Why not serious

Speaking Tree is a daily column in the middle pages of Times of India (e-paper is here). It is a column which can be said to provide spiritual insights of people from varied religious faiths, who have a keener understanding of the human nature. Apart from specifically written articles, there are excerpts from discourses and texts.

Today’s (August 22, 2009) edition of ToI features an article titled “Trust is everything, nurture it” with Anil Dirubhai Ambani as the credited author.

The article opens with almost an invocation to the late Dirubhai Ambani and talks of how trust was the guiding principle in christening the company ‘Reliance’. In the article Anil is said to have written “my father’s proudest legacy to all of us, our most precious inheritance” is trust. But it was the very same father, who distrusted Anil and left behind his less precious inheritance, Reliance, to his elder son Mukesh, before his death.

Keeping in mind the nature of the column, a few mythological references have been sprinkled to taste. However, with a rapid change of focus, the column starts to talk of Matrudevo bhava (Mother is God) and reminds one of the futility of hoarding “power, ego of material riches” when one “breaks a word spoken solemnly in her presence”. The filmy dialogue, Mere pas ma hain, packaged for a spiritual column, one may suppose.

To me, it is more than a coincidence that Anil is, at the moment, on a media campaign against his elder brother’s gas price hike. And it is a no-brainer to look for specific references to the spat in the column above. So in effect, the aggressive advertisement campaign which Anil launched, with overtly moralistic questions, has extended its reach to the Speaking Tree. I am all for suave businessmen, who run marathons, court with film stars and are willing to spend millions to enlighten the public about issues of concern. But then there is a line: to encroach into a spiritual column with hypocritical statement at every turn, to me speaks of a weak ethical spine.

It is very saddening, indeed, that ToI has allowed for such a column to be published. While I do not hold ToI highly for its morality and choice of content, this to me is a new low. A column which had excerpts from Osho and Shri Shri Ravishankar in the past few days should be a scene of a personal tussle? Does it even matter to ToI that the sensibilities of the regular readers of the column may be hurt?

I do not know what a just resolution to the row between the Ambani brothers is. But one thing that I do know is  that hatred is on display all over – even on the speaking trees, thanks to agents like ToI. For many may be the benefits of nurturing trust, hatred if nurtured, and displayed, can only bring harm, to all.