Subscribe
Also Find Me At
Blogs That I Read
Sites I Like
-
Recent Comments
- Ina Gutscheinbuch on Life
- rick on Life
- Bob on The (un)balance of power
Blind Riches
Mahatma Gandhi - Capitalist?
I don’t know of a better story of people completely missing the point. A guy has just bought a bunch of Gandhi’s possessions for $US 1.8 million.
The buyer was one of India’s richest men. The chairman of United Breweries, Vijay Mallya had been on the phone all along, talking to his representative Toni Bedi – a sharply dressed man in an immaculate white turban, sitting near the front.
Afterwards, as the scrum pressed forwards towards him, Mr Bedi asked for “a little breathing room”.
Were the items really worth $1.8m I asked him?
“Absolutely. I think it’s well worth it, and a lot more. If you look at the heritage of Mahatma Gandhi and what Mahatma Gandhi was teaching it is well worth it.”
via BBC News | World | South Asia | High Drama at NY Gandhi auction
Worth it?!If you look at what Mahatma Gandhi was teaching it was well worth it?!?! Which teaching? How do you idolise the man to the point of wanting to spend that much money on owning his stuff, without actually having any real grasp of what the man taught, and lived for?
Well – that does sound a little familiar.
This entry was posted in World and tagged Humor, india, Mahatma Gandhi, missing-the-point, World. Bookmark the permalink. Follow any comments here with the RSS feed for this post.
Both comments and trackbacks are currently closed.
4 Comments
You are certainly right about what we are upto with Gandhi’s teachings and where we still lag… But, the good thing about spending so much for someone Indians consider as the father of the nation …is certainly worth. Theres a different way of looking at things. I wonder…if Otis could have possibly given it back to the place where it rightfully belongs. But, a sheer No… quite prudent when it comes about this big figures of money those stuffs can fetch. Now, buying it back and bringing it back to India…Mallya would certainly be proud about what he has done…it’s a different thing all together if he has followed what Gandhi stood for whole of his life… atleast the artifacts can remind and inspire people who have tried and will follow, what we call the Gandhian way of living.
Atleast from now on…Gandhi’s artifacts won’t be under any hammer now!
What more a proud Indian can ask for!!
the irony is indeed not lost geoff and the comparison to jesus’ own life and teaching is appropriate.
not sure what i think of your point rome. is it worth stepping completely outside the spirit and the letter of the leader’s teachings in order to secure the teacher’s legacy, or does this step utterly betray the legacy?
certainly christendom has always appealed to the latter idea to justify its own existence and i’m really not convinced it has ever quite made the argument!
Shane,
How do you gauge if someone has completely stepped outside the spirit and the letter of the leader’s teaching … atleast in this case of getting back the artifacts of Gandhi we can’t blame Vijay Mallya of bidding it highest for 1.8million, just for the reason that Gandhi always portrayed simplicity.
Now, would Otis have returned it back to Indian Govt for free…? I think the Indian embassy had made an offer which they felt were very meagre…quite pertinent to what you believe would utterly betray the legacy of simplicity.
Shane and Rome, thanks both of you for dropping by. Rome, it seems the question (certainly as Shane has articulated it) becomes the classic conundrum of whether the means justifies the end. And while I respect that you might believe that it does, it seems to me that Gandhi’s approach to life across the board would argue strongly in opposition to that.