Education, not prayers will solve world's problems: Dalai Lama

Tibetan spiritual leader, the 14th Dalai Lama said the world needs education and not prayers to solve all existing problems.

The Dalai Lama spoke after unveiling the foundation plaque of the National Institute of Mental Health and Neuro Sciences (Nimhans) Integrated Centre for Yoga in the City on Monday. He said there is a need to find a secular way to enrich inner value.

Asking Indians to “wake up”, he said the world was making use of the knowledge that came from Nalanda. “However, you Indians are busy copying the west and leading a materialistic life. Ancient Indians were our Gurus (teachers),” he added.

Recollecting that most Indian scholars hailed from South India, he said he often teased North Indians that people from the south had a special brain. “Revive the angels of knowledge and serve humanity,” he added. Even as modern science focusses on physical matter, the Dalai lama said there was not enough ongoing research about the mind.

While the leader was of the opinion that prayer would help individual practitioners, he was skeptical whether it would do the society any good. “If god were to visit the earth and we asked him to give us peace, he would say that he created a peaceful and compassionate world. But the freewill that he gave was misused,” he narrated.

On being asked about how someone of his caliber could be so down to earth, he said, “If I think I am unlike the seven billion others, I will become lonely.”

He also urged youngsters to question before accepting. “First, one must understand by hearing or reading. The next step is to analyse knowledge and contemplate it. After this, one must get experience,” he said.

While he answered some of the questions posed by the audience, he chose to let a few other find answers for themselves. “I do not know. Being concerned about students is what is important,” he told one of the teaching staff from the nursing section when she sought to know what was most important in the teaching profession.

The audience were in for a surprise when hollywood actor Richard Gere walked up on the stage and gave a brief address. “It is ironic that I am talking to Indians about meditation. Meditation is a new concept for us. I come from a country that is just born,” said Gere who is also a follower of the Dalai Lama.