'Seek Ultimate Values'

‘Seek Ultimate Values’

BY K. RAMAKOTISWARA RAO ¹

I am grateful to the Reception Committee for inviting me to preside over this session of the Andhra Students’ Conference. I have great hesitation in occupying the place meant for my chief, Dr. Pattabhi Sitaramayya. But for the uncertainty regarding the duration of the meetings of the Working Committee of the Congress at Patna, you should have welcomed a President older, wiser, and incomparably more brilliant than myself. Even as it is, I have no manner of doubt that this honour has come to me, not in my individual capacity but as the present head of a great national institution, the Andhra Jatheeya Kalasala, founded by Kopalle Hanumantha Rao, the noblest Andhra of his generation. You have indeed gone out of your way in choosing one who is not officially connected with the Andhra University or any of its affiliated colleges. But I am Editor of Triveni as well as Principal of the Kalasala; and as your eminent Vice-Chancellor is a member of the Advisory Board of Triveni, I might claim, in a playful mood, that the entire University is but a part of Triveni. My young friends! Though I am not old enough to utter words of profound wisdom garnered from the experience of many decades, I am near enough to you in age to appreciate your point of view and to share, in some measure, your glowing idealism.

On this and the succeeding days you will discuss several problems affecting your lives as students and as citizens. You belong to one of the youngest Universities in India. Having successfully overcome the initial obstacles and emerging from the dust of many heated controversies, it is well on its way to splendid achievement. With the poet-prince of Jeypore as its foremost patron, and a thinker of international reputation as its Vice-Chancellor, it may confidently look forward to a great future. But mine is not the Convocation Address for the year, and I shall therefore pass on to questions which relate not so much to the University, but which vitally concern your outlook as young men and women.

In an age of changing values, of the conflict of cultures and the clash of ideals, the youth of every land must develop a power of initiative and arrive at that synthesis which will resolve those conflicts and harmonise those ideals. The very immensity of the problems must call forth into active play the latent powers of youth, sharpen their intellect, and enrich their emotions. India, even more than the rest of the post-war world, is at the cross-roads. Here and now she has the opportunity offered her of facing and solving the problems of man and the machine, the individual and the state, nationalism and internationalism, realism and idealism, classicism and romanticism. And if the youth of India can summon up enough of the spirit of intellectual adventure, they will receive the gift of far-seeing vision, and their contribution to the thought of the world will be as notable as that of the ancient Rishis. For, believe me, the age of the Rishis is not merely in the far-off past. In our day India has given birth to seers of the type of Sri Aurobindo, Rabindranath Tagore, Mahatma Gandhi, Sir S. Radhakrishnan, and J. Krishnamurti. Some of these might seem to be at cross-purposes with the rest, but ultimately their message is one,–unflinching devotion to truth, and unerring pursuit of the vision splendid. You may study the many facets of the truth as glimpsed by these seers of modern India, and bring to bear upon that study your own awakened powers of intellect and intuition. You can neither refuse to perform this duty nor seek to evade it. If you do either, you do so at your peril. As the great Kannada poet and scholar, Sriman Masti Venkatesa Iyengar, puts it, India is in the position of Yudhishtira and his brothers. Each of them was required by the unseen Yaksha to answer certain questions before being permitted to quench his thirst. All but Yudhishtira evaded this duty and were condemned to death. India today must like Yudhishtira answer the questions propounded by the Time-Spirit, for then only may she drink of the waters of Life.

In this task, the spectre of arid utilitarianism that is now stalking the land is our worst enemy. To look merely at the surface of things and not seek to pierce behind the veil of form; to test every new idea from the point of view of immediate practicability and not that of ultimate value; to judge men and matters as if objective success and not inward growth were the highest good; is indicative of a narrow vision and can but lead to a very low type of achievement. It is because of this predominance of the merely utilitarian point of view that our lives are becoming cramped and mechanised, devoid of the spaciousness and beauty that lend a meaning to life.

Another unfortunate feature of our fervered existence is the fear of sentiment. From our earliest years we are taught to be careful and circumspect, to take no risks, to be guided at home and abroad by authority even in the smallest details of everyday life. Any slight variation from the standard, any exhibition of special aptitudes is looked upon with suspicion. Children who are dreamy, and more than usually affectionate, are deemed unfit for the rough and tumble of life. Every effort is made to get them to conform to the established standard. The poet, the actor, the musician, and the painter in every child must be crushed out, so that there may be no impediment to its becoming an efficient lawyer or business man. It is forgotten that all sentiment is not necessarily mawkish sentimentality, and that the love which ennobles and uplifts is a divine gift that ought to be treasured. Some day, indeed, this intense affection for father, mother, or playmate may be transfigured into the love of all living beings. When the prince Siddhartha chose Yasodhara from amongst all the Sakya maidens, and lavished all the love of a noble nature on her, he was inevitably preparing for the great destiny, in fulfillment of which he flooded the entire universe with his beneficence and grace. Nothing great is ever achieved by an over careful calculation of chances. It is but a peurile philosophy which fails to take note of the value of sentiment and of the adventure that flows from sentiment. And though equanimity of spirit and equi-vision are valuable, let us realise that they are the results of the rich and varied experience of youth. They will not come to those that fail to face the battle of life. If, while young, you are not great enough to dare, you will achieve not equanimity of spirit but spiritual inertia.

