Udio Pankh Pasar #2

That’s why I say, Yash: you have asked the question, but whether you will be able to digest my answer—that is doubtful. I too am opposed to rape, but for different reasons. For the rape that goes on in the world, your religious leaders are responsible. Arya Samajis, Christians, Jains, Buddhists, Hindus—all stand behind this mischief. These fools have handed you the distorted condition of humanity we see today. Over centuries they have piled up so many arguments, and you have heard them so often, that you have stopped rethinking altogether.
In Bastar there has never been a rape. The British noted in their reports that in Bastar no incidence of rape has ever been recorded—throughout their entire period there. In Bastar rape does not occur; there has simply been no cause for it. The matter ends there. Life became easy, natural.

Only direct experience can free you from this stupidity; otherwise it is very difficult. Animals do not rape, because they are free—free to relate to one another. Among men and women this trouble arises. It is not natural or animal; it is religious. Don’t call it “bestial,” Yash Kohli—call it religious, cultural. This downfall is religious and cultural. It is the legacy bequeathed by your so‑called spiritual leaders. The burden you are carrying is the result of your centuries‑old, rotten tradition. And it is rotting you; it is killing you.

We can be free of it. In fact, now it should be even easier, because in the ghotul there was still a risk. Yet it is astonishing that it never happened there either: in the ghotul boys and girls had sexual relations, and yet never once did a girl become pregnant. That too is surprising. Why did no girl get pregnant? This deserves deep research by psychologists—it should have happened.

My own view is that since neither the young men wished to become fathers nor the young women wished yet to become mothers, their psychology itself created a resistance; their psychology was not consenting. So there were bodily relations, but because their psychology ran counter—they did not want to become parents yet, they only wanted to pass through experience—pregnancy could not occur.

This needs investigation: is it psychologically possible that if the mind is not consenting, a woman cannot become pregnant? If the mind refuses inwardly to conceive… But perhaps it will be very hard now to create such a mind, because the minds we have created teach every girl that she must become a mother. The marriage is not yet over and we start waiting: when will she become a mother, when will he become a father? If two or three years pass without children, the village starts talking—what’s the matter, something is wrong. People begin to raise suspicious eyebrows. People snicker: perhaps there’s some defect in the boy; why aren’t children being born? Children must be born.

We have created a psychology that from the moment of marriage there must be children. Because of this foolishness, children start coming quickly. Otherwise even psychologically there can be birth control. The centuries‑old experiment of the ghotul in Bastar is proof.

But perhaps now changing the psychology won’t be so easy. These are ancient conditionings. Still, there is no need to rely on that now. Science has given us means. So stop the madness of keeping boys and girls far apart. And we nourish other stupidities too. We give great value to a “virgin girl.” Why? What is there in a virgin girl? Yet that obsession still rides our minds. So we “protect” girls, don’t let them meet and mingle. If you lock girls away, you break their spine; you make them weak.

From childhood we start teaching girls: you are a girl. If girls climb trees, we stop them—that’s not for girls. If girls want to swim in the river, we don’t let them. If they want to climb a hill, we won’t allow it—“that is not your work.” Your work is to play with dolls, arrange their weddings, and so on. From the beginning: you must become a wife, a mother. So little girls sit feeding their dolls milk. There is no milk, no breasts, nothing—yet the little game of breastfeeding goes on. Little girls conduct weddings.

Two children knocked at a door—a little girl about five, a little boy about six, all decked up. They had been playing “wedding.” The housewife opened the door and saw them standing there, the girl dressed like a bride, the boy like a groom. “Come in, come in!” She joined their play. “Be seated! When was the wedding?” They told her it had just happened, and thought they’d drop by to inform her. She served them tea and snacks. Then suddenly the girl said, “We must go now.” The housewife said, “What’s the hurry?” The girl said, “Nothing—my husband has peed in his pajamas.” The game begins—and then it goes on for life.

We won’t let girls climb trees or horses. And then we expect, Yash, that girls will somehow protect themselves. How will they? Let boys and girls grow up as equals. Drop this nonsense about who is a boy and who is a girl. Let them grow equally, play together, grow up together. Let them grapple together in kabaddi, kho‑kho, football, volleyball.

But is there any end to our follies? News just came from Pakistan that Ayub Khan has decreed that women there may not participate in sports unless they wear salwar‑kameez, because if they wear shorts their thighs are exposed. So let them be exposed—what is going to happen because thighs show? People will look at their thighs? Let them look. Once they’ve seen, the urge to look will subside.

