Walking In Gandhi's Footsteps

Even though we happily use technology, we unhesitatingly blame it for the downfall of our values and lifestyle. However, people like Dr Anil Rajvanshi show us a new way of being, by harnessing technology’s power instead of misusing it, says Jamuna Rangachari

- Jamuna Rangachari

All the while he was living and working in the USA, Dr Anil Rajvanshi kept telling himself that he must work to bring about a change in his motherland, India. And, one day, in a fit of madness or what he terms as jihad, he left a very lucrative career in the USA and came back to rural India in 1981, thinking that he will change India.

Ironically, what changed completely was not the country but his life. In the process of developing renewable energy technologies for rural areas, he discovered himself and the great spiritual traditions of India. We can actually call Dr Rajvanshi a spiritual engineer in the Gandhian tradition. Since 1981, Dr Rajvanshi has been the director of NARI (Nimbkar Agricultural Research Institute) in Phaltan (110 km away from Pune), Maharashtra, where he works on sustainable rural development programmes through the application of science and technology. He has more than 150 publications and seven patents to his credit.

No junking

The hallmark of his idol, Mahatma Gandhi, was simplicity. His primary focus too is on leading as austere a life as possible with regard to energy consumption. “During my stay in the USA in the 1970s, my lifestyle was typically consumerist. But coming back to India and living in rural regions taught me the significance of spirituality and austerity,” he says.