really care about your problems—and you don’t either. No one cares about the problems. He has to promise, or you won’t vote. Whatever you say, he says “Yes.” Just as you say, he says, “Yes, we will do exactly that.” But once in office, he sees how vast the matter is—how can it be done? Where’s the possibility?

And if some politician tries to do something, you make him pay. The trouble you gave Indira for three years had only this cause: she tried to do something. She made an effort to stop your population growth. So you got angry—“we’re being forced,” “we’re being sterilized,” “they’re rounding us up and doing vasectomy.” Sterilization sank Indira. Now Indira too will have to think whether to pursue sterilization or not. And if sterilization doesn’t happen, your problems will grow every day. You stand on the edge of ruin—on the brink of suicide. And if she tries for sterilization again, you’ll give her trouble again.

So Morarji, in three years, did nothing—let the numbers rise merrily. Go on, enjoy! Let the nation multiply its little Krishnas! This is the land of little Krishnas. The little ones keep increasing—there’s neither milk nor a pot. Not even a pebble to throw. Morarji quietly… did nothing for three years. People approved of Morarji: at least he doesn’t stir things up—he’s a decent man. Indira became the villain because she tried to do something.

I would tell Indira: try again! And try harder! Because this country cannot be brought onto the straight path straightaway—its problems have become too crooked. Countries like America are content because they have two hundred million people and far more land than us. Russia is content—two hundred million people and far more land. How can we be content? Yet in America there is a concern: don’t have more than two children. No one does; no coercion needed.

We aren’t even fit for democracy yet. We don’t have the talent required to be worthy of democracy. Democracy means people are intelligent and thoughtful enough to be left free, knowing they themselves won’t act in harmful ways. But no—you keep creating problems, and those above can see nothing can really be solved; if not any problem, at least let’s solve our own. Life is just a few days; nothing will get solved here—only worsen—so at least let us live in a bungalow for these few days. Let us enjoy a little. We didn’t take a contract to fix the world!

The politician makes promises because he needs your vote. After he gets it, he has no concern for you. And if he does care, you won’t let him stay. There’s no end to this country’s foolishness. If the country is to change, only those can change it who are ready to go to the gallows, to take bullets. This country will kill them. I get abused all over the land—only because I say directly what needs to be said. But you want flattery. You want to be told you are great, very religious, supremely intelligent, the wisest on earth. Then you’re perfectly pleased.

But there is no bigger fool on earth than you today. And I don’t need your vote, so I don’t care.

You ask, Narayan Das, why I don’t say anything about party-hoppers?
What is there to say! You already know it all.

O dishonorable party-hopper!
A thousand times, shame!
I hear you’ve left yet another party,
did you smash your own fate or theirs?
People needlessly
doubt what kind of person you are—
but what can you do!
Your very samskaras are like this:
the moment you were born in the hospital
you leapt up
and scrambled onto the cot next to you.
There happened to be a nurse and doctor standing there—
otherwise you would have changed your very roots,
born to one, raised by another.
O lover of change!
Till yesterday you were a rock, unshakable;
today you’ve mixed with the pebbles of the road.
Leaving the poor donkeys of your party,
you’ve joined the fast-running horses.
But who can trust you—
leaving the horses, tomorrow you might join the mules.
You are a true lover of posts;
if even a mosquito were to say, “Come, here’s a chair,”
you would join the mosquitoes.
O righteous soul!
When did you read that Gita verse “Vasansi jirnani”?
In your whole life you read one useful thing,
and extracted this meaning from it:
instead of changing bodies or clothes,
you changed parties.
In your hunger for the chair,
you swallowed Krishna’s Gita whole.
O quick-change artist!
Surely, in solitude you must feel shame sometimes—
but what can she do, poor thing!
She bangs her head on the chair and goes away.
When you went to sleep you were over there,
when you woke up you were over here.
You are a spinning top—
no one can tell which way your mouth faces.
O supreme patriot!
For the nation’s good
how much hardship you’re enduring—
you neither sit calmly to drink nor to eat,
whenever one looks, you are running.
You are fulfilling a true national leader’s duty.
You have done so much for the country—
given your all to it.
My humble request: for the people,
do this one thing more—
quickly go and drown yourself in some filthy drain.

