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is a worse crime than anything else.
Recently there was the question of the independence of India, so the politicians said that the teachers and the students must both participate in the independence movement. When these politicians came into power, they said the students and teachers must keep away from politics. The communists and socialists say, "No, it is not necessary for the students to keep away from politics. Both the teachers and students must participate in politics." If the communists come into power tomorrow, they will say that now there is no necessity for them to take part in politics. Whatsoever is in the interest of the politicians in power becomes right, and an attempt is made to make the teachers and students believe it to be right.
According to me, one can become a teacher in the right sense only if he has within him a powerful, burning flame of rebellion.
A teacher who has no such flame of rebellion within him will become an agent of some policy, some interest -- be it of society, be it of religion, or be it of politics. Every teacher must have that burning fire of rebellion, of thinking and of reflecting. But have we got that fire of independent thinking? If not, are we anything more than shopkeepers?
To be a teacher is a great thing. What is the meaning of being a teacher? Do we ever think about it?
You may be teaching the children, as is taught all over the world, that they should love others. But have you ever thought that the whole structure of your education is built not on love but on competition? You claim to teach love, but the whole arrangement is to teach competition. Where there is competition there can be no love. Competition is a form of envy, a sort of burning sensation, jealousy. What are you teaching?
When one child comes first in a class, the other child is told that he is lagging behind and this fellow has come first. You are teaching him to flatter, to compete and get ahead. You are teaching ego, telling them that one who has come first is higher, and one who is behind is lower. In books you tell them to be humble and loving, whereas your whole arrangement teaches them to hate, to
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