Brahmanical culture and modernity

The hiatus between traditional minds and modern needs in India and the urgent necessity to overcome it in the interests of the country's progress forms the theme of this remark ably perceptive essay by a thoughtful Indian executive "who has taken a little time off to observe what goes on around and why." The main purpose of Mr Moddie's thinking aloud is to hold the mirror up to the Indian elite and to prod them into making clearer choices.

Mr Moddie is sensitive to the saner and beautiful aspects of the Indian tradition and does not advo cate any radical break from it. In fact, he avers that the culture of each society makes sense only in its own. setting. Yet he approaches tradition critically and urges its rejection to the extent that it retards rapid eco nomic and social progress. Moder nity, after all, need not be suspect. It is not an alien product. It is only a meaningful regeneration of the positive responses of the people to wards the new challenges of life. It' is in a sense a striving for identity with the spirit of the age.

Mr Moddie, therefore, urges the Indian elite to think and respond new so as to reach new heights of civilization. As he puts it "more than monsoons or foreign aid weed such men in numbers."