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Amidst today’s information overload and attention chaos, we have witnessed the emergence of a number of meditative practices and art forms. Yet, none match the allure, popularity, and widespread acclaim of yoga. More than any other institution of its kind, The Yoga Institute, the world’s oldest organized centre of yoga, has preached this ancient way of living for exactly a century, having been founded in 1918! More than 55000 teachers have now been trained by The Yoga Institute over its entire existence, a number so baffling that it may give even established global university alumni networks a run for their money!
Today, more than 2000 people visit The Yoga Institute every day! While its original philosophy was pure and centralized on a single centre of practice (in Santacruz East, Mumbai), with time The Yoga Institute has expanded its physical and geographical reach to around ten branches, with a prominent presence in Goa, Delhi, and even Hong Kong! Despite its expansion, the original centre in Santacruz, Mumbai remains the bastion of all learners, with individuals from more than 40 international countries taking tutelage under the gurus through a host of training programs!
Its significance is underscored by the stupendous scale of its centennial celebrations this week, as the ‘Harmony Fest’ – a two-day celebration of The Yoga Institute’s 100th foundational anniversary – is simultaneously India’s biggest wellness festival! From being inaugurated by the Hon. President of India, to being attended by the Hon. Governor and the Hon. Chief Minister of Maharashtra, among other dignitaries, this festival is one of the largest of its kind in the entire world!
Yet, while the Yoga Institute has a rich heritage, how did it all begin?
In a candid interaction with The Yoga Institute’s Director, Dr. Hansaji Yogendra, we explored some of the essences that cement the foundations of this great institution.
“Shri Yogendraji, our founder, preached the first ever yoga lessons conducted by The Yoga Institute, at Versova beach on December 25th, 1918, before leaving for the USA for education”, says Dr. Hansaji Yogendra, Director, The Yoga Institute, sitting through a candid interaction in the midst of an otherwise packed day.
“He interpreted this as a scientific endeavour and would pointedly ask specific questions that elucidate the scientific method in its rawest form – ‘…when you meditate, what happens to your brain? What about your bodily organs and what about the effects of exercise on any or all of your biological systems?…’ – questions that were unheard of in similar fields by other practitioners,” she quipped.
The primary question that drove the narrative early on was indeed to determine the needs of the modern man.
The conclusion? “We need a focused yoga for the householders, and for everyday use without major cumbersome procedures or specially designed environments,” said Dr. Hansaji Yogendra.
This philosophy of not tweaking the practice of yoga basis the environment was on full display when you examine the historical account of the life of Shri Yogendraji and his persistence on setting up the institute and continuing its operations under challenging circumstances. He shifted base from Versova to Bulsar, in Gujarat just ten years after having founded The Yoga Institute at the revered Dadabhai Naraoji’s residence. Just after the conclusion of the Second World War, he was already looking to shift base back to Mumbai, yet the plan only came to fruition in 1948, when he bought a plot in Santacruz, the current residence and base of operations of The Yoga Institute.
Back then, a lot of lush greenery and foliage surrounded the suburban areas of Santacruz and the adjacent Vile Parle, and yoga could not have been practiced in a better environment than the one found here. The only airport operations of the city were at Pawan Hans, in Vile Parle-Santacruz on the western side. Yet, just a decade after its newfound base in Santacruz, the domestic airport in Santacruz suddenly represented a lot of commotion for the peace-loving folks indulging in yoga in its nascent stages.
“This institute was the first one to do research on yoga in a scientific capacity, and has done so since inception,” remarked Dr. Hansaji Yogendra.
In today’s commercially-driven fitness mania, some people have taken the physical portions of yoga and commercialized those to the benefit of their respective organizations, but to the detriment of the distorted perception around the wholesomeness of yoga.
Especially chronic in these commercial aggrandizements were the ignorance of both the psychological and the philosophical elements within yoga. While vastly ignored by virtually all other yoga centres in India and beyond, these, along with the other wholesome aspects of yoga, have remained the focus of The Yoga Institute in its bid to imbibe the most complete form of yoga training.
