THE UNITY AND DIVERSITY OF LIFE.

[Based on a lecture delivered by J.B.S. Haldane at Vigyan Bhavan, New Delhi, on 15th, 16th and 17th  December, 1957 and later broadcast by All India Radio]. 

Lecture 1.

The Government of India has done me a very great honour in inviting me to deliver these lectures. I felt even further honoured when I learned that my predecessors had been Rajagopalachari and Krishnan. But worthy successors to them could certainly have been chosen from amongst my colleagues in this country. And I could, I believe, have given a better course of lectures after two or three years in India. By that time I hope not only to know your plants and animals better than I do, but to have learned enough Sanskrit to make a more direct contact with some of the great minds of India's past than is possible through translations and summaries. Perhaps I should have done better to lecture on the subjects on which I am carrying out research and teaching at the Indian Statistical Institute, namely, genetics and statistics. If India had television I could perhaps have shown you different breeds of cows, hens, rice, jute, and so on, and told you something of how the differences between them are inherited, and what is their economic importance.

I have decided to deal with a more general topic both because I can speak of plants and animals which are familiar to you, and because the question of unity and plurality has interested Indian thinkers for more than two thousand years. And I believe that this subject is particularly appropriate to a series of lectures memorising Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel. His most remarkable single achievement was, I believe, the unification of the princely States into the Indian Republic, a task which India's enemies hoped, and her friends feared, would prove impossible.

What do I mean by the phrase "the Diversity of Life"? I mean several different things. In the first place, there are many different sorts of living creatures, for example cows, koels, rice plants, and pipal trees. We use the word species to denote these different sorts, and there are more than a million of them. Secondly, each species consists of a great many members, and they are all a little different. Thirdly, each one of these is made up of different parts, such as hair and bone, leaves and roots, and can alter its behaviour, for example running at one time and eating at another, flowering at one time and fruiting at another.  

NEW ERA OF SCIENCE.

[Based on a lecture delivered by K.S. Krishnan, broadcast over All India Radio on 15th, 16th and 17th December, 1956].

Lecture-I.

