OVER TO AN ETHICAL UNIVERSE

PREAMBLE

WE, the enlightened citizens of this Universe, take this pledge and decide to create a NEW WORLD BASED ON ETHICAL VALUES. We shall strive

1. To introduce an alternative system of education which focuses on increasing the ethical conciousness among the students, teacher and administrators, and the people at large who are at the receiving end of a faulty educational buildup.

2. To establish contact with people of different groups in the social strata, apart from intellectuals and students, such as workers, labourers, and people who are suffering from the ethic-less social structures and to impart them a consciousness of Right and not right, and make them aware how they can unite against the ethic-less philosophies of the upcoming world.

3. To run courses parallel to university courses,  so that universities and colleges start running courses in Ethics under the Compulsory Category, so that people could be prepared for an ETHICAL UNIVERSE.

4. To shift the focus of humanity – students, teachers, professionals, corporates, workers, and small time businessmen – from the blind pursuit of wealth creation and unbridled success which is the source of all misery in the world.

5. To direct the thrust of human endeavour towards a World which recognizes the wealth of character, prizes good deeds, and believes in Universal Good.

6. Finally, to THINK RIGHT AND ACT RIGHT.

7. Our efforts will directed towards Creation of a University of Ethics, in an attempt to ensure that No course in any world Institution gets recognition unless it has an inbuilt Ethical Programme.

8.  We shall connect with the UNESCO to grant affiliation to the International Academy of Ethics which will work for A WORLD OF PEACE, understanding, and respect in international affairs. WAR must be exiled from the Ethical Universe because it is most unethical event which leads to massacre of millions.

MISSION

The Aazaad Foundation (Trust) dreams of a PEACEFUL AND HAPPY WORLD. The Ethical Universe, an International Academy of Ethics is a forerunner to the realization of our dream of a University of Ethics.

VISION

Humanity is not a race, it is a value and we have lost it in blind  pursuit of wealth and prosperity. – Anand

In this age of falling moral standards, and near-absolute absence of the sense of discrimination between good and evil, we find that the structures which imparted values to humanity have been erased out of existence, or distorted so that they stand only in form, while their essence is essentially lost. Let us look at religion. All the goodness that it preaches remains restricted to the holy pages, while what we see going on in society is utter lack of divinity even among the holiest of holy people. Religion has been reduced to a habit, a custom, a rite, and its spirit has been taken away. In the same way, the second structure which was supposed to maintain morality in the system was the teaching profession. It has been dropped from the list of ‘noble professions’. It is not a matter of choice with our youngsters. It is only a matter of employment, a dry attachment to a job from which we extract monthly salary to support the family. The systems which decide the content of teaching subjects want that there should be no literature in the syllabi, students should learn only how to write a letter, a quotation, and how to draft advertisements. The third structure that has fallen, absolutely, is the presence of the grand parents at home. Need I mention the broken family system, and the single-parent families where old people have been exiled from homes and quarantined old age homes? Who is there to teach the stories of Raja Harish Chander and Shakuntala, and even the Ramayana to the young minds? They have been replaced with the TV which has tumbled them into a world of consumerist culture, day and night telling them, eat this eat that, making them obese in body and mind too.

The culture of corruption that has made inroads into human society on a spectacular scale has increased the pace of humanity towards self-destruction. Philosophically, we appear to be at the end of the cycle of Kalyuga, and this being the last phase of the epoch, we can see signs of imminent disaster waiting for us, when every value has been lost. Humanity is not a race, it is a value. And we have lost it in our pursuit for success and prosperity.

THE COUNTER-BLAST

We, all those who wish well to this society, who want values to return to our younger generations, who want that we must rise above crass commercialism, and turn human again, need to join heads together. Certain things are clear. We cannot look for correction towards religion. Education has been destroyed by masters of commercialism. And family system has gone down the drain. Our worry is how to inculcate Humanism among our growing children, who are going to make our world tomorrow. How to bring them to realize that this society needs certain values of goodness, humanity, honesty and integrity. That wealth is not the last value. That fame, power are glittering illusions only.

We can do so if in each state, we have a University of Ethics, which should be beyond the pale of all religions, regions, and creeds. We need to teach literature and philosophy, and issue 6 month certificate courses in Moral Engineering and make them compulsory to pass Higher Secondary. No person who does not possess a degree can get into a job. A three year degree programme in Moral Engineering may give us Ethical Supervisors to be placed, one in ten schools in a cluster. In Universities too, we need to open Department of Ethics, and make the study compulsory in every department.