In Queen Victoria’s time in England, women wore skirts so long their feet could not be seen—the hem had to touch the ground. The very rich had maids carry the skirts, because they were so large they trailed along two feet on the ground. Bertrand Russell wrote that if at that time a woman’s toes were glimpsed, the mind filled with sexual arousal. Of course it would. But now? Do your minds grow inflamed at the sight of women’s toes today? What is repeatedly seen loses its savor.

But Pakistan has decided that even for tennis women must wear salwar‑kameez. What tennis could they play like that? And a scarf too must be worn, otherwise someone might glimpse the breasts moving! And another arrangement: men cannot be spectators at women’s events. This is the twentieth century! Women may play only with women. So Pakistan’s women will not be able to participate in the Olympics and such.

What stupidity is this? Yet such stupidity prevails. It is only their great kindness they didn’t decree that women must play hockey in burqas—otherwise what fun that would be! If even a single goal happened, call it a miracle—only by accident. Like loosing an arrow in the dark and it happens to hit. If it hits, fine; otherwise just luck. And there is no protest in Pakistan, because this suits the Quran perfectly: women must remain hidden. It is “very religious.”

Your religion is the root of your troubles. What you call religion is more disease than remedy; less a cure and more the cause. I want rape to end. But there is only one way for rape to end: bring men and women closer; remove the distance; let them become familiar with each other. These men who shove women around—those shoves will stop. If men and women bathe naked together at swimming pools and rivers, who would shove whom, and why? When you know a woman’s body, why would you shove? These shoves are a way to become acquainted with the female body—a wrong way, because you left no right way. Someone will jostle a woman in a crowd—this itself proves you have left no easy and legitimate way to be near women. Provide natural ways and these things will end.

But we never look to the roots of our illness. The whole world talks of abolishing prostitution. Prostitution will only end if your notions of marriage change; otherwise it cannot. As long as you forcibly bind two people—a man and a woman—into marriage, prostitutes will remain. Prostitutes are the offspring of marriage. I too want prostitution to end, because it is degrading that a woman must sell her body. But what to do? If some people are forced to remain together—for the children, family, social status, parents; or they can’t muster the courage to separate; or the law gives no opportunity; or separation is too costly—then what? If there is no joy left in this woman, he will seek another woman. He will buy a woman’s body. Will that bring fulfillment? It will not. So he seeks another.

And in India only women become prostitutes; you’ll be surprised to know that in Western countries, where women are becoming independent and demanding equality in all directions, male prostitutes have also appeared. One shouldn’t call them “prostitutes” in the feminine sense; rather “prostitutes” in the masculine. If women sell their bodies, why shouldn’t men’s bodies be bought? In London men now stand on the streets. Women stop their cars to see whether they’re worth buying, and just as female prostitutes display their bodies and make crude, obscene gestures, so do the men. They too stand ready to be bought, if only someone will buy them. You have turned human beings into marketable goods. But who is responsible?

Ordinarily, Yash Kohli, you and most people think it is man’s animality. No—it is his so‑called religiosity.

Let me read your question again, so you can consider each point. You asked: “How to eradicate violation of chastity within the family?”

A husband unsatisfied by his wife is dangerous; he may molest his own daughter. But if he is fulfilled with his wife, it is unthinkable—beyond imagination—that he would even consider such a relation. A wife unsatisfied with her husband, with no way to go outside, will take up with her devar. Have you noticed the word devar? It practically means “second husband.” Devar: the second husband! If the first doesn’t work out, the second will do. That’s why the devar may make obscene jokes with his bhabhi—we’ve given him this license. He’s the number two husband; not far removed—only a matter of seniority. If there’s no devar at home, then the servants. If there are no servants, you are forcing people to start forging relations within the family. Women cannot go out; if they go out it is dangerous, shameful. Then mischief will begin in the home. A mother may end up with her son—such reports appear daily in the newspapers. A father, a mother… These are vulgar, inhuman. But I won’t call them bestial. I will only say your religions and your social notions are responsible.

Two people—a man and a woman—should have the right to remain together only so long as love is alive. The moment the lamp of love goes out, they should have just as much ease in separating as they had in coming together. The truth is, marriage should be difficult and divorce easy. Today marriage is easy and divorce very difficult. If someone wants to marry, we immediately start the band and drums; if someone wants a divorce, everyone opposes them. The one seeking divorce is wrong. It should be the other way: if someone wants to marry, we should say, “Wait a year or two—what’s the hurry? Live together for a year or two, meet, mingle, live side by side, get to know one another.” Life is spoiled by tiny things, not by big things. Romance cannot sustain life; life is not a poem. Life is stark reality.

