Counterpoint: Happy New Year 2023
By Vivekanand Jha*
When the world is on the cusp of negotiating with a new uncertain year ahead, 2023, such has been the scale of the hubris afflicting mankind in recent decades that, giving short shrift to Mother Nature, unleashed deliberate havoc on nature itself.
The year 2022 was the definitive break from the last two preceding years. It showed human beings their most desired place: at the feet of Mother Nature, after the COVID-19 menace.
Sri Aurobindo, in his classic The Interpretation of Bhagavad Gita, had succinctly sought to establish symbiotic relations between men and nature, where the former is presumed to be the devoted son of Mother Nature, and, as a mother teaches her child to stand erect, stumbling repeatedly in the process, till it learns to stand erect. The eco-system, says Sri Aurobindo, is designed in such ways that nature is the supreme, under whose benevolence, Creation is to flourish. Regrettably, human beings haughtily sought to alter this equation: like the rich brats who throw their old mothers to the Old Age Home, they sought to ignore the existence of nature in order to derive a greater pleasure for themselves; to arrogate to themselves the tag of being a Creator unto themselves. This is the scripting of a new equation where humans sought to be all-powerful, and the Covid 19 was a small means to teach the hubristic them their true place. Thus the message of Covid 19 is unambiguously this: The sanctity of Mother Nature is to be outright restored; the relations of mother and son are eternal between that of man and Mother Nature.
The scourge of COVID-19 in China, where almost millions are purportedly said to be afflicted by the Coronavirus, implies that the hiatus of 2022, after the turbulence of two consecutive years–2020 and 2021–appears to be short-lived, if we fail to take the required precaution to enter into 2023 with a sense of optimism and hope.
We have entered a new year while bidding goodbye to 2022, which, in comparison to the preceding two years, had definitely been brighter. There is a sign of hope: India has vaccinated its people against the deadly Corona. We stand on a surer footing than the people from the rest of the world. Moreover, our strong roots in Vedas and Upanishads instil in us a sense of divine purpose for being in this world, where divinity remains our core identity. It is this inherent strength in our belief in Creator and His Creation, which, since time immemorial, has been lending us vigour and strength. This alone has given our civilisation the strength to negotiate with the vagaries of time and vicissitudes of fortune. And, it is the same robust belief which will see us through.
We celebrate the new year 2023 with profound faith in us that, notwithstanding the challenges galore, we will surely overcome them; we will make 2023, even better and brighter than 2022. This should be the resolution for the year 2023. It is the most appropriate time for us to revisit our spiritual priceless treasure, which was retrieved from the books to galvanise the nation by Swami Vivekananda, whom Sri Aurobindo had defined as the collective Consciousness of Bharatvarsha when the former had given a clarion call, ‘ Wake up, O, Amrtashya Putra, you are bliss personified; arise, awake, and stop not, till your goal is reached’.
2023 is the year for us to achieve the vision that we could not achieve in 2022; to strive for the accomplishment of the new vision that we may have set for ourselves. Happy New Year 2023!
*Author, Academician and Public Intellectual. Views expressed are personal.
Well articulated. Full of energy and positivity. Make 2023, even better and brighter than 2022.