EKNATH RANADE
The Man and his
Prof. K. N. VASWANI
Vice-President, Vivekananda Kendra,
Kanyakumari
Shri Eknath Ranade, President, Vivekananda Rock
Memorial Committee and Vivekananda Kendra, Kanyakumari, Is no more. But he
lives beyond death in the inspiring, magnificent Vivekananda Rock Memorial off
the Kanyakumari shore and even more in the living, growing memorial–Vivekananda
Kendra–a spiritually oriented Service Mission, consisting of men and women,
specially young men and young women, dedicated to the twin tasks of man-making
and nation-building inspired by the ideals of Swami Vivekananda – Renunciation and Service, Tyaga and Seva. Eknathji lived and died to
build, to foster, to nourish with his vision, his will, his wisdom, his
life-long Sadhana and Tapas,
his sweat, his tears, his blood remaining dedicated and dynamic to the last day
of his life, 22nd of August 1982, when he breathed his last at 2.45 p. m. after
a sudden, massive heart attack in his office at Madras while on his way to
Kanyakumari. He was returning after a long tour which had taken him to Kashmir,
Delhi, Ajmer, Ahmedabad, Bombay, Nagpur, Poona, Sholapur, etc., to visit the various Vivekananda Kendra
Branches and to meet the life-workers of the Vivekananda Kendra, whom he had trained
with such care and affection for devoted, selfless service, which was both a
passion with him, as also an inexhaustible source of abiding inspiration to
him, which kept him ever a tireless worker, undeterred by difficulties,
undaunted by obstacles and problems, accepting them as challenges, as hurdles
to be crossed with courage and confidence, treating them as opportunities for
strengthening oneself for more work, harder work, more dedicated work, more
selfless work.
Eknath Ranade was a Karmayogi,
wedded to work, dedicated to Nishkama
Karma, Self-less Seva, of which he was an
embodiment and his life a shining, inspiring example. There is no doubt, he
will live in and through the dedicated work done by the Vivekananda Kendra
through its life-workers at its many branches, in different States, including
Port Blair in Andamans, where they are running a
school with over 300 students, Imphal in Manipur, Gauhati and Dibrugarh, Tinsukhia in Assam, in so many places in Arunachal Pradesh where they are working among the Tribals,
the most neglected children of Bharatmata, running
among them for their children, both girls and boys, with the devoted love and labour of their lady-life-workers over a dozen schools,
including Residential and Girls Schools, with the co-operation and appreciation
of both the people and the Government. The people have been inviting them
cordially to open more and more schools in their areas for the benefit of their
children and the people in the area, for the teachers, in these schools, some
of them as far away and inaccessible as in Tafragaon,
are dedicated and devoted souls; who even during vacations do not go on a holiday to their own home but hold
camps and like to meet parents and other people, young and old, in different areas to work among
them to serve them. They seek to understand them, learn about their manners and
customs, their language and culture, to appreciate them and to build bonds with
them for their national integration as an invaluable element in the beautiful, multifaced, rich and varied culture of India, which
accepts, assimilates and enriches and inspires and unifies us all, and which is
like a garland of many flowers, or like a symphony of many tones and tunes,
woven into a beautiful inspiring harmony, precious for all.
It has been singing through the centuries,
for ages untold, the rich
resonant song, the ineffable music of ‘Unity in diversity.’ which
is the need not only of India that is Bharat, but of
the whole world, entire Humanity, which without its message of love and wisdom,
of Harmony and Unity, would fall a prey to venomous, warring creeds. It would
fall a victim to hatred and disharmony and to destruction, devastation and
death, through the multiplication of monstrous means of mass destruction
devised by modern science, with its enormous efficiency, in its unparalleled unwisdom and exceptional technical competence, misdirected
to inhuman ends which may result
in diabolic deeds, which would be a shame to civilization and a blot on culture and humanity.