I DEEPLY APPRECIATE the honour of being invited to give this year's Sardar Patel Memorial Lectures. I wish to thank sincerely the organisers for giving me this opportunity to pay my tribute to the memory of one of the greatest statesman that modern India has produced. The title of these lectures is "The New Era of Science" in which, naturally, we are all interested, whether our direct interests lie in science or elsewhere. The recent outburst of cultural activities - the numerous seminars, conferences and exhibitions - organised in Delhi and elsewhere in connection with the Buddha Jayanti celebrations has tended to highlight one major trait that characterises all living ancient civilisations like ours, namely, the remarkable resilience that they have shown all through the ages, and the capacity for absorbing and assimilating newer and widely different currents of thought. Otherwise these civilisations would not have survived so long. We were of course aware of this trait previously, but the recent seminars have brought it to light rather prominently. Sanskrit scholars have a felicitous way of expressing this resilience. The word puranah means literally 'the ancient ones' but the scholars, taking advantage of the elasticity so peculiar to the language, have taken the word to mean purapi navah, that is 'more fresh than ever before', which again serves to emphasise the peculiar genius of our civilisation to assimilate and integrate many different cultural currents; realising 'unity in diversity' has luckily been one of our major virtues.
The virtue, which is so eminently characteristic of our cultural life, has unfortunately not been so apparent in our political life. Indeed at many stages in our long political history, this virtue has been conspicuously absent. Even in the golden age of Asoka, to which we all refer with a certain pride, the integration of the country was predominantly cultural rather than political. Real integration, extending not only over the cultural but also over other fields, is of a more recent date. At any rate its study growth is recent and it had to await the nurturing care with which Mahatmaji and his distinguished colleagues cherished them. It is, therefore, not without significance that we fondly refer to him as the Father of the Nation. The accomplishment of this task of integration oof the country on the political side was in a large measure that of Sardar Patel, whose anniversary we are commemorating today. 
There is close analogy between the virtues involved in cultural integration and those needed for the cultivation and advancement of the pure sciences, and similarly between those involved in political integration and in technology. In this context, it may be significant that in India we took to the pure sciences much more readily than to the applied sciences. With our great cultural and academic traditions and the new political awakening, one may confidently look forward to a bright scientific and technological future for the country.
Now the main purpose of science is to understand Nature in all her varied aspects, and learn to control Nature and to use this mastery over Nature for the good of mankind. I am aware that even the mere mention of 'control over Nature' brings immediately to one's mind its misuses too, some of them frightfully inhuman. Indeed when I was thinking of a suitable title for these lectures I thought of "The Atomic Age", but for the reason just mentioned I fought shy of using it. I know also that many people who are not quiet sympathetic to science have asked the question: "Why then apply science at all if its results are liable to be so grossly misused"? They would quote very eminent authorities too. The well-known toast for science is: "Here is to science. May it be of no use to anybody at any time". The great mathematician Gauss, who would rank with Archimedes and Newton as one of the greatest mathematicians may be regarded as the Queen of the Sciences, then the theory of numbers should be regarded as the Queen of Mathematics - and he proceeded to give the reason - "because it is the least useful". But the reply to these critics would be this: The ideal of knowledge for its own sake is a very ancient one, at least as old as Plato. It is also a laudable one, and has proved to be of immense value. This Platonic ideal has and has proved to be of immense value. This Platonic ideal has inspired creative thought over all the intervening centuries in many centres of learning. It expresses the natural yearning of the creative artist to be left alone without being bothered by interference from those he would regard as the Philistines.
I may be permitted a digression here. As some of you know, what are now called non-Euclidean geometries were developed about the middle of the last century by two or three independent groups of mathematicians. It is a typical example of a problem which had resisted the attack of very able mathematicians for more than two thousand years, and for which, very strangely the solution was found almost simultaneously by two or three independent groups of workers. Gauss certainly had the solution, probably earlier earlier, but questioned why he had not published the solution he made the characteristic reply that he feared the outcry from the Boeticians. In the context, Gauss was obviously thinking of the Boetians among the mathematicians themselves, and not of the uninitiated multitude.
I permitted myself this digression just to emphasise that when Gauss claimed for the theory of numbers the unique virtue of "being the least useful" he was merely voicing forcibly the traditional distinction between the arts and the crafts, between knowledge for its own sake, i.e., knowledge that is not usable and which for that reason was regarded as high-brow knowledge, and knowledge which is applicable. It was a distinction nearly as marked as the distinction between Gentlemen and Players at Lord's. Intellectual aristocracy is not peculiar to any one country or climate. I would remind ourselves at this stage, lest we feel very superior, of a proverb which is probably Sancho Panzia's - that wisdom may not be all ancient nor is all folly outdated. There is hardly any branch of mathematics nearly twenty-five years ago, the question was pointedly raised, probably in the context of Guass's claim for the theory of numbers that it is the least usable, whether for example the theorem of partition of numbers found any practical application. Presumably the questioner regarded it as the least likely of application among the results in number theory itself. The answer was, surprisingly, affirmative, and came from one of the scientists in the Bell Telephone Laboratories who had been applying it effectively for his work on the splicing of cables. There are two research papers on this subject in the Bell System Technical Journal to which I may refer the reader if he is interested.
I mentioned just now that there is hardly any branch of abstruse mathematics which is not ultimately applicable. In the same manner almost any result in science which is applicable for the good of mankind can probably be equally effectively misused. "Belligerency", as David Sarnoff remarked, "is an attitude of mind and not a property of matter and therefore does not concern science as such". The cure of misuses of science is to stop the misuses, and not to stop all the uses of science. It would be like throwing out the baby along with the bathwater. Blackmailing, for example, might be a form of telling the truth but we do not for this reason think the less of the virtue of truthfulness.
I may add incidentally that the corresponding Sanskrit word 'satyam', so dear to Mahatmaji, has always been regarded as excluding misuses. "Satyam Yatha Drishtartham Hitaroopa Vachanam" is an old definition of the word, i.e., "The content should conform to the best of one's personal knowledge, and its expression such as would conduce to the good of humanity". It is unfortunate that one has to use the same respectable word 'science' even when it is grossly misused. It reminds me of a well-known Tamil classic in which the author deplores that the cultured and the vandals have the same external animal appearance. 
Most of the sentiments expressed by the ancients about the control of the senses and of the temptations are applicable to the proper uses and the misuses of science. The ancient teachers insisted on strict disciplining and proving of character of the disciples before they ventured to impart any knowledge, particularly knowledge of profound import: though it might imply monopoly of available knowledge, and might as such be of value even today - probably I should say particularly I should say particularly today. 
Rajaji, my very distinguished predecessor on this platform - you may remember he initiated the Sardar Patel Memorial Lectures last year - has a modern rendering of this safeguard. It was not in his Patel Lectures, but elsewhere when he was in one of his characteristic Jules Vernian moods. What we need for the purpose is a gadget for monitoring the operations of the human mind and the moment it recognises the image of an evil thought fleeting across the field of view, the monitor will operate a relay that will automatically freeze all further thinking and immunise the brain.
"To ask well is to know much" is an old proverb. All our great epics start with something asking such a question. 'Prapacha' is a hoary word. The demand made of our gadget is one such. It implies that it is in the minds of men one should seek a solution. It is not a problem in the physical sciences, but one concerning the human mind. After attending some of the sessions of UNESCO, one almost hears the words of the first paragraph of the Declaration, namely, "Since wars begin in the minds of men, it is in the minds of men that the defences of peace must be constructed".
I said that the major objective of science is to understand Nature. It immediately implies a certain faith, which, however, has since been wholly justified by our wide experience, that underlying the working of Nature and the operation of all natural phenomena there is a certain inherent order, and conformity to certain invariable and fundamental physical laws. Nature, as Einstein remarked, may be profound, but she never cheats, that is, she plays the game strictly according to the rules. The rules of course are of her making but she never changes the rules to suit the vicissitudes of the game. There are no exceptions to these rules. The main purpose of science is to discover these fundamental laws of Nature, to unveil the ultimate pattern  to which natural phenomena, and all the events in Nature, conform. In this sense, the function of science is more one of unveiling than one of creating.       

