ideas with regard to social behaviour. He has divided the Society into Five classes of people. He calls it Panch-Jana-Shakti ta-stet-2rl(Five powers of people).
“We have five fingers to a hand. These five powers of the people _
are like those five fingers. First is the Thumb. It is a most powerful finger, This is the power of Common people or Jana-Shakti (aeterfer). I want to awaken this People’s power on the basis of Satya and Ahimsa. (Truth and Non-Violence) (@ea and 3ifea1). Second is the power of minds. This is motivating power. This is like a small finger. It is a power of people's servants and the good people in the society. They spend their life on the basis of ethical practices and simple living. This is a power of the people who engage themselves in the useful work all the time. The third or Index finger is like the power of people who can show to the people the right path. I consider this as a power of the thinkers. They show the right path to others. What is good and bad in the world is studied by them and ina neutral fashion they guide the people. Then is the power of people who are Rich, Industrialists, Traders, and managers. They are the Mahajans. The last finger is called Anamika or nameless in Sanskrit(3taTfetenT). It has no significance of its own. It helps in bringing all other fingers together and makes a fist. That finger is often decorated with a ring. According to Vinoba the job of this finger is the job of the Government or State. By itself this finger cannot do anything and so is the Government. It is nameless because it has no function as such. In Democracy it is like a zero. If the people are behind the Government then its power grows tenfold, otherwise its value is Zero. We see this in life; where there is no support of the people those governmental actions become ciphers.
In the context of management Practices we have to see the function of this Mahajana-shakti. The problem before our society is a problem of hungry minds. Because of the colonial contact, we have picked up the English language with attendant mode of thinking but where our feelings are concerned, the idea of Dharma has remained separate from all this social behaviour.
In life there was a role for the Christian religion. The English people had the basis of ethical thoughts acquired from Christianity. Those ideas are not embedded in the minds of most of the People in our country. Impact of Bible is not on our minds. It is not on the minds of most of the Managers, Supervisors or Workers in our country. Because of our English language schooling, we pick up English words, but we do not have the English cultural ideas associated with those words in our minds. The religious and cultural thoughts acquired by us through Dharmic teachings were treated by many ruling colonizers as backward, idiotic and born out of superstition. They were eventually rejected by most of the Indian
36 �
