Genocide of Bangladeshi
Buddhists by Muslim settlers
There have been many attacks on Buddhist and Hindu villages since 1997 in Bangladesh which have now been occupied by Muslim villagers and landowners. Many critics call this a genocide of non-Muslim minorities by neighboring Muslim villages.
By Ranjit Roy
The Asian Centre for Human Rights (ACHR) has demanded the intervention of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (UNHCHR) Navi Pillay to ask Bangladesh government to take appropriate action on the burning of tribal Buddhist villages and indiscriminate killing of tribals by the Bangladesh Army and illegal settlers. KOLKATA: Brutal killings of hapless Chakma Buddhists living for centuries in Chittagong hill tract and burning of of their houses and pagodas by powerful gangs of Muslim land mafias in Bangladesh on February 19-20 have evoked sharp reactions from Kolkata’s Bengali intelligentsia. It is these intellectuals who are the main source of inspirations of the general people in West Bengal who are now determined to vote out the present Left government in the next Assembly elections slated for May, 2011. The same intellectuals lent their full support to the Campaign Against Atrocities on Minorities in Bangladesh (CAAMB), a human rights organization, at a meeting in Kolkata Press Club on March 3 and asked the Indian government to intervene. They unequivocally condemned unprovoked killings of 10 Buddhists Chakma villagers attempt to grab their land and houses. The intellectuals have described the ghastly incident as an attempt to sabotage the friendship treaty signed between Bangladesh and Indian governments recently.
According to intellectuals like Tarun Sanyal, Debabrata Bandopadhyaya and Sujat Bhadra, who were present at the press meet, apart from killings of 10 poor Chakmas, at least 200 houses in 11 Chakma villages were burnt to ashes by marauding goons on the night of February 19. At one point during the clash, the military personnel started firing indiscriminately on fleeing Chakma villagers only to help encourage attacking Muslim settlers. Chittagong is Bangladesh’s only district having a significant Buddhist population. Army was called in after a pagoda and an office of a UN-funded project were set on fire. A statue of Lord Buddha installed at the Banani Buddhist Monastery was damaged and another statue was looted. Enraged Chakma villagers prevented Dipankar Talukdar, the minister for Chittagong Hill Tracts and other senior administration officials from visiting the remote Gangaram Mukhi area of Bagaichhari upazila on February 21. Chakmas demanded immediate withdrawal of 400 army camps from Chitagong hills alleging that Bangladesh army personnel are actually helping outsiders to settle in Chakma villages by grabbing their land and premises.
The Asian Centre for Human Rights (ACHR) has demanded the intervention of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (UNHCHR) Navi Pillay to ask Bangladesh government to take appropriate action on the burning of tribal Buddhist villages and indiscriminate killing of tribals by the Bangladesh Army and illegal settlers. "This attack on the indigenous Buddhist people shows that the government of Bangladesh has failed to change its policy of indiscriminate killings of tribal and minorities win order to occupy their lands and implant more illegal plains settlers instead of implementing the Chittagong Hill Tracts Accord of 1997," stated a Chakma tribal representative present at Kolkata Press Club. There have been many attacks on Buddhist and Hindu villages since 1997 in Bangladesh which have now become occupied by Muslim villagers and landowners. Many critics call this a genocide of non-Muslim minorities by neighboring Muslim villages.
Friday, March 19, 2010
Religious Conversion as an Economic Enterprise
By R Samarasinghe
The imposition of the belief of cultural superiority of the coloniser was particularly important in effecting social control of the colonised. It also underpinned their racial superiority firmly. This process, defined as hegemony enabled the wheels of capitalist system to move efficiently. The colonisers also created a comprador class, whom they educated, trained and some times Christianised to continue their work when they eventually withdrew their military forces of domination.
Fundamentalist Christian groups, funded mainly from America, have continued to use religion as a weapon, funding ‘local’ groups to convert the ‘heathens’. They conduct a spiritual war using sophisticated, psychologically devised forms of mind control and aggressive marketing strategies using electronic media and incorporating them into proselytizing in India and Sri Lanka and other parts of Asia as well as Africa.
The conversions are a two pronged attack against society. They target the poor and vulnerable, because in a democracy numbers mean power, but they also hunt the vulnerable among the power elite. Here, they are able to manipulate the nation through internal interference with the machinery of power, subtly. They target the lonely or the bereaved and depressed among the rich and powerful and promise personal peace and of course salvation.
The foundation of a nation is its culture. The loss of culture and religion weakens a people and naturally and instinctively we tend to react emotionally and irrationally when our way of life is threatened by alien forces. But in modern context this is not skillful. It is made out into an attack on freedom of choice and therefore a rights issue and also since ‘their’ right to ‘save our souls’ has been given to them by God. Our actions have to be justified through rational behaviour and the use of law. RELIGIOUS conversion has to be examined in its global context, because coerced conversion is not a spiritual but a political act with economic motives. So was colonisation; though they said they came to civilise us! The so-called religious wars such as the Crusades were about wealth and dominance.
War is not an option any more because it is no longer economically viable. It can lead to expensive recurring conflict, and though beneficial to the Western military industrial complex, have negative political implications at home for the politicians. Therefore cultural hegemony achieved through conversion is an effective political and economic strategy.
The imposition of the belief of cultural superiority of the coloniser was particularly important in effecting social control of the colonised. It also underpinned their racial superiority firmly. This process, defined as hegemony enabled the wheels of capitalist system to move efficiently. The colonisers also created a comprador class, whom they educated, trained and some times Christianised to continue their work when they eventually withdrew their military forces of domination. This class has completely internalised the idea of European cultural and racial superiority. Present new missionary activity is simply a readjustment of colonial strategy to suit the new global order.
The British colonisers had an existing developed literary and cultural tradition which they used to good effect through education, to create a tame brown elite in colonised countries; to carry out their policies. But in US, which later became the dominant capitalist state, religion provided the basis for social solidarity in place of a shared culture and it was but natural that they would use controlling forms of Christianity to establish hegemony over people they wished to dominate. This form of Christianity arose from Puritanism, a strict, narrow and literal interpretation of the Bible and has evolved into the present day fundamentalism. Economically, religion has proved to be a cost-effective form of social control.
Fundamentalist Christian groups, funded mainly from America have continued to use religion as a weapon, funding ‘local’ groups to convert the ‘heathens’. They conduct a spiritual war using sophisticated, psychologically devised forms of mind control and aggressive marketing strategies using electronic media and incorporating them into proselytizing in India and Sri Lanka and other parts of Asia as well as Africa.
It is an attempt to retain economic dominance through cultural/religious hegemony in order to maintain control of valuable resources.
At these mass rallies for conversion they use religion as propaganda. The methods used in conversion are the same as those used in advertising and war fare. They attack the mind from several directions, breaking down the buyers’ or enemies’ resistance.
Buddhism which appeals to reason and focuses on disciplining the mind and promotes critical thinking stands little chance against this onslaught. There are many morally reprehensible methods used in conversion but only a few can be dealt with here.
One of the main techniques used by missionaries is to create a state of cognitive dissonance in their victims’ minds. That is, they would create doubts about the validity of their existing belief systems, at the same time offering some thing ‘far superior’ which would advance them materially and spiritually. The interpretation of reality offered by their original religions as well as the customs etc. will be shown to have less status and usefulness.
Holding two contradictory views at the same time would cause psychological tension, motivating the person to reduce dissonance by changing their attitudes, beliefs or behaviours. Aggressive missionary activity would create dissonance and convince some, that their beliefs and culture was inferior; leading them to avoid this emotional tension or cognitive dissonance by changing them. The targeted would shift their allegiance to the spiritual colonisers and identify with them, while seeing the ‘natives’ and their religions through the missionaries’ interpretation.
At some of the prayer meetings where new recruits had been lured, they had been asked to bring a statue or picture of the Buddha or Shiva etc or a picture of the Pope. Then after the initial preamble of denigrating their religions, the recruits would be asked to smash the statue or tear and trample the holy pictures. This would create a situation of ‘no return’ spiritually. The prayer leaders are powerfully persuasive, similar to modern salesmen and use the vulnerability and weakness of the victims to their own advantage, so that they would be forced to conform with the group.
The idea of purifying one’s soul through confession and completely washing away one’s sins (total immersion baptism) has existed since early biblical times. Since man was ‘born of sin’ he had to be made ‘pure’.
During the Cold War, enterprising psychiatrists began to experiment with electric shock therapy and mind altering drugs on their patients. According to Naomi Klein, (The Shock Doctrine 2007), Dr Ewen Cameron, who had been the president of the American Psychiatrist Association and later of the World Psychiatrist Association, rejected Freud’s talk therapy and began using electroshock therapy as well as a cocktail of newly discovered mind altering drugs to try to return the minds of patients to a state of tabula rasa, where the earlier personality was wiped out, so that he could reprogramme them as he wished.
For example, the sheer volume of noise at one of these ‘prayer meetings’ shuts out thoughts and one has no choice but to listen to the magnified voice of the Pastor. His shouting and Halleluiahs are interspaced with loud religious pop music and shouting to Satan, Mahasona (a local demon) and related demons etc to leave forthwith! The confused patients allow manipulation through being stunned by the force of persuasion. Sometimes physical force is used to restrain them. Sometimes it is not only their freedom to think that is murdered but their bodies as well.
In the recent deaths that took place at one of these Evangelical Meetings in Viharamaha Devi Park, one of the women who subsequently died was tied up and isolated in a cage, and her father or relatives were forcibly prevented from accessing her. Thus isolated and intimidated by a screaming Pastor and a shouting and singing mass of unfamiliar people she had gone into shock, as they would have expected, and then they would have reprogrammed her, or ‘saved her soul’; but her body was not prepared for the violence imposed on it. It was a very public execution, all in the name of religion.
