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Ramoji Rao, is founder and head of the Ramoji Group, owner of ETV, Eenadu and Ramoji Film City

What does spirituality mean to you?
It could manifest in two ways: one is a value-based life, the other one is a religion-attached life.
I belong to the first category. God to me is a creation of man.
As a child, I believed in God. I would walk for three miles to school, barefoot, and pass each day a goddess temple with whom I bargained for good grades or some other nice thing.
Belief takes you a long way. When you feel you can do it, then you achieve it. So the belief in God may be a psychological way of achieving it.

It also often comes from greed as people hope they can get things from gods. Because as you can see, all criminals go to God and make ample offerings. If you go to Tirupati at Lord Balaji’s temple for instance, you can see all sorts of people with notorious histories behind them. I am not sure what they ask for: do they actually believe they are committing sins and are asking for forgiveness to wash them --- so they can start afresh another set of sins; or do they believe they are doing right and want God to be on their side?

How did you come to believing that God is a creation of man?
In my student years, in the late forties and early fifties, I became a Communist party cardholder and was active in its students’ wing activities. I was attracted to them because they were very sincere in their desire to serve society; they were not selfish, seeking out something for themselves in politics --- instead they were value-based human beings more focused on service and sacrifice.

Later on though the Communist movement got split between the Chinese and Soviet versions. They were throwing mud at each other. Also, their ideology did not change over time, even though the world and Indian society were changing. Influences from Moscow and Beijing were more important than homegrown ideas. I gradually grew more disappointed and distanced myself from the Party. And remained independent ever since. That was the extent of my political life.
But in the meanwhile, I had read all the Communist literature, Marx, Lenin, Mao and so on. With it I had lost my faith in God and have remained an atheist ever since.

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