SIRD Malaysia

Even after 63 years of independence, we have not been able to effectively instill and reinforce our Nation's time-tested values in our children as well as grown up citizens.

Rampant Value decline, evidenced by the mounting corruption, administrative misconduct and the like, strikes any thinking National with grave concern as to what we should do to redress the plight.  Undoubtedly the rescue lies in restoring our own time-tested National Values, our own immortal poets and literature have sung. The thought led to forming the "Foundation for Restoration of National Values".

For the whole humanity, there is this ever-relevant question: Does the mind come first, or the body?  Which employs the other?  The answer is obviously "mind", not the body.

While food nourishes the body, value alone can nourish the mind and intelligence.  Bereft of values, human civilization in all facets and levels will not endure for long.  Individuals, alone constitute family, society, Nation as well as globe.  All our national values, relating solely to the individual mind and intelligence, should be rightly exposed, evoking emotional persuasion and intellectual compulsion, so that one and all can take to them with relish and resolve.

I am particular that in the dissemination, our National Values should not be overtly or covertly linked to God or religion. Values are the subtle psycho-intellectual pulsations, which shape characteral elegance, behavioural majesty and interactional excellence. And none with a mind and intelligence can deride or claim exemption from them.

Unless India's citizens imbue themselves with their own age-old National Values, human life here at all levels are sure to suffer, decay and perish. The world has witnessed extinction of great civilizations in the hands of value decline.

It may be late; but we still have the time, knowledge and scope to marshal our own inner resolve, and strive for timely redress and reinforcement. All we need is the will to persevere collectively to imbue our homes, offices, factories and the various centres of productivity and service, with the Nation's values, enriching and empowering ourselves, to make the Nation strong, cohesive and insurmountable.

[Excerpts from Poojya Swamiji's message read out on the occasion of the launch of the book "Restoring Values" by the Foundation for Restoration of National Values, FRNV, www.valuefoundaiton.in]