There are usually thousands at these conversion meetings and many who come due to sickness or poverty or helplessness are intimidated and coerced by the weight of sheer numbers. The total power of the presiding Pastor backed by the shouting, singing and praying congregation shocks the victims into compliance.
As anyone who reads the history of the Christian religion will know that it has a long history of torture and murder of those who reject their views.
According to Klein, Dr Cameron used what he called "input-overload" or use of six times the normal electroshock to change behavior.
Dr Cameron spoke of ‘wearing down of defenses’ and the ‘breaking down of the individual under continuous interrogation’. The label applied to ‘the enemy’ then was Communist, and now it is ‘infested by Satan’ which really mean non-believer. The word that is repeated again and again is "Jesus" so that Satan is driven out and that word replaces Buddha or Shiva etc. It is ‘shock and awe’ by other means.
Hitler and Mussolini used similar methods very successfully. For them the Satan was the non Aryan Jews and Slavs etc.
The conversions are a two pronged attack against society. They target the poor and vulnerable, because in a democracy numbers mean power, but they also hunt the vulnerable among the power elite. Here, they are able to manipulate the nation through internal interference with the machinery of power, subtly. They target the lonely or the bereaved and depressed among the rich and powerful and promise personal peace and of course salvation. The prayer group provides a substitute family to the lonely and the real family and community are gradually ripped apart.
The core of a culture is religion. The foundation of a nation is its culture. The loss of culture and religion weakens a people and naturally and instinctively we tend to react emotionally and irrationally when our way of life is threatened by alien forces. But in modern context this is not skillful. It is made out into an attack on freedom of choice and therefore a rights issue and also since ‘their’ right to ‘save our souls’ has been given to them by God. Our actions have to be justified through rational behaviour and the use of law.
In acting like victims we become disempowered and taking the law into our own hands criminalises us and makes them, into martyrs, which is what these Evangelists want; in order to obtain more funding from their donors. There is no accountability to the donors or the Government who is responsible for the people they prey on, as to how this vast amount of money is spent.
We are no longer fighting the Portuguese but sophisticated, well funded pseudo-religious organisations who use criminal methods against our society to re-colonise us again. Therefore we should use the law against them but, also ask ourselves why, with free education and free healthcare people still flock to these false messiahs.
The imposition of the belief of cultural superiority of the coloniser was particularly important in effecting social control of the colonised. It also underpinned their racial superiority firmly. This process, defined as hegemony enabled the wheels of capitalist system to move efficiently. The colonisers also created a comprador class, whom they educated, trained and some times Christianised to continue their work when they eventually withdrew their military forces of domination.
Fundamentalist Christian groups, funded mainly from America, have continued to use religion as a weapon, funding ‘local’ groups to convert the ‘heathens’. They conduct a spiritual war using sophisticated, psychologically devised forms of mind control and aggressive marketing strategies using electronic media and incorporating them into proselytizing in India and Sri Lanka and other parts of Asia as well as Africa.
The conversions are a two pronged attack against society. They target the poor and vulnerable, because in a democracy numbers mean power, but they also hunt the vulnerable among the power elite. Here, they are able to manipulate the nation through internal interference with the machinery of power, subtly. They target the lonely or the bereaved and depressed among the rich and powerful and promise personal peace and of course salvation.
The foundation of a nation is its culture. The loss of culture and religion weakens a people and naturally and instinctively we tend to react emotionally and irrationally when our way of life is threatened by alien forces. But in modern context this is not skillful. It is made out into an attack on freedom of choice and therefore a rights issue and also since ‘their’ right to ‘save our souls’ has been given to them by God. Our actions have to be justified through rational behaviour and the use of law. RELIGIOUS conversion has to be examined in its global context, because coerced conversion is not a spiritual but a political act with economic motives. So was colonisation; though they said they came to civilise us! The so-called religious wars such as the Crusades were about wealth and dominance.
War is not an option any more because it is no longer economically viable. It can lead to expensive recurring conflict, and though beneficial to the Western military industrial complex, have negative political implications at home for the politicians. Therefore cultural hegemony achieved through conversion is an effective political and economic strategy.
The imposition of the belief of cultural superiority of the coloniser was particularly important in effecting social control of the colonised. It also underpinned their racial superiority firmly. This process, defined as hegemony enabled the wheels of capitalist system to move efficiently. The colonisers also created a comprador class, whom they educated, trained and some times Christianised to continue their work when they eventually withdrew their military forces of domination. This class has completely internalised the idea of European cultural and racial superiority. Present new missionary activity is simply a readjustment of colonial strategy to suit the new global order.
The British colonisers had an existing developed literary and cultural tradition which they used to good effect through education, to create a tame brown elite in colonised countries; to carry out their policies. But in US, which later became the dominant capitalist state, religion provided the basis for social solidarity in place of a shared culture and it was but natural that they would use controlling forms of Christianity to establish hegemony over people they wished to dominate. This form of Christianity arose from Puritanism, a strict, narrow and literal interpretation of the Bible and has evolved into the present day fundamentalism. Economically, religion has proved to be a cost-effective form of social control.
Fundamentalist Christian groups, funded mainly from America have continued to use religion as a weapon, funding ‘local’ groups to convert the ‘heathens’. They conduct a spiritual war using sophisticated, psychologically devised forms of mind control and aggressive marketing strategies using electronic media and incorporating them into proselytizing in India and Sri Lanka and other parts of Asia as well as Africa.
It is an attempt to retain economic dominance through cultural/religious hegemony in order to maintain control of valuable resources.
At these mass rallies for conversion they use religion as propaganda. The methods used in conversion are the same as those used in advertising and war fare. They attack the mind from several directions, breaking down the buyers’ or enemies’ resistance.
Buddhism which appeals to reason and focuses on disciplining the mind and promotes critical thinking stands little chance against this onslaught. There are many morally reprehensible methods used in conversion but only a few can be dealt with here.
One of the main techniques used by missionaries is to create a state of cognitive dissonance in their victims’ minds. That is, they would create doubts about the validity of their existing belief systems, at the same time offering some thing ‘far superior’ which would advance them materially and spiritually. The interpretation of reality offered by their original religions as well as the customs etc. will be shown to have less status and usefulness.
Holding two contradictory views at the same time would cause psychological tension, motivating the person to reduce dissonance by changing their attitudes, beliefs or behaviours. Aggressive missionary activity would create dissonance and convince some, that their beliefs and culture was inferior; leading them to avoid this emotional tension or cognitive dissonance by changing them. The targeted would shift their allegiance to the spiritual colonisers and identify with them, while seeing the ‘natives’ and their religions through the missionaries’ interpretation.
At some of the prayer meetings where new recruits had been lured, they had been asked to bring a statue or picture of the Buddha or Shiva etc or a picture of the Pope. Then after the initial preamble of denigrating their religions, the recruits would be asked to smash the statue or tear and trample the holy pictures. This would create a situation of ‘no return’ spiritually. The prayer leaders are powerfully persuasive, similar to modern salesmen and use the vulnerability and weakness of the victims to their own advantage, so that they would be forced to conform with the group.
The idea of purifying one’s soul through confession and completely washing away one’s sins (total immersion baptism) has existed since early biblical times. Since man was ‘born of sin’ he had to be made ‘pure’.
During the Cold War, enterprising psychiatrists began to experiment with electric shock therapy and mind altering drugs on their patients. According to Naomi Klein, (The Shock Doctrine 2007), Dr Ewen Cameron, who had been the president of the American Psychiatrist Association and later of the World Psychiatrist Association, rejected Freud’s talk therapy and began using electroshock therapy as well as a cocktail of newly discovered mind altering drugs to try to return the minds of patients to a state of tabula rasa, where the earlier personality was wiped out, so that he could reprogramme them as he wished.
For example, the sheer volume of noise at one of these ‘prayer meetings’ shuts out thoughts and one has no choice but to listen to the magnified voice of the Pastor. His shouting and Halleluiahs are interspaced with loud religious pop music and shouting to Satan, Mahasona (a local demon) and related demons etc to leave forthwith! The confused patients allow manipulation through being stunned by the force of persuasion. Sometimes physical force is used to restrain them. Sometimes it is not only their freedom to think that is murdered but their bodies as well.
In the recent deaths that took place at one of these Evangelical Meetings in Viharamaha Devi Park, one of the women who subsequently died was tied up and isolated in a cage, and her father or relatives were forcibly prevented from accessing her. Thus isolated and intimidated by a screaming Pastor and a shouting and singing mass of unfamiliar people she had gone into shock, as they would have expected, and then they would have reprogrammed her, or ‘saved her soul’; but her body was not prepared for the violence imposed on it. It was a very public execution, all in the name of religion.
There are usually thousands at these conversion meetings and many who come due to sickness or poverty or helplessness are intimidated and coerced by the weight of sheer numbers. The total power of the presiding Pastor backed by the shouting, singing and praying congregation shocks the victims into compliance.
As anyone who reads the history of the Christian religion will know that it has a long history of torture and murder of those who reject their views.
According to Klein, Dr Cameron used what he called "input-overload" or use of six times the normal electroshock to change behavior.
Dr Cameron spoke of ‘wearing down of defenses’ and the ‘breaking down of the individual under continuous interrogation’. The label applied to ‘the enemy’ then was Communist, and now it is ‘infested by Satan’ which really mean non-believer. The word that is repeated again and again is "Jesus" so that Satan is driven out and that word replaces Buddha or Shiva etc. It is ‘shock and awe’ by other means.
