"God Godmen and Good People: A Journey from Spiritualism to Capitalism"

Philosophical Society of Dev Samaj College for women organized a Students Seminar on the topic “God, Godmen and Good People: A Journey from Spiritualism to Capitalism” in which Gurmeet, Manpreet, Nature, Simarjeet and Gurpreet of class B.A. First year shared their views on the concept of spirituality which is being sold by the so called Godmen or the ‘spiritual Gurus’ with about four hundred students and other participants in the college campus. They highlighted the current picture of the growing Dera culture in India where a large number of people unreasonably following the footprints of these Godmen who in reality are constructing their Capitalist empire taking advantage of the dogmatism and innocence of the illiterate people.

College Principal Dr Madhu Prashar in her key note address cautioned the students against the hidden capitalist interests of the Godmen ‘Spiritual Gurus’who are exploiting the hard earned resources of their followers. She said that these Godmen take large amount of money in cash or kind from their followers in the name of ‘Shradha’ or ‘honour’ which is further utilized by these Godmen for their self interest, in the name of social work. She also raised concern about how young women are sexually exploited by these Godmen, who are forcefully send by their parents to serve such ‘Deras’ ‘Spiritual institutions’. Dr. Prashar said that there are women and men who leave their house hold responsibilities towards their children and join these institutions. How far is it justified is again a matter of enquiry?

Gurmeet, Manpreet and Nature in their presentation outwardly questioned the very concept of faith to an institution. They said that in Spiritual Institutions or religion a person is asked to simply follow the given instructions. He or She is not allowed to reason or question the very notion of an institution or religion. They raised certain questions that how far it is justified to blindly follow any Spiritual Institution or religion?
Do we ever question who are we and what the purpose of our life is? It is reason which can definitely lead us to some answers. We live in a sociopolitical world where there is deep seated inequalities in terms of economy and other social evil of such as caste prejudices and gender inequality. They said that until these inequalities are not questioned and solved, there cannot be any human salvation possible.
Gurpreet and Simarjeet asked the people to adopt the scientific reasoning in following any religion. They said that there are many people in the country who offer milk to certain God forgetting that there are millions of children who need that milk to survive. So ‘Spirituality’ does not lie in offering milk to God but in service of humanity.
The seminar was followed by a discussion in which Avinash, Amarjeet, Navjeet and the Vice President of Philosophical Society Amanpreet did raise certain important questions which were well taken by the speakers. Among others who participated were Mrs. Narinder Deora of Department of English, Mrs. Madhu Gautam of Department of Hindi, Mr. Kuldeep Singh of Department of Punjabi,