A young woman—from a very wealthy family—was in love with a boy from a poor family. She asked me, “What should I do? My father is against it, my mother is against it.” I said, “I am not against it, but I will say: first go live with him for a few days.” She asked, “What will that do?” I said, “You will see a few things clearly. Life turns on small things. You are used to a grand way of living. This boy’s house doesn’t even have a bathroom. The ‘bathroom’ is the river; bathing is the river. Are you prepared to get up at five in the morning and go outside the village? Have you ever risen at five?” She said, “I never get up before eight.” I said, “If you go to the river after eight, you won’t come back alive. And can you bathe in the river?” She said, “I need hot water.” Where will hot water come from in the river? In India even heating a bucket of water is a feat—how will you heat a whole river? That’s why Buddha said: be a lamp unto yourself—because Indian electricity is utterly unreliable; who knows when it will come and when it will go! Seers do see ahead—two and a half thousand years ago he had already seen what Indian power supply would be like.

She said, “I never thought about bathrooms. But you… I’m talking of love, and you bring up bathrooms.” I said, “Love and such is talk; at the crucial moment the bathroom is the issue. Do you know how to cook?” She said, “Not at all.” I said, “Then hear my experience. I made tea once in my life—and from that experience I agreed with Buddha that life is suffering. The stove wouldn’t light; tears streamed from my eyes; only smoke. The tea never got made. I never tried again. I decided instead to put all my energy into liberation from the cycle of birth and death—because if I had to return, who knows, I might have to make tea again.” “Have you ever made tea? At home the waiter brings everything to you. Think through these things. Come back in seven days.” Seven days later she returned and said, “I’ve ended it—you were right; I cannot do these things.”

Love is not made of poetry; life is reality. If man could live on poetry it would be easy. But life is lived by reality.

And what is our reality? We have made women utterly crippled. In crippling them we found advantage: they became dependent on men. This gave great satisfaction to men’s egos. We call women “the weaker sex”! Men feel no shame calling women weak—and they well know who rules at home. Outside they strut with puffed chests; inside, look—tail tucked! And still they call women weak.

Mulla Nasruddin and his wife were quarreling—about who was the master of the house. “I’ll show you who,” said the wife, and came after him with a rolling pin. Mulla fled and dived under the bed. The wife was fat and sturdy, so she couldn’t get under. That was his only refuge—whenever danger grew, under the bed, beyond her reach. He sat there cross‑legged. “Come out!” she said. “I will not,” said the Mulla. “I am my own master! Who can make me come out? Do what you like!” Just then a guest knocked. “Come out, quick!” said the wife. “Let him come,” said Mulla. “Today let guests also learn who is master. Put down that rolling pin and rub your nose on the floor, then I’ll come out. Otherwise let the guests come, and call in the neighbors too—let it be made public once and for all, decided this way or that, who is master of the house.” Such is “mastery”—hiding under the bed! And calling women weak!

Every man knows women are stronger. Women outlive men by five years on average. Women fall ill less. Women go insane less. Women commit suicide less. Men break at a touch: a small bankruptcy—and finished; straightaway they think of dying. Lose an election—start buying rope to hang themselves. Women have greater resilience—how else to carry a child in the womb for nine months? Imagine a man carrying a child nine months! Forget nine months—hold a baby in your arms for nine hours; he will make you remember your mother’s milk!

Nasruddin took his little son out for a stroll in a small buggy. Winter day, the boy screaming and crying. “Nasruddin, keep calm! Be patient,” he kept saying. A lady nearby heard him. “What a sweet child! And how patient you are,” she said, placing her hand on the child’s head: “Nasruddin, dear, be quiet now.” “Madam, you misunderstand,” said Nasruddin. “Nasruddin is not his name—Nasruddin is me! I am telling myself: ‘Nasruddin, keep calm, keep calm.’ My heart wants to wring the little devil’s neck!”

Spend a night with your own baby—either you’ll jump out the window or you’ll wring the baby’s neck. And you call women “weak”! You certainly tried to make them so, but you failed. From the outside you crippled them, so their entire strength turned upon you.

