Learning at Bodhshala

This week we look at some excerpts from a SIDH publication, Learning at Bodhshala, that chronicles a unique educational experiment. I think that, in times to come, this book may become required reading for anyone trying to re-imagine a truly Indian education.

Excerpt 1: (The eye of commonality, page 1)

I soon realised that, with children, it is not difficult to introduce farming or any useful productive work in the classroom. However, when a child goes through a mainstream school, he emerges 12 or 15 years later as a young adult, who will resist any out-of-the-textbook, real-life learning. This is indeed something amazing about modern schooling – it makes us uniformly useless in a productive environment. Urban society has accomplished this efficiently and the same model is being thrust on rural schools.

Excerpt 2: (The eye of commonality, page 29)

Our reading of Gandhiji and his vision of buniyadi shiksha, i.e., basic education, also provided direction. Soon our farm produce activity grew into a full fledged Production-Integrated Basic Education programme. It ran for three years, during which the learning activities at Bodhshala school resulted in the production of recycled hand-made paper, value-added food items, ayurvedic medicines, soaps and creams, cloth bags, paper bags and envelopes, and learning material such as number rods and the abacus.

Excerpt 3: (Food and health, page 34)

Mandua began to be regularly cooked in our kitchen, and so was jhingora as and when it was available. This had an unexpected effect on both parents and children. Visitors from the community would be pleasantly surprised and were prone to say, ‘oh, so you eat mandua too!’ This went a long way in bridging the gap between home and school.

Our teachers, too, rediscovered the joys of traditional Garhwali cooking, which they remembered from their childhood. Some of them were eating this at home, but joylessly, because schooling and the modern systems made the millets appear inferior. I then realised how detrimental schooling is to health.

Excerpt 4: (Production-integrated basic education, page 83)

The cruelty is now global; governance and science are both subservient to business, there is no ethics. The minimum and adequate response is to take farming back into our own hands. Every family must grow some of its food, not only the village family, which must be encouraged and supported to continue doing so, but the urban family as well, who must be educated about the significance of regaining this lost independence.

In that sense, I believe that natural farming or rishi kheti is the modern-day charkha. I also feel that Gandhiji, if he were here today, would approve of this; he would wholeheartedly encourage the self-production of food in a sustainable way.

Excerpt 5: (Production-integrated basic education, page 93)

The paper industry, in particular, is a double villain because apart from creating pollution at the output end of the process, it is also destroying forests at the input end. Our students were shocked to learn all this, and said that these polluting industries ought to be shut down. ‘What will we do for paper?’ asked a teacher. ‘We will find a way,’ they replied, with the new-found confidence from having made their own paper and notebook. It would be tempting to dismiss this as innocent bravado, but the important point is that these children were willing to face a truth which adult society has been evading.

(The list of SIDH publications is available here. If you want copies of ‘Learning at Bodhshala’ or any other publication, please use the contact form on the SIDH site to place your order. If you face any problems, please write to me at arun@aslishiksha.com)

Learning to learn

In the accelerated digital world we inhabit today, not many people seem to be doing any serious reading. It is easier to passively watch a YouTube video (at 2x speed) than to read something which forces us to think. The two books on ‘Learning to learn’ try to address this problem by using images and minimal text to convey their message.

Here are some pages from the first book, ‘Learning to learn – An Introduction’.

This introductory book is also available in Hindi as ‘Asli Shiksha – Ek parichay‘.

If you are interested in buying copies or learning more about these books, please write to arun@sidhsri.org.

Understanding history

This week we take a look at another SIDH publication – ‘Understanding history’. First published in 2003 in Hindi as ‘Itihaas ki samajh‘, this small book looks at the importance of history teaching and provides the teacher some tools to make history relevant and interesting for children. Here are some excerpts to give you an idea of what the book contains.

