The Bhagavad Gita

Manish Shrivastava
Bhopal, Apr 22 (PTI)

Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan''s directive to introduce ''Gita Saar'' in school curriculum has not gone down well, with the main Opposition Congress terming it as an attempt to "saffronise" the education system in the state.
Chouhan while reviewing the progress of the School Education Department yesterday directed officials to include ''Gita Saar'' from the Hindu holy epic Bhagvad Gita besides stories of valour of the freedom fighters like Tantya Bheel and Nayak Shankar Shah Raghunath Shah.
''Gita Saar'' is a condensed form of the teachings in the Bhagavad Gita.
"The main agenda behind the move is to saffronise the education system in the state. Schools are not meant for doing ''havans'' and ''Gita paath'' and we will oppose the move vociferously in the entire state," newly appointed Leader of Opposition in Madhya Pradesh Assembly, Ajay Singh told PTI.
The Christian community also seemed to be not pleased with the move.
Archbishop of Bhopal, Father Leo Cornelio said, "The directives to introduce Gita Saar in the school curriculum is again an unnecessary interference on the part of the state government in the education system."
"We are a secular country with mutli-religion culture. Instead, it would have been better if the government encompasses all good things of every religion in a moral science book and introduce them in school curricula for the development of a holistic society," he added.
Endorsing the view, Congress MLA Arif Aqueel said now that the countdown for the BJP rule in the state has begun, it has again indulged in doing all those things which suits its agenda.
"Why just Gita and why do they not include teachings of other religions too. This proves that they are not secular," he said.
Earlier also they introduced Surya Namaskar in the system as part of their saffron agenda, the Congress leader pointed out.
Following opposition from minority institutions, participation in the Surya Namaskar (Sun Salutation exercise) was made voluntary by the government.
The minority community leaders opposed it on religious grounds while the Opposition dismissed the event as a case of misplaced priorities.
The Catholic Church went to the Madhya Pradesh High Court bringing to its notice that the order of the state government violates Section 25 to 30 of the Fundamental Rights of the Constitution under which the minority institutions are governed.

The Pseudo Secular brigade is at it again.
Anything which the BJP does is criticized as Saffronisation.
The Bhagavad Gita is a book which has been praised by people of all religion.
It has been praised by the father of the nation who the pseudo-secular brigade pay an annual homage on 2nd October every year and then throw him to the dustbin.
It is praised by the head of the clan to whom all congressmen swear, i.e J L Nehru and yet they find fault with the Gita
It has been praised by Albert Einstein and former Prime Minister of Canada and a host of other national and international figures. Some names with what they stated are given below.

For thousands of years, the Bhagavad Gita has inspired millions of readers. Here’s what some of the greats have to say in praise of this venerable scripture.
"When I read the Bhagavad-Gita and reflect about how God created this universe everything else seems so superfluous." ~ Albert Einstein
"The Bhagavad-Gita has a profound influence on the spirit of mankind by its devotion to God which is manifested by actions." ~ Dr. Albert Schweizer
"The Bhagavad-Gita is the most systematic statement of spiritual evolution of endowing
value to mankind. It is one of the most clear and comprehensive summaries of perennial philosophy ever revealed; hence its enduring value is subject not only to India but to all of humanity." ~ Aldous Huxley
"The Bhagavad-Gita is a true scripture of the human race a living creation rather than a book, with a new message for every age and a new meaning for every civilization." ~ Rishi Aurobindo
"The idea that man is like unto an inverted tree seems to have been current in by gone ages. The link with Vedic conceptions is provided by Plato in his Timaeus in which it states..." behold we are not an earthly but a heavenly plant." ~ Carl Jung
"In the morning I bathe my intellect in the stupendous and cosmogonal philosophy of the Bhagavad-Gita, in comparison with which our modern world and its literature seems puny and trivial." ~ Henry David Thoreau
"The marvel of the Bhagavad-Gita is its truly beautiful revelation of lifes wisdom which enables philosophy to blossom into religion." ~ Herman Hesse
"The Bhagavad-Gita calls on humanity to dedicate body, mind and soul to pure duty and not to become mental voluptuaries at the mercy of random desires and undisciplined impulses."
"When doubts haunt me, when disappointments stare me in the face, and I see not one ray of hope on the horizon, I turn to Bhagavad-Gita and find a verse to comfort me; and I immediately begin to smile in the midst of overwhelming sorrow. Those who meditate on the Gita will derive fresh joy and new meanings from it every day."
~ Mahatma Gandhi
"The Bhagavad-Gita deals essentially with the spiritual foundation of human existence. It is a call of action to meet the obligations and duties of life; yet keeping in view the spiritual nature and grander purpose of the universe." ~ Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru
"I owed a magnificent day to the Bhagavad-Gita. It was the first of books; it was as if an empire spoke to us, nothing small or unworthy, but large, serene, consistent, the voice of an old intelligence which in another age and climate had pondered and thus disposed of the same questions which exercise us."
"The Bhagavad-Gita is an empire of thought and in its philosophical teachings Krishna has all the attributes of the full-fledged montheistic deity and at the same time the attributes of the Upanisadic absolute." ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson
"In order to approach a creation as sublime as the Bhagavad-Gita with full understanding it is necessary to attune our soul to it." ~ Rudolph Steiner
"From a clear knowledge of the Bhagavad-Gita all the goals of human existence become fulfilled. Bhagavad-Gita is the manifest quintessence of all the teachings of the Vedic scriptures." ~ Adi Sankara
"The Bhagavad-Gita is not seperate from the Vaisnava philosophy and the Srimad Bhagavatam fully reveals the true import of this doctrine which is transmigation of the soul. On perusal of the first chapter of Bhagavad-Gita one may think that they are advised to engage in warfare. When the second chapter has been read it can be clearly understood that knowledge and the soul is the ultimate goal to be attained. On studying the third chapter it is apparent that acts of righteousness are also of high priority. If we continue and patiently take the time to complete the Bhagavad-Gita and try to ascertain the truth of its closing chapter we can see that the ultimate conclusion is to relinquish all the conceptualized ideas of religion which we possess and fully surrender directly unto the Supreme Lord." ~ Swami Prabhupada
"The secret of karma yoga which is to perform actions without any fruitive desires is taught by Lord Krishna in the Bhagavad-Gita." ~ Vivekananda

Another objection which this pseudo-secularist brigade is the Suryanamashkar.
The physical base of the surya namashkar links together twelve asanas in a dynamically performed series. These asanas are ordered so that they alternately stretch the spine backwards and forwards. When performed in the usual way, each asana is moved into with alternate inhalation and exhalation (except for the sixth asana where the breath is held in external suspension). A full round of Surya namaskara is considered to be two sets of the twelve poses with a change in the second set to moving the opposite leg first through the series.
Proponents of the use of Surya namaskara as part of the modern yoga tradition prefer to perform it at sunrise, which the orthodox consider to be the most 'spiritually favorable' time of the day.
The sun as we know is the source of all life on this Earth. We have not seen God but we can feel His powers through the sun. Our health conscious scientists say our body requires vitamin D which we get in ample proportion from the sun. Hence these asanas are performed facing the sun.
Where does religion come in this?
Our pseudo-secularists will raise the saffron boogie just to divide the population for their vote banks.