And what else is there to say about party-hoppers! What is there worth saying! They are falling into the drains themselves. Every day their prestige sinks further. In thirty years two things lost value in India—the rupee, and the leader. The rupee hasn’t fallen as much as the leader. The rupee still has some value; the leader has none. In thirty years they’ve made a mess of themselves. But you still fall for their words. The fault is yours.

A leader was giving a speech, full of fire. Without looking ahead, he kept talking, and in his enthusiasm he kept walking too—saying, “March on, immortal! March on, ageless! Mount your honor!” and with a thud he fell off the dais.

Mulla Nasruddin was in the crowd. He stood up and said, “Fall into the ditch, march on!”

What else will you do—they are falling with a thud anyway. There isn’t much more to say about them.

I’ve heard that after the recent elections, Morarji Desai was so downcast one day that he drank a bit too much. You know what he “drank”! When the high rose, in the dark he took his own hanging sherwani to be someone standing there and said—

“Mr. Chamatkar,
greetings again and again!
You are one of this nation’s seasoned rogues:
you offer your hand to men,
and give your company to the ladies.”

Hearing this, Chamatkar smiled
and said—
“When Bahuguna can switch parties,
Chaudhary sahab can practice guile,
and Fernandes can bolt—
then I too can slip that way.”

We said—
“There’s no answer to your swagger.
We’re ruined—
left neither of home nor ghat.
You’ve put us in such a fix:
ahead is a well,
behind a ravine,
and in between is ‘I’.”

Chamatkar said—
“You’re the ones fighting,
you get upset for no reason.
When Raj Narain can topple a government,
and Harijans can abandon the world and life,
then for our own safety,
we can break this miraculous pitcher on your head too.”

I said, “Stop this nonsense!”
He said, “Shall I open the prison gates?”
Before I could speak, he went on:
“What did you do in three years?
Swung your lathis in the dark,
dug up buried corpses,
shut your eyes to truth,
and kept pulling each other’s legs.”

I said—
“Hey, Chamatkar,
give me back my namaskar!
Know this: leg-pulling
is not part of politics,
it’s a limb of exercise.”

He said, “Son!
Then spend your whole life exercising.”

I said—
“Brother,
don’t fly into a temper.
Please tell me,
how did this two-thirds majority come?”

He said, “Five-rupees-a-kilo onions delivered it.”

I said, “What are you babbling?
Can onions make someone Prime Minister?
If that’s true,
we’ll tell Raj Narain—
he’ll grow onions on his face instead of a beard.
If that’s true, then now
mothers in temples will pray
not for sons, but for onions.
Our Indian yogis abroad
will no longer preach spirituality,
but ‘onion-ality.’
There will be no revolutions
or total revolutions—
only onion-farming.”

Hearing this, Chamatkar grew serious and said—
“Listen:
the reality is—
this country’s thinking has become onion-centric.
There’s a stench in people’s speech,
a stench in their thinking.
People have begun to prefer the stink,
and the whole environment has become fetid.
Brother,
where the present learns no lesson from the past,
the future weeps and weeps.
In such conditions, nothing happens—
only ‘miracles’.”

So leaders keep talking to you about miracles. They keep feeding you hope that a miracle will happen. There has never been a miracle, nor will there be. But your problems are so big that, to you, nothing except a miracle seems even comprehensible.

Even now, nothing is irretrievably lost. Things can still change. A new page can still be opened. This country needs less “spirituality” and far more science. It doesn’t need spinning wheels or khadi. It needs new technology and new industries. It should drop foolish talk of swadeshi and invite the world’s capital. The world has capital looking for places to be invested. India lacks capital but has ample space to invest it. Yet we block outside capital. We even banned poor Coca-Cola! We’ve become so fearful—so touch-me-not—that we’ve walled ourselves in.

