in a speech that was both a playful departure from the conventions of literary gatherings as well as a gentle interrogation of the conventional definition of literary canons samir jain vice chairman and managing director times group said indias great spiritual texts passed down generations should be read as literature and the young especially must not limit their reading to standard curricular prescriptionsspeaking to a packed auditorium in delhis siri fort drawing frequent rounds of applause and appreciative laughter jain said he hoped that for the audience the litfest became a celebration of literature laughter and lovenotably he spoke in both hindi and english he began his speech welcoming the litfests chief guest union cabinet minister ashwini vaishnaw with a few evocative lines in hindi dil ke saude me chahiye dil to main dil se aapke dil ko chhukar aapka dil se swagat karta hun we will trade our hearts my heart will reach out to yours and i welcome you with all my heartjain switched between the two languages as he explained his central motif indian literature is indistinguishable from spirituality through quotes and couplets from the works of guru nanak kabir the sufi poet raskhan and the yogvashisht he made it a point to directly address the young among the audience i had specifically asked that we have a youthful audience he said noting prime minister modis emphasis on indias youthi see so many teenagerstoday is a day of ullas umang utsah joy zest and enthusiasm jain said exhorting them to open their minds to books that are not taught education as it is conventionally structured limits students minds to learning the prosaic the supposed skills demanded by the job market he said universities may have universe in their name but they dont teach students anything about the universe that he argued is why the young rarely encounter the extraordinary literary achievements of indias spiritual masters jain drew a sharp distinction between the religious and the spiritual ours is not a religious nation but a spiritual one he said and a reader need not be religious to appreciate the beauty of indias ancient texts old texts are the best starting point in a readers journey jain observed quoting in this context thinker and essayist nassim nicholas taleb who had famously said everyone should read books that have lasted at least a hundred years jain told the young among the audience that the starting point for even popular authors are books that have stood the test of time the timeless relevance of old books comes from the power of their wisdom he said perhaps his most pivotal questioning of conventional literary wisdom came when jain said much of whats considered great writing is preoccupied with the darker impulses of human nature while theres nothing wrong with such writing theres no reason why we must consider it to be a defining feature of literature a text that brings only joy and understanding to the reader can and should