“Let me light my lamp, says the Star and never debate if it
will help to remove the darkness”
— Tagore
We are all good people. We all feel we must help others. Our
intentions are noble. We all agree that we must make a difference. And yet when
it comes to putting our good intention to practice, we hesitate. We are unable
to act. Our good intentions remain in our thoughts only. Why ? I have been
asking this question to myself. Why is it that we do not act ? Two possible
reasons come to my mind. First is the feeling that the problems of the world are
so immense that our little effort will hardly make any significant difference.
It is sheer magnitude of the problem that restrains us from acting.
But this should not be so. Have you heard the story of the
little boy and the starfish ? David McNally writes thus in his book ‘Even Eagles
Need a Push’.
“. . . . . . Loren E. Eiseley talks of the day when he was
walking along a sandy beach where thousands of starfish had been washed up on
the share. He noticed a boy picking up the starfish one by one and throwing them
back into the ocean. Eiseley observed the boy for a few minutes and then asked
what he was doing. The boy replied that he was returning the starfish to the sea
otherwise they would die.
Eiseley then asked how saving a few, when so many were
doomed, would make any difference whatsoever ? The boy picked up a starfish and
as he threw it back said. ‘It’s going to make a lot of difference to this one.’
You will agree that we can certainly make a difference at
least in a few lives in our lifetime.
The second thought which inhibits us from acting is the
belief that making a difference is the preserve and prerogative for saints like
Swami Viveknanand, Mother Teresa or leaders like Mahatma Gandhi. A quotation of
Mahatma Gandhi dispels our doubts :
“The world knows so little of how much my so-called greatness
depends upon the incessant toil and drudgery of silent devoted able and pure
workers, men as well as women.”
We will not be able to reach the heights of Mahatma Gandhi,
but certainly we can do the work done by those countless men and women who
worked for him and brought us our freedom.
In words of Robert F. Kennedy :
“Few will have the greatness to bend history itself, but
each of us can work to change a small portion of events. It is from numberless
acts of courage and belief that human history is shaped.”
But to understand this better you will have to travel with
me. We will go to the deep interior of one of the most backward areas of our
country in Dharampur, to a small village hamlet called ‘Matunia’. We will talk
there with inhabitants of that small village in that godforsaken place and ask
them a question. ‘Did anyone make a difference in your life ?’ We will also go
to some remote villages like Chandvegan and Tamachhadi and ask the same question
to the Adivasi children living and studying in the village schools. We will get
the same answer. ‘Yes, one Hitenbhai came to us and he made a difference in our
lives’. Friends, they are referring to our Hiten Shah whom we lost at a very
young age of only 48 years on 14th June of this year. Since past decade or more
he was regularly going to these and other places and helping the Adivasi
villagers. He was working in the field of building check-dams, getting wells
dug, soil bunding, helping the village schools in getting help for constructing
their schools, getting computers and other equipments necessary for the
students, looking after medical problems particularly of mothers and babies,
arranging mass weddings, improving irrigation and cultivation, getting trees
planted and similar welfare activities. He is a shining example of what a single
person can do and what difference in life one can make. He left behind his
footprints on the sands of time for people like us to follow. We all can make a
difference. I offer our Namaskar to him. Let us all resolve that we all shall
contribute our might and do our best to leave this world a better place than
what we found it to be and follow the path shown by Hitenbhai.
