Obviously, since the dawn of the evolution of the homo sapiens, our human species, religion and spiritual projections are the essence of all cultures Bharat Ganarajya needs Ganapati: myths, facts and gods ‘m Ganesha Nomah! This inyoeation must have slipped from the lips ‘and hearts of many devotees of Lord Ganesha on the occasion ‘of Ganesha Chaturthi these days. It was inspiring to read Claude Alvares on his Face Book mural, recalling his ear- lier reflections and a write-up ‘of 2008 about Lord Ganesha andthe Mangala principle, placing the Lord Ganesha above St Franeis of Assisi pa tron-saint of ecology in the (Christian tradition. Incidentally the e seems somewhat far-fetched and even unjust 4 rail human, being like Francis of Assisi had ‘to face real life challenges in ‘Nedieval Europe while amuyth- ical construct of wishful ideals of pre-historic India can win any’ and all obstacles, be they logical or otherwise, pre- historic o post-modern, Is it ‘an effort to rebuild a myth of ‘ecological foundations that is deat, and rightly s0, for the Goa Foundation? “According to Claude AWvares, ‘the Mangala prineiple whieh hie associates with Lord Gane- sha, implies wishos of progper= ity but not at the cost of somebody else's prosperity, something extremely difficult for near impossible to achieve for human beings. That is pre- cisely why many religious scriptures and great spiritual leaders insist upon seliess ace tions, known as _nishiar ‘makarma to the followers of the Bhagvad Gita, However, ingala principle reminds me of Anim Shourie's Introduction to his book entitled Worship- ping False Gods (New Delhi Rupa & Co, 1997): “Soon what started as the convenience of some politicians becomes myth, and myth becomes fact And the country adopts as its deities the very ones who had striven for decades with itsen- emies to keep it in subjugae tion”. The book was a denunciation of Babasaheb Ambedkar, exposing the texts and contexts, that hardly sus- tainthe political myths around the Indian Dalits Mangala sutra is better Hindu prosperity. kama (sex) and dharma, the ‘two purusharthas, and pre- vent the sex becoming a pleasure without responsibil- ities. To bring up Mangala principle in defence of ecol- ogy is a commendable exer- cise in updating a peeudo-historical myth into a convenient tool for curing a present malaise, The Fathers of the Indian nation tried something like this success. fully in the Constituent As- sembly, replacing the charka of the Indian National Con- gress with Ashoka's dharma chakra in the national flag, ‘Obviously, since the dawn of ‘the evolution of the Homo sapiens, our humanspecies re- ligion and spiritual projections are the essence of all cultures. [twas essential for the instinct of self-survival to project an eternity afterlife, The existe tial insecurity of the human needed cultural constructs to take charge of the process of evolution and to check the nat- ural tendency of the stronger to exploit and lord over the ‘weakdings. ‘Those born handicapped ‘would hardly stand a chance to survive if cultural injunc- tions and institutions did not come to their rescue and pro- tection It was through culture and its linguistic component of transmission that human species took control ofits evo- anism introduced into India ‘the British thinkers and ad- inistrators cited by Claude Abares, More about this ethi- cal theory of governance may be read at Iattps://stanford jo/2xhbeGs, bout we have grown far beyor classical utilitarianism in our understanding. of progress, hhappiness and development, though the outcome may be disheartening and the Mangala principle may still continue to be valid as ever in the past, even very distant past. Our Nobel Prize winner Amartya Sen deserves credit for con- ‘ributing to the new criteriafor defining the human develop- ment index leaving behind the national GDP as abasie compo- nent. Also Ganesha, Vinayak, Vie givvaneshiwar, Gajapati or Ganapati, will continue to be relevantin times to come, con- sidering the fact that human progress has never been linear fr Fastforward. We need to be ‘thankful to our Indian ances- tors from the times ofthe rocks carvings of Kerala for recording Ganesha ae ahelpful ally ftp: //bit.y/2NJUYDM], ‘World cultures have thrown up since pre-historic times mythical heroes, gods and mother-goddesses to seek {quidanee, comfort and protee- tion against the insecurities and threats to human survival Many of those have been re- placed and new ones invented as human skills developed to reduce those insecurities. Baruch Spinoza, a descen- dant of the Portuguese Jews ‘who fled to the Netherlands, hhas left his understanding of this phenomenon, and summed it up by distinguish- ing two phases of nature, ‘which he called natura natu rata and natura naturans, The former represented the natural forces dominated by man, and the latter as the nature that re- mains uncontrolled by science and continues to instill fear And insecurity (he author is Founder-Di-‘Mangala sutta is also an ime portant doctrine of Theravada Buddhisi. Before we proceed to reflect upon the comparison with Benthan’s utilitarianism, this lution, unlike any other species that eventually died out or are doomed to die Granting that cultures. have thrown up counter-cultural checks from time to time, they rector of the Xavier Centre of Historical Researeh (Goa) 1979- 41994; Retired Cathedratie Pro- fessor of the Universidade Lusofona de Humanidades © ‘Teconolgias (1996-2014)