A Humble Offering

At The Divine Lotus

Feet
 Achievements
The growth in the world economy during the year 2000 exceeded
that during the entire nineteenth century.

The global economy has expanded sevenfold since 1950, raising

output from $6 trillion of goods and services to $43 trillion in the
year 2000.

Proportion of human kind living in poverty has fallen faster in the

past 50 years than in the previous 500 years.

Over the past three decades the population in developing countries

with access to safe water has almost doubled.

Life expectancy has almost doubled in the developing world since

WWII and the gap to the developed world is starting to close.
 Achievements
Scientific and Technological Revolution

More Convenience, Comfort and Luxury

Immense Variety of White Collar Goods

Endless list of Gadgets and Home Appliances

Marvelous Infrastructure

Excessive Consumption Culture

 Achievements in India
Goldman Sachs Projections:
 Estimated Growth rate until 2020 is 8%.
 Golden Quadrilateral Highway Project will attract
activity and increase productivity.
 From 2007 to 2020 India will consume about 5 times
more cars and 3 times more crude oil.
 India has 10 of the 30 fastest growing cities in the world.
 140 million rural dwellers will move to urban areas
by 2020.
 700 million people will urbanize by 2050
 At What Cost?
Despite 50 years of development; poverty, famine, environmental
disaster and the gulf between the rich and poor have been increasing at
an almost exponential rate.

Global income inequality is probably greater than it has ever been in

human history.

More than 40% of the world’s population constitutes a global

underclass, faced with the threat of extreme poverty.

Number of illiterate people in many developing countries still

represents more than half their youth and adult populations. Two
thirds of these are girls and women.

Fifty countries with a combined population of almost 900 million people

are going backwards on at least one Millennium Development Goal.
 At What Cost?
The richest 1% of people in the world receive as much as the bottom
57%.

The ratio of the poorest 10% of the population to the richest 10% is
1 to 103.

The net wealth of the 10 richest billionaires is $133 billion, more

than 1.5 times the total national income of the least developed
countries.

The average American is 61 times richer than the average

Tanzanian. The Gini coefficient for the world is 67.

One in 5 people in the world – more than 1 billion people – still

survive on less than $1 a day. Another 1.5 billion people live on $1 -
$2 a day.
The amount needed to lift 1 billion
people above the $1 a day poverty
line – is $300 billion. Expressed in
absolute terms, this sounds like a
large amount, but it is equivalent to
less than 2% of the income of the
richest 10% of the world’s
population.

Human Development Report - 2005

 At What Cost?
More than 1 billion people lack access to safe water and 2.6 billion
lack access to improved sanitation.

Only half the children in the developing world have access to clean
drinking water, and fewer have access to sanitary waste facilities.

More than one billion people - the majority of them children - either
have no home or live in inadequate housing.

The average life expectancy gap between a low-income country and

a high-income country is still 19 years.

There are still nearly 100 million children of primary school age who
are not enrolled in primary schools. Nearly 55% of them are girls.
 At What Cost?
Excessive Greed and Selfishness

High Stress levels

Suicide and Drug Addiction among the youth

Violence and Terrorism

Communal Intolerance, Religious Fanaticism and

widening gap between have and have-nots.

Rampant Child Labour

Corruption, Unemployment, Crime

Development – Unsustainable Trends

Global Warming Collapsing Fisheries

Melting Glaciers Shrinking Forests

Rising Sea Levels Eroding Soils

Drying Coral Reefs Deteriorating Rangelands

Rising CO2 Levels Expanding Deserts

Falling Water Tables Disappearing Species

 Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Jan 24, 2007

Hundreds of women in Maharashtra's Gondia district travel from small towns to the
villages to earn a daily wage. This is eastern Vidarbha of Maharashtra.
P. Sainath

Travel 1000 Kms each week in

in search of work
Weeding & Farm work
Earnings – Rs.30 per day
Leave house at 4 am
Return home at 11.00 pm
Never seen own children for months
Goes on day in and day out

Why?
Beedi Industry has closed down
Cheaper labour available in
UP & Chattisgarh
REVERSE MIGRATION: These women are former beedi workers who gather
everyday at Tiroda in Maharashtra to board a train to nearby villages in search of
work.
 World’s most expensive
Costs just Rs. 1 crore Lakshmi N. Mittal
If you want the best of
the best, the world's

 
most expensive watch
will set you back 10
crores    

Most Expensive House

                                $ 128 million USD

             

Most Expensive Tie

The hotel cost more than $3,000,000,000.00 to build, that's three

                                           
billion dollars for those of you that can't count all the zeroes.           
 Development
Meeting the basic needs and improving the standard of people?

