Inching forward to transcend mourning, grounding, reflections, internal conversations, reworking equations, relationships, sutras. Into the flow(s) slowly.
In the context of Azaadi ka Amrit Mahotsav, Prime Minister gives a call for a national movement for natural farming. Call for nature-centric living. Lifestyle. Farming. Local Value-chains. Giving up chemical fertilizers and pesticides. Saving forex by reducing of their imports. Before the crises hit us badly.
Natural farming is completely science-based, nature-centric. Soil fertility comes from the microbes in the soil and these have to be augmented. It requires less water and is more resilient to floods and droughts. Diverse crops round the year, so that soil is not exposed to sun. This increases cropping intensity. Fallow lands can be un-fallowed. Burning can give way to Mulching. Being vigilant, conscious and caring for cattle, seed, water, season, time, et al is natural farming. No water beyond the roots helps. Soil matters for fertility and productivity. 80% of farmers, small and marginal, benefit first from NF.
Let ICAR, Universities and KVKs try NF in their lands and take NF models to more and more farmers. Let us also unlearn and shun wrong practices that crept in.
Let the movement grow. Let us help it grow. Quickly, at least one village in each Panchayat. Let the farmer come in parcel by parcel. Practice by practice. Let there be investment for more models, customized models. In value-chains. Let us be part of the global movement for nature-centric life, lifestyle, living, farming. For people’s health, planet’s health. Let us make Maa Bharati free from chemical fertilizers and pesticides. Let us realize that India’s Aatma nirbharata comes from India’s Krishi Aatma nirbharata, Karshak’s Aatma nirbharata, from soil aeration and fertility augmentation. Carbon sequestration. Water from air into soil. For the wellbeing of every Indian, for the wellbeing of every living being, let this be Saarvajanik Jan Aandolan. Now.
In response, ICAR has already mandated ICAR institutes, Universities and KVKs to take up NF research, demonstration and training; dedicated portions of their land for NF; developing syllabuses in UG/PG courses.
Hope, a National Mission for NF Movement comes by the time Nirmala proposes 2022-23 Budget.
India ranks 66 (out of 109) in the global MPI (multidimensional poverty index) 2021. NITI Aayog’s first Multidimensional Poverty Index, MPI, concludes – Bihar has the highest population of poor, Kerala the lowest.
I missed the 50 year celebrations in Sarvail on 23 November. Soon, I could join another event celebrating the same today (26 December), but in Hyderabad. I could meet our teachers – VVSN, Ramana Murthy, Sridhar, Venkataiah. Remembered Marri Srinivasa Reddy, the principal. Our sahaadhyaayees. I could remember the visionary behind – PV Narasimha Rao. The land donor – Maddi Narayan Reddy. Could meet their children and family members, as a token of gratitude.
I was just getting back after deep mourning. Realization in hindsight. Sarvail Gurukulam has given me the Deeksha to become and be a development lifeworker. And the payback is only through our life and our work of life.
All of us can be true development workers. The essential act of a development worker is LOVE. Love is an activity of giving, without any reciprocal expectation. Inability to give gives pain. To give, one needs to have power, capacity and will. Giving gives joy; boundless joy – like joy of feeding the child, caring for the sibling, giving love to her/him, submitting to God, achieving a goal, etc. Development comes on its own spontaneously. To realize this fully, one needs to internalize intertwined Care, Responsibility, Respect, and Knowledge.
Love is like an art to be learnt, requiring discipline, concentration, and patience. It means to listen and living life fully with merged personal and professional lives into one, as it happens to a painter, to a dancer, to a musician, etc.
A lover’s main job is to give ‘love’. Like a mother feeding the child. Like a driver driving. Loving heart/soul loves all. If it cannot love all, it may not be loving that one person either! It sees from the viewpoint of the loved, with necessary faith and trust in the loved. It desires the loved to grow, with a vision to reach their full potential for being useful and productive – like a mother’s vision for the child that s/he grows into an adult. It does many a thing towards this. It has the power and ability to promise and deliver the promise, by acquiring those new powers/capacities required. It provides ambience for emergence of this potential to show up. It requires courage, risk and readiness displayed by a mother in child rearing, the courage and boldness displayed while we sleep.
It has faith in all life and shows respect for life, for every living being. It stands for fairness and justice, because it loves all waiting for love. Without rest.