Hitler and Mussolini used similar methods very successfully. For them the Satan was the non Aryan Jews and Slavs etc.
The conversions are a two pronged attack against society. They target the poor and vulnerable, because in a democracy numbers mean power, but they also hunt the vulnerable among the power elite. Here, they are able to manipulate the nation through internal interference with the machinery of power, subtly. They target the lonely or the bereaved and depressed among the rich and powerful and promise personal peace and of course salvation. The prayer group provides a substitute family to the lonely and the real family and community are gradually ripped apart.
The core of a culture is religion. The foundation of a nation is its culture. The loss of culture and religion weakens a people and naturally and instinctively we tend to react emotionally and irrationally when our way of life is threatened by alien forces. But in modern context this is not skillful. It is made out into an attack on freedom of choice and therefore a rights issue and also since ‘their’ right to ‘save our souls’ has been given to them by God. Our actions have to be justified through rational behaviour and the use of law.
In acting like victims we become disempowered and taking the law into our own hands criminalises us and makes them, into martyrs, which is what these Evangelists want; in order to obtain more funding from their donors. There is no accountability to the donors or the Government who is responsible for the people they prey on, as to how this vast amount of money is spent.
We are no longer fighting the Portuguese but sophisticated, well funded pseudo-religious organisations who use criminal methods against our society to re-colonise us again. Therefore we should use the law against them but, also ask ourselves why, with free education and free healthcare people still flock to these false messiahs.
Bhopal was Bhoj Nagari
The seat of the great Hindu empire
How Bhojpal became Bhopal
By Sangeet Verma
The glory of Raja Bhoj... One thousand years of a legend
A deliberately concealed fact of history by many, but revealed by Turkish author Gardizi is that it was the military offensive of Raja Bhoj that compelled Mahmud Ghazni to flee India through the desert of Sindh in 1024. Earlier, Bhojraj had also sent military aid to King Bhimdev of Pattan (Gujarat) who was facing the aggression of Ghazni at Somnath. Later, the great Bhojraj not only had the Somnath temple rebuilt, he formed an alliance of many Indian kings against any future Islamic invasions.
The forces of Bhoj surrounded and killed Salar Masood in the month-long battle of Behraich, thus avenging the destruction of Somnath from Mahmud Ghazni. Bhojraj then, along with King Bhimdev and other Kings, went on to liberate far-off territories including Hansi, Thaneshwar and Nagarkot (Himachal Pradesh) from Ghazni’s rule.
The mastermind and visionary that Bhoj was, he understood the necessity to conserve trees and forests as early as the eleventh century. So when he started one of the earliest paper industries in known history, he chose to cultivate lotus over hundreds of acres of land. The tubes of the lotus were used to create the pulp from which paper was manufactured. The village Nalcha on Dhar-Mandu road in Madhya Pradesh-was the site of cultivation, and owes its ancient name Nalkakshpur to the lotus project of Raja Bhoj (nal is the tube of the lotus).
The Bhoj temple near Bhopal is the greatest example of the mixture of art and geometry in ancient India. The sheer size of the temple and the Shivlingam speak volumes of the greatness of traditional Indian architecture and technology. The great Bhojraj did not stop here. Using his understanding and knowledge of geography, he went on to create massive water reservoirs using traditional technology including the upper lake in Bhopal and of course, the biggest man-made reservoir in ancient history, the great Bhimkund, that had a total spread of 648 square kilometres. This massive reservoir is extended from Bhopal to Goharganj down south and had the Bhoj temple on its south-eastern bank.
Raja Bhoj was a legendary ruler of Malwa from 1010 to 1053 who played a key role not only in protecting and institutionalising culture and knowledge, but also chased away Mahmud Ghazni from India. This great King was the founder of Bhopal, which is unfortunately today called the city of the nawabs and the real history of Bhopal is deliberately brushed under the carpet. In an effort to bring back the true history of Bhoj and Bhopal the writer has photographed, researched and documented the unknown facts about Bhojraj. Manav Sangrahalaya, Bhopal has put up an exhibition of this work under the heading ‘Bhojpal / Bhopal 1000 years of cultural journey’ with the aim of starting 1000-year celebrations of the great Bhoj.
RAJA Bhoj or Bhojraj (1010-1053) was one of the greatest kings in India. Although his works and vision spread far and wide, very little has been written and published on this great ruler of central India, who played a key role in saving India from foreign invasions in the eleventh century. Bhojraj was the son of the great conqueror Sindhuraj of the Parmar dynasty in Malwa.
Although the great Bhoj was a brilliant general and a brave conqueror, he is remembered more for his reverence to arts and knowledge and for institutionalising the traditional knowledge system of India. Himself an encyclopaedic author and a master of many subjects, Raja Bhoj documented this elaborate knowledge in 84 encyclopaedias that include Samrangana Sootradhar on architecture and town planning, Yukti Kalpataru on shipbuilding and navigation, Rasmriganka on extraction of metals from ores, Ayurved Sarvasya on ayurved and naturopathy, Tatva Prakash on spirituality, Jyotish Mriganka on astrology and Saraswati Kanthabharan on Sanskrit poetry and phonetic text, to name a few.
A deliberately concealed fact of history by many, but revealed by Turkish author Gardizi is that it was the military offensive of Raja Bhoj that compelled Mahmud Ghazni to flee India through the desert of Sindh in 1024. Earlier, Bhojraj had also sent military aid to King Bhimdev of Pattan (Gujarat) who was facing the aggression of Ghazni at Somnath. Later, the great Bhojraj not only had the Somnath temple rebuilt, he formed an alliance of many Indian kings against any future Islamic invasions. His vision worked when Mahmud Ghazni send his son Salar Masood to India to loot the wealth in Indian cities that he had missed due to the offensive of Bhojraj. The forces of Bhoj surrounded and killed Salar Masood in the month-long battle of Behraich, thus avenging the destruction of Somnath from Mahmud Ghazni. Bhojraj then, along with King Bhimdev and other Kings, went on to liberate far-off territories including Hansi, Thaneshwar and Nagarkot (Himachal Pradesh) from Ghazni’s rule.
Despite his great military achievements Bhojraj is remembered more as a King who was the protector and promoter of arts and knowledge, and as one who made every effort to document and institutionalise them in order to ensure their use and survival. In fact, he went one step further to implement this great knowledge system and show the world the greatness of Indian knowledge system. Using the technology described in the eighty three chapters of Samramgana Sootradhar, his epic on architecture and design, Bhojraj built great cities like his capital Dharanagari (Dhar), Bhojpal (Bhopal) and Mandap Durg (Mandu). The Bhojshalas at Dhar, Mandu and at Qutub Minar Delhi are beautiful examples of his architectural brilliance. The Bhoj temple near Bhopal is the largest example of the mixture of art and geometry in ancient India. The sheer size of the temple and the Shivlingam speak volumes of the greatness of traditional Indian architecture and technology. The great Bhojraj did not stop here. Using his understanding and knowledge of Geography, he went on to create massive water reservoirs using traditional technology including the upper lake in Bhopal and of course, the biggest man made reservoir in ancient history, the great Bhimkund, that had a total spread of 648 square kilometres. This massive reservoir extended from Bhopal to Goharganj down south and had the Bhoj temple on its south eastern banks. Bhojraj understood the harmful impacts of large reservoirs better than the engineers today, and understanding the threat the upperlake could cause to the city of Bhopal, he created and overflow duct that carried the flood waters of the upper lake to the much larger Bhimkund. This rivulet was named Kalia Srot, after Kalia Gond, the engineer who designed it. This incident clearly highlights the fact that Bhojraj gave education and promoted knowledge in local communities including Gonds, who were the original inhabitants of Bhopal. The Kalia Srot is till date an essential component of the eco system of Bhopal. This great reservoir was later destroyed in the fifteenth century by Hoshangshah (1404 - 1435) who grew jealous of the legend of Bhojraj that refused to die, even four hundred years after his death. Folklore has it that it took three years for the water in the reservoir to drain out and another thirty years for the land to become cultivatable. Even today, this fertile land is called the Taal Pargana meaning fertile land from the reservoir and is a rich harvesting area. The only island or dweep in this great reservoir became the market or mandi for this harvest and is till date called Mandi Dweep, which is now a flourishing industrial town near Bhopal. The upper lake is till date the largest source of water and biodiversity, in fact the reason for the survival of the city of Bhopal.
The model management and governance of Raja Bhoj did not stop here. He understood that the cultural identity of India would be the primary target of future invasions, and also deeply understood the role of Sanskrit language and Indian arts, traditions and practices in safeguarding the same. So he created the Bhojshalas, that were not just temples of Goddess Saraswati, but were institutions where scholars and performers of art, Sanskrit, and various sciences could present, educate, document and be rewarded for their works. Such Bhojshalas can be seen in Dhar, Mandu, Vidisha, and adjacent to Qutub Minar, now called the ‘Qutawal Islam’ mosque. The design of these Bhojshalas is identical with detailed Indian designs and deities on their pillars. Interestingly, the Vijay Mandir Bhojshala in Dhar has a ‘Vijay Stambh’ similar to the iron pillar inside the Qutawal Islam mosque near Qutub Minar. The only surviving statue of Godess Saraswati from the Dhar Bhojshala is now kept at the British Museum in London, and much needs to be done to bring it back and restore its dignity back.
