Spiritual leader and the founder of the Art of Living foundation, Sri Sri Ravishankar on Saturday said India has the spiritual strength that capable of freeing the world from emerging social evils like terrorism and fundamentalism.

"India should take a lead role in globalising our immense spiritual knowledge and see the whole of humanity as one. The religious leaders, in particular, can play a major role by safeguarding interests of all sections of the society instead of confining their activities among members of own community", Ravishankar said.

He was addressing a meeting at Kannur.

Most people are tempted to run after material comforts by totally disregarding the need to have spiritual empowerment.

Negative emotions like restlessness, anxiety and insult could be overcome by taming mind through systematic yoga," he said.

Religious leaders did not have a clear cut idea as how best they could get rid of such negative feelings by imbibing spiritual values, he added.

Ravishankar said 27 per cent of youth in the United States were indulging in criminal activities and the figure was bound to increase to 40 per cent in another eight years as their sole pursuit was material well being.

The most saddening fact was that one third of the younger generation in the US go to jail on criminal grounds. The situation in Brazil [Images] was heart breaking, as the people do not know how to manage their stress and emotions, he said.

Nowadays, when more and more people visit places of worship, the society is witnessing instances of crime, atrocities on woman, suicides and other negative tendencies.

The spiritual leader termed the phenomenon as a 'puzzle' and said such incidents were occurring as people forget the importance of spiritual values.