INDIA, MY MOTHERLAND

           India, a name that represents a vast country is my motherland. Nature gave all her beautiful gifts to this country. The Himalayan range stands on her north as her crown and the Indian Ocean washes her feet at south while Bay of Bengal and Arabian Sea kiss her east and west coasts, respectively. Throughout the country there are vast expanses of green fields which supply food for more than 120 crores people of India. For her very rich and ancient civilization India is renowned in the world as a mystic country. There is mystery in her natural beauty; mystery is there in her life-style. I love India not only because I was born here but also because of her beautiful landscape and simple and quiet life. There are many regional peculiarities in our country. We have diverse languages and religions, many types of dresses and habits. But we all are the same Indian in spite of the diversities. Historically, geographically, politically and culturally, India is one nation and we have some common national characteristics the most important of which is our love for peace. For hundreds of years we have lived in this vast land with millions of people, many of whom came from abroad and we lived in amity. We have lived through foreign invasions and foreign rules with some kind of acceptance. The peoples of India are not very hard working and that may be due to our tropical climate. But our intelligence is renowned all over the world. The Indian scientists have already started their work to take the country into 20th century.

           Above all, the national characteristics of Indian people have been gloriously translated into her ceaseless attempts at spreading the messages of Ahimsa, Equality and Peace.

TRAVELLING AS A PART OF EDUCATION

           Man is essentially a nomad in his life. His desire for travelling is perennial. The next horizon always invites him and he yields to the call of the Distant. Next and next station is his goal. Modern man’s desire for travelling is an inheritance from his forefathers who led nomadic lives in the primitive age. Everyman, mentally, is a ‘Sindbad the Sailor’ who warns to go out to meet the Indefinite at every chance.

           Travelling satisfies man’s craving for meeting the unseen and knowing the unknown. It instructs and educates the man who undertakes travelling. Modern concept of education has come to lay, therefore, much stress on travelling.

Lesson on history and geography become practical, attractive and wholesome through travelling. The monuments and historical relics, when visited by the modern man, take him back to the very ages when those were built and then came to be dilapidated. Again, a visit to an unknown land lay, before us the topographical details of the land, The food habits, the clothes, the social culture and the religious legacy of the inhabitants of that land and its climatic peculiarities become to the traveller vivid, direct and- apparent.

           Travelling has so many beneficial contributions to our education. First of all, it serves the highest purpose of education as it broadens our outlook and instills understanding in our heart. It drives away one’s superstition, selfishness and shyness. By coming in close contact with the peoples of diverse religions and cultures a traveller gradually develops an aptitude that makes him a member of the greater world community, and thus, he becomes a true cosmopolitan. The hardships of travelling and its experiences make a man painstaking6, patient arid learned.

           Ours is a very poor country while educational travelling is an expensive undertaking. So, such tours should be conducted wisely and systematically with the governmental help. Our schools and colleges must send out their students at least once in a year in a package tour.

MODERNISM

           The word ‘modernism’ comes from the L.L. ‘modernus’‘modo’ meaning ‘just now’, The term ‘just now’ does not denote’ any specific time: it connotes 'relating to any period of time.’ Hence. ‘modernism’ means with any period of time referred to.’ It is virtually a concept. The word Modernism may relate to any time or age. It actually means advancement of ideas and thoughts manifested through any norm or form of contemporary Life. It does not mean going ahead of time, it is always ‘within the time’ judged in the perspective of that time.

           Modernism refers of values - ethical and aesthetical, social and economical. The so-called moderns in the history of man could not leave any perennial legacy for the posterity. They simply brought in a transitory agitation in their contemporary ages. Modernism in culture always tends to accelerate the pace of the society. It takes its followers in the fore-front Modern men are the elite of the society and they are midways the leaders in a fraternity.

           Modernism has its inherent hazards too. Many in a society may not like it or may not be able to live up to the modern norms. A conflict may crop up in between the die-hards and the moderns. Even then, modernism is welcome because it lends speed to a life-style. 

ACHIEVEMENTS OF SCIENCE

          Modern age is an age of science. Scientific discoveries have given us both comforts and opportunities. They have been useful to us and at the same time delightful. We use the various scientific instruments for relieving our troubles. We can quickly finish our cooking and can quickly go from one place to another. Television, satellite, wireless have brought the whole world closer to us. Moreover, the discoveries of medicine and other surgical instruments have relieved Lies from our sufferings of deadly diseases. The modern discovery of electronics has solved many problems and helps us to do many things quickly. So science has become a blessing to us.