Give women a chance. Let their lives unfold in their full expanse. But your jealousy, your ego, your pride are eating you alive. Let women expand in life. Yet you are seized by this panic—lest their “chastity” be violated! Out of that fear you lock them away. Often your very measures become the causes of the trouble. If women are out and free, engaged in all kinds of work, present everywhere—who has the time or urge to violate anyone? But women are hard to encounter. And when, rarely, one meets a woman alone by chance, then a man thinks it would be foolish to miss the opportunity—who knows if it will come again! Then the sayings of the sages pop into mind: “Do tomorrow’s work today, today’s work now; in a moment the world may end—when will you do it again?” So he thinks, do it now; do whatever you want now; who knows if this chance will ever come again.

This false partition between men and women—that is what has created the tumult. Tear it down. Remove it completely. I am not saying 100 percent of incidents will end; 99 percent will. Yes, one percent will still occur—don’t give that the weight you give it now. There is no such enormous “value” here. In this so‑called violation of chastity—what exactly is violated? Why such a din? Why pile so much moral weight upon sexuality? What is really ruined?

One of my sannyasins, Kamal, was in Iran. And you see the condition of Iran today—if any country in the world is in the grip of madness now, it is Iran. There is no one as crazed as Ayatollah Khomeini. Kamal went with her lover to bathe at a secluded waterfall. They were Americans, so they undressed and were bathing; no one else was there. Four Iranians came, tied her lover to a tree with a rope, and raped her. They went to the police. “We will catch them,” said the police. “If they are caught, you’ll have to testify in court. Your mere statement that they raped you is enough for all four to be hanged.” In Iran today people are chopped like radishes.

Kamal sent me a telegram: What should I do? Should I have four men executed? Granted they harmed me—but the matter has come and gone. What of mine is spoiled? Should I have four men killed? I wrote back: Do what feels right to you—on this I leave the decision to you. If I tell you to forgive, later you might regret it. If I tell you to have them hanged, later you might think: four men killed for a small thing that has no real value at all. Decide yourself.

I was very happy. When she returned, she denied it in court. She said, no, no rape happened to me. When she came, I asked her. She said, “I am so delighted that I could forgive—because, really, what was there in it?” What gets shattered in a “violation of chastity”? If someone holds your hand, what is ruined? Even with vaginal penetration—what is ruined? At most, take a douche and clean yourself. Don’t give it excessive value. You are burdening sexuality with absurd weight. Life has more important things.

I blessed her. “I am pleased—you decided rightly. The value of four human lives is far greater.” I asked, “What happened to them?” “Their faces were worth seeing,” she said. “Tears streamed from their eyes. When we left the court, all four touched my feet and said, ‘Forgive us. We were fools; we made a mistake. We never imagined this. We came certain that now it is death—because in Iran a woman’s word is enough.’”

What do you say—did Kamal do right or not? Should four men be killed? Granted they are foolish, stupid, and granted they erred. But are they solely responsible? Behind them stands the hand of thousands of ayatollahs. The very Ayatollah who would have them hanged—his doctrines and teachings have produced this result.

Something strange is afoot in this world: those who are the greatest cause of trouble are the ones we worship. I do not see as others do.

Ninety‑nine percent of “violations of chastity” will end; one percent will remain, because there will always be a few deranged people. They can be treated psychologically. We should accept as much—man is not perfect; some errors and lapses will occur. But lapses are lapses—don’t give them so much value that life seems built solely upon them. That value itself creates an obstacle.

Now you say, “Condemn the violator, not the one whose chastity is violated.” Condemn no one. Condemn the system—the arrangement in which violators are produced and in which the violated are produced. Condemn the conditioning, the culture. You are not raising that point, Yash Kohli—you want a verdict between the two.

Condemn neither. In a sense both are innocent. What fault is theirs? One is a negative participant; the other, a positive participant—but both are innocent. The guilty party is the system.

You ask, “In India the victim is condemned, while the aggressor carries on unhindered.” It is so the world over, because men have been the aggressors everywhere—and men wrote the scriptures; they made the rules, the codes. They left no place for women. “Women are the gateway to hell!” And you still worship people like Tulsidas. “Dhol, peasant, shudra, animal, woman—fit only for beating!”

Why is Baba Tulsidas so angry at women? The truth is, it was his wife who gave him awakening. He himself was sex‑crazed. His wife had gone to her parents’ home; he could not restrain himself. He must have been highly “attained”! He reached there in the rains; the river was in spate—he crossed it clinging to a corpse, thinking it was a log. Then he climbed up the back of the house by grabbing a snake, thinking it a rope. Babas always climb houses from the back! Whether rope or snake—what’s the difference when you’re in ecstasy! His wife startled him awake: “What are you doing? If only you had such love for Ram as you have for me, you’d attain everything!” Stung, he turned back. He has been taking revenge for that blow ever since. The woman who showed him the path to heaven—he calls her the gateway to hell, and lumps her with drums, peasants, shudras, and animals, to be beaten. The beating his wife gave him that day—its wound sits deep.

