For two years, I studied in Vivekananda College (Chennai) and for two long years, I saw how the name of Vivekananda got entangled with needless religious rituals and insensible religious fervor.
His core values of secularism, harmony and social upheaval where ignored, often thrown to dust while a collection of saints that thought of themselves as God-men used his name, nay, misused his name at every congregation, sermon and address.
Gandhi's grandson writes a masterpiece to resurrect the real man behind the saintly image that we've developed of Vivekananda. He writes:
Vivekananda was not God, thank God.
He was human. And he was fallible.
His statements on who is a Brahmin and what Brahminism means, are not among his liberating utterances. His observations on caste are hugely problematic. Some of his views on womankind are, today, unacceptable. His comments on slaves and slavery in America invite long editorial scissors.
I believe if Vivekananda had lived longer he would have seen how times are a’changing and given us trajectories, ancient and new, to travel on. I also believe he would have let Time influence his own thinking and alter some of his intellectual positions. He who questioned Sri Ramakrishna, his guru, would have had to take some hard questioning himself.
And then finally, in a fitting remark that would be true should the name "Vivekananda" be replaced by the author's legendary grandfather, Mr Gandhi writes of today's unscrupulous politicians and saints alike:
They have figured that Vivekananda worshipped is Vivekananda forgotten, Vivekananda enshrined is Vivekananda enchained, Vivekananda co-opted is Vivekananda encashed.
My country needs both these people now more than ever.