Acharya Prashant is a philosopher and author, an alumnus of IIT Delhi and IIM Ahmedabad. He is among the most widely read philosophical columnists writing in India today, with more than 190 published columns ranging across climate and consumption, elections and ideology, caste and religion, gender, education, geopolitics, technology, and the inner life.
What unifies this range is a single method: tracing every public crisis back to the unexamined self that produces it.

FOR COMMISSIONING EDITORS
In this special Janmashtami feature published in Rajasthan Patrika, philosopher and author Acharya Prashant explains why the true Krishna is not an idol to be worshipped from a distance, but Truth, the Self, and Realization (Satya, Atma, Bodh) itself.

"In a healthy life, work does not stand outside life as a burden. It is a major part of life itself. A suitable job is not one that forces a person to seek regular rehabilitation from it, but one that does not require such rehabilitation at all."

"This win reveals what becomes possible when women stop being ornaments and start being participants. For centuries, India celebrated women as symbols of purity, patience, and sacrifice, but seldom as doers. This reverses that. A woman is not sacred because she endures, but because she acts, strives, transforms."

"If caste were only a social structure, reformers would have erased it. If merely legal, the Constitution would suffice. But caste is sustained in religious belief. It persists because it hides behind Dharma's name."

A true victory is not over an external opponent, But over one’s own limitations: personal, cultural, historical. When women play freely, the nation breathes freely. When women claim their place, the planet finds its peace.

True victory is not over the opponent, but over one's own shackles: personal, cultural, historical. When women play freely, the nation breathes freely. When women dance fearlessly, life on earth finds shelter.

"Teachers’ Day should spark gratitude but also reflection on education’s deeper purpose."

"Domestic violence, dowry, and oppressive marriages are symptoms of a deeper poverty — absence of inner clarity. They thrive because society at large runs on fear, desire, and unexamined habits. Outrage after each tragedy has become a ritual, but that cannot cure the blindness of the mind."

"A remark by a public figure or religious authority may spark discussion, but beneath the noise lies something far older than any single controversy. At the core of this idea of ‘the woman as the body’ is an old belief that treats women as physical stuff to be owned, utilized, and consumed."

"True rebellion begins when one stops performing a role written by others and starts living from the center of understanding. Your body is a resource. It is meant to serve consciousness, not define your identity. Freedom lies in transcending inherited conditioning, whether biological, emotional, or cultural."

"Life unfolds beyond our control. We don’t choose our gender, birthplace, or time of arrival. The belief that we control everything is comforting, but false. A tragic accident, where many lives were lost, reminds us of this."

"Every now and then, a disturbing news story grabs the nation’s attention – one that seems too extraordinarily gruesome to be real, yet involves seemingly ordinary people. We would like to call such incidents as aberrations. "

"These things are not new. The predation, the cover, the reduction of religion to a numbers game: all three have been operating, visibly and continuously, across this society for as long as anyone currently registering horror at the case has been alive. And yet the country received these events as though they had arrived from somewhere else entirely. That astonishment is not innocence. It is the ego’s preferred method of self-protection: to locate the problem at a sufficient distance that no self-examination becomes necessary. To be shocked is to be excused."

"Women’s Day is approaching, and soon discussions will emerge across various platforms. New slogans will be coined, and policy tweaks will be grandly announced."

"The debate on working hours has intensified recently. Initially, it was suggested that Indians should work 70 hours a week, and recently, the chairman of a major organisation proposed 90-hour workweeks."

"Our society embodies a stark contrast between its proclaimed life-affirmative ideals and the underlying suffering that prevails. Relationships, especially marriage, are often transactional and materialistic arrangements rather than expressions of love and understanding."

"In honor of Swami Vivekananda’s birthday, celebrated as Youth Day, seminars, meetings, and resolutions around youth empowerment take centerstage. The discussions surround Swami Ji’s feat in taking Vedanta to the world, yet the immense struggles and challenges he faced often go unacknowledged."