Preface
I am very happy to commend this publication of the Peace Research Center of the Gujarat Vidyapith[1]. The Center is playing an innovative role for promotion of non-violent society through seminars, training courses and Kamalnayan Bajaj[1] Memorial Lecures on Science and Non-violence. This is a subject of supreme importance for the survival of humanity and there could be no greater tribute to Mahatma[1] Gandhi than promoting reconciliation between Science and Non-violence. I hope this small endeavour will be welcomed by all those who are concerned about the future of mankind.
Dahyabhai Naik
Vice-Chancellor
Gujarat Vidyapith
31-01-1979
Introduction
This publication is an outcome of three lectures delivered by Shri[1] Lanza del Vasto (Shantidasji[1]) on October 18-20th, 1977. He was invited by Peace Research Center, Gujarat Vidyapith.
It was the first lecture of Shri Kamalnayan Bajaj Memorial Lectures on Science and Non-violence. An endowment from the family members of the late Shri Kamalnayan Bajaj facilated these lecture series every year to cherish his memory by promoting a subject which exercised his mind in the last years of his life, under the inspiration of Shri Vinoba Bhave.
Lanza del Vasto is deeply influenced by Mahatma Gandhi and Vinoba Bhave. Like Mahatma Gandhi and Vinoba Bhave, he is engaged in promoting the philosophy and practice of non-violence in the Western hemisphere by establishing a community at La Borie Noble in Southern France. This ashram is self-reliant in every respect. It is a laboratory for non-violent social order in the West where affluence of industrialisation have jeopardised the peaceful human existence and created innumerable problems.
These lectures clearly indicate that prevailing so-called modern style of the West would bring the mankind on the verge of destruction through misuse of science. The world can be saved from prudent application of Science and Technology through non-violent and non-exploitative methods.
Shantidasji came in contact with Mahatma Gandhi in 1937. This brought about a total transformation of his life and he set up a Gandhian ashram in the over-developed country like France. He has poignantly pointed out the destructive potential of Science without Ethics.
The Peace Research Center of the Gujarat Vidyapith was fortunate in receiving such a distinguished person in its annual lecture series. It is hoped that this publication will stir the conscience of many.
Ramlal Parith
Director
20-01-1979
Two profiles
Shri Kamalnayan Bajaj
Shri Kamalnayan Bajaj was the elder son of Shri Jamnalal Bajaj, businessman, freedom fighter, and one of the closest associates of Mahatma Gandhi, whom Gandhiji had accepted as his Fifth Son. From his childhood, Kamalnayanji was profoundly influenced by three great personalities — Gandhiji, Archarya Vinoba Bhave, under whose tutelage he had his early education and rigorous training in his Ashram at Wardha, and his own father who by both precept and practice led an examplary life. Living at the epicentre of the national struggle for freedom, he was truly a child of the revolution. Kamalnayanji was among the selected band of volunteers who accompanied Gandhiji on his famous Dandi March in 1930. He was arrested and imprisoned for participating in the Salt Satyagraha Movement. After his release from jail, he joined the Gujarat Vidyapith as a student. Later, he went first to Ceylan and then to England for further studies and joined the Cambridge University for Economics Tripos. But the declaration of war in 1939, the individual Satyagraha Movement of 1940, his father's sudden death early in 1942, and the Quit India Movement of August 1942, coming in quick succession interrupted his education and changed the course of his life. He spent the new years in attending to the family business as also in keeping up his father's tradition of political and social work. Kamalnayanji's early education and training in the Ashram under Vinobaji had laid the real foundation of his character and given direction and purpose to his life.
He devoted much of his time for the work of many voluntary and official organisations for propagating the Sarvodaya philosophy and rendering service to the people such as Gandhi Smarak Nidhi, Kadhi and Village Industries Board, Blind Relief Association and Goseva Sangh. He himself set up an International Sarvodaya Centre Vishwaneedam at Bangalore with Vinobaji's blessings. He came to firmly believe that a solution of the problems facing the modern man torn apart by conflicting pulls lay in the reconciliation of science and technology with religion and spirituality. While his outlook was progressive, modern and international, he was essentially Indian and Gandhian in orientation.
Lanza del Vasto
Shri Josepj John Lanza del Vasto is know as Shantidas, a name given to him by Mahatma Gandhi himself in 1937. He was born in 1901 in Southern Italy at San Vito dei Normanni. He pursued his studies upto Doctorate in Philosophy and is devoted to peotry, sculpture and music. He has travelled extensively all over the world. He met Mahatma Gandhi at Sevagram in 1937.
Shri Shantidas voluntary chose poverty since his youth and has been ceaselessly working for peace, non-violence and eliminating of injustice, misery and war from our planet the Earth.
After marrying Chanterelle, a musician, he established a Rural Community of the Ark based on the concepts of non-violence through self-reliance. The main center of the Community is La Borie Noble in Southern France. Several of his followers have formed similar communities in Italy, Spain, Morocco, Canada, Argentine and the United States of America.
Shri Shantidas has written over twenty-five outstanding books in French which were translated in more than six languages.
The community of Ark is a Western ashram in France where people live a simple life. The members of different nationalities live together with truth, love and mutual tolerance.
They strive to live as self-reliant a life as possible. One of the vows taken by a companion of the Ark is To work... in order not to be a burden to others, to work oneself... To work for the support and progress of the Order. The members of the Ark Community take part in non-violent actions, through self-suffering and sacrifice. At the age of 76, this tall man with full-robe in sky-blue colour resembles in certain aspects Gurudeo Tagore. Coming from the part of the world where science and technology are on the verge of violence, Shri Shantidas has been making thrilling endeavours of non-violence.