Excerpt 1: (Preface, page 2)
We decided to challenge the notion that history is only about people, or about wars. Agriculture and technology, rivers and forests, laws and livelihoods; in fact, the way people are related to all else – all this is part of history. Everything evolves over time and hence has a history. Thus the present handbook encompasses Social Science and Geography within the framework of History.

Excerpt 2: (Introduction, page 5)
This handbook has primarily been written to facilitate teachers. It is not a ‘how to do’ book, but is an attempt to explain the concept of History and suggest possible ways of conveying this knowledge. Teachers are requested to understand and assimilate these suggestions before explaining to the students. They can adapt/modify according to the level of the students and their circumstances. There can always be other ways and the teacher must not hesitate in exploring better methods. In the teaching/ learning process the priority has to be of the ‘what’ (content) and ‘why’ (purpose). There needs to be flexibility regarding the how’ (method), which will depend on the environment and circumstances in which the teacher and students are situated.

This book attempts to help the teachers reduce their dependency on textbooks and the learning process more practical and relevant for the students. Projects can be designed for three days to several months. During these projects, students not only learn to read, write, speak and listen (the four aspects of language), but they also learn how to ask questions, how to interpret answers and take notes. By this method we are able to take teaching/ learning closer to reality by integrating different subjects – language, geography, social science, science, environmental science, math, etc. – in a natural manner. This makes learning practical and ensures that the issue/reality (vastu/ vastavikta) takes priority over the subject (vishay). Subjects are ultimately not the goal of education. They are categories – means to understand the existing reality.

Excerpt 3: (Concept of history, page 17)
The identity of a society – with its strengths and weaknesses – can be traced to its history. Traditions and culture, strengths and weaknesses are all part of the history of a society. Culture is always in the making. We did not suddenly begin to start living in the manner we are living today, nor will we always live like this. It happened through a series of small and big changes. So, in order to understand our present situation, we need to explore and understand our history.

Excerpt 4: (History of my village, page 38)
India is a country with a large percentage of cultivable land. Nearly 55-60% of our land mass is cultivable whereas the world average is less than 15%. Our books do not tell us these things and we end up assuming that the situation all over the world is the same.

Excerpt 5: (History of my village, page 62)
Schools can become a rich resource center for our local knowledge systems, where both teachers and students will work together as co-learners. This will certainly enhance the self-confidence of students which ultimately is the main aim of education.

(The list of SIDH publications is available here. If you want copies of ‘Understanding history’ or any other publication, please use the contact form on the SIDH site to place your order. If you face any problems, please write to me at arun@aslishiksha.com.

‘Understanding history’ is also available for free download at Arvind Gupta’s website here.)

A matter of quality

Over the years, SIDH has published more than 40 books in Hindi and English. This post highlights one such book, first published in 1998, which was based on research done by SIDH on what people from the Tehri-Garhwal area wanted from education.

Here are some excerpts from the book.

Excerpt 1: (Preface to the first edition, page VIII)
This project was a tremendous learning experience for the research team. We examined ourselves as much as we examined India’s education system. During the course of our study, we realized that perhaps our colonial past has caused us to forget how to speak out what we really think or feel. Instead, we speak what we presume others want to hear. Our aspirations are molded by the dominant classes, who we tend to imitate rather than challenge.

Excerpt 2: (Summary, page 11)
Rural parents strongly criticized modern education. They felt it had alienated their children from the community and its belief systems. They felt it had fostered indifference towards land, family, culture, and customs. The disenfranchisement of literate youth from their land, culture, and their feelings of superiority over physical labor seem to be one of the most destructive aspect of the present education system.

Excerpt 3: (Summary, page 12)
Respondents have made it clear that the people want a value-based education system that will help their children become useful, productive members of society. What the education system has done – alienating the child from his own society and encouraging him to be a market-driven consumer – is self defeating. The disappointments and frustrations of the parents in this study are mirrored in the hearts of people throughout our nation. It is abundantly clear that the present system does not serve our children properly.