Swami Vivekananda’s
message proclaimed at the World Congress of Religions at
Eknath Ranade, the chosen instrument for the
spread of the vital, vigorous, man-making, nation-building and world-unifying
message, was not only the patient builder of the Vivekananda Rock Memorial
which took 6 years to build (1964-1970) being inaugurated on 11th Sept. 1970,
and which was a sturdy, impressive, magnificent monument in granite, to the
memory of that magnificent personality Swami Vivekananda, but Eknath Ranade was
also the wise visionary, the founder of the Vivekananda Kendra, a Service.
Mission of active, dedicated men and women, who were to be the living growing
memorial to the message of the matter Swami Vivekananda who had said in his
wonderful inspiring prophetic words: “A hundred thousand men and women, fired
with the zeal of holiness, fortified with eternal faith in the Lord and nerved
to lion’s courage by their sympathy for the poor and the fallen and the
downtrodden, will go over the length and breadth of the land, preaching the
gospel of salvation, the gospel of help, the gospel of social raising-up and the gospel of equality.” These were the words which were the refrain of the
one song which in the course of my 11-year-long, continuous, personal
association with Eknathji since 1971, I was
privileged to hear again and again and he lived and died to translate this
dream of Swami Vivekananda into a living reality, an actual fact, through
Vivekananda Kendra, the life-workers whom he taught and trained, among whom he
lived and worked and died.
Eknathji was a tireless worker, an organiser and a great dreamer, with a vision, and a will
which will not accept defeat or be dismayed. Even after his last serious,
severe and shattering illness when be had a terrible stroke in April 1980 and
was laid low, almost near his end and death, he like a valiant, formidable,
faith-inspired fighter that he was, gave a long, patient, tough and, victorious
fight to Death and won through the battle that time, to the surprise of the
doctors and the joy and jubilation of his co-workers in the Vivekananda Kendra
who were like his own daughters and sons, to the joy also of his co-workers in
the R. S. S. with whom he had played a heroic and wholesome role in the history
of nation-building in India before coming in 1963, at the time of the
Vivekananda Birth Centenary Celebrations to his new last phase of work, which
was to be a glorious one including the erection of the magnificent Vivekananda
Rock Memorial and the founding of the Vivekananda Kendra as a Service Mission,
the training of its life-workers young men and young women, whom he has left
behind to work as a dedicated, devoted, determined, humble and harmonious team,
to carry on the great task of selfless national service with Swami Vivekananda’s inspiring ideals and the example of his
dedicated dynamic life before them.
While the doctors described Eknathji’s recovery from his serious illness as “a miracle,” and several senior Swamis of the Ramakrishna Mission with whom he had very
close friendly and fraternal relations as “a blessing,” Eknathji
himself described it to me as “a second life.” He said to me: “Vaswani, I was dead for a few months, I had closed my eyes;
but now that I am back, it means
God still wants me to work.” This was his reply to appeals from co-workers who were like his
children in the Kendra to co-workers and friends also in the R. S. S. and the
Ramakrishna Mission and other sister organisations,
and to admonitions and advice also from doctors, “I do not want to rest and
rust. I must work and harder to complete my task during the time granted to me.
I shall try to be careful. But life without work, is
like death to me. God will keep
me as long as He wishes, so let me work.” This was his way of withstanding any request for rest by him.