Your rishis and sages explain: woman is the gate to hell. Why should she be? But their minds are ensnared by women. They sit tending their sacred fires, fingering their rosaries—inside, lust seethes. They are frightened, anxious, disturbed. Out of fear—fear of their own inner turmoil—they abuse women. And these very men wrote your scriptures and rules; they sit astride your chest. That is why the aggressor is excused—because the aggressor is male and the victim female.

Unless you overturn this whole ancient tradition—throw this garbage into the fire at once, make a holi of it, cut yourself loose from the past, clean your mind once and for all—obstacles will remain, things will never become clear. But they don’t become clear, because these are the people who manufactured your thoughts. On the tracks they laid your trains of thought run back and forth.

What a spectacle: you call Yudhishthira “Dharmaraj”—lord of righteousness! He gambles—even stakes a woman—and still he is Dharmaraj. You abuse Duryodhana and call Yudhishthira Dharmaraj—because Yudhishthira won and Duryodhana lost. The winner writes the rules; how can the loser? So he is Dharmaraj. Fine “righteousness”! Five brothers share one woman—and because they won, that divided woman is counted among the five great virgins. Do whatever you please—whoever holds the stick owns the buffalo.

Men hold the stick—wealth, office, prestige. So they do as they like. Hence the aggressor is praised—or at least ignored—and the one assaulted is blamed. The woman is abused. But there are many facets.

When a woman becomes sati with her husband, you honor her. But no man ever became a “sata.” Centuries have passed—so many satis—no man once felt the urge to become a sata. And men build shrines to satis. They mount pageants. In Bombay there is a band of crazies—I see it in the papers—pageants of “Dhadhan Sati”! I don’t know which madmen keep staging pageants in that name. Every few days some commotion in the name of Dhadhan Sati! And women will devoutly listen to the preaching that when the husband dies the wife should die too. Men taught women: alive you are ours; dead you are ours. Men feared: if we die, who knows—she may love someone else. The property must remain under full lock! So if we die, the wife must die with us. But why should a man die? He is the owner!

We call a woman “property.” Even now we say “stri‑sampatti”—women‑and‑property. Have you ever called a man “property”? Even now, at a girl’s wedding, we say “kanyadaan”—the gift of a maiden. A gift! Is a girl a thing you donate? No shame in saying kanyadaan? But that is our notion. This society is organized by men. Till now we have given no respect to women. And if we are to give respect, we must transform our entire moral assumptions and codes.

That very work—that great work—I am doing here. That is why I am abused so much. Perhaps no one else in this country is abused as much as I am. I expect it; I know it is natural. It must be so.

You say, “The woman bears mute suffering.” You taught her to be mute. Where do you let her speak? You stole her voice. First you forbade her the Vedas. You deprived her of the right to worship, to perform yajna.

Just yesterday there was news: Saudi Arabia has decreed that no woman may go abroad for education. Is this the twentieth century or the time of Father Adam? Women may not go abroad for study—why? Because it is dangerous. When they return from education abroad, they become vocal—they gain a voice. Even when you allow women education, it is not so they may find their voice—it is so they may find a “good” groom: an M.A. to snare a collector, commissioner, doctor, or engineer. The total value of a woman’s education is that her certificate helps catch a good husband; nothing more. So what subjects do you let women study? Those of no use in life.

I was a professor of philosophy. I was amazed to see that most of the students in philosophy were girls! I asked, what’s going on? Where are the boys? Boys study science and mathematics. What will girls do with math and science—they’re not going to work in the world. They study philosophy—which is utterly useless, has no practical value. Fan the stove and perform metaphysical speculation. And in old philosophy such “great” questions as: does the pot hold the ghee or does the ghee hold the pot? Fan the stove and diligently examine whether the pot holds the ghee or the ghee the pot. And what else is there to do! Ponder mysteries—how does syrup get inside the jalebi; how does a chapati puff up when both sides are sealed, where does the air enter? Lofty talk, airy talk! Think “spiritual” thoughts!

Girls study philosophy. Girls study poetics. Girls study languages. Useless subjects, where no one else goes! They need the certificate. Department heads in philosophy must give girls good marks—because if the girls stop coming, their trade is finished; their livelihood depends on them.

