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‘Need to implement happiness index to gauge people’s well-being’
LUCKNOW: “One needs to follow one’s own North Star. And for Bhutan, the Gross National Happiness (GNH) is no less than a North Star that leads the way to happiness,”
LUCKNOW: “One needs to follow one’s own North Star. And for Bhutan, the Gross National Happiness (GNH) is no less than a North Star that leads the way to happiness,” said Thakur S Powdyel, an educator and a politician who served as minister of education from 2008 to 2013 with the Royal Government of Bhutan, perhaps the first to implement the model of GNH to spread and assess the rate of happiness among the Bhutanese.
Powdyel is here to participate in an international convention ‘Promotion of Happiness through Public Policy’ scheduled on November 16. The one-of-its-kind programme for promoting happiness among the masses is being jointly organised by Lucknow Management Association (LMA) and Global Lucknow.
Powdyel said the concept of GNH went back to 1972, when the fourth King His Majesty Jigme Singye Wangchuck took over at the tender age of 17. “Though he was young he was mature in his decisions. In the initial days of his regime, he realised that nations across the world had a yardstick to measure growth. It was the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) that was totally about commodities and economics. He also realised that there was nothing that could measure the rate of happiness among the people, hence he coined a term GNH that was solely about happiness and human progress, said Powdyel while addressing the media on Thursday evening.
The seasoned educator said education being an important part of any nation, in 2010 Bhutan’s ministry of education launched a nationwide educational reform, labelling it Educating for Gross National Happiness to make the younger lot understand the meaning of happiness in a better way.
He said people used to believe that ‘having more’ meant ‘being more’ and even ‘being happier’ which was totally a wrong interpretation. “We have confused wants with needs and means with ends. We have even invented a way to measure how much we have in terms of goods and services and labelled it as GDP. In stark contrast, the GNH is turning out to be a saviour for Bhutan,” he added.
Bhutan’s GNH model broadly stood on four pillars: balanced social development, conservation of natural environment and resources, preservation of heritage and promotion of good governance, he said.
He called India the land of wise people and said it did not need too many extra efforts. “It has most of the things, be it infra or other systems. What is required is effective implementation of welfare schemes. Besides, the government should also chalk out its own happiness index to assess the satisfaction or happiness level of the people,” he said while giving the happiness ‘mantra’.
On his visit to the state capital on Children’s Day, also the birth anniversary of the first prime minister of India Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru, he said coming to Nehru’s land was no less than going on a pilgrimage. He said Children’s Day and the former prime minister’s birthday were also celebrated in Bhutan. There the celebrations begin from November 11 which is the birthday of the fourth king and last till November 14.