The mastermind and visionary that Bhoj was, he understood the necessity to conserve trees and forests as early as the eleventh century. So when he started one of the earliest paper industries in known history, he chose to cultivate lotuses over hundreds of acres of land. The tubes of the lotuses was used to create the pulp from which paper was manufactured. The village Nalcha on Dhar-Mandu road in Madhya Pradesh-was the site of cultivation, and owes its ancient name Nalkakshpur to the lotus project of Raja Bhoj (nal is the tube of the lotus). The village where the pulp was mixed in huge tanks to manufacture paper is till date called ‘Kagzipura’ (the town of paper) and is located near Nalcha. It still has three mixing tanks surviving from the original 152 that were used in the industry. The evidences of the quality of this paper can be seen in two books, Mista-ul-Fazal and Niyamat Nama that are life style magazines of Mandu, dating the fifteenth century and are till date preserved at the British Museum, London.
The book Samrangana Sootradhar of Bhoj has its chapter 31 dedicated to mechanics, where interestingly, he describes the design of the jet engine in detail. "A large bird like shape made of a very tough material, that has a cylinder within where an inflammable chemical spray is ignited filling the tank with fire. The pilot uses this energy and the energy produced by the movement of the two wings against the winds to activate the machine within and fly at very high velocity to long distances creating beautiful scenery in the sky." This clearly is not imagination. In the eleventh century, when the west was yet deciding whether it is the Sun that orbits the earth or the earth that orbits the Sun, Indians had mastered aircraft design, and it would have been interesting to know what the Wright brothers would have to say about it. Also it would be interesting to know the reaction of Boeing and Airbus in context of the patent laws imposed by the west on the rest of the world today.
Raja Bhoj was not just a King, he was a visionary who added steel to the foundations of a great civilisation. He ruled vast territories from Himachal Pradesh in the north to Telangana down south, and from Malwa in the west to Bengal in the east, from his capital Dharanagri. The great Bhoj had many great scholars in his court, but unlike other ‘great’ kings, he did not have a single biography written on himself, nor had any poetic marvels composed praising his achievements, neither any statues carved to make himself immortal. Instead, he used all available strength to institutionalise and protect the knowledge banks, traditions and culture of the land he loved, lived and died for
How Bhojpal became Bhopal
By Sangeet Verma
The glory of Raja Bhoj... One thousand years of a legend
A deliberately concealed fact of history by many, but revealed by Turkish author Gardizi is that it was the military offensive of Raja Bhoj that compelled Mahmud Ghazni to flee India through the desert of Sindh in 1024. Earlier, Bhojraj had also sent military aid to King Bhimdev of Pattan (Gujarat) who was facing the aggression of Ghazni at Somnath. Later, the great Bhojraj not only had the Somnath temple rebuilt, he formed an alliance of many Indian kings against any future Islamic invasions.
The forces of Bhoj surrounded and killed Salar Masood in the month-long battle of Behraich, thus avenging the destruction of Somnath from Mahmud Ghazni. Bhojraj then, along with King Bhimdev and other Kings, went on to liberate far-off territories including Hansi, Thaneshwar and Nagarkot (Himachal Pradesh) from Ghazni’s rule.
The mastermind and visionary that Bhoj was, he understood the necessity to conserve trees and forests as early as the eleventh century. So when he started one of the earliest paper industries in known history, he chose to cultivate lotus over hundreds of acres of land. The tubes of the lotus were used to create the pulp from which paper was manufactured. The village Nalcha on Dhar-Mandu road in Madhya Pradesh-was the site of cultivation, and owes its ancient name Nalkakshpur to the lotus project of Raja Bhoj (nal is the tube of the lotus).
The Bhoj temple near Bhopal is the greatest example of the mixture of art and geometry in ancient India. The sheer size of the temple and the Shivlingam speak volumes of the greatness of traditional Indian architecture and technology. The great Bhojraj did not stop here. Using his understanding and knowledge of geography, he went on to create massive water reservoirs using traditional technology including the upper lake in Bhopal and of course, the biggest man-made reservoir in ancient history, the great Bhimkund, that had a total spread of 648 square kilometres. This massive reservoir is extended from Bhopal to Goharganj down south and had the Bhoj temple on its south-eastern bank.
Raja Bhoj was a legendary ruler of Malwa from 1010 to 1053 who played a key role not only in protecting and institutionalising culture and knowledge, but also chased away Mahmud Ghazni from India. This great King was the founder of Bhopal, which is unfortunately today called the city of the nawabs and the real history of Bhopal is deliberately brushed under the carpet. In an effort to bring back the true history of Bhoj and Bhopal the writer has photographed, researched and documented the unknown facts about Bhojraj. Manav Sangrahalaya, Bhopal has put up an exhibition of this work under the heading ‘Bhojpal / Bhopal 1000 years of cultural journey’ with the aim of starting 1000-year celebrations of the great Bhoj.
RAJA Bhoj or Bhojraj (1010-1053) was one of the greatest kings in India. Although his works and vision spread far and wide, very little has been written and published on this great ruler of central India, who played a key role in saving India from foreign invasions in the eleventh century. Bhojraj was the son of the great conqueror Sindhuraj of the Parmar dynasty in Malwa.
Although the great Bhoj was a brilliant general and a brave conqueror, he is remembered more for his reverence to arts and knowledge and for institutionalising the traditional knowledge system of India. Himself an encyclopaedic author and a master of many subjects, Raja Bhoj documented this elaborate knowledge in 84 encyclopaedias that include Samrangana Sootradhar on architecture and town planning, Yukti Kalpataru on shipbuilding and navigation, Rasmriganka on extraction of metals from ores, Ayurved Sarvasya on ayurved and naturopathy, Tatva Prakash on spirituality, Jyotish Mriganka on astrology and Saraswati Kanthabharan on Sanskrit poetry and phonetic text, to name a few.
A deliberately concealed fact of history by many, but revealed by Turkish author Gardizi is that it was the military offensive of Raja Bhoj that compelled Mahmud Ghazni to flee India through the desert of Sindh in 1024. Earlier, Bhojraj had also sent military aid to King Bhimdev of Pattan (Gujarat) who was facing the aggression of Ghazni at Somnath. Later, the great Bhojraj not only had the Somnath temple rebuilt, he formed an alliance of many Indian kings against any future Islamic invasions. His vision worked when Mahmud Ghazni send his son Salar Masood to India to loot the wealth in Indian cities that he had missed due to the offensive of Bhojraj. The forces of Bhoj surrounded and killed Salar Masood in the month-long battle of Behraich, thus avenging the destruction of Somnath from Mahmud Ghazni. Bhojraj then, along with King Bhimdev and other Kings, went on to liberate far-off territories including Hansi, Thaneshwar and Nagarkot (Himachal Pradesh) from Ghazni’s rule.
Despite his great military achievements Bhojraj is remembered more as a King who was the protector and promoter of arts and knowledge, and as one who made every effort to document and institutionalise them in order to ensure their use and survival. In fact, he went one step further to implement this great knowledge system and show the world the greatness of Indian knowledge system. Using the technology described in the eighty three chapters of Samramgana Sootradhar, his epic on architecture and design, Bhojraj built great cities like his capital Dharanagari (Dhar), Bhojpal (Bhopal) and Mandap Durg (Mandu). The Bhojshalas at Dhar, Mandu and at Qutub Minar Delhi are beautiful examples of his architectural brilliance. The Bhoj temple near Bhopal is the largest example of the mixture of art and geometry in ancient India. The sheer size of the temple and the Shivlingam speak volumes of the greatness of traditional Indian architecture and technology. The great Bhojraj did not stop here. Using his understanding and knowledge of Geography, he went on to create massive water reservoirs using traditional technology including the upper lake in Bhopal and of course, the biggest man made reservoir in ancient history, the great Bhimkund, that had a total spread of 648 square kilometres. This massive reservoir extended from Bhopal to Goharganj down south and had the Bhoj temple on its south eastern banks. Bhojraj understood the harmful impacts of large reservoirs better than the engineers today, and understanding the threat the upperlake could cause to the city of Bhopal, he created and overflow duct that carried the flood waters of the upper lake to the much larger Bhimkund. This rivulet was named Kalia Srot, after Kalia Gond, the engineer who designed it. This incident clearly highlights the fact that Bhojraj gave education and promoted knowledge in local communities including Gonds, who were the original inhabitants of Bhopal. The Kalia Srot is till date an essential component of the eco system of Bhopal. This great reservoir was later destroyed in the fifteenth century by Hoshangshah (1404 - 1435) who grew jealous of the legend of Bhojraj that refused to die, even four hundred years after his death. Folklore has it that it took three years for the water in the reservoir to drain out and another thirty years for the land to become cultivatable. Even today, this fertile land is called the Taal Pargana meaning fertile land from the reservoir and is a rich harvesting area. The only island or dweep in this great reservoir became the market or mandi for this harvest and is till date called Mandi Dweep, which is now a flourishing industrial town near Bhopal. The upper lake is till date the largest source of water and biodiversity, in fact the reason for the survival of the city of Bhopal.
The model management and governance of Raja Bhoj did not stop here. He understood that the cultural identity of India would be the primary target of future invasions, and also deeply understood the role of Sanskrit language and Indian arts, traditions and practices in safeguarding the same. So he created the Bhojshalas, that were not just temples of Goddess Saraswati, but were institutions where scholars and performers of art, Sanskrit, and various sciences could present, educate, document and be rewarded for their works. Such Bhojshalas can be seen in Dhar, Mandu, Vidisha, and adjacent to Qutub Minar, now called the ‘Qutawal Islam’ mosque. The design of these Bhojshalas is identical with detailed Indian designs and deities on their pillars. Interestingly, the Vijay Mandir Bhojshala in Dhar has a ‘Vijay Stambh’ similar to the iron pillar inside the Qutawal Islam mosque near Qutub Minar. The only surviving statue of Godess Saraswati from the Dhar Bhojshala is now kept at the British Museum in London, and much needs to be done to bring it back and restore its dignity back.
