Make people happy by doing ethical business: Dalai Lama
[TNN] SURAT, Jan 3: His Holiness the Dalai Lama on Friday asked the business community in Surat to strictly follow ethical standards and best business practices to make the consumers in country happy.
While interacting with industrialists and business people from different sectors at a session organized jointly by Southern Gujarat Chamber of Commerce and Industry (SGCCI) and the SRK Foundation on ‘Ethical Business in current century’, the Dalai Lama said, “If a spiritual leader indulges in doing wrong, he or she brings a great disaster to the society. Likewise, if a businessman does something wrong then he loses faith and trust of the consumers. The best business is where there is no cheating.”
In an one-and-a-half-hour interaction with the business community, the 79-year-old spiritual leader conceded that he may not have a successor.
“Whether another Dalai Lama comes after me would depend on the circumstances after my death and was up to the Tibetan people,” he said.
He pointed out that the role no longer included political responsibilities; in 2011 the Dalai Lama handed these to an elected leader of the Tibetan government in exile, Lobsang Sangay.
The move was seen by many as a way the Dalai Lama ensured the Tibetan community had an elected leader in place outside the control of China.
China has said repeatedly that it will choose the next Dalai Lama.
“The Dalai Lama institution will cease one day. These man-made institutions will cease,” the Dalai Lama said.
“I have faced a lot of difficulties in my entire life, but I have a great sense of optimism in whatever I do. Same way, the businesses would succeed only after facing difficulties,” the spiritual leader said.
