K School – Students Talk 1, Rajghat, 10 December 1952

Talk to Students of the Rishi Valley Trust Educational Institutions, Banaras.

10th December, 1952.

I

I suppose most of you understand English, because I am going to talk as you know every morning at 8-30 and we are going to talk over the many difficulties that are involved in education. Have you ever thought why you are educated, why you are passing, reading, learning anything — History, Mathematics, Geography and so on? Have you ever thought why you go to schools, colleges? Is it not very important to find out why we are crammed with information, with so called knowledge, why we have to read? What is all this so-called education? Your parents send you here and they have taken certain degrees and passed certain examinations and what for? Have you ever asked yourselves why you are here and have the teachers themselves asked you why you are here? Do the teachers themselves know why they are here? So, should you not try to find out what is all this struggle to pass examinations, to study, to live in a certain place, to be frightened, playing games and so on? You enquire into all this. Should your teachers not help you to enquire into all this and not merely to pass certain examinations? The boys pass examinations, because they think they will have a job, they have to earn a livelihood. Why do you girls marry, to be educated in order to get better husbands? Do not laugh, just think about this. Or, are you a nuisance at home and therefore, the parents send you away to a school? By passing examinations, have you understood the whole significance of life? Take for instance, a boy passes certain examinations, some stupid examinations, because you people are very clever in passing examinations, which does not mean that you are very intelligent people — and some people who do not know how to pass examinations may be very intelligent, may be capable with their hands, with their minds and they can think out more than the people who merely cram and learn some subjects very well and try to pass and so on. Some boys may pass examinations to get a job and their whole outlook on life is getting a job and then what happens afterwards? They get married, they have children and they are caught in a machine, are they not? They become clerks or lawyers or policemen. They are caught in that machine for the rest of their lives they keep on being clerks, lawyers — everlasting struggle with the women, they have married, with the children, a constant battle, is it not and that is their life till they die. As regards the girls, what happens to you? You are so glad, fortunate enough to be educated. What happens? You get married, don’t you? That is your aim or concern and your parents get you married and you have children. For the rest of your life, you marry a clerk or a lawyer and lead a so-called fashionable life. If you have a little money, you are concerned about your saris and how you look and what people will say and so on — quarrels between you and your husband.

So, you see all this. Are you not aware of this, in your family, in your neighbourhood? Have you noticed how it goes on, all these going on all the time? Must you not find out what is the meaning of education, why you want to be educated, why do the parents want you to be educated, why they make speeches about education as you heard the other day — elaborate subjects, what education is doing in the world? You may be able to read Bernard Shaw’s plays, you may be able to quote Shakespeare or Voltaire or some new philosopher, but if you yourself are intelligent, anxious, if you are creative, what is the point of education?

So, is it not important for the teachers as well as for you students to find out, to enquire how to be intelligent. Education does not consist in being able to read, any fool can read, any fool can pass examinations. If you know how to read, are you educated? Surely, education does consist, does it not, in cultivating intelligence? Must you not find out what it is to be intelligent? I do not mean cunning. I do not mean trying to be so clever to outdo somebody. Intelligence is something quite different, is it not? Intelligence obviously comes when you are not afraid, when there is no fear. You know what fear is. Fear comes when you think what people might say about you, what your parents may say, when you are [Blank space in original typescript with ‘criticised’ added by hand. WS-06], when you are punished, when you fail to pass an examination, when your teacher scolds you, when you are not popular in your class, in your school, in your surroundings. Fear gradually creeps in, does it not?

So, fear obviously is one of the barriers to intelligence, is it not? Is not the essence of education to free the student, that is, you and me from fear and to be aware of the causes of fear and so live, free ourselves from it? Is it not one of the essential aims of education, so that from the very beginning, from childhood till you go into the world, you are free so as to be able to understand fear and the causes of fear? Do you know that you are afraid, you have fear, have you not, or are you free from fear? You know what fear is. You do not know? Do not be nervous. Are you not afraid of your parents, or your teachers, of what people might think? Suppose you do something which your parents, which the society round you do not approve. Would you not be afraid? Suppose you do not marry the person of your caste or class, you would be afraid, won’t you of what people might say? Would you not be afraid if your future husband does not get the right amount of money or position or prestige. Would you not be ashamed? Would you not be afraid if your friends do not think well about you? Are you not afraid of death, of disease? So, most of us are afraid. Do not say “no” so quickly. Or, we have not thought about it and if we do think about it, you will notice that almost everybody in the world, grown-ups as well as children have some kind of fear gnawing at their hearts. And, is it not the aim, the purpose, the intention of education to free each one, each individual to be free from that fear, so that he can be intelligent? I do not know if this school is going to do or is doing that? That is what we want to do here, which means really, teachers must be free from fear. It is no good teachers talking of fearlessness and themselves being afraid of what the neighbours may say or afraid of his wife or the women teachers afraid of their husbands.

If one has fear, there is no initiative. You know what initiative is? Is it so difficult to find out what you think you know to initiate is to do something original, spontaneously, naturally, without being guided, forced, controlled, to do something which you love. You often walk in the streets and you see a stone in the middle of the road for example and a car goes about bumping. Have you ever removed that stone? Or, have you as you walked, seen the poor people, peasants, villagers and do something spontaneously, naturally, kindly out of your own heart, instead of being told what you have to do? You see if one has fear, then all that is shut out, all those go out of your life, you are conscious, you do not observe what is going on round you.

If you have fear, you are bound to follow some people, some guru, follow tradition, follow a husband or a wife. As an individual, as a human being, you lose your dignity. Is not the purpose of education to free you from fear, not to make you pass some examinations which may be necessary, but essentially, deeply, is it not the vital aim of education to help you from childhood till you go out into the world, should not such education help you to be completely free inwardly from fear, so that you are an intelligent human being full of initiative. Initiative is destroyed when you are copying, when you are merely following a tradition, following a leader, political, religious, a Swami or anybody. To follow anybody is surely detrimental to intelligence. The very following creates a sense of fear, not understanding the extraordinary complications of life with all its struggles, sorrows with its poverty and riches and the beauty, the birds and the sunset on the water. When we are frightened, all this is shut out and it is the function, obviously of every teacher to help each one of his students to be completely free, free from fear, so that he is awakened to do things out of his own accord without being told, without being guided.

I have talked for twenty minutes and I think it is enough. If you talk for twenty minutes, if I may suggest, you should ask your teachers to tell you what we have been talking about, to explain it. Will you do it? Find out for yourself and if the teachers, if they have understood what I am talking about, it will help them to help you to be more intelligent, not to be frightened. Because, in subjects of this kind, we want teachers who are very intelligent — intelligent in the right sense, not passing M.A or B.A — and if you are interested in it as students, discuss it with your teacher, have a period during the day in which to talk about this. Because you have to grow up, you have to have husbands or wives and children. You will have to know what life is, the struggle to earn, starvation, death and the beauty of life — you have to know. This is the place to find out about all these things and if the teachers merely teach you mathematics or arithmetic, Geography, History and Science, that is not quite enough. So, if I may suggest, during the time I am here for the next three or four weeks, set aside a period to talk over what I have talked, so that tomorrow when you come, you may ask questions and find out more about it, so that you are awake, you want to question, you want to find out, so that your own initiative is awakened.