THE GOOD ADMINISTRATOR. by C. Rajagopalachari.

[Inaugural address broadcast from All India Radio, Bombay, 14th August, 1955].

The Minister for Broadcasting has conferred on me a great honour by asking me to inaugurate and give the first lecture in the Patel Memorial series.

Vallabhbhai Patel was a great man. He worked for the deliverance of India from foreign rule and he lived to see it fully achieved. In the work of reconstruction which followed he saw to the integration of all the States in the Indian Union. About forty years ago (in 1915), Vallabhbhai Patel gave up the legal profession when the Motherland wanted one of his type for the gigantic struggle for liberation. But, alas, before India could well get on without him, death snatched him from us. It was said of Augustus that it would nave been better for Rome if Augustus had never been born or had never died. This can be said with great truth about India and Vallabhbhai Patel.

It is not intended that this lecture should deal with Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel's life. But what I shall talk about today, viz., the efficient administration of our country, was a subject uppermost in his anxious mind when death was relentlessly approaching him. 

If one wrote a book on any subject, it would be a grave defect if anything important and relevant to the subject were omitted. When writing a book one must be careful also about the amount of emphasis that is laid on each aspect that is dealt with. The reader's mind should be left with no bias enriched with well-balanced thoughts. In a talk of this kind one need not be so careful and lapses will be excused. Often it happens that when we exhaustively deal with any matter, putting all the pros and cons justly, weighing and balancing things one against another ina careful and proper way, we shall have done justly and well but we leave no resulting positive effect behind. This is the evil of too much of balance. We give information but little guidance. In fact we create plenty of doubt and caution and no momentum for initiative. Movement forward always means and involves taking risks, accepting the chance of going wrong and having to rectify upon the experience gained. There are plenty of things to be said on 'good administration'. But if I proceed to collect them all and put them before you I shall have not done anything very useful; indeed I doubt my ability to do such exhaustive analysis, with anything like satisfaction to myself, not to speak of the effect on the listeners.