Excerpt 4: (Discussion, page 25)
During the course of this study, while the urban parents lamented that their children have become spoiled (bigad gaye hain), the rural parents expressed their despair that their children have become ruined (barbaad) by the education system. This is a significant distinction. In urban areas, people have largely accepted the utilitarian role of education. They have no land holdings or an income source of their own, and so no longer expect their children to be self-employed. They are only lamenting that the children have been spoiled, which is manifested in: 1) rude behavior towards their elders, and 2) spending beyond their means. For the rural community, however, the effect of such an education is quite severe because what their children are losing is an already established system of self-sufficiency.

Excerpt 5: (Conclusion, page 42)
SIDH, too, believes that given the right direction, education could turn towards upholding humanitarian values and result in a peaceful and fearless society. Our study proves that, today, public opinion is in favor of such a change in education – may be it always has been, but never listened to.

(The list of publications is available on the SIDH website here. If you want copies of ‘A matter of quality’ or any other publication, please use the contact form on the SIDH site to place your order. If you face any problems, please write to me at arun@aslishiksha.com.

‘A matter of quality’ is also available for free download at Arvind Gupta’s website here.)

SIDH Vision

Note: This is the modified SIDH vision statement. The earlier version is available as the first post on this blog.

Introduction:

When we look around, we see that modern systems – economic, social, technological, educational etc. – appear to be aligned against the fundamental human need for peace and happiness. They seem to inexorably lead towards crises in individual lives and in society at large. The rise of individualism, which is central to modernity along with associated “ideas” like freedom, rights and equality, pushes us towards comparison and competition and towards converting every want into a need. The cost we pay for this is visible in our broken, unhappy relationships at personal, familial and societal levels. Despoliation and degradation of our life-supporting natural world and strife at the global level also seems to be built into modernity. Our modern lives are lived out in a bleak, unhappy, faithless landscape with no apparent avenue of living a happy life.

The problems of modernity which are faced by everyone across the uni-polar world of western liberalism that we all unfortunately find ourselves in, are compounded in India by the still festering wounds inflicted by the brutal Islamic and British rule we endured over the last 1000 years or so. As a people we, perhaps, need to derive strength and wisdom from our still surviving civilizational roots and to heal our wounded collective psyche. At SIDH-Asli Shiksha we want to continue and grow our work of research, publishing and running workshops/ courses, with an objective of creating strong, grounded, confident Indians.

Direction:

We believe that the fundamentals of Indian traditions are based on eternal, existential Truth (the Sanaatan), therefore it is in harmony with the way the world IS. Modernity imposes its own unnatural order on this existential order causing conflict at the individual and societal levels.

Our endeavor is to work in this area to:

  1. Expose the myths and falsehoods of modernity.
  2. Bring out and establish the eternal, the Sanaatan.
  3. Correct the narrative of India, its civilization, culture and belief systems.

Work done:

Since 1989:

  • Running 35 rural schools and an experimental nai-taleem based school in rural Uttarakhand.
  • Workshops, seminars and residential programs at SIDH Kempty campus (1 year long programs for youth, for example).
  • 40 plus books in Hindi and English published since 1989.
  • A quarterly journal, Raibar.

More recently:

  • Online courses on education and modernity (8-hour long, 1-month long and 2-month long with various levels of participant interaction).
  • A weekly blog on education and modernity for our course/ workshop alumni.

Way forward:

  • Forming partnerships with aligned people and organizations.
  • Creating online and offline courses and workshops for looking at various aspects of modernity with reference to our civilization.
  • Researching our traditional knowledge systems about various aspects of life (food, health, behaviors, weather, agriculture, forest, flora, fauna, soil, water, air etc.).
  • Looking into our Itihaas – scriptures, literature, folk stories, idioms/ phrases, songs/ legends etc. – in different Indian languages/ dialects to cull out the essence, the fundamental premises, the knowledge about different aspects of life embedded therein.

If you are interested in joining our journey in any way (funding it, working with us etc.), please write to arun@aslishiksha.com to start a conversation.