We should assure the world: we have labor, facilities, the opportunity for development. The world has capital. They can be willing to invest in this country. Of all the American capital invested worldwide, only one percent is in India. That’s astonishing. At least fifty percent could come here. But we never let them feel assured. And here, too, we don’t let private enterprise grow; we’ve draped everything in the hollow blather of socialism.

Socialism is the final stage of capitalism. When capitalism produces enough capital that it can be distributed, then socialism has meaning. What do we have to distribute here? If you do distribute, it will be poverty—you have nothing else to share. Don’t talk of distributing yet—talk of producing. Socialism cannot produce; only capitalism can. Capitalism means the process of producing capital. When capital has been produced, then share it; then socialism is the natural outcome.

Russia has been socialist for sixty years and still isn’t rich—still thousands of miles behind America. What’s the secret of America’s prosperity? It’s simple: private enterprise is valued as much as possible. And America has invited capital from all over the world.

This country’s problems can be solved. There is no problem that cannot be solved. Three things matter.

First: the population must come down. Whoever has a little sense should become alert about having children. Even the slogan “two or three, that’s all” won’t do now. Those who can live without children should be honored, given every facility—priority in jobs, higher pay, income-tax relief. Right now it’s the opposite: the more children you have, the more tax breaks you get.

Second: emphasize private enterprise. Any industry that becomes nationalized is the one that gets ruined; it starts making losses. In private hands there’s profit; the moment it goes to the nation, the losses begin—because we don’t even have the notion of “nation.” The idea of a nation doesn’t arise here. This land has never been a nation; for centuries it wasn’t. Only after independence is this the first moment we’ve become one nation; otherwise we were fractured into pieces. And here every person is self-interested. As long as his interest is served, fine; the moment it isn’t, he doesn’t care.

I saw a man in a park, sitting and gouging the bench he was on with a knife. I said, “Brother, what are you doing?” He said, “Is it yours?” I said, “No, not mine—public.”

He said, “If it’s public, what’s the worry? If it’s public, gouge it with a knife—does it belong to anyone’s father?”

It’s true—it belongs to no one’s father. So why worry? Public property has no respect here. We have no concept of the public. That’s why, in this country, the more we value private enterprise, the more useful it will be.

Third: we must reassure the world that if you invest your capital here, it won’t be destroyed. We won’t do such petty things as seizing Coca-Cola, or banning this firm or that—no such nonsense. Your capital will be safe.

But our life seems to hang on this: “they must not profit.” We worry less about how much we’ll gain and more about them not gaining. Yes, they will earn something. But if they earn something, we will earn a lot.

The very mode of thinking in this country has gone wrong. We care more that no one should earn off us—even if we ourselves remain in loincloths.

They will certainly earn—and then we, too, will earn. The country should invite the world’s capital. And the country needs a fidelity to thought. Thinking must be born. If you develop fidelity to thought, so will your leaders. Your leaders are merely your flags. They are as you are.

And the fun is, these party-hoppers you ask about, Narayan Das—you still keep voting for them! They don’t even get a thrashing! No one picks them up and flings them out. They hop from here to there and still remain top leaders—still hold posts.

Even now Jagjivan Ram is scheming how to get back into office. He has held posts for forty years. In the name of Harijans, he has held office. Which Harijan has benefited in these forty years—you can’t say. And for forty years the only trick has been: somehow stay in office. When it looked like Indira would lose, he bolted and joined the Janata Party. Now that Janata has lost, he’s left Janata too. He was busy trying to become Prime Minister of Janata; now that he’s lost, suddenly Janata is full of flaws. Now he’s busy seeing which door might open so he can reach some post again—cutting deals.

There are many from the tanner-cobbler community in this country, but none like Jagjivan Ram—he’s the cobbler of cobblers. What else is this but cobbling? Still, it will go on. He’ll get a post again, and you’ll start addressing him as “Babu-ji!” And that’s apt in a way—“Babu” means one from whom “boo”—a stink—arises; “boo-sahit.” “Babu” is not an honorific; it’s a taunt. If you want to honor someone, don’t call him Babu. If you want to insult him, call him Babu—and add “ji” so he doesn’t mind.

That’s all for today.