          But science is used for destructive purpose also. Atom bomb once destroyed Hiroshima and Nagasaki. More deadly weapons are being evolved by the super powers. If another World War comes about human civilization may be completely destroyed. Mankind is now threatened with the danger of total destruction.

          Scientific discoveries may be a blessing of man if man can make a proper use of them. Mere knowledge is not enough. Man must have the good sense and wisdom to use them for the welfare of mankind. Science cannot make man happy if man mad with the power of deadly instrument uses it for destructive purpose. So it is only on us how science can made human life happier.

A HOPELESS FEELING OF GENERATION GAP

          Generation Gap is a strange phenomenon. I am not at all ripe in age, but strange that I do not exactly under-stand the school and college students these day. I cannot stand them in their good-for shaken clothes and with their peculiar mode of speech. Discipline and decency are two words which are alien to then. Peculiarly they pride in being rude to others and even to their betters. These so-called sophisticated Romeos and Juliet’s hobnob with each other and sometimes their intimacy, temporary and skin-deep though, is reckless. I despise all these. But, my irritation probably has its origin in generation gap, the gap between myself and my elders as well as the gap between myself and my younger’s. I have practically become an introvert and have, under duress started to live by myself,—probably being biased and fixed in my emotions and views. My concepts of ethical and aesthetical values, to my utter dismay I find, sharply differ with those of the previous Generations as with the younger generations. The orthodox views of my parents in the matters of free-mixing of boys and girls pinches me equally as the lousy attitude in the name of wooden-lib shocks inc. The world, it seems to me, has gone crazy and we have been uprooted today from the soil of our belief.

IMPORTANCE OF LETTER-WRITING

          Letter-writing is an indispensable feature of human life. It is one of the great arts of civilized society. We are social beings and, we have to communicate with other beings in the society for mutual exchanges of thoughts. But when our friends and relations stay far away, we cannot speak to them. It is then that we send them messages through letters. So letter plays a very important role in our social life, because, letters then efficiently act as the substitute for talks.
          Letter-writing is an art, perhaps a lost art, as we do not liar now- a-days enough time for writing lengthy literary letters. Horace Walpole, Cowper, Byron. Lamb or Carlyle and many other eminent persons wrote immortal letters. They had time to write such letters through which they could hold up any topic of interest and present themselves through their letters to persons whom they wrote to. But now we race hard against time.
          Yet we have to write letters—may be personal or informal letters. Cowper once told his cousin: ‘When I read your letters, I hear you talk!’ That is the trick or the art one must know about letter-writing. One may have to write all kinds of letters, formal and informal. Personal letters have countless varieties. It must throb with an intense intimacy of that it can make the distance between the two disappear totally and make your presence felt by the reader of your letter. In the same way, official or business correspondence, too, must be agreeable. A certain standard or form, an extent of elegance always tend to lend an extra dimension to even official or business correspondence thereby increasing the importance of such letters.
          The modern way of life compels us to go anywhere in the world in quest of a suitable subsistence. It is only the letter that comes to help us to overcome that distance and hence, the importance of letter is beyond any question.

CENSUS

             The periodic count of the population of a country is called census.

Excepting the occasions of national emergency or a widespread natural calamity in a country census is conducted every ten years. Irrespective of the size of a country or of the form of its government, a census is a regular task undertaken by every country at regular intervals of ten years. Census has a very great national importance as it couples and records very valuable information about a land and its people at a given point of time.

             Certain well-defined purposes govern enforcement of census. It graphically registers the trends in the population of a country—whether the population is increasing or decreasing. It records the detailed number wise proportion of men and women, young and old citizens of a country. It clearly shows the trends in the rates of birth and death and the net increase or decrease in population.

             The objectives of a census are much more than simple covering the traits of a population. An efficient civic administration becomes possible only when the wide ranges of facts revealed by the census are minutely considered and their implications accurately realized. A census is essential for implementation of effective economic planning. A census, for example, discloses the existence of the different types of households in the country.—normal, institutional or houseless. It shows the typical industries,—large-scale or cottage industries. The census also furnishes a classified list of the vocations of the people as well as a similar list of their economic activities. Above all, a census provides accurate information about the employed and the unemployed, the illiterate and the literate of a country. All these records of information are absolutely indispensable for the planners, businessmen and entrepreneurs.