You took away their voice. You taught for centuries that the husband is master, you are the maid. Do maids have the right to speak? They must say “Yes, sir”—whatever the husband says is right. What stories you invented: that the true pativratas were those who, when their husbands said, “Carry me to the prostitute’s house,” hoisted them on their shoulders and delivered them there! These were true wives! While if the husband hears his wife talking and laughing with the neighbor, he will cut off her head.

In China there has been a rule: if a husband kills his wife, no case can be brought in court—because the wife is his property. If someone smashes his own chair or burns his car, what case is there? If someone breaks his fan and throws it away, what case? Likewise, the wife. There have been many societies where when a guest comes, the wife is given to him for the night. Guests must be honored! A guest is a god—and you know the gods’ business. Perhaps the god came precisely because the wife is beautiful, and a god must be fully honored. How will the god sleep alone? Give the wife. And wives have done this too.

You took away their voice. You must give them voice in every direction. That can happen only when you gather the courage to accept that ninety‑nine percent of your inherited notions are inhuman. However many great rishis and sages supported them, their support has no value. Neither those rishis nor those doctrines have any value. Whether written in the Vedas or the Ramayana—no difference. What matters is not where it is written. We need a re‑thinking.

You say, “For this reason she is deprived even of enjoying marital bliss with her husband.” Has anyone ever enjoyed marital bliss? What are you talking about, Yash Kohli! Marriage is an arrangement for suffering. If you want joy, remain unmarried.

Mulla Nasruddin suddenly converted one day. I heard and went to see him. He was sitting in the courtyard—head shaved, robed in yellow, cross‑legged. “I hear you have changed your religion,” I said. He slowly opened his eyes. “Yes,” he said, “you heard right. I am now a Buddhist.” “I could tell from your look,” I said, “but tell me—who inspired you? Who is your guru?” “Guru?” said Mulla. “Not one—two! One is my mother and the other my wife—each a greater guru than the other. By their grace I gained faith in the Buddha’s words.” “I don’t follow,” I said. “Don’t give me riddles. Your mother is a staunch Muslim and your wife a staunch Parsi. Why would they inspire you to adopt Buddhism?” “It’s simple,” said Mulla. “These two witches together have brought me to such a pass that the First Noble Truth is now clear—clear and experienced: life is suffering, one hundred percent suffering. The Second Noble Truth too is clear and experienced: there are two causes of suffering—one, the mother; two, the wife. Between them I am being crushed, dying, rotting. God could not help me; the Quran says He is all‑compassionate—utterly false. The Buddha spoke the truth: there is no God. For all these reasons my faith in God collapsed, and I was initiated into Buddhism.” “You speak to the point,” I said, “but why don’t you mention the Third and Fourth Noble Truths? The Buddha said there is a way to end suffering, and there is a state beyond suffering.” “You know me,” said the Mulla. “I’m a common man. I’ve managed to follow two truths—isn’t that enough? The other two are beyond my current capacity.” “And about God—not existing—are you fully convinced, or only halfway?” “On that I agree with the Buddha a full hundred percent,” said Mulla, puffing his chest. “There is no Creator—everything runs by its own law. Dharma is all. Dhammam sharanam gachhami! There is no God—and Mohammed is his only prophet.”

Married life cannot be a happy life, because we have not yet given human beings the conditions to love. We have not created an arrangement in which the flowers of love can blossom. If marriage comes out of love, joy is possible. We have done the opposite: we want love to come out of marriage. That cannot be. And that is what we have been doing. Marriage does not yield love; it yields only arrangement, security. Once in a while some exceptional case may occur—don’t mistake that for the rule. The rule stands, not broken.

Love is needed on this earth—and for love, a great revolution is needed. I am calling for that revolution. From love, let marriage arise—or not arise; it does not matter. Whatever arises out of love will be auspicious. But to live in love means to live in insecurity. And we are all security‑hungry. That is why we avoid the trouble of love and choose the shelter of marriage. For this reason we agreed with the rishis and sages: they gave us arrangement and security.

Only those people can agree with me, Yash Kohli, who have courage, daring—the audacity to experiment with life, to stake life itself. Then all these things can be transformed. But you must go to the roots. Don’t prune leaves. The leaves are symptoms. If you seek a solution you must go to the roots. Until the roots are cut, you may apply paint on the surface, but it will wash off. The first rain will strip all the color—and things will be as they were.

Enough for today.