Page 82 - Acharya Vinoba Bhave in 21st Century ISBN

21oha “krkCnh esa vkpk;Z fouksck Hkkos dh izklafxdrk

I must cling to my mother tongue as to my mother’s breast, in spite of its shortcomings... I love
the English tongue in its own place, but I am its inveterate opponent if it usurps a place which does not

belong to it. English is today admittedly the world language. I would therefore accord it a place as a
second optional language, not in the school but in the university course… It is our mental slavery that

makes us feel that we cannot do without English. I can never subscribe to that defeatist creed. 7
It is clear that for Gandhiji education in a society determined the direction in which it would go.

He aimed that reconstructing to form non-violence society. Nai Talim for Gandhiji was both a philosophy
and a structure for it. In the following section we shall see how Vinoba explained and commented on

the Gandhian ideal of education.
II

At the outset it needs to be stated that Vinoba’s contribution to Gandhian Ideal of education is
not in a form of a treatise or a commentary as one comes across in the tradition of Indian tradition of

scholarship. Vinoba all through his life continued learning and he understood learning to live a life of a
seeker of Moksha in the sense of becoming one with God and hence his called his settlement in Paunar

as Brahma Vidya Mandir. He was a Vidvana - a scholar in a very young age. He would have perhaps
become a Brahma Rishi - a hermit in a cave in Himalaya, had he not come in contact with Gandhiji.

But he was a transformed person under the influence of Gandhiji.
Vinoba’s contribution on Gandhiji’s ideal of education is fairly extensive and comprehensive.
8
His complete thoughts have been compiled in volume 17 of Vinoba Sahitya. However, Marjorie
Sykes, an English teacher who came to Madras in early 1920s and then moved to Wardha and taught

in the Nai Talim School at Wardha for a long time after 1937, has compiled Vinoba’s thoughts on
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education as an English translation. Sykes translation and compilation is excellent and in this paper I
have relied on mainly on this work especially for reproducing the quotes. In the Translator’s Note she
notes,”(The Compilation) contains no fully worked-out system, no ready-made pattern of education.

On the contrary Vinoba utters repeated warning against the dangers which threated education from
systems, regulations and rules. The essays and speeches which are translated are occasional writings in

the best sense of word; that is to say, they are called forth by, and designed for, particular and special
occasions… they were given… to suit their circumstances, to answer their questions, to meet their

difficulties. 10
Sykes has classified Vinoba’s thoughts on Gandhiji’s Nai Talim in two broad sections, ‘Basic

Ideas of Nai Talim and ‘Principles of a Nai Talim Syllabus’. I have also followed the same classification.

Vinoba on basic ideas of Nai Talim

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