In a country that is being rapidly flooded by cheap machine-made goods, ugly and unaesthetic, there is urgent need for a gospel of beauty. In our dress, our household utensils and the many articles of daily use, in the music we hear and the plays we witness, in our shrieking advertisements and wall-posters, we have to fight the cult of ugliness. When you look at a water-colour by Nandalal Bose, or a khadi muslin from Chicacole, or a carpet from the Jatheeya Kalasala, you will find that every one of these possesses a quality that transcends all limitations of time and space and monetary value, for you are drinking in the essence of the creative gift of the craftsman or the painter. In some mysterious way they draw us nearer to God, the supreme artist. Every time you purchase anything, ask yourself not merely whether it is useful, but whether in addition it is beautiful. Aim not at mere efficiency, but at efficiency that is informed by culture. One of the main objects of your conference is the organisation of work in villages. Bring to the village the beauty of simple yet harmonious surroundings, of dance and music, of the arts of the builder and the painter, and of the thousand and one crafts that are India’s precious heritage through many millennia. The work that is being carried on by the Poet at Santiniketan and Sriniketan is the prelude to that now inaugurated by Mahatma Gandhi. The seven lakhs of villages in the land must hum once again with life, with the Joy of self-expression and of human endeavour for the ennobling of human life.

I have noticed with pleasure, during the past few years, an increasing interest in the study of Telugu literature. Very many of you, young men and women, are seeking to express your inmost soul through verse, song or story. Part of this work may be ephemeral or defective in form, but you, young friends, are carrying forward in the present age the great mission of enriching the literature of Andhra and making it an expression of the highest thought and feeling of the race. I belong to the generation of Rayaprolu Subbarao, Abburi Ramakrishna Rao, Basavaraju Apparao, D. V. Krishna Sastri, Pingali Lakshmikantam, Katuri Venkateswara Rao, Viswanatha Satyanarayana, Chinta Dikshitulu, Sivasankara Sastri, Nayani Subbarao, Nanduri Subbarao, and Adivi Bapiraju. I am neither a poet nor a painter, but I claim kinship with all of them. I am not so sure, however, that they will admit any kinship with me. I have been on fairly intimate terms with them, and I have had the privilege of listening to them while they recited their poems or songs. Andhra Desa ought to be proud of them, for by their achievement they have won for Telugu literature an abiding place in the literature of All-India. You belong to the next generation; you have sat at their feet, some literally, others in the spirit. I am therefore longing to hear some of you recite at this conference choice poems and songs of your creation. Thus shall we link the generations; one with another, and establish a fellowship of the elect. As a lover of Andhra culture, I am thankful to the University for instituting an Honours course in Telugu language and literature, and for placing at its head one who is not merely a scholar but a poet of distinction. I refer to Mr. Lakshmikantam. I do hope that very soon an effort will be made to impart instruction in the highest classes through the medium of Telugu, and also to open a section of fine arts.

I have spoken at such length about idealism, art, and poetry that you must be wondering whether I have any ready-made solution for the problem of problems, that of the educated ‘unemployed. Government service, the so-called learned professions, industry and commerce, can absorb but a fraction of the graduates turned out year after year by the Universities. You will erelong find that learning and scholarship are not the passports to lucrative employment which they once were. The State or the University can do but little. Fresh avenues of employment like the Army, the Navy, and the Diplomatic and Consular services can be thrown open to us only after the establishment of Swaraj. I do not know if it is fair to expect highly educated young men and women in search of wealth and distinction to settle down in villages, curtail their personal wants, and help to build up the New India of the future. But this is all that a nation, yet unfree, can offer. And why should this cause disappointment? Learning is certainly its own reward; other rewards are incidental. To those that have a burning faith in a return to the life of the village, rendered purposeful by the urge of service, this counsel will not appear fatuous. In the All India Spinners Association and the All India Village Industries Association, you have the nucleus of a mighty organisation which will spread a network of village societies allover the land. You can take your share of this glorious work.

Here I must utter a word of warning. Do not attach much importance to the current notions of success and failure. I claim that I am a close student of the philosophy of failure; and I wish to repeat what I said some years ago when Triveni passed through a crisis in its career: ‘Success consists in unceasing pursuit of the Path; and the only failure that the idealist recognises is the failure to stand by Truth.’ Let me close on that note.

1 Presidential Address delivered at the thirteenth Andhra Students’ Conference, Vizianagaram, on 14th December 1934.