He had a dream of Vivekananda
Kendra, International, as the third phase of his plan for the true memorial to
Swami Vivekananda, his vital message for the world, of selfless service and
universal harmony. The first meeting of the General Body of Vivekananda Kendra,
International, was held at Vivekanandapuram, Kanyakumari, in his room on 7th June 1982 before he
proceeded on 30th June on his last tour of
Vivekananda Kendra: A Thought Movement
Eknath Ranade used to
call the Vivekananda Kendra, not only a service Mission, with a cadre of
dedicated life-workers both men and women, but he also used to call it a Thought
Movement, the thought being selfless service. He used
to say, how very many or how few we are in the Vivekananda Kendra within our
cadre for life will not matter so very much, if we conceive of Vivekananda
Kendra as a Thought Movement for selfless service. Let people do selfless service,
not for life, for a few years, months, or only days, even for a few hours and
not under the auspices of Vivekananda Kendra but under the auspices of any
organisation or no organisation at all, absolutely on their own as individuals
in their own neighbourhood, in their own family even,
teaching or nursing their own servant, whoever is in need but do this as
selfless service. The spread of this thought, the inculcation of this idea of
selfless service, is the essence of the Vivekananda Kendra work. And spreading this
idea even beyond the borders of
Plan for a Kendra Branch in
Every District
But he had cherished
another dream, earlier, which he thought was not to be only a dream, but which
he wished to translate into a reality. He had thought and planned and also expressed
at meetings with life-workers of the Kendra, that with the co-operation
and support of well-wishers in all parts of
Eknathji
is no more in his body yet he is still here in his dream, his plan, his example
of a dedicated life, his pursuit with determination of a set purpose, from
which he would not be distracted, for which he would work resolutely,
persistently, consistently with a vigour and a will,
with determination and dedication, tirelessly and selflessly. Can we learn from
his life, his example, to do so? Shall we try? Let each one answer for himself or herself.
Influences that shaped Eknathji’s Life
Who made Eknathji, what he became? Who moulded
him? What shaped him? Who gave him the sense of purpose, and the will and
persistence to achieve his purpose?
Eknath Ranade was born
on 19th November 1914, at Timtal in Amravati District,
He was brought up and
educated at
His stay in Nagpur was
to be the turning point in his life, the central moulding
force which shaped and made him, for during his school days, the more formative
years, he came in close contact with that moulder of
men into humble, yet heroic, dedicated men–Dr. Hedgewar,
the founder of the R. S. S. ( Rashtriya Swayam Sevak Sangh)
under whose magic spell, he was drawn into that movement, joining it in 1938 as
a whole-timer, a Pracharak, working for them not only
in Madhya Pradesh, but also in the north-east region including Bengal, Assam,
Orissa, Tripura, Manipur and Meghalaya.
He had learnt Bengali and also come in close, friendly contact with Ramakrishna
Mission and during the great exodus from East Bengal to West Bengal, with his organising skill and dedication, he devoted himself body,
heart and soul to the relief and rehabilitation of the
The Last Luminous Phase
He was destined for
the nation-building work by Swami Vivekananda in the Vivekananda way. To this
he came in 1963, in the year of Vivekananda Birth Centenary Celebrations, issuing
in January 1963 as his personal
homage, to the great Swami, his compilation of Swami Vivekananda’s
inspiring words under the caption “Rousing Call to Hindu Nation.” So the moulding forces in Eknathji’s life have been “Discipline,” from
his father, “Devotion” from his mother, “Patriotic nation-building urge” from Dr. Hedgewar and
the R. S. S. and its spiritual orientation and strengthening from the Ramakrishna
Mission, and their integration and final
fusion and fruition through the vital, vibrating, man-making message and
masterful personality of Swami Vivekananda during the last 20 years of Shri Eknathji’s life. First from
11th August 1963 as Organising Secretary of Vivekananda
Rock Memorial Committee, then as General Secretary for many years and
since 1978, as President of the Vivekananda
Kendra, Eknathji has left an indelible mark not only
on the land and the country in the form of the Vivekananda Rock Memorial, as a
fountain source of inspiration for all, but he has made also an invaluable
contribution in the sphere of service
organisations by founding and fostering Vivekananda
Kendra, which through its selfless exemplary work among Tribals in the north-east
in Arunachal Pradesh, and its expanding service-activities
in the South in Kanyakumari, has earned enormous goodwill and inspired faith in
the role which it and such other organisations can play
in the sphere of national reconstruction. And so Eknath Ranade, the man with
a