L Ranahaang

The universe still remains a mystery for human beings. The Upanisads equate it with the absolute freedom. It says, “In freedom the universe rises, in freedom it rests, and into the freedom it melts away”. This profound statement echoes the significance attached to the idea of freedom by the great sages and seers of the Upanisadic era. According to them, real happiness in the cosmic life comes from the freedom from all sorts of bondage — physical, mental and intellectual. The Gita says that human beings subsist on various planes based on their consciousness levels — physical, mental, intellectual and spiritual. According to the Vedic concept, “Consciousness is the Absolute”. While a person living on the plane of physical consciousness enjoys the lowest freedom, the one living on the spiritual consciousness level enjoys the highest freedom.

Consciousness level of society is the function of the quality of education, living standard and political conditions of the people. All these factors are complementary to each other, and they are meant to create conditions favourable for satisfying different levels of needs and aspirations of the people. In other words, the consciousness level of the people in general is related to the hierarchy of the basic human needs and aspirations. According to Abraham Maslow, there is a hierarchy into which human needs arrange themselves. This hierarchy in the descending order consists of physiological, safety, social, esteem and self-actualisation needs. The physiological needs are the basic human needs to sustain life — food, clothing and shelter. Until these basic needs are satisfied the other needs will provide little motivation. But once these needs are satisfied, other needs emerge, and so on down the hierarchy. The natural needs of human beings are to achieve peace, prosperity and enjoy happiness, but without freedom nobody can enjoy happiness in a true sense. It is also a fact that true freedom cannot survive in the absence of order. Without order the achievement and preservation of happiness and prosperity of the society is not possible. It is the order which maintains and sustains the balance and equilibrium of nature.

Order for the human society stands for self-discipline or self-control, and freedom for human creativity and entrepreneurship. No society has ever achieved greatness without self-discipline, self-control and sacrifice. A society enjoying absolute freedom is doomed; it ends up in absolute anarchy and chaos. History testifies that without order freedom cannot survive; and without freedom a society cannot grow and prosper. Freedom and order are inseparable twins in the pursuit of prosperity and happiness for the society. Presently, the majority of the Nepalis suffer from the lack of basic human needs, and almost everybody is concerned about his security. It is impossible for the few so-called intellectuals enjoying the lop-sided prosperity in the urban areas to realise the utter miseries of the rural people. The meaning of the concept of freedom for the rural people and for the urban ones is bound to be apart.

The fundamental moral question is “What is freedom from for the overwhelming majority of the people?” First and foremost, it must be the freedom from the untold sufferings caused by absolute poverty and insecurity. Unless their basic human needs are reasonably well looked after by the government, society will never be able to achieve and enjoy peace, prosperity and sovereignty. In other words, no government of any type will succeed as long as it ignores the fundamental needs of this majority.

Government is nothing but ways and means to serve the people. In the present world, however, one cannot deny that democracy is the best form of government. But, since nation-states are not identical with each other, democracy is bound to have its various forms and variations depending on the unique nature and the outstanding characteristics, histories, cultures and value systems. It would be sheer foolishness and short-sightedness to import and impose a photocopy of model of democracy from other countries with different values and cultures.

There are examples of successful democratic countries — Singapore, South Korea, Thailand, Malaysia, and so on, in Asia. One of the important lessons these nations have drawn from the exercise of democracy is: it is not the question of having either total order (absolute dictatorship) or absolute freedom (total lawlessness) in the society; rather it is the wise, harmonious and dynamic balance and compromise between them. They have demonstrated that this key issue is directly related to the consciousness, and the needs and aspirations levels of the society and the security situation of the nation. The relevant and time tested lesson we can derive from these states is that the art and science of successful and effective political leadership, governance and statesmanship for a least developed country like Nepal lies in making a wise, harmonious and timely adjustment and readjustment between these two sides — freedom and order of the same coin. We must be prepared for sacrificing narrower and lower freedoms for the higher and nobler freedoms of our people in true sense. And this is the pre-requisite for our nation and people to retain and sustain sovereignty, independence, democracy and freedom from the uncalled for interferences of international community.

Ranahaang is an expert in security affairs