Organised by the Arya Sabha Mauritius island wide, the one-month anniversary celebrations (12 June-12 July 2007) of the writing of Satyarth Prakash (The light of truth), the basis of the teachings of Swami Dayanand, founder of the Arya Samaj, it is timely to refer to this soul-stirring book. Out of its 15 chapters treating all aspects of life ? upbringing of children, education, family life, duties of the State among others ? I will, for the purpose of this article, focus on education as written mainly in the third chapter.

Swami Dayanand, like Jean-Jacques Rousseau in his treatise on education, Emile, stresses the importance and influence of the mother on the earliest education of the child. While Rousseau appeals to the ?tender, anxious mother? capable of shielding the child from the social conventions, Swami Dayanand states from nowhere do children obtain better advice and more well-being than from their mother. He even adds it is essential for the mother and the father that, before, during and after the conception of the child, they should avoid the use of food and drink that are intoxicating, decomposed and junk: they are injurious to the child?s mental development. They should take only wholesome foods and such things as are useful to health, good temper and vitality. Today, medical research is confirming this.

?Good health is the birthright of all human beings. To be ailing and unhealthy is a sin, he keeps saying. After all, this is increasingly being attested everywhere with evidence. Such is the essence of the breathing exercise?

Prayer both early in the morning and in the evening has a prominent place in the principles of education laid down in The light of truth. Prayer to the Lord who is within our soul and intellect will keep us away from evil deeds and wicked ways and direct us towards the path of righteousness. There is none His equal or superior, it unfolds. Let us think of what Lord Alfred Tennyson chants. ?More things are wrought by prayer than this world dreams of.?

Also, the need for compulsory education for 5-8 year olds, separate schools for boys and girls, uniform, strict discipline, cleanliness to name but a few has been emphasised. It would be important to bring out what has been recommended about exercises in The light of truth. Pranayama (breathing exercise) according to sage Patanjali is prescribed to students. A sound mind in a sound body is an aphorism as old as the hills.

Having simplified and popularised breathing exercise through Yog Science Workshops in India, UK, North America and so on with amazing results, Swami Ramdevji Maharaj, founder of the Patanjali Yog Peeth is doing a colossal work concerning a vision of a healthy India and a healthy world. He even affirms that good health is the birthright of all human beings. To be ailing and unhealthy is a sin, he keeps saying. After all, this is increasingly being attested everywhere with evidence. Such is the essence of the breathing exercise.

The principles of education as set down in The light of truth have been for sure the wake-up call to go back to the Vedas for a society made hollow by blind faith, class division, glaring sex discrimination, orthodox prejudices, widespread superstition among other crying evils. Romain Rolland, a giant of French Literature and Nobel prize winner paid a glowing tribute to Swami Dayanand by calling him ?a great nation builder with the nature of a lion?.

<B>By Kaviraj SOHUR</B>