It is no surprise, therefore, that the institute’s four books were selected for preservation in the 1940s by Oglethorpe University, which, after having scavenged for similar pieces of literature across the subcontinent, accredited immense significance to The Yoga Institute’s publications over other prominent ideologues’ written work. This was no ordinary feat. The preservation was specifically towards the ‘Crypt of Civilization’, a first-of-its-kind repository whose contents will only be opened approximately 6000 years later, according these works an unparalleled level of importance.
What was the vision of Shri Yogendraji and what elements of his vision were possibly executed during his lifetime? Which elements still resonate with The Yoga Institute of today as it embarks on global awareness on an unprecedented scale?
“It was difficult for him to found this institution during the British Era,” quips Dr. Hansaji Yogendra. “Only essential buildings were allowed to be constructed, and it also resulted in a tiff between the Founder and the local Municipality Commissioner, who eventually did bow down to the stern stance adopted by Shri Yogendraji. All plants in the institute were planted by Shri Yogendraji, signifying his centennial presence even today.
“He named it ‘The Yoga Institute’ to deprive it of any personal branding as an institutional symbol withstands far longer than any personal scripture embedded within such symbolisms,” she added.
Keeping Shri Yogendraji’s unique contributions in mind beckons another question. Transforming the vision of The Yoga Institute, what were some of the greatest contributions by Dr. Jayadeva Yogendra ji in advancing the ideals of The Yoga Institute?
The Government plays a widespread role in advancing a widespread health and well-being movement across the country and beyond. The present Government and the Ministry of AYUSH has fared quite well in exactly the same principles that are important in increasing subscription and adoption – from viral promotional campaigns to the creation of an International Yoga Day (first held in June 2015 in the presence of the Hon. Prime Minister, with Dr. Hansaji Yogendra on-stage), this governmental machinery has indeed multiplied the significance of yoga. The International Yoga Day in particular, under the tutelage of Hon. Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi ji, has attracted widespread acclaim.
In her role as the Chairperson of the Yoga Certifications Committee at the Quality Council of India, Dr. Hansaji Yogendra’s scope covers introducing a standardized metric to regulate the entire field.
“Standardization of yoga is a priority indeed, as lots of institutes and individuals have sprung up in recent times without regard for the actual teachings of yoga,” she said.
Millennials have an outsized role in shaping the discourse over the next ten to twenty years. With the cultural depth and therapeutic history of yoga, does The Yoga Institute witness a widespread adoption of the yogic way of living in the years to come?
“Yoga is the classical version as being pronounced and promoted by The Yoga Institute. Asanas is 1/8th of what yoga is as per Ashtanga Vinyasa Yoga. Yamas (restraint, the 1st ‘limb’) and Niyamas (discipline, the 2nd ‘limb’), Dhyana (meditation, the 7th ‘limb’) and Dharana (concentration, the 6th ‘limb’) are completely ignored as compared to Asanas in popular discourse elsewhere in the world,” as per Shri Hrishi Jayadeva Yogendra, Assistant Director, The Yoga Institute.
This is the primary concern of The Yoga Institute. “The classical approach itself needs to reach out to masses,” he quips.
The plan ahead? Amend a bit of the communication strategy employed by The Yoga Institute.
Indeed, with so many initiatives, amidst a backdrop of the rich cultural heritage of this ancient practice as well as the transcendental personalities of its founders and caretakers, The Yoga Institute is poised to change lives well into the next century!
India is urbanising at an unprecedented pace. Ninety million new urban residents were added between 2001 and 2011, and McKinsey Global Institute’s projection predicts that India’s urban population will soar from 377 million in 2011 to 590 million by 2030. This burgeoning urban population will account for 70 per cent of nation’s GDP by 2030 and, with more than 68 cities with populations of more than a million each, these urbanites will contribute to nearly four-fold increase in per capita income. In spite of these awesome figures, the plight of the urban poor doesn’t feature in any narrative.
According to G. Chatterjee, a researcher with UN-HABITAT, India’s urban growth follows a 2-3-4-5 pattern, that is, it has an annual population growth of 2 per cent, urban population growth of 3 per cent, mega-city growth of 4 per cent, and slum population growth of 5 per cent. About a third of the major slums are not recognised in official records and a considerable proportion of the urban poor live in squatter settlements, on pavements, at construction sites and other fringe locations, and thus remain a floating population.
