Dharmo Rakshati Rakshitah. The meaning of this Sanskrit ancient saying is “those who save dharma will be saved by dharma in return”. Dharma in our Hindu scriptures is a very comprehensive term. A religion that believes in and preaches Vasudhaev Kutumbakam cannot be exclusive. Hindutva is an all-inclusive ecosystem. Hindutva and its underlying preaching and principles are established ones, they are scientific and are as relevant today as they were 5000 years ago.

But as a modern age educated Hindu living in an Indian metropolitan, I see and observe that to a large extent my contemporaries are shy about demonstrating love for the religion. Our daily life as an urban educated Hindu is having loopholes and gaps as far as closeness to teachings in Hindu scriptures are concerned. There is a gap that is there between the educated and modern Hindus living in the developed parts of the country and practicing of the age old traditions and beliefs as prescribed by the Hindu religion.

It is my personal observation that most of the customs and traditions that form an integral part of the Hindu religion are being followed and kept intact by the rural Hindu masses only. Be it Ekadashi and Pradosh vrats (fasts), celebration of Hindu festivals like Parashuram Jayanti or Vat Savitri vrat, most of the rituals are being kept alive and celebrated mainly by the rural Hindu masses. I am sure that a considerable section of the urban Hindu youngsters does not know how to completely recite Hanuman Chalisa and what is the meaning of it. A large Hindu mass living in the urban areas of the country do not even know why Ram Navami is celebrated or what is Sankranti and Ekadashi. Festivals are a means by which we get to celebrate the monthly and yearly milestones of our religion. Festivals not only bring a small halt to our daily hustle so that we can stop for a while and celebrate what is eternal in our life, but also bring a new wave of positive energy and keep us rooted to our soil. The irony is that we urban Hindus want our current and coming generation to be highly educated so as to become millionaires and billionaires, but we don’t understand that if we don’t introduce our coming generation to basics of Hindu dharma so to be applied in daily life, there is not much time that our young generation will feel entirely dissociated with our religion.

Any religion remains alive only when it is practised, studied and understood. Let’s take a small halt here to think as to how much we study Hindu scriptures on a daily, weekly or monthly basis, how much do we ask our kids to study our iconic Hindu scripts that are written by God himself. Hindu scriptures are God’s own voice. How many of us know the names of four Vedas, how many Upanishads are there, any guesses? If the adults are looking clueless after reading the former questions, how do we expect our generations to come to be able to connect with our roots. The day is not far when we will lose our identity because we do not want to devote time ourselves and make our children read our Hindu scriptures. How many times do you think the Muslim counterparts are going back to Koran on a daily basis to take learnings on how to spend their daily lives and do their regular chores as per the teachings of their holy book. So why wouldn’t they derive more of what is written in their book than Hindus. So who is at fault, others or us?

It is therefore really important for us to understand that until we bring ourselves closer to Hindu scriptures in our daily lives, we and our young ones are not going to get any inspiration from our religion, we will not feel associated with Hinduism, instead, we will stay dissociated from it. Dharmo Rakshati Rakshitah is all about staying safe in the warmth of our religious beliefs, and only when we save our dharma, we will be saved in future by our dharma itself.

We must show more love to our roots. You can see for yourself that the wealthiest Gujarati industrialist of India Mr. Mukesh Ambani stays so humbly devoted to his religion. He is not shy of organizing Bhagwat Katha ceremonies and Krishna Bhajan Sandhya in his iconic house even after earning a fortune each going month. Then why are we educated urban Hindus getting so sceptical of our Hindu traditions? Why do we feel shame in applying tilak and wearing sindoor? Don’t feel shame, instead, feel immensely proud that this is the Hindu religion only that fetched India the title of Vishwaguru for ages. Until we feel proud of our heritage, our generations will not get associated with the scriptures and history of Hindutva.

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