As the earth spin on its imaginary axis as usual, ushering in the month of aswini, the people inhabiting the region between the Hindukush and the Arakhan, from Kanyakumari to Kashmir, prepare themselves to celebrate Diwali, the festival of lights.

Light has a special meaning and significance in human life. A devout traditional Hindu tends a permanent fire in his house. A modern hindu keeps a lamp or a zero-volt bulb burning in his puja room.

The Lord, the Self of all beings is of the nature of light--Jyotisvarupa. The Vedic Rishis chanted: lead me from unreal to real, from darkness to light, from death to deathlessness.The ultimate reality, the consciousness, the Brahman is pure light. It is in the light of that consciousness, everything that falls in the field of experience, including the sun and the moon, is illumined.He alone shines in His resplendent glory, and everything else shines after Him.

Even from a mundane historical standpoint light has had an important role in man's development from a mere wandering brute to the prsent state of high sophistication. But for the discovery of fire man could not have smelt metals and built up the modern technological civilisation. Unto Lord Fire, man owes everything that he has achieved, down the centuries, in terms of technology and culture.

Religious enlightenment also is understood in terms of light. 'The fire of knowledge burns up all sense of limitations and sets man free' says Gita. A wise man is compared to a lamp, undisturbed by breeze, its flames constantly licking up their way to the regions beyond. So too the wise man in thought and deed constantly aim at the absolute.

Traditionally Diwali is celebrated to mark the destruction of evil by divine forces. Presently when the world is groping in darkness, under the gathering clouds of atom bombs, when man's bosom is besmirched by lust, cruelt and destructive impulses, pious people without losing faith invoke Lord Fire and beseach Him to incarnate as a mighty conflagration and drive away the forces of evil.

Diwali is an annual reminder of the age long struggle between the divine and the evil, and the inevitable victory of righteousness over unrighteousness.

Darkness can never ever stand light.