The mastermind and visionary that Bhoj was, he understood the necessity to conserve trees and forests as early as the eleventh century. So when he started one of the earliest paper industries in known history, he chose to cultivate lotuses over hundreds of acres of land. The tubes of the lotuses was used to create the pulp from which paper was manufactured. The village Nalcha on Dhar-Mandu road in Madhya Pradesh-was the site of cultivation, and owes its ancient name Nalkakshpur to the lotus project of Raja Bhoj (nal is the tube of the lotus). The village where the pulp was mixed in huge tanks to manufacture paper is till date called ‘Kagzipura’ (the town of paper) and is located near Nalcha. It still has three mixing tanks surviving from the original 152 that were used in the industry. The evidences of the quality of this paper can be seen in two books, Mista-ul-Fazal and Niyamat Nama that are life style magazines of Mandu, dating the fifteenth century and are till date preserved at the British Museum, London.
The book Samrangana Sootradhar of Bhoj has its chapter 31 dedicated to mechanics, where interestingly, he describes the design of the jet engine in detail. "A large bird like shape made of a very tough material, that has a cylinder within where an inflammable chemical spray is ignited filling the tank with fire. The pilot uses this energy and the energy produced by the movement of the two wings against the winds to activate the machine within and fly at very high velocity to long distances creating beautiful scenery in the sky." This clearly is not imagination. In the eleventh century, when the west was yet deciding whether it is the Sun that orbits the earth or the earth that orbits the Sun, Indians had mastered aircraft design, and it would have been interesting to know what the Wright brothers would have to say about it. Also it would be interesting to know the reaction of Boeing and Airbus in context of the patent laws imposed by the west on the rest of the world today.
Raja Bhoj was not just a King, he was a visionary who added steel to the foundations of a great civilisation. He ruled vast territories from Himachal Pradesh in the north to Telangana down south, and from Malwa in the west to Bengal in the east, from his capital Dharanagri. The great Bhoj had many great scholars in his court, but unlike other ‘great’ kings, he did not have a single biography written on himself, nor had any poetic marvels composed praising his achievements, neither any statues carved to make himself immortal. Instead, he used all available strength to institutionalise and protect the knowledge banks, traditions and culture of the land he loved, lived and died for
History in the Remaking
A temple complex in Turkey thatpredates even the pyramids is rewriting the story of human evolution
(Courtesy: Newsweek, by Patrick Symmes, issue dated March 1, 2010 http://ndn2.newsweek.com A pillar at the Gobekli Tepe temple near Sanliurfa, Turkey, the oldest known temple in the world.)
The new discoveries are finally beginning to reshape the slow-moving consensus of archaeology. Göbekli Tepe is "unbelievably big and amazing, at a ridiculously early date," according to Ian Hodder, director of Stanford’s archaeology programme. Enthusing over the "huge great stones and fantastic, highly refined art" at Göbekli, Hodder-who has spent decades on rival Neolithic sites-says: "Many people think that it changes everything...It overturns the whole apple cart. All our theories were wrong."
Unlike most discoveries from the ancient world, Göbekli Tepe was found intact, the stones upright, the order and artistry of the work plain even to the un-trained eye. Most startling is the elaborate carving found on about half of the 50 pillars Schmidt has unearthed. There are a few abstract symbols, but the site is almost covered in graceful, naturalistic sculptures and bas-reliefs of the animals that were central to the imagination of hunter-gatherers. Wild boar and cattle are depicted, along with totems of power and intelligence, like lions, foxes, and leopards. Many of the biggest pillars are carved with arms, including shoulders, elbows, and jointed fingers.
Whatever mysterious rituals were conducted in the temples, they ended abruptly before 8000 BC, when the entire site was buried, deliberately and all at once, Schmidt believes. The temples had been in decline for a thousand years-later circles are less than half the size of the early ones, indicating a lack of resources or motivation among the worshipers. THEY call it potbelly hill, after the soft, round contour of this final lookout in southeastern Turkey. To the north are forested mountains. East of the hill lies the biblical plain of Harran, and to the south is the Syrian border, visible 20 miles away, pointing toward the ancient lands of Mesopotamia and the Fertile Crescent, the region that gave rise to human civilisation. And under our feet, according to archaeologist Klaus Schmidt, are the stones that mark the spot-the exact spot-where humans began that ascent.
Standing on the hill at dawn, overseeing a team of 40 Kurdish diggers, the German-born archaeologist waves a hand over his discovery here, a revolution in the story of human origins. Schmidt has uncovered a vast and beautiful temple complex, a structure so ancient that it may be the very first thing human beings ever built. The site isn’t just old, it redefines old: The temple was built 11,500 years ago-a staggering 7,000 years before the Great Pyramid, and more than 6,000 years before Stonehenge first took shape. The ruins are so early that they predate villages, pottery, domesticated animals, and even agriculture-the first embers of civilisation. In fact, Schmidt thinks the temple itself, built after the end of the last Ice Age by hunter-gatherers, became that ember-the spark that launched mankind towards farming, urban life, and all that followed.
Göbekli Tepe-the name in Turkish for "potbelly hill"-lays art and religion squarely at the start of that journey. After a dozen years of patient work, Schmidt has uncovered what he thinks is definitive proof that a huge ceremonial site flourished here, a "Rome of the Ice Age," as he puts it, where hunter-gatherers met to build a complex religious community. Across the hill, he has found carved and polished circles of stone, with terrazzo flooring and double benches. All the circles feature massive T-shaped pillars that evoke the monoliths of Easter Island.
Though not as large as Stonehenge-the biggest circle is 30 yards across, the tallest pillars 17 feet high-the ruins are astonishing in number. Last year Schmidt found his third and fourth examples of the temples. Ground-penetrating radar indicates that another 15 to 20 such monumental ruins lie under the surface. Schmidt’s German-Turkish team has also uncovered some 50 of the huge pillars, including two found in his most recent dig season that are not just the biggest yet, but, according to carbon dating, are the oldest monumental artworks in the world.
The new discoveries are finally beginning to reshape the slow-moving consensus of archaeology. Göbekli Tepe is "unbelievably big and amazing, at a ridiculously early date," according to Ian Hodder, director of Stanford’s archaeology programme. Enthusing over the "huge great stones and fantastic, highly refined art" at Göbekli, Hodder, who has spent decades on rival Neolithic sites, says: "Many people think that it changes everything...It overturns the whole apple cart. All our theories were wrong."
Schmidt’s thesis is simple and bold: it was the urge to worship that brought mankind together in the very first urban conglomerations. The need to build and maintain this temple, he says, drove the builders to seek stable food sources, like grains and animals that could be domesticated, and then to settle down to guard their new way of life. The temple begat the city.
This theory reverses a standard chronology of human origins, in which primitive man went through a "Neolithic revolution" 10,000 to 12,000 years ago. In the old model, shepherds and farmers appeared first, and then created pottery, villages, cities, specialised labour, kings, writing, art, and-somewhere on the way to the airplane-organised religion. As far back as Jean-Jacques Rousseau, thinkers have argued that the social compact of cities came first, and only then the "high" religions with their great temples, a paradigm still taught in American high schools.
Religion now appears so early in civilised life-earlier than civilised life, if Schmidt is correct-that some think it may be less a product of culture than a cause of it, less a revelation than a genetic inheritance. The archaeologist Jacques Cauvin once posited that "the beginning of the gods was the beginning of agriculture," and Göbekli may prove his case.
The builders of Göbekli Tepe could not write or leave other explanations of their work. Schmidt speculates that nomadic bands from hundreds of miles in every direction were already gathering here for rituals, feasting, and initiation rites before the first stones were cut. The religious purpose of the site is implicit in its size and location. "You don’t move 10-ton stones for no reason," Schmidt observes. "Temples like to be on high sites," he adds, waving an arm over the stony, round hilltop. "Sanctuaries like to be away from the mundane world."
Unlike most discoveries from the ancient world, Göbekli Tepe was found intact, the stones upright, the order and artistry of the work plain even to the un-trained eye. Most startling is the elaborate carving found on about half of the 50 pillars Schmidt has unearthed. There are a few abstract symbols, but the site is almost covered in graceful, naturalistic sculptures and bas-reliefs of the animals that were central to the imagination of hunter-gatherers. Wild boar and cattle are depicted, along with totems of power and intelligence, like lions, foxes, and leopards. Many of the biggest pillars are carved with arms, including shoulders, elbows, and jointed fingers. The T shapes appear to be towering humanoids but have no faces, hinting at the worship of ancestors or humanlike deities. "In the Bible it talks about how God created man in his image," says Johns Hopkins archaeologist Glenn Schwartz. Göbekli Tepe "is the first time you can see humans with that idea, that they resemble gods."
The temples thus offer unexpected proof that mankind emerged from the 140,000-year reign of hunter-gatherers with a ready vocabulary of spiritual imagery, and capable of huge logistical, economic, and political efforts. A Catholic born in Franconia, Germany, Schmidt wanders the site in a white turban, pointing out the evidence of that transition. "The people here invented agriculture. They were the inventors of cultivated plants, of domestic architecture," he says.
Göbekli sits at the Fertile Crescent’s northernmost tip, a productive borderland on the shoulder of forests and within sight of plains. The hill was ideally situated for ancient hunters. Wild gazelles still migrate past twice a year as they did 11 millennia ago, and birds fly overhead in long skeins. Genetic mapping shows that the first domestication of wheat was in this immediate area-perhaps at a mountain visible in the distance-a few centuries after Göbekli’s founding. Animal husbandry also began near here-the first domesticated pigs came from the surrounding area in about 8000 BC, and cattle were domesticated in Turkey before 6500 BC. Pottery followed. Those discoveries then flowed out to places like Çatalhöyük, the oldest-known Neolithic village, which is 300 miles to the west.
