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Value Education : Need Of The Hour & Great Opportunity For The Librarians.

Article · March 2004

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Yojana Yatin Patil

University of Mumbai
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 Value Education : Need Of The Hour & Great
Opportunity For The Librarians.

Present scenario of Education

Today’s education system has lost it’s luster & relevance because of the western
influence. It has succeeded in developing within us a hatred towards our own
tradition and culture & in making us look at the western way of life with respect &
admiration.

: Our country today is in the throes of a moral and cultural crisis & we can say
that our education has failed to create a decent society.

: There is a crisis of character, moral decay & breakdown of traditional

discipline.

: Quick acquisition of position & wealth by whatever means, fair or foul; good /
bad has been the soul motive of the products of such a defective system of
education.
: We can see the way organized crime, financial frauds & terrorists violence (are being
headed) by some of the best minds endowed with the best of educational & technical
attainments.
: Look at the way even the members of the learned professions indulge in scandalous
unethical ways of making money obligations & social responsibilities.
: Merit has been consistently ignored in academic set up.
: Ugly symptoms are seen everywhere.
: Today’s education gives importance to the total marks, merit positions, awards & such
thing. The education system has changed into the examination system & now it is becoming
an information system; pushing back the value system that the earlier system used to
emphasize.
This is the outer scenario, but what about the student ?
: Students are obliged to rely on private tutors.
: They require to depend so much upon their memory that they have no
chance to cultivate their imagination & thinking power.
: They resort to socially destructive and personally devastating ways of
coping this stress as evident by increased rate of crime, alcoholism, drug addiction,
suicides, accidents, self-harm, running away from home, depression, low self-esteem etc..
Ultimately what this mean is that there is a general decline in the quality of
life and total absence of moral creativity, which could raise a great voice and summon us to
the finest ideals of our ancient tradition.
A UNESCO report of Education for the 21st century entitled ‘ Learning : The
Treasure Within’ also pleads for an education which is rooted to culture and committed to
progress.
Indian heritage, culture & values need to be thoroughly studied, analyzed &
incorporated comprehensively in the education system. In achieving the above goal we
librarians can definitely help the educators. We can re-establish the self-confidence of the
youth, show them the way of regaining their faith in themselves & according to me it should
be done with a spiritual touch.
Religion is the soul of India & library is the heart of any institution & when
heart & soul will meet, the brain will definitely be peaceful. This will result in growth of
character, growth in virtues like self-control, tolerance, selfless service, practice of prayer,
harmony, to love all people, to help them in need & respect them etc…
Man being the ‘cast in the mould of God’ cannot easily deny Him. Even the
great scientist like Newton and Einstein have believed in the existence of God as an
intelligent power regulating and guiding the destinies of the universe.
In the words of Swami Vivekananda ‘Religion is nothing but a manifestation
of the divinity already in man. Man is not just the body or even the combination of the body
& the mind. He is essentially the spirit. The aim of our teaching should be to help manifest
this spirit in every thought, word and action.
So, it should aim at a full and harmonious development of the body & the
intellect and tune it to the spirit within. In other words, it should help build up an integrated
personality, a perfect character.
We librarians can teach values to students by means of showing them good
books of moral stories, biographies of great people, displaying good articles from the
newspaper / magazines, writing our own articles to guide them, instilling the habits of
prayer, meditation, giving respect to others, helping someone selflessly etc. good things.
Here the teaching of ethics has come.
What is ethics?
Ethics is the feelings, emotions and values based on the unity of souls. Why
should I show compassion, love, respect to you? Because you & I are fundamentally
interconnected.
The moment we violate this fundamental unity of all life, we violate ethics.
Therefore, I strongly believe that we human beings are all interconnected
fundamentally. And we all have the same divinity within us. It is just the question of
manifestation of the same that differs.
When we are in tune with this divinity within, we are poised & peaceful. This
is the basic law of spiritual values that can be given to the students.

Dhnyaneshwar Maharaj says :-

“Maazeni Anusandhaanevin Snaan-Sandhyaa Japa Homa Dhyaan

Te Sarvahi Adharma Jaan Maja Bhajan Te Navhe”
What does it mean?
It means, in every state, whether we are happy or worried or in any state or whatever we
are doing we must have contact with the Supreme One. Then we become peaceful. I tell the
students that, if you are in trouble, just call the Supreme One (in whatever form you like),
with each & every cell of your body & mind, from the bottom of your heart (i.e.
wholeheartedly), with tears in your eyes & then see what He does. He definitely answers.
But we have to surrender first. Surrendering means not having a single doubt about His
Grace. Having full faith on His mercy, His AKAARAN KAARUNYA, His justice / NYAAYA,
His love / PREM. This is called AATMANIRBHARTAA.
When we completely rely on the Almighty, who is sitting in each of us taking
the form of AATMAN, He Helps.
 His abode is AANANDMAYA KOSH.
In TAITTIRIYA UPANISHADA it is said that self is surrounded by five layers
i.e. PANCHAKOSHAS.

AnnamayaKosh Physical cell

Pranmaya Kosha Vitality cell

Manomaya Kosha Mental cell

Vijnanamaya Kosha Psychic cell

Anandamaya Kosha Spiritual cell

The great seer & philosopher shree Aurobindo says, “Education to be complete must have
principal aspects relating to the five primary activities of the Human being : the physical, the
vital, the mental, the psychic & the spiritual.