Namaste!

Physics for entertainment

This is an article about my favorite books on physics that I wrote for TeacherPlus magazine. The original article is available here. I think that it points to something more than just Physics education. Take a look and see!

The mainstream educational discourse stridently insists that science and mathematics are the most important and also the most difficult subjects that children need to learn. Here are some contrary expert opinions:

Opinion 1
“If people do not believe that mathematics is simple, it is only because they do not realize how complicated life is.” – John von Neumann
(About John von Neumann, the Wikipedia says: Hungarian and later American pure and applied mathematician, physicist, inventor, polymath, and polyglot. As a 6-year-old, he could divide two 8-digit numbers in his head. By the age of 8, he was familiar with differential and integral calculus. Von Neumann’s reputed powers of speedy, massive memorization and recall allowed him to recite volumes of information, and even entire directories, with ease. It has been said that von Neumann’s intellect was absolutely unmatched.” I have sometimes wondered whether a brain like von Neumann’s does not indicate a species superior to that of man,” said Nobel Laureate Hans Bethe of Cornell University.)

Opinion 2
“GNM Tyrell has put forward the terms ‘divergent’ and ‘convergent’ to distinguish problems which cannot be solved by logical reasoning from those that can. Life is being kept going by divergent problems which have to be ‘lived’ and are solved only in death. Convergent problems on the other hand are man’s most useful invention; they do not, as such, exist in reality, but are created by a process of abstraction. When they have been solved, the solution can be written down and passed on to others who can apply it without needing to reproduce the mental effort necessary to find it. If this were the case with human relations – in family life, economics, politics, education, and so forth… – well, I am at a loss how to finish the sentence, there would be no more human relations but only mechanical reactions; life would be a living death. Divergent problems, as it were, force man to strain himself to a level above himself; they demand and thus provoke the supply of, forces from a higher level, thus bringing love, beauty, goodness, and truth into our lives. It is only with the help of these higher forces that the opposites can be reconciled in the living situation.

The physical sciences and mathematics are concerned exclusively with convergent problems. That is why they can progress cumulatively, and each new generation can begin just where their forbears left off. The price, however, is a heavy one. Dealing exclusively with convergent problems does not lead into life but away from it.” – EF Schumacher
(The internationally influential economic thinker, writing in 1973, in his wonderful and extremely influential book ‘Small is Beautiful: A study of economics as if people mattered’)

Opinion 3
“You do not really understand something unless you can explain it to your grandmother.” – Albert Einstein

That, I think, nicely sets the context for this article.

When I was in secondary school, a decade before the collapse of the Soviet Union, I used to frequent a well-stocked Russian library, where I discovered the most beautiful books on science and maths. They had intriguing names like: ‘Experiments without explosions’, ‘This chancy, chancy, chancy world’, ‘Physics in your kitchen lab’, etc.; but the most enchanting ones I found were two books called ‘Physics for Entertainment’ written by Yakov Perelman.

Ya. Perelman, writing in the preface to the 13th edition of the book in 1936, estimated that during the 25 years of its existence, millions of people had read these books in the USSR alone. The idea behind the books and the unique presentation that converts dry theoretical knowledge into ‘entertainment’, is nicely summed up in the first paragraph of this preface. Ya. Perelman writes:

“The aim of this book is not so much to give you some fresh knowledge, as to help you learn what you already know’. In other words, my idea is to brush up and liven your basic knowledge of physics, and to teach you how to apply it in various ways. To achieve this purpose conundrums, brain-teasers, entertaining anecdotes and stories, amusing experiments, paradoxes and unexpected comparisons all dealing with physics and based on our everyday world and science-fiction are used.

I have tried my best both to arouse interest and to amuse, as I believe that the greater the interest one shows, the closer the heed one pays and the easier it is to grasp the meaning thus making for better knowledge.”