We have turned the British out and we have told all the people of the land that it is good for them that they now govern themselves. But afterthoughts lead one to some doubts. Our hopes can be realised only if and to the extent that the administrative set-up is satisfactory. If anyone investigated into what most people in India desire as regards government - whether they want democracy, or whether they want a federal or a unitary government, or whether they want the American type of democracy or the British and so on - I guess we shall see that the people were honest, efficient, prompt, just and sympathetic officers; and they do not mind the form of government. The Constitution has been settled on the basis of democracy, universal adult suffrage being the foundation thereof. The selection of representatives who will wield supreme power in legislation as well as in amending the Constitution itself, is left to the people, every individual's judgment weighing the same as every other's. No qualifications are prescribed for standing as candidates; anyone may be elected. Something like the principle underlying the universal postal system where distances do not count - an anna will carry your post-card to the neighbouring village as well as to distant Calcutta or Karachi or Cap Comorin - the distances and differences between men and men are ignored so far as the power to select representatives is concerned. That is a settled and final affair not to be disturbed till another Plato or Manu is born. What I shall now talk about, however, is the type of men required for the satisfactory administration of a tremendously big area and big population such as India is, or even a single State like Bombay or Uttar Pradesh or Bengal is, or even the reduced units down South. In the selection of personnel to fill official posts, whether judicial or executive, the principle of universal equality is not enforced and qualifications do count.

The people expect a rise in the general standard of comfort, and this, too, not for one class at the expense of another but among all classes generally, urban as well as rural. Apart from technical advances leading to increased average national income which will go towards bringing about a rise in the general standard of living, the importance of an efficient administrative organisation is very great. No people can be happy with an inefficient government or with a government that is not firm and impartial. Th psychology of the caste nexus and of class differences is strong in India. All the greater is the need for firm and impartial officials, and the common people know this.

For any administration to be good and efficient as a whole, we want the right type of men. The quality of the men placed in position is more important than the laying down of rules and methods of operation. The caste consciousness is a hard reality. It unites and divides in a very real manner today whatever be our goal. And today is most important in matters of administration. Short-sighted favouritism and concessions to produce contentment among classes and castes will be very short-lived and deteriorate into a constant pandering to intrigues and factions if we do not look to the real efficiency of the administration.

