The Ancient Wisdom

 The ancients had this advantage. They were closer to existence with fewer artificial meshes. What they spoke, the essentials of that remain essential.

Niraj Kumar Jha 

Graduation

 Nature properties men to belong to many herds. Graduating does not mean getting into one more. One must graduate to being assured of the humanity of self and each of all fellows. 

Niraj Kumar Jha 

Being Conscious of Consciousness

Education is about acquiring the capability of being conscious of consciousness, or to be more focused, about viewing and reviewing happenings with self-consciousness. People are mostly unaware of their being programmed, i.e. their subconscious being a designed ware. The suave among people has been scripting such programmes from the beginning of civilization. How to be yourself is to be the end of education, but ironically it still remains a far cry. The other education inputs are skills for a bare living.

Niraj Kumar Jha

शक्ति और दायित्व

वर्तमान समय का प्रत्येक दिवस लोक माध्यम (सोशल मीडिया) की शक्ति का लेख करता है, जो सामान्य जन की ही शक्ति है। इस संदर्भ में  प्रत्येक व्यक्ति के लिए यह सतत स्मरण रखना आवश्यक है कि यह शक्ति समानुपातिक रूप से उसे स्वयं या अन्य के उस उद्देश्य हेतु संघर्ष से नहीं बल्कि प्रौद्योगिकी और पूँजीवाद से भेंट स्वरूप मिली है। जो वस्तु व्यक्तियों को  स्वयं के कठिन प्रयास से प्राप्त होती है, वह सामान्यतया उसका दुरुपयोग नहीं करता है। यह वर्तमान शक्ति सामान्य लोगों को अकस्मात अत्यंत बढ़ी हुई मात्रा  में  मिली है और इसलिए यह स्वाभाविक है कि उनमें से अधिकांश इसकी गंभीरता को नहीं समझे। इस शक्ति के दुरुपयोग का पहला दुष्परिणाम इस शक्ति का क्षरण होगा जिसकी घोर आवश्यकता सामान्य जन को है। एक सामान्य व्यक्ति को इस पुरानी समझ को आत्मसात करना होगा कि महान शक्ति के साथ महान दायित्व का भी आगमन होता है। प्रत्येक व्यक्ति गंभीर हो, जिज्ञासु हो, और स्वयं और अन्य के प्रति उत्तरदायी हो; यह ज्ञान आज किसी भी कालखंड की तुलना  में अतुलनीय रूप से अधिक प्रासंगिक है। जैसा कि एक सामान्य जन किसी भी समय की तुलना में आज अधिक प्रभावशाली है, इसलिए उसे उसी अनुपात में दायित्व बोध को भी विकसित करना होगा। अन्यथा उनका यह बल उन्हीं के  लिए घातक सिद्ध होगा। संक्षेप  में मात्र इतना कि लोक माध्यम पर वयस्क बालपन से  बचें।  

नीरज कुमार झा 

George Orwell

The twentieth was a vicious century and also bizarre. That was the age of unprecedented advances in sciences and technologies, but humanity only abused that knowledge to brutalise itself and deprive itself of its human spirit. A man was more transcending than being himself. At that time, a person who could see things with great clarity remains even today a valuable resource for sane living. A citizen to qualify as one must be familiar with George Orwell's writings.

Niraj Kumar Jha 

Time: a simple tool

Nothing befuddles men, though totally a human construction, like time. Men created time out of nothing, and it exists nowhere except in their minds. Its utility is only to map collective memory and to put perspective in order. The time factor is the management of life and a means of making existence engaging. It is riddlesome only when we see time as a representation of our existence. Otherwise, it is a simple mechanism as I put it above.

Niraj Kumar Jha

A bird called democracy

 A bird called democracy was in the egg in the 18th century. It underwent a  century-long hatchling phase, the 19th century. During the first half of the 20th century it was nestling and the later half was its fledgling phase. Now, it's a juvenile. It no longer needs any support but it still cannot reproduce.  It is its troublesome adolescent age. Soon, the bird would move to adulthood and we all be a happier lot under the wings of this mature bird. 

Niraj Kumar Jha

Illusion of knowledge

Humanity has yet to get over a devastating pandemic, and still, under trauma, they get a war unleashed on them. No big act of commission is possible without the active association of a big number of people and a consenting multitude. This pathetic brutalisation of humanity makes it clear that humanity's knowledge of self is not knowledge. It is still living with illusions.

Niraj Kumar Jha 

Human Problems

 Human or social problems are not, for example, like weather problems. These problems exist through persons only. A social problem becomes a problem as such only when a good number of people personify that problem. The challenge is that these persons also partake in discoursing the problem. It so happened that a scholar came to research an institution of which I was a part. When I shared my thoughts, she objected and pointed to me that I was saying something just opposite to what my colleagues had said. 

 

Niraj Kumar Jha 

Digitalization: the Great Redemptive Passage

 Digitalization to the optimum of all feasible means and methods would have a redemptive effect on human beings. Countries and cooperations with a digitalization edge would have an overall advantage over their rivals and competitors. So it is for the individual persons. It would translate into greater efficiency and cost-effectiveness and lesser scope for scams, embezzlements, and corruption. And it would ensure greater dignity and liberty for one and all:  employers, employees, clients, and whosoever connected with the process.  

One may wonder how wise it is for us to rely on technology to resolve intractable and perennial problems like corruption. Is there no human, legal or moral, way of overcoming the human predicament? The Gandhian basics insist on that. However, I say any technology is as natural as a twig used for brushing teeth. And, any technology, no matter even if it is for destruction, ultimately serves the human cause. Have not nuclear weapons prevented the third world war from breaking out? 

Digitalization would be the mother of many reforms or revolutions; one may choose the term as per their ideological persuasion.   

Niraj Kumar Jha