Yoga research mentioned in Constituent Assembly Debates

Wednesday, the 31st August 1949

Shri H. V. Kamath: Any way, interference by the Centre or governmental interference in yogic matters. I suppose he referred to the observations I made with regard to the yogic institutes in India. What I had pointed out yesterday--I am sorry my Friend Mr. Santhanam did not understand it-was that there are certain institutes today run by private agencies which are doing splendid work in yoga and yogic research. They should not be interfered with so long as they-are running very efficiently and to the advantage of the people at large. But today the point I am making out is about Union institutes the word used in this entry has reference to Union agencies and institutes of the Union. These are different from private institutes run by private agencies, and I hope my Friend Mr. Santhanam will understand the distinction that has been made between this entry and my remarks made yesterday.

As regards the point of my amendment No. 199, I wish to state that we should make the word "research" very clear here. Yesterday Dr. Ambedkar, moving the amendment with regard to surveys in India, expanded the term "zoological" so as to bring in or to include the word "anthropological" as well. His intentions were excellent. It was to make the meaning quite clear and unambiguous. So also, here, following- in his own estimable footsteps, I want to make the word "research" absolutely unambiguous and clear. There are various kinds of research. There is historical research, conducted in various institutes; one of the well-known institutes in Poona, the Bhandarkar Institute has been doing very good work for many years. Then scientific research institutes there are so many. But institutes of the third kind, those which are doing spiritual research have so far been few in number. There have been yogic ashram as but they are different from institutes which carry on research in the spiritual field. The only institute which has been doing this work, to my knowledge, in a scientific manner, in the spiritual field, is the Kaivalyadhama Institute of Lonavla; and Government, during the last Budget session or soon after that, recognised 'his Institute and sanctioned a grant of Rs. 20,000 for advancing or promoting scientific research in yoga. I am speaking on very reliable authority. The head of the Institute applied for a grant to carry on scientific research in yoga, and Government granted to the Institute Rs.20,000, for conducting and promoting scientific research in yoga. 

With the advent of freedom and the dawn of Indian renaissance, I have no doubt in my own mind that our spiritual culture, our ancient culture, must be revived not in one direction only but in all possible directions. One objection that is levelled against spiritual culture -yogic culture especially-is that it is unscientific. Today the pioneer of scientific research in yoga, Swami Kuvalayananda, at Lonavla is doing splendid wok in this field. I am sure that as we grow in stature, as India's freedom grows, there will be many more institutes of this kind which will promote research in the spiritual field. It is very necessary. As Mahayogi Aurobindo Said recently, the West is turning to the East for some light and guidance, and if the East fails the West today then the world is doomed. He further exhorted us saying that India should not run after the materialistic baubles of the West. It is all right to increase the

standard of living, but to become merely materialistic is not all in life. The world craves something else and the world is looking towards India. It is high time we did something in this direction and showed the light to an expectant world. 

I hope the Union will promote agencies under its aegis to promote not merely historical and scientific research but also research in yoga and the spiritual field on a really scientific basis, science understood in the largest and most comprehensive sense, not in the very narrow sense of having a little laboratory, test tubes, flasks, pipettes and burettes, but the real scientific outlook of experiment, the outlook of a man seeking knowledge-scio "to know".....