I have had the two volumes of ‘Physics for Entertainment’ for so long that I cannot now remember where I picked them up. You see, the problem is that Mir, the publishing company that brought out these popular science books, shut shop when the Soviet Union collapsed. So the only way to get the books was at old book shops or on the pavements of Daryaganj in New Delhi, or its equivalent in the other big cities. Also, it was pretty obvious that people who had these books in their collections would let go of them only when they were senile or dead.

I had not looked at the ones at home for a long time, when recently, a chance conversation put them firmly back in my mind. I was talking to some people from an NGO that works on school improvement and they had just got somebody to do an interactive physics workshop for a middle school. The people from the NGO were very sure that the workshop had been inspirational for the attending children but they were wondering how the model could be scaled up given its cost and the logistical impossibility of getting these inspiring science educators to all the schools that need them. And I got thinking of how I had been inspired to learn physics not from inspiring educators, but from inspiring books like ‘Physics for Entertainment’. That, like probably only books can do for most of us, opened my mind and sparked my imagination.

(‘Physics for Entertainment’ can be downloaded from here)

The pond and the swimming pool

Some years ago, we lived in a house with a pond and our two boys spent long hours swimming and lounging around in the water. It was like having a private swimming pool of our own. However, there is a fundamental difference between a pond and a swimming pool, and in this post I would like to talk about it.

What you notice about a pond is that it is alive – its an ecosystem, a self-contained world in itself. The plants and insects and animals that live in it appear to all be components of an ‘alive’ pond. The distinction will become clear when you see that swimming pools have energy-guzzling aeration, filtration and circulation systems that work hard to keep the water clean. Like a person on life support with a machine doing what occurs naturally and effortlessly in healthy people. In other words, a pond is a self-sustaining, effortless, natural system and the swimming pool, in contrast, is an energy-draining, effort-full, artificial system.

We can think of other natural/ artificial pairs like pond/ pool – for example, meadow/ lawn, forest/ plantation etc. An ecologist friend used to say that all of Kerala is one giant plantation. I point this out so that you are not deceived by the greenery in the photo above. It may look natural and forest-like but it is the greenery of an artificial plantation.

The pond/ pool idea serves as a good metaphor when applied to education. We can see that modern education is artificial and effort-full and pool-like. We need to move it in the direction of becoming natural and effortless and pond-like. I like to think that if we succeed, what has happened is Asli Shiksha.

What do you think?

Understanding modern education – Online course

Registration: Visit https://learn.aslishiksha.com -> Signup -> Verify email (Check spam folder if email not in Inbox) -> Login -> Buy course -> Launch course

For bulk registration (more than 10 participants): http://www.aslishiksha.com/bulkregistration.html

For other queries: Email us at learn@aslishiksha.com

Course details are as follows:

Time investment: 6-8 hours (40 minutes of audio-visual presentations, around 3 hours of reading material and around 3 hours of contemplative writing exercises)

When: The course has NO facilitator interaction and you can go through it at your own pace.

Chapter index:

Chapter 1: The problem with modern education
Chapter 2: Historical background
Chapter 3: Introduction to Asli Shiksha
Chapter 4: Drawing the attention or dhyaanakarshan vidhi
Chapter 5: Principles of Asli Shiksha
Chapter 6: Modernity and tradition
Chapter 7: What modernity does to us
Chapter 8: Sthiti and Gati
Chapter 9: Stepping-out

Each chapter has 6 segments:

Segment 1: Introspect (Self-reflective questions to set the context)
Segment 2: Listen (3-5 minute audio-visual presentation. Some samples of the listen segment are available on our YouTube channel here)
Segment 3: Contemplate on ‘Listen’ (Writing down takeaways)
Segment 4: Read (Reading material to deepen understanding)
Segment 5: Contemplate on ‘Read’ (Writing down takeaways)
Segment 6: Know (Some points to read and ponder)

If you go through the course and like it, please share it in your circles.

Namaste!

