First Quote Added
April 10, 2026
Latest Quote Added
"Even he [Gautama Buddha] was allowed a worldly existence until he was 29. But since the age of five I’ve been disciplined to live like Buddha after he renounced the world. Why? How do we know that his enlightenment was not a direct result of his worldly existence too? Apo, where is that freedom promised to me after a strict monastic discipline? Where is the promised satisfaction from our vows of celibacy? “You should not accept my teachings on hearsay unless and until you understand them from your own point of view,” he said once. There are things we must unlearn in order to learn them. And there are things we must own in order to renounce them."
"What is more important: satisfying one thousand desires or conquering just one..."
Young though he was, his radiant energy produced such an impression of absolute reliability that Hedgewar made him the first sarkaryavah, or general secretary, of the RSS.
- Gopal Mukund Huddar
Largely because of the influence of communists in London, Huddar's conversion into an enthusiastic supporter of the fight against fascism was quick and smooth. The ease with which he crossed from one worldview to another betrays the fact that he had not properly understood the world he had grown in.
Huddar would have been 101 now had he been alive. But then centenaries are not celebrated only to register how old so and so would have been and when. They are usually celebrated to explore how much poorer our lives are without them. Maharashtrian public life is poorer without him. It is poorer for not having made the effort to recall an extraordinary life.
I regret I was not there to listen to Balaji Huddar's speech [...] No matter how many times you listen to him, his speeches are so delightful that you feel like listening to them again and again.
By the time he came out of Franco's prison, Huddar had relinquished many of his old ideas. He displayed a worldview completely different from that of the RSS, even though he continued to remain deferential to Hedgewar and maintained a personal relationship with him.