Kong Qiu famously known as Confucius was a Chinese teacher, editor, politician, and philosopher of the approximately until 403 BC which is also called the Spring and Autumn Period of Chinese history which corresponds roughly to the first half of the Eastern  Zhou dynasty. This period can also be described further as a golden era because the concept of morality was established and practiced. Confucius emphasized personal and governmental morality, correctness of social relationships, justice and sincerity. His followers competed successfully with many other schools during the Hundred Schools of Thoughts. The concept ‘hundred schools of thought’ refer to an era of great cultural and intellectual expansion in China. Though, that era was loaded with chaos and bloody battles, but it was also known as the Golden Age of Chinese philosophy because a broad range of thoughts and ideas were developed and discussed freely. This phenomenon is also been called the Contention of a Hundred Schools of Thought.  The Qin Dynasty tried to suppress Confucius’s philosophy and thinking but Qin lost his dynasty soon, and Confucius’s thoughts received official sanction and were further developed into a system known as ‘Confucianism’.

Confucius’s teachings center on graceful existence of people; he also imbibed correctness and integrity in his philosophy. It seems Confucius was threatened with his life; but he kept going. He used say “I hear and forget. I see and I remember. I do and I understand.” He believed that every human being is capable of cultivating moral feelings and virtues. To the morally cultivated individual, virtue is what he or she desires for its own sake and virtuousness is the foundation of a successful society.

If you read Confucianism in details, you will observe that Confucius overestimated the power of virtue. Virtue cannot protect the weak against the strong, and it is powerless against wickedness and naked selfishness. In pressing situations, people often simply find it more convenient to resort or submit to the use of power in order to protect themselves or advance their interests. Ironically, Confucius was keenly aware that his moral approach could not save the world from moral and political decay.

Confucianism is a complex system of social and political ethics based on dutiful piety, kinship, loyalty and righteousness. His teachings cover a wide range from how a “true gentleman” should behave in his daily life to how a ruler should govern with a benevolent concern for the well-being of his subjects. In other words, it’s a kind of moral guide and direction for good governance based on values of hierarchy, group orientation, and respect for seniors in age and tradition. The Confucian system is based on morality.

The Analects of Confucius is a collection of sayings and ideas discussed between him and his followers and contemporaries, traditionally believed to have been written by Confucius’ followers. The Analects was considered merely a commentary. But its status grew to be one of the central texts of Confucianism. The Analects has been one of the most widely read and studied books in China for the last 2,000 years, and continues to have a substantial influence on Chinese and East Asian’s thoughts and values today. In today’s chaotic world where morality has lost its value it’s all the more important for us to read about Confucianism. Once Confucianism is saved, it could make the world a much better place to live in.

Today’s generation feels that Confucianism is a very old tradition of thought that can no longer work effectively. They feel it is utopian in nature; hence for the modern world it requires systematic reconstruction. Confucianism also needs saving because of the chronic gap between its political ideals and the reality of societal circumstances. But to save Confucianism and to let it save the world, we must first learn its profound insights and its profound failures. Even in those days i.e 403 BC the political elite were motivated more by self-interest than by virtue, and played by the rules of power rather than the rules of rituals designed to ensure good governance. Same is the case even today. Confucius’s solution was to revitalize the style of governance. He observed that power goes to head and it is difficult to stay grounded when people have power in their hands.

Confucius felt that legalism spoils the social fabric; legalism is based on the belief that people are evil by nature and that people behave properly only if compelled by strict laws and harsh punishments. Xunzi who was one of the contemporaries of Confucius, led to the development of Legalism. He believed that people had to be forced to make the right decision. He did not believe in the essential goodness of all human beings, and he did not believe that they could make the right decisions. Whereas, Confucius felt that reward and punishment makes people shameless and turns them further away from independent moral cultivation. To accept Legalism is equal to abandoning the best aspects of humanity. Second, reward and punishment alone cannot ensure long-term stability and peace. If people have no virtue, sophisticated systems of sanction only breed ingenious crimes, and no government of any kind can save the day. If you see our system closely, that’s what criminals do. They study the loopholes in laws and exploit it to the hilt.