The Isa Upanishad illuminates an aspect of modernity

This post is offered with a head-bowed pranaam in the manner of the Isa Upanishad when it says…
इति शुश्रुम धीराणां ये नस् तद् विचचक्षिरे
(This we have heard from the wise who have expounded it to us)

I don’t remember when I first started reading the Upanishads. I think it was probably just after I came out of college and started working. I remember being deeply moved by the lyrical quality of the unfamiliar language, that seemed just a little bit beyond the reach of understanding. And I remember the assurance with which the Upanishads spoke and the aura of wisdom they exuded.

I was reading the Isa Upanishad again and was struck by something that reminded me of what Pawanji talks about in our courses on Education and modernity. I thought I would present it here and see what you think…

The Isa Upanishad in its eighteen shlokas covers a vast territory. However, in its highly compressed message it still repeats twice, with only minor changes, a set of three shlokas. So, the Upanishad moves away from its terse tone and, through repetition, underlines the message given in 3 of its shlokas. With that as a preface, take a look at the shlokas and the English translation (not word-to-word) done by Eknath Easwaran.

अन्धं तमः प्रविशन्ति येऽविद्याम् उपासते ।
ततो भूय इव ते तमो य उविद्यायां रताः ॥ ९ ॥

अन्यद् एवाहुर् विद्ययान् यद् आहुर् अविद्यया ।
इति शुश्रुम धीराणां ये नस् तद् विचचक्षिरे ॥ १० ॥

विद्यां चाविद्यां च यस् तद् वेदोभयं सह ।
अविद्यया मृत्युं तीर्त्वा विद्ययामृतम् अश्नुते ॥ ११ ॥

In dark night live those for whom
The world without alone is real; in night
Darker still, for whom the world within
Alone is real. The first leads to a life
Of action, the second to a life of meditation.
But those who combine action with meditation
Cross the sea of death through action
And enter into immortality
Through the practice of meditation.
So have we heard from the wise.

अन्धं तमः प्रविशन्ति येऽसम्भूतिम् उपासते ।
ततो भूय इव ते तमो य उ सम्भूत्यां रताः ॥ १२ ॥

अन्यद् एवाहुः संभवाद् अन्यद् आहुर् असंभवात् ।
इति शुश्रुम धीराणां ये नस् तद् विचचक्षिरे ॥ १३ ॥

संभूतिं च विनाशं च यस् तद् वेदोभयं सह ।
विनाशेन मृत्युं तीर्त्वा संभूत्यामृतम् अश्नुते ॥ १४ ॥

In dark night live those for whom the Lord
Is transcendent only; in night darker still,
For whom he is immanent only.
But those for whom he is transcendent
And immanent cross the sea of death
With the immanent and enter into
Immortality with the transcendent.
So have we heard from the wise.

The word pairs used in the two sets of shlokas are avidya/ vidya and asambhuti/ sambhuti (using ‘vinasa‘ instead of ‘asambhuti‘ in the 14th shloka). Both sets refer to gross/ subtle or outer/ inner worlds. And the message of the Upanishad is that, since these are two sides of the same reality, focusing on only one side leads to a dark, incomplete life. It tells us to engage with the world of action/ immanence where change and death exist and also to engage with the world of meditation/ transcendence which is the unchanging and immortal world.

And how this ties up with our course is that Pawanji keeps saying that modernity over-emphasizes the outer world of change and action and ignores or negates the inner world of unchanging Truth. In our workshops and courses we point out that a modern life focused on the outer is rudderless and leaves us vulnerable to external manipulation (by modern institutions like the market, state etc.). Whereas, taking decisions grounded in the inner leads to a spontaneous, sahaj outer life. The Isa Upanishad in its eighteen shlokas gives us a description of the territory and gives us indications on how we can navigate through this territory to live a full life.

What do you think?

