During VARDHANTHI CELEBRATIONS 2009 - 2010
School has been celebrating Vardhanthi of His Holiness Sri Bharathi Theertha Mahaswamiji ever since the school started in 1995. Very illustrious people have presided over the function and distributed prizes. In the year 2010, Shri. Kirthivasan , the then Vice President, TCS, presided over the celebration.
Shri. Kirthivasan’s golden words are very relavant to the students even today.
We are happy to reproduce his speech to our dear parents and students for their appreciation and adoption.
His speech....
First of tall, let me thank you for having me here. I feel the other qualifications Mr. Krishnaswami mentioned don’t really matter as much as being honoured on his great day. I am particularly happy to be associated with the Vardhanthi of the Guru, something which I value immensely. Thanks a lot again.
I participated in this function a couple of years ago. Today, I would like to reiterate the points I mentioned then because of their everlasting relevance.
Our country has rich treasures in terms of slokas, vedic hymns and so many things. In the good-old days, it was very natural that we had a Gurukul system of education, where all these things were passed on from generation to generation. But today, all of us have a different form of education in sense that the very approach to education itself is more practical and utilitarian. The focus is more towards getting a good job in a better company after schooling rather than education as such.
In other words, today we get barely instructed in school, but not educated. In this context, the task Bharathi Vidyalaya has taken up is extremely important for our country. By having this event year after year, the school is in a way encouraging all its students to remember the slokas more importantly, our rich heritage is being passed on to the next generation. Unless we have sufficient incentives for people to pass them on to the next generation, may be few generations down the line, we may not be left with as many slokas as we have today, as many treasures of this country as we have today. We need to thank the school immensely for making it happen. I congratulate the school for continuing this initiative year after year. It is a great achievement. I really like to thank you madam.
My second message is to the students. At the end of this event, some of you would be given prizes. I was actually thinking as to what do all students really get by participating in this event.
I feel the most important prize all of you get is the blessings from the Guru, forget about who gets first or second in the contest. The second prize all of you are getting is an opportunity to learn a sloka.
I don’t know how many of you would have learnt these slokas without this particular event and that is the second most important thing. Mr. Krishnaswami was talking of Vaidyanatha Ashtakam, Adithya Hridayam and Chandrasekara Ashtakam. Each and every one of these slokas some of you may not realize it today, but as you grow older you will realize how much of inner strength they give you as you keep repeating them. The amount of inner strength they give you is of great value to you as you grow up.
The third prize, who comes first and second is fairly incidental. Yes it is in appreciation of the effort being put by some individuals. But I think that all of you deserve to be applauded, first of all for coming in here and taking part in this event. I congratulate all of you.
My last message is to the parents. Yes, we are all forced into a system of education that does not focus on spiritual teachings of our country and have become fairly materialistic too in school. We cannot change it overnight. I am not saying that is wrong or right. I am not going to be judgemental on that. But please ensure that we give enough motivation to the kids, to learn our treasures, slokas, vedic chanting etc. we should not lose them. Each generation has a responsibility at a minimum of passing these on to the next generation intact. So that they can propagate it further.
I also have two kids and I can understand from everyone’s perspective that getting higher marks in school is very important in today’s context. Therefore whatever activity that we think would further our kid’s career in a material world becomes important to us as well. So if somebody would give you additional three marks for extracurricular activities, you would put the kids in tennis or cricket classes because, we think that has a career. If there is extra tuition class because of which the kid would get additional marks in mathematics or science we would definitely do that. I am not saying that we should not do that as each of it is important. But it should not get into a situation where propagating and continuing the spiritual strength of the country takes the last preference in everything we do.
Like the usual habit, we have a small prayer at home daily. But if I have to go to office early on a particular day, I will never forget to eat, but what may get sacrificed is the pooja on that day. So usually God comes last, may be that is the privilege we take with God. Perhaps we need to ensure that we struggle through this life, to give spirituality to the kids, It is something that is going to help your kids life long. We may not realise the value of what we are doing today. But this is something that is going to help them throughout their life. And it is probably one piece of education and help we are doing for the betterment or our kids. It is not just for coming here and just winning a prize, as Mrs. Alamelu rightly said, it is not just the marks that someone gets. If you go back to see how well today’s established people had performed while they were in school you will see that not everyone was a 100% score in all subjects in the school. But they were all rounded personalities with varied interests, and that is helping them in the later part of their life.
So what I request the parent is that once again to continue to focus on whatever you are doing but kindly let your kids know the importance of learning what the treasures our country has and not losing it.