The artists of Göbekli Tepe depicted swarms of what Schmidt calls "scary, nasty" creatures: spiders, scorpions, snakes, triple-fanged monsters, and, most common of all, carrion birds. The single largest carving shows a vulture poised over a headless human. Schmidt theorises that human corpses were ex-posed here on the hilltop for consumption by birds-what a Tibetan would call a sky burial. Sifting the tonnes of dirt removed from the site has produced very few human bones, however, perhaps because they were removed to distant homes for ancestor worship. Absence is the source of Schmidt’s great theoretical claim. "There are no traces of daily life," he explains. "No fire pits. No trash heaps. There is no water here." Everything from food to flint had to be imported, so the site "was not a village", Schmidt says. Since the temples predate any known settlement anywhere, Schmidt concludes that man’s first house was a house of worship: "First the temple, then the city," he insists.
Some archaeologists, like Hodder, the Neolithic specialist, wonder if Schmidt has simply missed evidence of a village or if his dating of the site is too precise. But the real reason the ruins at Göbekli remain almost unknown, not yet incorporated in textbooks, is that the evidence is too strong, not too weak. "The problem with this discovery," as Schwartz of Johns Hopkins puts it, "is that it is unique." No other monumental sites from the era have been found. Before Göbekli, humans drew stick figures on cave walls, shaped clay into tiny dolls, and perhaps piled up small stones for shelter or worship. Even after Göbekli, there is little evidence of sophisticated building. Dating of ancient sites is highly contested, but Çatalhöyük is probably about 1,500 years younger than Göbekli, and features no carvings or grand constructions. The walls of Jericho, thought until now to be the oldest monumental construction by man, were probably started more than a thousand years after Göbekli. Huge temples did emerge again-but the next unambiguous example dates from 5,000 years later, in southern Iraq.
The site is such an outlier that an American archaeologist who stumbled on it in the 1960s simply walked away, unable to interpret what he saw. On a hunch, Schmidt followed the American’s notes to the hilltop 15 years ago, a day he still recalls with a huge grin. He saw carved flint everywhere, and recognised a Neolithic quarry on an adjacent hill, with unfinished slabs of limestone hinting at some monument buried nearby. "In one minute-in one second-it was clear," the bearded, sun-browned archaeologist recalls. He too considered walking away, he says, knowing that if he stayed, he would have to spend the rest of his life digging on the hill.
Now 55 and a staff member at the German Archaeological Institute, Schmidt has joined a long line of his countrymen here, reaching back to Heinrich Schliemann, the discoverer of Troy. He has settled in, marrying a Turkish woman and making a home in a modest "dig house" in the narrow streets of old Urfa. Decades of work lie ahead.
Disputes are normal at the site-the workers, Schmidt laments, are divided into three separate clans who feud constantly. ("Three groups," the archaeologist says, exasperated. "Not two. Three!") So far Schmidt has uncovered less than 5 per cent of the site, and he plans to leave some temples untouched so that future researchers can examine them with more sophisticated tools.
Whatever mysterious rituals were conducted in the temples, they ended abruptly before 8000 BC, when the entire site was buried, deliberately and all at once, Schmidt believes. The temples had been in decline for a thousand years-later circles are less than half the size of the early ones, indicating a lack of resources or motivation among the worshipers. This "clear digression" followed by a sudden burial marks "the end of a very strange culture," Schmidt says. But it was also the birth of a new, settled civilisation, humanity having now exchanged the hilltops of hunters for the valleys of farmers and shepherds. New ways of life demand new religious practices, Schmidt suggests, and "when you have new gods, you have to get rid of the old ones."
(Courtesy: Newsweek, by Patrick Symmes, issue dated March 1, 2010 http://ndn2.newsweek.com A pillar at the Gobekli Tepe temple near Sanliurfa, Turkey, the oldest known temple in the world.)
The new discoveries are finally beginning to reshape the slow-moving consensus of archaeology. Göbekli Tepe is "unbelievably big and amazing, at a ridiculously early date," according to Ian Hodder, director of Stanford’s archaeology programme. Enthusing over the "huge great stones and fantastic, highly refined art" at Göbekli, Hodder-who has spent decades on rival Neolithic sites-says: "Many people think that it changes everything...It overturns the whole apple cart. All our theories were wrong."
Unlike most discoveries from the ancient world, Göbekli Tepe was found intact, the stones upright, the order and artistry of the work plain even to the un-trained eye. Most startling is the elaborate carving found on about half of the 50 pillars Schmidt has unearthed. There are a few abstract symbols, but the site is almost covered in graceful, naturalistic sculptures and bas-reliefs of the animals that were central to the imagination of hunter-gatherers. Wild boar and cattle are depicted, along with totems of power and intelligence, like lions, foxes, and leopards. Many of the biggest pillars are carved with arms, including shoulders, elbows, and jointed fingers.
Whatever mysterious rituals were conducted in the temples, they ended abruptly before 8000 BC, when the entire site was buried, deliberately and all at once, Schmidt believes. The temples had been in decline for a thousand years-later circles are less than half the size of the early ones, indicating a lack of resources or motivation among the worshipers. THEY call it potbelly hill, after the soft, round contour of this final lookout in southeastern Turkey. To the north are forested mountains. East of the hill lies the biblical plain of Harran, and to the south is the Syrian border, visible 20 miles away, pointing toward the ancient lands of Mesopotamia and the Fertile Crescent, the region that gave rise to human civilisation. And under our feet, according to archaeologist Klaus Schmidt, are the stones that mark the spot-the exact spot-where humans began that ascent.
Standing on the hill at dawn, overseeing a team of 40 Kurdish diggers, the German-born archaeologist waves a hand over his discovery here, a revolution in the story of human origins. Schmidt has uncovered a vast and beautiful temple complex, a structure so ancient that it may be the very first thing human beings ever built. The site isn’t just old, it redefines old: The temple was built 11,500 years ago-a staggering 7,000 years before the Great Pyramid, and more than 6,000 years before Stonehenge first took shape. The ruins are so early that they predate villages, pottery, domesticated animals, and even agriculture-the first embers of civilisation. In fact, Schmidt thinks the temple itself, built after the end of the last Ice Age by hunter-gatherers, became that ember-the spark that launched mankind towards farming, urban life, and all that followed.
Göbekli Tepe-the name in Turkish for "potbelly hill"-lays art and religion squarely at the start of that journey. After a dozen years of patient work, Schmidt has uncovered what he thinks is definitive proof that a huge ceremonial site flourished here, a "Rome of the Ice Age," as he puts it, where hunter-gatherers met to build a complex religious community. Across the hill, he has found carved and polished circles of stone, with terrazzo flooring and double benches. All the circles feature massive T-shaped pillars that evoke the monoliths of Easter Island.
Though not as large as Stonehenge-the biggest circle is 30 yards across, the tallest pillars 17 feet high-the ruins are astonishing in number. Last year Schmidt found his third and fourth examples of the temples. Ground-penetrating radar indicates that another 15 to 20 such monumental ruins lie under the surface. Schmidt’s German-Turkish team has also uncovered some 50 of the huge pillars, including two found in his most recent dig season that are not just the biggest yet, but, according to carbon dating, are the oldest monumental artworks in the world.
The new discoveries are finally beginning to reshape the slow-moving consensus of archaeology. Göbekli Tepe is "unbelievably big and amazing, at a ridiculously early date," according to Ian Hodder, director of Stanford’s archaeology programme. Enthusing over the "huge great stones and fantastic, highly refined art" at Göbekli, Hodder, who has spent decades on rival Neolithic sites, says: "Many people think that it changes everything...It overturns the whole apple cart. All our theories were wrong."
Schmidt’s thesis is simple and bold: it was the urge to worship that brought mankind together in the very first urban conglomerations. The need to build and maintain this temple, he says, drove the builders to seek stable food sources, like grains and animals that could be domesticated, and then to settle down to guard their new way of life. The temple begat the city.
This theory reverses a standard chronology of human origins, in which primitive man went through a "Neolithic revolution" 10,000 to 12,000 years ago. In the old model, shepherds and farmers appeared first, and then created pottery, villages, cities, specialised labour, kings, writing, art, and-somewhere on the way to the airplane-organised religion. As far back as Jean-Jacques Rousseau, thinkers have argued that the social compact of cities came first, and only then the "high" religions with their great temples, a paradigm still taught in American high schools.
Religion now appears so early in civilised life-earlier than civilised life, if Schmidt is correct-that some think it may be less a product of culture than a cause of it, less a revelation than a genetic inheritance. The archaeologist Jacques Cauvin once posited that "the beginning of the gods was the beginning of agriculture," and Göbekli may prove his case.
The builders of Göbekli Tepe could not write or leave other explanations of their work. Schmidt speculates that nomadic bands from hundreds of miles in every direction were already gathering here for rituals, feasting, and initiation rites before the first stones were cut. The religious purpose of the site is implicit in its size and location. "You don’t move 10-ton stones for no reason," Schmidt observes. "Temples like to be on high sites," he adds, waving an arm over the stony, round hilltop. "Sanctuaries like to be away from the mundane world."