Infinite energy

(The following was written as an entry to a story writing competition. It doesn’t deal with education but is a satirical look at modernity and so is 50% on topic for this blog. I hope that it breaks through the grimness of our virus-related predicament and succeeds in making you smile)

Dr Ramdas Verma, a scientist with a Phd from MIT and 25 patents in high-tech electronics, has solved man’s age-old problem- how to get infinite energy off a finite planet. It is now amply clear, even to Nobel-prize-winning economists from the ‘developed’ nations, that the era of cheap fossil fuels is over. It is in this newly opened space for innovation that Dr Verma had his world-changing epiphany. Before we get to that, a paragraph about what a world famous scientist is doing rotting in Bangalore, when he could have been getting in and out of long black cars with beautiful women on his arm. (For example, Dr Verma is younger, better looking and has more hair than Salman Rushdie)

Alongside his awards-filled modern science education in some of the best schools in India, Dr Verma also found the time to get a classical Vedic education before leaving for America on an MIT scholarship. Over the next thirty years, Dr Verma worked very hard and managed to attract great wealth to himself. At the age of fifty, after many ex-wives and their various children had siphoned off all the money they deserved, Dr Verma found himself rich beyond his wildest imaginings. This was when the Vedic component of his education boomeranged on him and he decided to give all his wealth away, stay in a mud hut, wear a dhoti and live a truly Gandhian life. (This conversation when first initiated in San Fransisco quickly led to Dr Verma’s latest divorce). As a halfway measure, Dr Verma moved into a modest ten room mansion in its own four acre parkland on the outskirts of Bangalore and used only a fuel efficient SUV for driving twenty kilometers into town for buying hand-sanitizer and potatoes and other such necessities.

Back to Dr Verma’s epiphany. Dr Verma all alone in crowded India met a social activist who told him somewhat rudely that:
a. If he wanted to give all his money away, why didn’t he just start (ideally with me said the rude social activist) instead of talking about it.
b. About helping poor Indians- has Dr Verma seen or smelt his target audience and why doesn’t he, for example, travel in a Mumbai local train during peak hour to gain this valuable and unforgettable experience.

After spending three sleepless nights over it, Dr Verma flew down (economy class on a cheap airline) to Mumbai and decided to brave it. At the railway station, automatically pushed into an overcrowded local train by the press of the crowd behind him, Dr Verma stood squashed by his target audience on all sides. A distinctly spiritual experience then slowly overtook him. He saw some flashing bright lights and had an experience of Savikalpa Samadhi (he was able to immediately identify it because of his classical education). In this heightened state of consciousness, Dr Verma noted that a young man, seen through smelly armpits and gaps in dirty beards, was shaking his right leg rhythmically. The young man was sitting opposite another young man who too was involuntarily shaking his leg. And, in his moment of insight Dr Verma saw a cross section of the entire train with thousands of nervously but rhythmically shaking men and women legs. Eureka, Dr Verma shouted and thinking that this was the name of their station many people got off and Dr Verma was un-squashed.

Dr Verma was secretive about the details of his solution. He hinted that there is an international conspiracy to steal his invention. However, he explained that the broad details involve the quantum mechanical piezoelectric effect, pre-stressed mechanical springs, lithium-ion wearable batteries, wireless micro-electric magneto-hydraulic transmissions, prana that fills the known and unknown universes and most importantly, of course, distracted men and women (which Dr Verma, Buddha-like, claims is 100% of all men and women). In other non-technical words, Dr Verma has created a revolutionary new way of harnessing the nervous energy floating free in the universe, and yes, it can be stored and can do many times more work than what our current infrastructure for Industrial Civilization needs. Being fabulously rich, as we mentioned earlier, Dr Verma could have easily funded the research and development and taking-to-market of this revolutionary new technology, but big banks from America are lining up with blank cheques outside his door. Friends, when the world is gratefully flooded with this technology, remember that you heard about it here first. This is the future of energy! The future of technology! Dare we say, the future of mankind itself! And, you know, it may soon be sidling up quietly and nestling itself next to your skin.