The urban poor are key contributors to the national GDP growth, and ill health amongst them results in a cascading effect on the economy. Despite their importance, they have remained largely “invisible” to policymakers and programme managers. The rhetoric of urban growth and development masks the real condition of the urban poor, which is even worse than that of the rural population. Disaggregated data from the 2015-16 National Family Health Survey revealed vast intra-urban disparities between urban poor and urban rich. For instance, the data showed that 28% of urban poor women, that is, women from the poorest 40% of the population, currently aged 20-24 years old, became mothers before they turned 18, compared to 16% urban non-poor women, or 19% rural women. During pregnancy, just 12% of urban poor mothers received the full package of antenatal care, compared to 29% urban non-poor mothers. And when it came to delivery, one in three urban poor women gave birth at home, compared to just 8% amongst the non-poor.
Compared to their better-off peers, urban poor children fare poorly across health parameters. 54 out of every thousand children from urban poor households die before their fifth birthday, and 29 babies die within 28 days of being born, far more than among non-poor children (31 before 5 and 19 in the first month). Poor urban children are even worse off than poor rural children in some aspects — more poor rural children received complete immunisation (43% vs 39%) and fewer rural children under 5 were underweight (38% vs 44%).
Why does this still remain the case?
Health infrastructure is concentrated in urban areas, with numerous public and private hospitals and diagnostic facilities based in cities and towns. This is also true of human resources in health, such as physicians, specialists and other clinicians, who prefer to live and work in urban areas. Given the higher availability of health resources, one may ask why is there such poor health among part of the urban population? The answer is that urban poor communities face barriers to access — inadequate infrastructure, overcrowded facilities, lack of information about available services, ineffective outreach, and a weak referral system, among others.
However, governance systems in urban areas, vary widely in structure — from municipal corporations to nagar panchayats —, and in their capacity for autonomy, resources and interdepartmental coordination. This dilutes responsibility for quality of public health services provided, which causes the majority of urbanites, including the urban poor, to turn to private providers for their healthcare needs — with all the financial burden that entails.
The National Urban Health Mission (NUHM) was launched in 2013 to address this huge gap in health outcomes, by setting up primary health centres in urban slums and ensuring community processes for key health interventions. There is, however, much to be done: data is still sparse, listed slums don’t include the entire slum and urban poor communities, the size of the urban poor population is growing rapidly, and the NUHM involves complex collaborations with governments at many levels, particularly urban local bodies. Mukesh Sharma, who leads the Challenge Initiative for Healthy Cities, points out the potential impact of better collaboration, “A multi-stakeholder approach led by Urban Local Bodies can change the urban health status in India. Urban Health should not be the sole responsibility of the Department of Health.” The Challenge Initiative strengthens sectoral collaborations to address health systems gaps for the urban poor in Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh and Odisha.
Alongside governance, the environmental and social determinants will need to rapidly transform even as health systems ramp up. As Damodar Bachani, lead of Building Healthy Cities project, puts it, “When decision making across these areas is harmonized, people will benefit from improved access to health services, decreased environmental and lifestyle risk factors for chronic diseases, a lower burden of infectious diseases, and an increased availability of useful data for decision-making.” The Building Healthy Cities Project is a global initiative funded by USAID to build smart cities that embody this holistic perspective.
Indian leadership at the recently concluded Global Conference on Primary Health Care at Astana, led by India’s Health Minister J.P. Nadda, expressed continued commitment to achieving health for all through the Ayushman Bharat Health and Wellness Centres. Ushering in a new generation of comprehensive primary health care for the poor, Nadda said that it is essential to leverage multi-sectoral collaborations that bring insights and leverage resources from different sectors to strengthen health outcomes.
Shama Karkal is a public health expert and currently chairs the Steering Committee of the Asia Pacific Alliance for Sexual and Reproductive Health, and is a Trustee of the Catalyst Foundation. She also serves as Chief Executive Officer of Swasti Health Catalyst.
Dipankar Bhattacharya leads the knowledge generation vertical in the Learning4impact knowledge collaborative for Reproductive, Maternal, Newborn, Child and Adolescent Health and TB, which is supported by USAID India Health Office.