Unlike most discoveries from the ancient world, Göbekli Tepe was found intact, the stones upright, the order and artistry of the work plain even to the un-trained eye. Most startling is the elaborate carving found on about half of the 50 pillars Schmidt has unearthed. There are a few abstract symbols, but the site is almost covered in graceful, naturalistic sculptures and bas-reliefs of the animals that were central to the imagination of hunter-gatherers. Wild boar and cattle are depicted, along with totems of power and intelligence, like lions, foxes, and leopards. Many of the biggest pillars are carved with arms, including shoulders, elbows, and jointed fingers. The T shapes appear to be towering humanoids but have no faces, hinting at the worship of ancestors or humanlike deities. "In the Bible it talks about how God created man in his image," says Johns Hopkins archaeologist Glenn Schwartz. Göbekli Tepe "is the first time you can see humans with that idea, that they resemble gods."
The temples thus offer unexpected proof that mankind emerged from the 140,000-year reign of hunter-gatherers with a ready vocabulary of spiritual imagery, and capable of huge logistical, economic, and political efforts. A Catholic born in Franconia, Germany, Schmidt wanders the site in a white turban, pointing out the evidence of that transition. "The people here invented agriculture. They were the inventors of cultivated plants, of domestic architecture," he says.
Göbekli sits at the Fertile Crescent’s northernmost tip, a productive borderland on the shoulder of forests and within sight of plains. The hill was ideally situated for ancient hunters. Wild gazelles still migrate past twice a year as they did 11 millennia ago, and birds fly overhead in long skeins. Genetic mapping shows that the first domestication of wheat was in this immediate area-perhaps at a mountain visible in the distance-a few centuries after Göbekli’s founding. Animal husbandry also began near here-the first domesticated pigs came from the surrounding area in about 8000 BC, and cattle were domesticated in Turkey before 6500 BC. Pottery followed. Those discoveries then flowed out to places like Çatalhöyük, the oldest-known Neolithic village, which is 300 miles to the west.
The artists of Göbekli Tepe depicted swarms of what Schmidt calls "scary, nasty" creatures: spiders, scorpions, snakes, triple-fanged monsters, and, most common of all, carrion birds. The single largest carving shows a vulture poised over a headless human. Schmidt theorises that human corpses were ex-posed here on the hilltop for consumption by birds-what a Tibetan would call a sky burial. Sifting the tonnes of dirt removed from the site has produced very few human bones, however, perhaps because they were removed to distant homes for ancestor worship. Absence is the source of Schmidt’s great theoretical claim. "There are no traces of daily life," he explains. "No fire pits. No trash heaps. There is no water here." Everything from food to flint had to be imported, so the site "was not a village", Schmidt says. Since the temples predate any known settlement anywhere, Schmidt concludes that man’s first house was a house of worship: "First the temple, then the city," he insists.
Some archaeologists, like Hodder, the Neolithic specialist, wonder if Schmidt has simply missed evidence of a village or if his dating of the site is too precise. But the real reason the ruins at Göbekli remain almost unknown, not yet incorporated in textbooks, is that the evidence is too strong, not too weak. "The problem with this discovery," as Schwartz of Johns Hopkins puts it, "is that it is unique." No other monumental sites from the era have been found. Before Göbekli, humans drew stick figures on cave walls, shaped clay into tiny dolls, and perhaps piled up small stones for shelter or worship. Even after Göbekli, there is little evidence of sophisticated building. Dating of ancient sites is highly contested, but Çatalhöyük is probably about 1,500 years younger than Göbekli, and features no carvings or grand constructions. The walls of Jericho, thought until now to be the oldest monumental construction by man, were probably started more than a thousand years after Göbekli. Huge temples did emerge again-but the next unambiguous example dates from 5,000 years later, in southern Iraq.
The site is such an outlier that an American archaeologist who stumbled on it in the 1960s simply walked away, unable to interpret what he saw. On a hunch, Schmidt followed the American’s notes to the hilltop 15 years ago, a day he still recalls with a huge grin. He saw carved flint everywhere, and recognised a Neolithic quarry on an adjacent hill, with unfinished slabs of limestone hinting at some monument buried nearby. "In one minute-in one second-it was clear," the bearded, sun-browned archaeologist recalls. He too considered walking away, he says, knowing that if he stayed, he would have to spend the rest of his life digging on the hill.
Now 55 and a staff member at the German Archaeological Institute, Schmidt has joined a long line of his countrymen here, reaching back to Heinrich Schliemann, the discoverer of Troy. He has settled in, marrying a Turkish woman and making a home in a modest "dig house" in the narrow streets of old Urfa. Decades of work lie ahead.
Disputes are normal at the site-the workers, Schmidt laments, are divided into three separate clans who feud constantly. ("Three groups," the archaeologist says, exasperated. "Not two. Three!") So far Schmidt has uncovered less than 5 per cent of the site, and he plans to leave some temples untouched so that future researchers can examine them with more sophisticated tools.
Whatever mysterious rituals were conducted in the temples, they ended abruptly before 8000 BC, when the entire site was buried, deliberately and all at once, Schmidt believes. The temples had been in decline for a thousand years-later circles are less than half the size of the early ones, indicating a lack of resources or motivation among the worshipers. This "clear digression" followed by a sudden burial marks "the end of a very strange culture," Schmidt says. But it was also the birth of a new, settled civilisation, humanity having now exchanged the hilltops of hunters for the valleys of farmers and shepherds. New ways of life demand new religious practices, Schmidt suggests, and "when you have new gods, you have to get rid of the old ones."
Sunday, March 7, 2010
Sonia invited Europian delgation to visit Kandhamal"
By Samanwaya Nanda
BHUBANESWAR: Vishwa Hindu Parishad’s International President Ashok Singhal came down heavily on Congress-led UPA government for it’s soft stand on Pakistan. He said there is no point talking to Pakistan .and said India should withdraw itself from the proposed talks.
"Instead of taking a hard stand against Pakistan the Central Government is going for talks with Pakistan . Talks are just part of Muslim appeasement policy. These politicians don’t know how to live with dignity", he added.
Shri Singhal termed European Union delegation’s recent visit to Kandhamal as direct interference of external forces in the internal affairs of a sovereign state. He questioned how this delegation was given permission for the visit.
He added that for conversion activities the church and missionaries are pumping huge funds in to India and the Europian delegation recently came here to review and monitor the church funded programmes.
"I don’t think they have come here from their own. UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi invited them to visit Kandhmal", h e said.
"Orissa chief minister Naveen Patnaik has a secrete understanding with Sonia Gandhi. He is sympathetic to missionaries as his elder brother Prem patnaik’s wife is also an Italian and and good friend of Congress chief" Shri Singhal added.
He accused Orissa Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik of encouraging conversion in the state. He slammed Chief Minister for his government’s ‘inefficiency‘ to arrest the killers of Swami Laxmananda Saraswati.
"Naveen Patnaik has betrayed the Hindu society by not arresting the killers of Swami Laxmananda Saraswati even after one and half year of the incident. On the other hand government is victimising thousands of innocent vanvasis by arresting them on false charges and registering cases against them.", he pointed out.
BHUBANESWAR: Vishwa Hindu Parishad’s International President Ashok Singhal came down heavily on Congress-led UPA government for it’s soft stand on Pakistan. He said there is no point talking to Pakistan .and said India should withdraw itself from the proposed talks.
"Instead of taking a hard stand against Pakistan the Central Government is going for talks with Pakistan . Talks are just part of Muslim appeasement policy. These politicians don’t know how to live with dignity", he added.
Shri Singhal termed European Union delegation’s recent visit to Kandhamal as direct interference of external forces in the internal affairs of a sovereign state. He questioned how this delegation was given permission for the visit.
He added that for conversion activities the church and missionaries are pumping huge funds in to India and the Europian delegation recently came here to review and monitor the church funded programmes.
"I don’t think they have come here from their own. UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi invited them to visit Kandhmal", h e said.
"Orissa chief minister Naveen Patnaik has a secrete understanding with Sonia Gandhi. He is sympathetic to missionaries as his elder brother Prem patnaik’s wife is also an Italian and and good friend of Congress chief" Shri Singhal added.
He accused Orissa Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik of encouraging conversion in the state. He slammed Chief Minister for his government’s ‘inefficiency‘ to arrest the killers of Swami Laxmananda Saraswati.
"Naveen Patnaik has betrayed the Hindu society by not arresting the killers of Swami Laxmananda Saraswati even after one and half year of the incident. On the other hand government is victimising thousands of innocent vanvasis by arresting them on false charges and registering cases against them.", he pointed out.
Sunday, February 21, 2010
Reservation to Muslims in West Bengal
Reservation at the cost of Hindu tax payers is criminal looting-Dr Pravin Togadia
VHP general secretary Dr Pravin Togadia criticised the West Bengal Government for announcing 10 per cent reservation for Muslims in the state despite the fact that the Andhra Pradesh High Court quashed the state Government’s unconstitutional move to grant 4 per cent quota to Muslims in education, jobs and so on. "For an eye-wash the West Bengal government has shown that these reservations would be for socially, educationally and economically backward Muslims and OBCs in Muslims. This is all twisting the Constitution and exploiting the hard-working Hindus. Majority Hindus from middle class, higher middle class and other working/business class work hard and pay taxes. Instead of giving benefit of this money to poor Hindus-Scheduled Castes, OBCs and Vanvasis, the government is all out to use this money to subsidise Muslims who do not even limit number of children quoting religion. This is not only unfair to Hindus but also is a criminal looting of Hindus," Dr Togadia said in a statement issued in New Delhi on February 8.
