Wisdom of Freedom

Freedom is a word which is used in many different contexts by people from different age, race or religion. It has positive connotations, when I use it in its most relevant sense of freedom of making my own choices. Choices can be in form of choice to let me vote for government of my choice or the choice which religious belief I want to follow or the choice where I would like to build my dream home. Still all these examples talk about external freedom. When I start talking about internal freedom, we can definitely say that we are in a much more confusing state. We have many choices, we have complete freedom of making those choices, but we remain indecisive for a very long period. 

Here I recall a childhood story, which my mother used to tell me regarding a fair choice. “A butcher was running behind a cow. On a crossroad, the cow disappeared from his sight. A person was standing on the crossroad. He saw the cow running into a particular direction. The butcher asked this person regarding the direction in which the cow ran ahead. This person understood that the butcher will definitely slaughter the cow as soon as he will catch her. In order to save life of the cow, he pointed in a different direction.” After telling this story, the obvious question for me was, whether the person on the crossroad did the right thing, even though he told a lie. Forty years back, the answer was a definite “Yes”. Although this person did tell a lie, but this lie was for the purpose of saving a life. Today if I tell this story to a child, he will react back and say that the butcher of today will keep the knife on the neck of the person standing on the cross-road and will forcefully ask the same question. If an incorrect answer is given, the butcher will return back and cut the throat of that person. The choice of telling truth or lie in a given situation is also enforced upon us. One can always write many version of this story. We may say that we are not free enough to have internal or external freedom. But! Can we produce more leaders like the Mahatma Gandhi, where a butcher brings a loaf of bread and throws his knife in front of Gandhi Ji when he was fasting unto death in Kolkata to stop the riots that broke down after Indian Independence? 

So friends! Before I give you more food for thought in my subsequent posts, let me congratulate my fellow Indians on completion of sixty eight years of neat freedom this 15th of August. So folks! Happy Independence Day. Let independence of thoughts prevail forever. 

Dr. Sunil Ji Garg