Here I want to point out that it is the duty of an educational institution to train the
student spiritually. Because spiritual education only has the power to develop the
students inner powers & to get knowledge about the Anandamaya Kosha. Only
Spiritual knowledge, teaches us how to cope with the problems of life, & how to be
happy with all the problems. It also teaches us the power of faith in the Supreme One,
the power of the positive, the power of the good.

Swami Vivekananda, who is my first Guru in spiritual knowledge & I personally 100% agree
with his views, says : We must have a hold on the spiritual and secular education of the
nation. You must dream it, you must talk it, you must think it, and you must work it out.

The education that today’s students are getting has some good points, but it has a
tremendous disadvantage which is so great that the good things are all weighed down. In
the first place, it is not a man-making education ; it is merely & entirely a negative
education. A negative education or any training that is based on negation is worse than
death.

The child is taken to school and first thing he learns is, that his father is a fool, the second
thing, that his grandfather is lunatic, the third thing, that all his teachers are hypocrites, the
fourth that all the sacred books are lies! By the time he is sixteen, he is a mass of negation,
lifeless and boneless…..” Further he explains that “Education is not that amount of
information that is put into the student’s brain and run the riot there undigested, all their life.
We must have life-building, man-making, character-making, assimilation of ideas.” Then
coming to our workplace he adds… “If you have assimilated five ideas and made them your
life and character, you have more education than any man who has got by heart a whole
library. If education is identical with the information, the libraries are the greatest sages in
the world, and encyclopedias are the rishis.”

Religion is a matter of the heart. Another place he says, “It is one of the evil of the
western civilization that they are after intellectual education alone. They give this education
but they do not take care of the heart, it makes man ten times more selfish and that will be
their destruction.”

“The present education is nothing but a result of the dominance of the head over the
heart, the in equilibrium between the two., To the scientist,” he says, “tear means only a
composition of phosphate of lime, chloride of soda, some mucus and some water. It does
not occur to him that a tear is an expression of a weeping heart.” “God created man so that
he may become perfect & go to Him. But man has made such a terrible mess of life that
instead of bloom & light we find gloom & darkness. The eyes are dimmed with tears.
Without the voice of faith, without the sterling note of love, without the memory of God (who
is the only reality), how can the mind be inspired and the tears changed into smiles?

If the teachings of spiritual philosophy are accepted and acted upon by the majority
of mankind, we should soon be able to say that we are now at the threshold of a new
epoch, which promises a happy blending of life into a harmonious whole. The soul
longs for happiness, and it is the wish of God that man should be happy. He dwells in
the human heart and the way to realize Him is through purity, duty, unselfish service,
devotion, knowledge, prayer & meditation. It is only when we drop our selfishness and
think in terms of “thyne” and not “mine” that we shall be ready to get the divine
perception.”

We librarians work in the heart of the institution & as one of our management
member puts it that the librarian is the heart of the heart. So we must educate
the students spiritually to face this today’s world & that according to me
should be our highest goal or rather duty. We must do the cleaning of the
heart of today’s students by giving such a variety of good books in their
hands, reading which their hearts can fill with Shraddha and Bhakti towards
the Supreme One.

Swami Vivekananda says “It is by losing this idea of Shraddha that the
country has gone to ruin….so make men first. Men we want, and how can men
be made unless Shraddha is there? …..We want that education by which
character is formed, strength of mind is increased, the intellect is expanded,
and by which one can stand on one’s own feet……We must compile some
books with short stories from the Ramayan, the Mahabharat and the
Upanishads, etc., in very easy and simple language, and these are to be given
to our little boys to read.”

According to me this definitely is a golden opportunity for we librarians in

today’s world of scientific knowledge, to gather the spiritual knowledge & give
it in the hands of the students, who are more in need of true knowledge than
anything else.

They will be too happy to know that the solution to their problems, their
weeping heart, dwells in their own hearts. And they just have to clean their
heart & open their inner door & call the almighty heartily, with full faith to solve
 their problems. And take spiritual experiences. They must be taught that “with
God everything is possible.” This is the whole of religion & nothing else.

We have to convert the minds of the students towards Satsangati, towards

good company good books & good thoughts.

Our great saint Shree Tukaram Maharaj says

“Karu Nakaa Kaahi Santasang Dharaa”

It has got a great meaning in it. We should not waste our valuable time in
redundant things, but we should use it for the Good only. Because whatever is
good is God Himself.

It is said that “life is too short for argumentation. The Gnyanayogi does not
waste time on all and every kind of study. Like Raj-Hansa, which takes up milk
but leaves off the water, he knows the art of picking up that which is valuable
and leaves off that which is of no use.

According to me, we Librarians, who are the heart of hearts of the institutions,
should take this moral task into our hands & start teaching the students this
great spirituality for their successful, value-based, moral & peaceful life.

Thus, I conclude that, librarian can contribute to the education; in man-

making, character building of students. We can give them positivity, the power
of faith. We can teach them respect for our ancient treasure of knowledge
given by great saints & rishis through the scriptures. We can teach them the
true way to solve their problems through spiritual counseling.

dtsslibrary@gmail.com

In the Refresher Course @

University of Pune,
Seminar Paper Presented by,
Mrs. Yojana Patil, Librarian,
D.T.S.S. College of Commerce,
Mumbai, India.

2004

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