Kathmandu, Feb 18 (Inditop.com) During his lifetime he had wished to visit Nepal and Tibet twice but failed to do so. But now, in his 148th birth anniversary year, Swami Vivekananda, one of India’s most progressive monks who preached the religion of service to mankind, will reach out to the Himalayan republic, thanks to the efforts of a diehard disciple.
“I was born in a village near Kamarpukur, the famed place where Vivekananda’s mentor, (Hindu mystic) Ramakrishna Paramhansa was born,” says Jagadish Ghosh, the current chief executive officer of the National Insurance Company in Nepal.
“My uncle was a monk at the Ramakrishna Mission (the social service organisation founded by Swami Vivekananda) and my family follows Vivekananda’s teachings.”
Vivekananda, born Narendranath Dutt in Kolkata, died in 1902 when he was only 39. But the man who swept the western world off its feet with his presentation of Hinduism as a dynamic religion at the Parliament of World Religions in Chicago in 1893 still remains relevant in Nepal and India, Ghosh says.
“Vivekananda spoke for the eradication of poverty, illiteracy and oppression,” Ghosh told IANS. “He also advocated equal rights for women. All these reforms are needed in Nepal as well as in India.”
Helped by the Nepal-India Friendship Society, the insurance CEO is bringing Vivekananda’s teachings to Nepal this month by bringing out a CD, “Arise, awake” containing the songs written by the monk as well as his famous quotes and a book, “Harmony”, that will provide the reader with a life sketch, Vivekananda’s messages and the perception of world leaders of him.
Ghosh says he was inspired by a similar CD produced by the Ramakrishna Sarada Peeth in Belur in West Bengal in 1993 when the organisation celebrated 100 years of the Parliament of Religions.
“All the people in Nepal who are associated with the CD and the book say they have been inspired by Vivekananda’s messages,” Ghosh said. “His biography, for example, was written by an 82-year-old, Laxmi Prasad Dahal, who suffers from tremors in his hands. The CD was organised by a housewife, Sabina Karki, who said she had always avoided responsibility in the past.”
On Feb 23, the CD and the book will be launched at the Nepal Police Club by Swami Bodhsarananda, the monk heading the Adwait Ashram in Uttarakhand in India, from where Vivekananda had first published “Prabuddha Bharat” (Awakened India) – the official journal of the Ramakrishna order – in 1896 and which continues to be published from there.
Ghosh has also distributed copies of a book published by the ashram on Vivekananda in Nepali – “Swamiji ko katha” – among schools hoping to inspire school children.
“The students in classes 7 to 9 are the most impressionable,” Ghosh says. “At a time they are most vulnerable to bad influences, if even one student in each school is inspired by Vivekananda’s teachings, it will be an achievement.”
Though a Hindu monk, Vivekananda eschewed dogma and taught a healthy body was more important. One would be closer to heaven through playing football, he said, and also taught that since God was present in all human beings, he who served mankind served God.
Though Vivekananda was born Jan 12, the Nepal celebration is being held this month in order to involve school children, who were away on winter holidays in January.
Ghosh regrets the fact that there are no Ramakrishna Mission branches in Nepal though there are branches in places as far off as Boston, Los Angeles, Washington and Chicago.