Economic Growth?

Cultural, social, economic, political, ecological or spiritual?

Process of enlarging a person’s functioning and capabilities to

function?

Freedom?

Improvement and unfolding to a higher level?

Planned change to improve quality of life?

 The Triple Bottom line
Economic

Sustainable
Development

Social Environmental
 Sustainable Development
Club of Rome Report – Limits to Growth – 1970
UN Conference on Environment in Stockholm – 1972
Cocoyoc Declaration – 1974 – Inner Limits and Outer Limits
World Conservation Strategy – 1980
Council on Environmental Quality – Global 2000 Report – 1981
World Business Council for Sustainable Development – 1991
Brundtland Commission
UN Conference on Environment and Development – Rio – 1992
Agenda 21 and Earth Charter
World Summit on Sustainable Development – Johannesburg - 2002
 Sustainable Development
Is Endless Economic Growth Feasible?

Environmental Management

Do not take out more from Earth than what you can put
in.

Improve Quality of Life within Carrying Capacity of

Ecosystems.

Pro-poor Economic Development

Environmentally Sound Development

Social Development
 Sustainable Development
It does not directly address the aspect of excessive greed
and selfishness in man.

Greed is o.k. so long as it can be sustained by the

environment. This is fine but will it work?

If all 6 billion people on Earth desire to live the ‘American

Dream’ the productive land needed for it would be 3 to 4
times that of Planet Earth.

The North feels that the Developing Nations must curb its
population growth and tendency towards civil unrest while
the South feels resentment that it is being asked to sacrifice
its chance to live the ‘American Dream’.
 Sustainable Development
Globalization

How do we
Reconcile?

Capitalism Sustainable
Market Economy Development
 Focus of Current Solutions
Growth within Limits of Environment. Limit
growth because resources are limited.

Cut down Population.

Research ways to increase recycling capacity of the

Earth.

Use environmentally safe processes and means to

fulfill demand.

Science and Technology will always find a way out

to resolve the sustainability problem.
 Focus of Current Solutions
Focus is always on Supply side.

Not on Cutting down Demand.

Does not question the true purpose of development?

No mention of human values.

Less talk of duties and obligations and more stress on

rights.

Respect for Environment to coexist with greed and

selfishness.
 True Purpose of Development
Happiness – Individual and Collective

Peace and Harmony in Society

Security & Safety

Rich quality of life

Fulfillment of basic Needs – Roti, Kapada & Makaan

Educare, Healthcare & Aquacare

All Inclusive – All beings must be happy

 Happiness Research
 Scitovsky - High level of wealth brings continuous comforts and
prevents pleasure resulting from incomplete and intermittent
satisfaction of desires.
 In industrialized countries, individuals are no more satisfied now
than respondents were 40 years ago even though incomes may
have quadrupled (Paul & Cameroon, 2000).
 At higher levels of industrialization, economic growth loses
somewhat the capacity to generate happiness, due to the law of
diminishing returns (Glatzer, 2000).
 In several countries like the United States, the United Kingdom,
Belgium and Japan; since World War II, real income has
drastically risen but self-reported subjective well-being of the
population has not increased or has even fallen slightly (Frey &
Stutzer, 2002).
INTERDEPENDENCY IN CREATION

GOD Man is a Social Animal

NATURE
PARAMESHTI
SOCIETY
SRISHTI
MAN
SAMASHTI

VYASHTI

Man cannot live in Isolation

 A New Socio Economic Order
Belief Systems that respect all life

Priority to the common good

Engender responsibility for the whole

Promote equality (Equality of what? will come to later)

Culture of caring and sharing

Moral Basis

Progress in harmony with Nature

 Trusteeship Revisited
Objective: To alleviate poverty through
promoting equitable distribution of wealth by
adopting a spiritual approach to life and
following a moral code of conduct.

