First try to understand what each leaders of India are saying.
(Sitaram Yechury is general secretary of the CPI(M) and a Rajya Sabha MP. The views expressed are personal)
Yoga is an ancient Indian set of practices that predates the Vedic civilisation. Several seals discovered at the Indus Valley Civilisation sites depict figures and positions resembling yoga meditation poses. The Rig Veda and various later Upanishads mentioned this term. The Katha Upanishad, believed to be composed between the fourth and third centuries BCE, describes yoga as the steady control of the senses leading to a supreme state. The Buddhist Pali Canons and earlier Jain texts also speak of meditative postures to liberate cognition. There are Patanjali’s yoga sutras. The Bhagwat Gita gives the descriptions of karma, bhakti and jnana yogas. It is believed that there is an energy lying dormant in every human body, Kundalini (which in Sanskrit means coiled like a snake). The aim of yoga is to arouse this energy lying at the bottom of the spine to reach the brain, leading to spiritual liberation. The exercises prescribed to achieve this state were broadly believed to be the yoga postures.
Such sublime spiritual pursuits, however, are not the concern of Modi. Yoga is to be practised for improving the quality of life. Indeed, many find it useful. It is marketed in the West, particularly in the US, as a cardio exercise supplement. Pranayam and body stretches to ensure the flow of oxygen to all cells could be as ancient a practice as human existence itself. An unsung yoga teacher once drew an analogy with a dog immediately after awakening stretching its entire body to activate itself. Today’s yoga postures may well have emerged from our ancients, the hunter-gatherers, stretching themselves as the day begins to embark on their adventures.
