On the occasion of Swami Vivekanand’s birth anniversary on Tuesday the Nehru Yuva Kendra Sangathan sent pictures of Swami Vivekanand to be framed in over 2.5 lakh centres of the organization across the country. The slogan is: Vivekanand’s soul in Nehru’s body. The vice president of the Sangathan Perala Shekar Rao said the mandate for 2016-17 is to build a ‘yuva sena’ with ‘Bharatiya thought’, whatever that means.
The problem with most icons is that their image and name is used extensively, while their teachings are largely ignored. Swami Vivekanand was an extraordinary human being who played a major role in shaping nationalism in the 19th and 20th centuries. Although he was a Hindu who was proud of his religion and his country and stunned a western audience at the Parliament of World Religions in 1893, he believed that there was truth in every religion. “Holiness, purity and charity are not the exclusive possessions of any church in the world and every system has produced men and women of most exalted character,” he said in his address to the parliament and concluded by adding, "Help and not fight," "Assimilation and not Destruction," "Harmony and Peace and not Dissension." Is the mandate of the Nehru Yuva Kendra Sangathan to build a yuva sena with ‘bharatiya thought’ in tune with Swami Vivekanand’s philosophy?