End result: Social stability, Peace & harmony

in society.

Motto: All for one and one for all.

 Trusteeship Revisited
Trusteeship could be termed as Moral Socialism or
Socialism with a Conscience as against Scientific
Socialism.

Nonviolent approach to equitable distribution of wealth

preferable to either state intervention or the violent
means of the communists.

Trusteeship does not aim at a universal equality of an

arithmetical kind.

Trusteeship based on love, cooperation and

brotherhood must evolve from the heart; it cannot be
imposed from outside.
 Trusteeship Revisited
Prerequisites:
 A passion for the welfare of all.
 Belief that everything belongs to God.
 Belief in the oneness of mankind and the
essential unity of all existence.
 Material wealth, good health, intelligence
all must be regarded as gifts of God to us.
 No place for excessive greed & selfishness.
 No question of large scale wealth flaunting.
Contentment is the Key!!!
Simple Living Approach to Development
 Check excessive consumption
 Focus on long term and not just on the
short term
 Equality of desires vis-à-vis equality of wealth
 To each one as per his requirement from
each one as per his ability
 Conspicuous Frugality (Brown, 1981)
 Voluntary Simplicity (Elgin, 1993)
 Ceiling on Desires (Bhagavan Baba)
Spiritual Dimension to Development
 Dharma + Artha & Kama + Moksha
 Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam
 Mother Nature (Prakriti revered as Mother)
 Purusha Suktam, Bhu Suktam, Bhagavatam
 Buddhism – Non-violence
 Taoism – Harmony between man and Nature
 Ubuntu – African Culture – Be Humane
towards others
 Sahana Vavatu Sahanau Bhunaktu……….
Materialistic vis-à-vis Spiritual Approach
 Limits to Growth out
of force
 Greed and Selfishness
 Focus on the Individual
 What’s in it for me?
 Pravritti – Outwardly approach
 Fragmented Outlook
 Short term framework
 Mind drives the decisions
 Keeps God out
 Voluntary Restraint –
Reverence to Nature
 Sharing and Caring
 Focus on the Collective
 What’s in it for us?
 Nivritti – Inward Approach
 Holistic Outlook
 Long term framework
 Heart drives the decisions
 Recognizes a Super Power,
call it what you may
 THE PROPER STUDY OF
MANKIND IS MAN
CELL

OS OF HUMAN
INDIVIDUAL
BODY
ORGAN SOCIETY

 Harmony COMMUNITY,
 Coordination SECTORS
 Selflessness SYSTEM
 Sensitivity
 Sharing & Caring
 Self Regulation
 Holistic
Spiritual Dimension to Development

Problems arising from the manipulations of the

head can be solved only by solutions that arise
from the heart!!

Heart is the seat of all Human Values!

Awaken the heart to sensitize the people towards

the needs and concerns of the lesser privileged.

Sensitivity is the need of the hour!!

Spiritual Dimension to Development
Once the heart is in the right place, any ‘ism’
can lead to the right type of development.

Mahatma Gandhi distinguished between capitalists and

capitalism. According to him the wealthy need not be
dispossessed of their possessions, for then, the society will be
poorer, for it will lose the gifts of a man who knows how to
accumulate wealth. The rich man will be left in possession of his
wealth, of which he will use what he reasonably needs and act
as a trustee for the remainder to be used for society.
Spiritual Dimension to Development
Adam Smith – Theory of Moral Sentiments

“Howsoever selfish man may be supposed, there are evidently

some principles in his nature, which interest him in the fortunes of
others, and render their happiness necessary to him, though he
derives nothing from it, except the pleasure of seeing it. Of this kind
is pity or compassion, the emotion we feel for the misery of others,
when we either see it, or are made to conceive it in a very lively
manner. That we often derive sorrow from the sorrows of others, is
a matter of fact too obvious to require any instances to prove it; for
this sentiment, like all the other original passions of human nature,
is by no means confined to the virtuous or the humane, though they
perhaps may feel it with the most exquisite sensibility. The greatest
ruffian, the most hardened violator of the laws of society, is not
altogether without it.”