Several causes have combined to raise the level of comfort that is aimed at in our country among all classes now. Although desires have gone up, the national income has not materially increased in that proportion. Hence the mental condition of our people after the achievement of complete independence is not one that can at all be described as happy. This is so especially in the case of those who have received school or college education of any kind. 
Religion is absolutely essential to drive away the fog that surrounds the truth in regard to what we really require. It is not less important than the devising of ways to increase national production in all directions. The spread of a sense of true values and the development of adequate spiritual strength for facing the struggles that are ever involved in life can be done only through education organised on right lines. Apart from religion and sound education of intellect as well as character, good administration is very important. It is important in all countries; but in our country it is most important. An efficient and just administration can make up for a great deal of unhappiness and frustration in other respects.
For the administration to be efficient, we require the right sort of men to be in positions of power and responsibility. Whatever may be believed or said in the passion of thoughtlessness of the hour that often passes for democratic thought, these men must come from our organised higher educational institutions. Splendid exceptions, meteor-like, sometimes appear. Leaders and organisers with Herculean strength come up now and then without any or with but little academic education. But these are exceptions. The general rule is that the men we require for running the administration must come from our higher educational institutions. They cannot be got at elsewhere. The type of equipment and mental make-up that we require for good administrators must therefore be kept in mind in the organisation of higher education, for these cannot be obtained for them elsewhere or later after recruitment.
What are the requirements we should demand in a good administrator? Character is a fundamental requirement. And a fundamental requirement is a most important thing. We cannot let fundamentals take care of themselves. But though character is a basic requirement, it should be remembered that it is not the decisive factor that makes a person specially fit for administrative tasks. A very good man may not be at all fit to be entrusted with administrative responsibility in the civil business of the State, even as it is obviously the case in the conduct of a military operation. It would be easy but perhaps dangerous to give examples of known men who have failed though they are persons of undoubted good character.
After this has been said and admitted, we are apt to think that sound technical equipment is the decisive factor in each department of public service. But it is not so. The special equipment required for various jobs is no doubt indispensable. But experts cannot govern nor can they be safely allowed to govern, though they may wish and, if permitted, be able to dominate. In administrative key positions, the special technical equipment that comes into play in those departments is strangely enough by no means the essential requirement. To give only one example, the man responsible for the fine and rapid development of the electricity system of Madras State was not an electrician, and an electrical engineer could not have done it.
What is essential at the top is the capacity to judge upon relevant advice and to decide promptly and rightly in executive matters. Judicial offices are not the only places where the capacity to judge is essential. To decide in matters executive, quickly and correctly, is a gift of the Gods. And this is it that makes a good administrator. In small as well as great affairs, he proves to be a good administrator who has this talent for right judgment and quick decision. It may be that early training can develop this quality. But I am inclined to think that it is a congenital quality and all that we can do is to seek it out where it exists and make use of it.
Those who are in the employment of Government in various capacities in the branch concerned and the people who are affected by the course of administration must know and feel that in matters of policy as well as in daily administration, they can get clear and binding decisions without delay or procrastination and that there will be no 'messing about', no modifications and counter-orders recalling and revising and modifying decisions once taken.
Speedy decision does not mean hasty decision without the consultation or discussion. The administrator should have the capacity to obtain the best out of his expert advisers; and quickly to understand what they say. He should have the opinions and experiences of all concerned before coming to his own decision. But when after full discussion a decision is taken, every one should thereafter feel that there will be no vacillation. those whose function is to carry out the decision should be sure that they will be supported through every difficulty or unpleasantness and will not be let down at the first hurdle under pressure from some powerful quarter. For successful and good administration in any department in a democratic set-up, this is most important. It explains the success of most great administrators as well as the failure of others. Decisions should be speedy. They should certainly wait for full discussion but not for cosmic rays accidentally and mysteriously to improve our mental apparatus. That is to say, a thing should not be put off for the reason that one is not able to make up one's mind about it. 
Often in the affairs of the world wherein generally so many complicated factors are in operation, one particular discussion is not the only right decision. But any firm decision is better than indecision. It should be remembered that the decision itself very often affects and alters the environment and psychology of the people concerned. Numerous are the causes the combined effect of which produces a result. The Bhagavat Gita has analysed the matter and enumerated five causes in Sloka 14 in the eighteenth chapter. The fifth and lase element is Daivam which is a technical term to include all unanticipated elements. Some of the causes that produce a result are incapable of anticipation. But one of them is certainly what follows in the minds of people from the fact of a firm decision. What theoretically may be an imperfect decision becomes the right decision with the help of the environmental and psychological modifications that a firm decision brings about.
