“Suicide rates are increasing at an alarming rate today. Suicide rates are higher between the age group of 15 – 29. Peer pressure, high academic expectations, job anxiety etc. have been the major reasons for suicide. However, today the situation is so deplorable that young students are ending their life for trivial reasons – an IIT student committed suicide because he was not able to secure admission to the branch of his own choice. Human life is precious, but the youths are getting so overwhelmed by the precarious conditions that they do not hesitate to do the unthinkable.”
The opening speech by Prof. Kanchan Chaudhary, an IIT Kharagpur Professor, echoed the sentiments of several people all over the world.
The occasion was the seminar organized by IIT KGP on the topic “Wordly Problems, Spiritual Solutions”. The honourable speaker on the occasion was H.H. Bhakti Charu Swami Maharaj. He is a senior disciple of Srila Prabhupada and travels throughout the world spreading the timeless Vedic wisdom.
The program began at 6:30 p.m. in the S.N. Bose auditorium of IIT KGP on 6th Oct. The auditorium was completely packed with IIT Professors, IIT students and with other staff members of the institute.
H.H. Bhakti Charu Swami Maharaj said that if we want to understand the problems of this world then we should get into the root of it. To analyse the root cause of the problems we need to understand – Nature of the Material World, Nature of the soul, Why do the souls (we) come to this material world? & What is our relationship with God, Krishna? We are all parts and parcel of the Supreme Lord but due to our desire to enjoy separately from the Lord we are sent to this material world. For e.g. spark is nothing but fire but when it gets separated from fire and falls on ash then it becomes just like ash. Similarly we are sac – cid – ananda i.e. eternal, blissful and full of knowledge but since we get separated from the Lord, we fall into this material world and we start identifying ourselves with matter. This is the root cause of all sufferings in this world.
H.H. Bhakti Charu Swami Maharaj further said that our salvation lies in re-establishing our relationship with the Lord. The spark can regain its fiery quality only when it reunites with fire. We can eliminate all our worldly problems and regain our blissful constitutional position if we again re-establish our forgotten relationship with the Lord. And doing this is very easy. H.H. Bhakti Charu Swami Maharaj then explained that “love” is the inherent quality of a soul. Love unites and hatred separates. So if we want to get united with the Lord then we have to offer our love to Him. Love means action and if we really want to express our love then we need to work for the pleasure of the lord. This is called bhakti.
Such a profound philosophy touched the hearts of every soul who were present in the hall.
After the talk, an unending Questions & Answers session began. Everyone present had something to ask from the speaker. However lack of time compelled the organizers to stop the Q&A session in the middle.
Prof. Kanchan Chaudhari thanked H.H. Bhakti Charu Swami Maharaj for sparing his time for this program. He further said that the speaker’s spiritual solution for the worldly problems were both practical and powerful. He expressed the need for organizing such thought provoking seminars on a regular basis.
At the end there was a melodious kirtan of Hare Krishna Mahamntra led by H.H. Bhakti Charu Swami Maharaj. Everyone joyfully participated in the kirtan.
Bhagavad – gita stall was put up outside the auditorium. All the 50 Bhagavad – gita’s were distributed within few minutes. Everyone was eager to imbibe and apply the timeless principles of this great literature in their own lives.
Finally everyone relished the Dinner Prasad.