A small boy from Gundrampally going through Sarvail Gurukualm has been blessed with initiation into a trajectory of metamorphosis into one such development lifeworker and mentoring many such development workers.
National Institute of Technology, Warangal, felicitated him as a Distinguished Alumnus (Public Service) for 2019, its Diamond Jubilee Year. Institute of Rural Management, Anand called him an Eminent IRMAN, in its 40 year celebrations. Development praxis got TRUE – Tribal Rural Urban Emerging – Livelihoods Framework, 100,000+ individuals, and 1000+ collectives/enterprises/organizations. On co-authoring GoI-approved Framework of implementation of Rs. 3.0 lakh Crore National Rural Livelihoods Mission 2011-29 taking 10 Crore poor women into self-help group architecture to take their livelihoods, lives and destiny into their hands, United Nations Development Program has placed his services for 5 years to build Mission’s capacity across India. Currently, he is co-leading Community-managed Natural Farming, a global movement at local levels, going to scale. His Akshara Livelihoods, ‘livelihoods’ portal, ‘yogakshemam’, Conversations, Journeys, Cohorts and 7L Coexistence advocate individual and collective social responsibility for Nature-centric 7L – life, living, livelihoods, linkages, leadership, learning and love.
From receiving otherwise “dustbined” test call letter, to Gurukulam’s resident Gurus letting us blossom, it has been an initiation into miraculous metamorphosis. Through starting the day in the brahma muhurat, reciting Asatoma satgamaya, mastering 3Rs, Vignana Sarvasvam, Tulasi ganitham, literature; writing stories, poetry; music, exercises, chess, mental ability; Misak pens and prizes in full throttle curricular, co-curricular and extra-curricular activities; mess committee; lasting friendships and attachments – Gurukulam has given me the Deeksha.
A teacher (Sri Ramana Murthy) traced and took me to receive the prize from the Governor, when I got Mathematical Olympiad! Probably for the first time, a Telugu medium student could crack National Talent Search, when I got selected, thanks to conceptual grounding in Sarvail. When I missed joining APRJC Nagarjunasagar, Gurus – T Venka Reddy and M Srinivasa Reddy – could take all steps to be in APRJC later. Payback, seeded then, got nurtured in due course to be a lifeworker, with Hope, Faith, Promise and Love.
Now, Gurukulam is the way for boys and girls. More Gurukulams, Navodayas, Colleges, and Alumni with integrity and sensitivity everywhere being useful to society. Alumni Associations and Networks of Gurukulams like Sagurwa and Visionary Gurukulam Association are serving Alumni, Students, Gurus and Gurukulams.
In this context, we are working to open a Mental Ability Support Club (tentative name, to be finalized) in Sarvail. One more in APRJC, Nagarjunasagar, if it works out. The MASC agenda may include:
- A person or two to spend time every week anchoring MASC for 30-40 weeks
- 100+ Mathematics and Logic, Mental Ability Books; 100+ Classics Telugu, Sanskrit, English
- Test a Month
- Exposure to traditional occupations, Apprenticeship in Communities/Devt. Organizations
- E-group/WhatsApp group
- Magazine, e-magazine, inhouse blogging
- Mentoring Potential Talent, Counselling, Visioning
- Extra-curricular/co-curricular/cultural events – 5 days a year; internals every month – Debate, Elocution, Just a Minute, 20Q, Dumb Charades, Essay, Poetry, Story, Painting, Book Reading et al
- Competitions
Not losing enthusiasm and curiosity even in delays, setbacks, failures is the way for us. Standing up, dusting ourselves off, and get going again after falling. For unlearning, correcting, learning. Small successes have to be celebrated, without becoming arrogant. These let us to try, push ourselves to flow in, to keep flowing. Without the fear of falling from grace. Efforts, trials, tribulations are our flows, our ways. Lest we become fossilised, irrelevant, maybe nuisance, and get extinct. Can we be in our flows?
Yes, we can. If we get Deeksha to be in our whats and hows, knowing whys. If we pursue on the pathways of Deeksha. If we are true to ourselves in the Deeksha of the flow of N. For 7L.
Join us in the world of initiation into yoga of whats, hows, whys for useful coexistence – pranavayoga for 7L.