The proper moment is most important. The good administrator should not only decide quickly but should have the sagacity to know when to do a particular thing. The quality that enables one to see this is based on the ability to grasp a variety of complicated features and to be able to evaluate them to know what features count and which do not. Often this explains why some succeed and some fail in spite of seeming unlikelihood.
Sagacity and imagination are terms that describe the talents required for judging aright. I have said that this quality is probably inborn and cannot be imparted. But experience does nourish and enlarge native talent. There are some people who though themselves not able to judge matters have the capacity to choose men possessing that ability and those qualities. Although one may not oneself possess imagination or sagacity in all matters, he must have the capacity to appreciate such qualities where they exist in order to be a good administrator in a key position. He should not be one who is jealous of it in others and prefers flatterers and yes-men.
The good administrator who has the capacity to make decisions without procrastination will command the loyalty of his staff if he also infuses the confidence that he will stand by and support them, however unpleasant or difficult the execution may be. He should mix with his staff freely and infuse in them the confidence that he is a firm and fair adjudicator on issues that come up. He should be even-tempered. Bad temper is not a substitute for firmness. It does not pay. It leads to being surrounded by worthless people who can stand bad temper. The better men drop off from one who exhibits ill temper or threatens every moment to do so without adequate reason. And the going away of the better men leads to a double loss. You lose good men and you get flatterers and worthless men. The capacity to size men up quickly and know what sort they are is very important. The administrator should have this special talent or he should entrust that particular job to some one else and accept his judgments without question. 
When a decision is reached and it has to be executed, the administrator should bring into being a sense of social purpose among his staff of all ranks. Whatever major decision is reached, and whenever a particular piece of work has to be executed, he should see to it that his men see what it is for and realise that it is a good and laudable purpose. They should be made to feel that it would be a service to society to bring it about. There is an oft-repeated story that brings this out. I shall give it an adapted form giving it a local and contemporary colour. Someone saw stone-cutters at work in Guindy Raj Bhavan at Madras and he asked one of them, "What are you doing"? He replied, "I am cutting stone, do you not see"? "What are you doing"? He asked a second man. His reply was, "Sir, I am a poor man earning my living". To the same question, a third man asnwered, "Sir, I am chiselling a Buddha image". A fourth replied, "Sir, we are building the Gandhi Mandapam to serve as a holy centre for prayer". It is this last man's feeling that must be infused among all those who have to carry out anything decided upon.
A hundred years ago, officials in Britain were incompetent, ignorant and frequently corrupt. Today they are efficient, well informed and of high integrity. I have taken this from a British Council Publication. In our country too, we can hope fro an ideal set of officials, provided democratic politics and communal politics allow and do not block progress and impartiality. The authority of Parliament or the State Legislature must be and is Supreme, but it would be frustrating the aim of democracy to let the influence of political or social groups functioning in the legislature or outside to affect recruitment or promotion in the services. In emancipated India, it was the hope that politicians who were born in revolution and civil disobedience should soon learn to become administrators. But this process has been slow. Instead, at the other end, administrators are perhaps tending to become politicians which is bad.
I have omitted a great deal that should have been said on this subject. I have repeated what many others said before this, because the problem I have dealt with is a very old one. What I have said applies not only to ministers and administrators  in government, but to administrators in all big non-official organisations, be it of industry or distribution or transport or other services. The days of big business may be thought to be over, on account of the Congress resolution as to the pattern of society that Congress wants to build up. But in reality it is not the case. Big organisations are still wanted and will continue. High taxation and low net-profits are no doubt elements deterrent to private enterprise. But though profits no longer accrue on the war-time scale, and though taxation is growing heavier and heavier with each budget, big business has its attractions still. As long as talent exists, there is a vocational call for big business to which men cannot say nay, profit or no-profit, taxation or no-taxation. Big business in that sense has an undying future. Human nature has a mysterious quality in it. Self-interest and profits attract. But man is led by a master within, who is all powerful and cares not for calculations. Big men will continue doing big things because they cannot help it. Good administration is a common problem for private enterprise as well as for the Welfare State. 
To the fundamental requirement of character I made a brief reference, but did not dwell upon it because it must be presumed. It is true as I said that it alone is by no means enough. But without it, let it be remembered, nothing else will avail. It is like daylight which we are apt to forget on account of its very importance. Character is as important for administrators at every level, from the Chief Secretary down to the last grade servant, as sunlight is to every form of life.
With a renewed tribute to the memory of the great man who was taken away from us before we could well dispense with his services and in whose inspiring name these annual lectures will be delivered, I close my inaugural talk. I thank you for the patience and attention with which you heard me.
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