The Confucians cannot agree with the Legalist strategy, yet they admit that their rituals and virtues fail to control elite behavior. The challenge then becomes this: Is there any alternative that effectively tackles problems in the non-ideal world and yet retains Confucian ideal aspirations? This question has haunted Confucians for over 2,500 years, and continues to do so even today.

The best way to meet this challenge is to adopt liberal democratic institutions that are shaped by the Confucian conception. Confucianism has good instrumental reasons to adopt democracy, because of its view that political authority exists for the happiness of the people. Under suitable social and economic conditions, the institutions of liberal democracy – limited government, democratic elections, human rights, and civil liberties appear to be more effective than other political systems in restraining political power, preventing unconcealed corruption, and forcing elected officials to work for and respond to the people. Well, all this does sound utopian.

While democracy can promote and express Confucian values, Confucianism can also work to the advantage of democracy. For a democracy to function well and not deteriorate into aggressive politics based on narrow self-interest, it needs virtuous citizens. The cultivation of Confucian morals, as a form of humanity-based moral education, may well be more effective than liberal civic education in instilling the virtues of such a citizenry.

Confucianism can also provide food for thought on how to select virtuous and competent people to serve in politics. If democratic elections do not furnish an adequate number of high-caliber politicians, or if they discourage politicians from making policies conducive to the people’s long-term interests, Confucianism would consider alternative institutions to supplement democracy. By way of example, establishing a second legislative chamber whose members consist of seasoned participants in public service with good reputation in serving the people.

The Confucius Institute program began in 2004 and is overseen by Hanban – the Office of Chinese Language Council International. The program is governed by a council whose top-level members are drawn from Communist Party of China and various state ministries. The institutes operate in co-operation with local affiliate colleges and universities around the world, and financing is shared between Hanban and the host institutions. The related Confucius Classroom program partners with local secondary schools or school districts to provide teachers and instructional materials. Confucius Institutes are sometimes compared to language and culture promotion organizations such as Britain’s British Council, France’s Alliance Françoise and Germany’s Goethe Institute. Unlike these organizations, however, Confucius Institutes operate within established universities, colleges, and secondary schools around the world, providing funding, teachers and educational materials.

Our heritage is all that has been passed to us by previous generations. Heritage refers to something inherited from the past. The word has several connotations. Natural heritage refers to, an inheritance of fauna and flora, geology, landscape and landforms, and other natural resources. Cultural heritage refers to the legacy of physical artifacts and intangible attributes of a group or society – man-made heritage. Food heritage refers to recipes and ingredients and procedures of cooking, industrial heritage refers to monuments from industrial culture. Virtual heritage refers to an ICT (information and communication technology) work dealing with cultural heritage. Inheritance of physical goods after the death of individual; of the physical or non-physical things inherited. Heredity refers to biological inheritance of physical characteristics. Birthright refers to something inherited due to the place, time, or circumstances of someone’s birth. And, Kinship refers to the relationship between entities that share a genealogical origin.

It is all around us. It is in the houses we live in, our educational institutions, our places of work, the transport we use, our places of worship, our parks, our gardens, beaches, the places we go to for our social life, in our language, literature, music, sports, in the ground beneath our feet, in the shape of our landscape and in the placing and arrangement of our fields, villages, towns and cities. Heritage is also found in our moveable possessions, from our national treasures in our museums, to our own family businesses, and in the intangible such as our history, traditions, legends and language. While all that we inherit is strictly our heritage, the term has become synonymous with the places, objects, knowledge and skills. I strongly feel that we must learn to value our inheritance for reasons beyond their mere utility and their functional use.

This is because each heritage is unique and exceptional; it is the responsibility of the current generation to preserve it. It’s so sad that due to us – the citizens of this nation and our government’s sloppy attitude we have lost a lot of historical, geographical, cultural heritage. This clearly shows we lack respect for our history. In order to build a great future every nation must connect with its past. Our past is loaded with brilliance, heroism, ethnicity, empires, inventions, also a lot of suffering and sorrows. The peaceful native people were massacred and virtually wiped out by invaders. Our history has experienced slavery in its most brutal and oppressive form. I have this strong belief that all generations born after independence have taken governance, rules and regulations, law & order for granted. They grew up in a very different world where a transition began towards Western culture.

We achieved independence but forgot the freedom fighters, we won so many wars but forgot the warriors, we believe in equality today but forgot those great rebellions who struggled for it,   and we are enjoying industrialization today but forgot the first generation of industrialists who had to bear the brunt of the Britishers; who were not given good treatment and equal chances. We have some of best musical inheritance, paintings, artifacts which we are hardly bothered about. We are so callus to not even make a mention of all those mammoth contributions made by thousands of people to create a powerhouse economy in our country due to which we can boast of many other laudable achievements today.

Our national accomplishments are the result of long journeys and numerous processes. It is these processes and journeys that we have no detailed records of and the very few persons who still remember may not be around much longer. There were long and sometimes painful steps that had to be taken to create the country we have today.

India is home to some great traditions. What are they? The first is spirituality of India. Nowhere else in the world will you find such profound and deep spirituality that can win over the hearts of people and make them blossom from within. The second is Ayurveda, it is such a unique tradition in which the medicines have no side effects, and only work to protect and enhance our mind and body. The third is Yoga; regardless of the country, people all over world are rapidly adopting and incorporating Yoga in their lives. The fourth tradition is music. India is home to so many different types and schools of music. I don’t think in any other part of world you will find such a rich diversity in music and dance.

The other mentionable heritage is of the language and dialect. You will find that after every 200-300 kilometers, the language or the dialect changes; the music and dance changes; the local culture and beliefs change. You will not find such diversity anywhere else in the world. Music, dance and drama (full of Navarasas) are inseparable from our culture. How can we forget our food? India has a fantastic basket of variety of recipes across the country. Next is our dressing and attire; you will see such a variety of clothes and dressing styles, and even the opulence of ornaments and accessories worn along with them. We decorate our idols in temples also with beautiful fabrics and ornaments. Due to such fascinating diversity in all aspects of life Indian tourism stands tall in the world. I have to mention proudly about our Sanskrit language. Do you know that Sanskrit fits the bill to become a computer language? Forbes in 1987 reported that Sanskrit is very suitable to use in computer as a programming language, because of its perfect syntax. Interestingly, Sanskrit has very little room for error as well. We have to take all efforts to nurture and conserve Sanskrit by compulsorily teaching it from primary standards in schools.

Our national anthem mentions about all regions, language, geographical inheritance, natural resources and culture of India and it advocates the people of India to preserve and cultivate its rich cultural heritage.

Albert Einstein said “We owe a lot to the Indians, who taught us how to count, without which no worthwhile scientific discovery could have been made.”

Max Mueller, German scholar has quoted “If I were asked under what sky the human mind has most fully developed some of its choicest gifts, has most deeply pondered on the greatest problems of life, and has found solutions, I should point to India”.

Anthropology, as a discipline of Humanities can do quite a lot in treasuring and nurturing our rich heritage. Universities can take some positive steps to stimulate Anthropology branch with adequate facilities and infrastructure; so that many youngsters opt for this branch of study. Besides collecting and preserving the narrative of our past, we should also be proud of it. We lack any real nationalism and pride. This is ruthlessly demonstrated in the way we treat our environment, how shabbily we have kept our heritage monuments, forts, architectural sites. We are very poor because we have not preserved our rich heritage.

Ignorance and shame regarding our own country is not only limited to the younger generations, the older generations are no less to hold closer the western culture with much fervor. Look at any Indian soap operas – they project unreasonable and unsound culture and customs.

I feel unless we wake up from our deep slumber to accept who we are, our authenticity, and begin to take pride in it, we may lose whatever little inheritance is left with us. We should take enormous efforts to maintain our uniqueness of heritage. We cannot displace our past, and if do so, we will become a bland and soulless country.