He termed the Sachar and Rangnath Misra reports as "preparation for criminal looting of Hindus. "Andhra’s 4 per cent quota, Sachar and Rangnath reports and now West Bengal giving 10 per cent reservation to Muslims are not sporadic isolated incidents. They are well connected and are part of a larger conspiracy against Hindus. This criminal conspiracy of looting Hindus is being hatched to please and appease Muslim vote bank. Today Union government also announced that youth from PoK would be encouraged to come to J&K and would be given special facilities. At this moment 78 per cent Hindu youth in Bharat are unemployed, 79 per cent Hindu farmers have already lost their lands/crops and most are about to commit suicides, 68 per cent Hindu children are malnourished. Yet, instead of helping them, governments are showering favours on Muslims. This is not acceptable to Hindus," he said.
Dr Togadia said the Hindus are being exploited in every field like education, employment, bank loans, trade facilities, housing and so on. "From Inheritance Act to Marriage Act, all laws are only to trouble Hindus. Essential food costs have gone so high that even well-to-do middle class families are no more able to feed their children even a cup of milk daily and now there is Muslim reservation burden on the Hindus. Hindus have reached their limit of patience and without waiting for anyone to lead; Hindus would hit the streets any moment against this continued injustice. Muslims claim that they are no more just a simple minority; but they are ‘the second largest majority in India (as Jamait-e-ulema-e-Hind’s Maulana Madani says) and yet governments are bent on giving them facilities and reservations snatching education, employment, loans and lives of Hindus," the statement said.
He termed the move unconstitutional and expressed concern that this would encourage not just conversions but also jehadi incidents. He said, "Those who argue that Muslims are poor in Bharat and therefore they turn to jehad, are living in a fool’s paradise. Pilots, engineers, professionals from well-to-do families are following jehad as a lifestyle based on madarsa preaching. If they are poor they do jehad by bomb and when they get rich or educated they use planes, computers against Bharat. Therefore, it will help governments to get all Hindus to avail of education, employment, trade facilities instead of wasting Hindu taxpayer’s money on inspiring jehad. When majority develops, the nation automatically develops. Those who do not even follow Bharat’s Constitution should not be given an opportunity to misuse Bharat’s democracy and Constitution for increasing their population to ‘minoratise’ Hindus."
VHP general secretary Dr Pravin Togadia criticised the West Bengal Government for announcing 10 per cent reservation for Muslims in the state despite the fact that the Andhra Pradesh High Court quashed the state Government’s unconstitutional move to grant 4 per cent quota to Muslims in education, jobs and so on. "For an eye-wash the West Bengal government has shown that these reservations would be for socially, educationally and economically backward Muslims and OBCs in Muslims. This is all twisting the Constitution and exploiting the hard-working Hindus. Majority Hindus from middle class, higher middle class and other working/business class work hard and pay taxes. Instead of giving benefit of this money to poor Hindus-Scheduled Castes, OBCs and Vanvasis, the government is all out to use this money to subsidise Muslims who do not even limit number of children quoting religion. This is not only unfair to Hindus but also is a criminal looting of Hindus," Dr Togadia said in a statement issued in New Delhi on February 8.
He termed the Sachar and Rangnath Misra reports as "preparation for criminal looting of Hindus. "Andhra’s 4 per cent quota, Sachar and Rangnath reports and now West Bengal giving 10 per cent reservation to Muslims are not sporadic isolated incidents. They are well connected and are part of a larger conspiracy against Hindus. This criminal conspiracy of looting Hindus is being hatched to please and appease Muslim vote bank. Today Union government also announced that youth from PoK would be encouraged to come to J&K and would be given special facilities. At this moment 78 per cent Hindu youth in Bharat are unemployed, 79 per cent Hindu farmers have already lost their lands/crops and most are about to commit suicides, 68 per cent Hindu children are malnourished. Yet, instead of helping them, governments are showering favours on Muslims. This is not acceptable to Hindus," he said.
Dr Togadia said the Hindus are being exploited in every field like education, employment, bank loans, trade facilities, housing and so on. "From Inheritance Act to Marriage Act, all laws are only to trouble Hindus. Essential food costs have gone so high that even well-to-do middle class families are no more able to feed their children even a cup of milk daily and now there is Muslim reservation burden on the Hindus. Hindus have reached their limit of patience and without waiting for anyone to lead; Hindus would hit the streets any moment against this continued injustice. Muslims claim that they are no more just a simple minority; but they are ‘the second largest majority in India (as Jamait-e-ulema-e-Hind’s Maulana Madani says) and yet governments are bent on giving them facilities and reservations snatching education, employment, loans and lives of Hindus," the statement said.
He termed the move unconstitutional and expressed concern that this would encourage not just conversions but also jehadi incidents. He said, "Those who argue that Muslims are poor in Bharat and therefore they turn to jehad, are living in a fool’s paradise. Pilots, engineers, professionals from well-to-do families are following jehad as a lifestyle based on madarsa preaching. If they are poor they do jehad by bomb and when they get rich or educated they use planes, computers against Bharat. Therefore, it will help governments to get all Hindus to avail of education, employment, trade facilities instead of wasting Hindu taxpayer’s money on inspiring jehad. When majority develops, the nation automatically develops. Those who do not even follow Bharat’s Constitution should not be given an opportunity to misuse Bharat’s democracy and Constitution for increasing their population to ‘minoratise’ Hindus."
Murder of Hindu fishermen
Marad terrorists convicted
By S Chandrasekhar
Despite continuous court judgments and judicial interventions against the spreading Jehadi menace, both the CPM and the Congress are pampering the likes of Madhani, NDF etc. for the fish and loaves of vote banks.
THE ‘Marad Massacre’ of eight Hindu fishermen in Marad beach in Kozhikode, on May 2, 2003 in still fresh in the mind of Hindus in Kerala. This was part of a Jehadi strategy to kill Kerala’s Hindu fishermen (Arayas). The role of Mayin Haji, confidant of Muslim League Minister P.K. Kunjalikutty was behind the massacre. Also Hilal Mohammed, who financed the operation is among loyalties to both the CPM and the Congress-League.
But, this united the Hindus of Kerala, like rock. Massive protests were organised for CBI probe and the Muslim families of Marad had to abandon their homes for almost a year. The RSS demand for Rs 10 lakh compensation for dead and job for dependent was agreed by then CM and now Defence Minister A.K. Antony.
The Thomas P. Joseph Judicial commission indicted Mayin Haji and Hilal Mohammed and called for CBI probe into the role of L-E-T and ISI in the carnage.
But the CPM and the Congress conspired to torpedo CBI probe, as it will expose their Jehadi nexus.
A few months back, the Marad Special Courts Judge gave life term totalling 27 Years to 62 Jehadis for the May 2 massacre. He also sentenced the manager of the marad mosque to five years for hiding the blood- stained weapons in the mosque. He also fined Rs. 10,000 on each convicted, the amount to be given to the dependents of the butchered. Incidentally the present Minister E. Ahmed ordered opening of the sealed ‘Marad Mosque’ and offered Namaz as a defiance to the Hindus.
Prior to the 2 May massacre five Hindus were killed by Jehadis at Marad during January 3 and 4, 2002.
The special Court in a judgement dated February 6, 2010, convicted seven Jehadis Latheef, Rizan, Manaf, Thajudeen, Manaf, Shafi and Anafi to Life imprisonment. They had killed among others Shimjith (16) after setting his house on fire. He had 70 cuts in his body!
The court also sentenced nine others to five years rigorous imprisonment. The court has also imposed a total fine of Rs.10 lakhs which is to be given to the dependents of dead at the rate of Rs. Two lakhs
Despite continuous court judgments and judicial interventions against the spreading Jehadi menace, both the CPM and the Congress are pampering the likes of Madhani, NDF etc. for the fish and loaves of vote banks. Kerala has become the terror factory of the whole world with kerala jehadis available all over.
By S Chandrasekhar
Despite continuous court judgments and judicial interventions against the spreading Jehadi menace, both the CPM and the Congress are pampering the likes of Madhani, NDF etc. for the fish and loaves of vote banks.
THE ‘Marad Massacre’ of eight Hindu fishermen in Marad beach in Kozhikode, on May 2, 2003 in still fresh in the mind of Hindus in Kerala. This was part of a Jehadi strategy to kill Kerala’s Hindu fishermen (Arayas). The role of Mayin Haji, confidant of Muslim League Minister P.K. Kunjalikutty was behind the massacre. Also Hilal Mohammed, who financed the operation is among loyalties to both the CPM and the Congress-League.
But, this united the Hindus of Kerala, like rock. Massive protests were organised for CBI probe and the Muslim families of Marad had to abandon their homes for almost a year. The RSS demand for Rs 10 lakh compensation for dead and job for dependent was agreed by then CM and now Defence Minister A.K. Antony.
The Thomas P. Joseph Judicial commission indicted Mayin Haji and Hilal Mohammed and called for CBI probe into the role of L-E-T and ISI in the carnage.
But the CPM and the Congress conspired to torpedo CBI probe, as it will expose their Jehadi nexus.
A few months back, the Marad Special Courts Judge gave life term totalling 27 Years to 62 Jehadis for the May 2 massacre. He also sentenced the manager of the marad mosque to five years for hiding the blood- stained weapons in the mosque. He also fined Rs. 10,000 on each convicted, the amount to be given to the dependents of the butchered. Incidentally the present Minister E. Ahmed ordered opening of the sealed ‘Marad Mosque’ and offered Namaz as a defiance to the Hindus.
Prior to the 2 May massacre five Hindus were killed by Jehadis at Marad during January 3 and 4, 2002.
The special Court in a judgement dated February 6, 2010, convicted seven Jehadis Latheef, Rizan, Manaf, Thajudeen, Manaf, Shafi and Anafi to Life imprisonment. They had killed among others Shimjith (16) after setting his house on fire. He had 70 cuts in his body!
The court also sentenced nine others to five years rigorous imprisonment. The court has also imposed a total fine of Rs.10 lakhs which is to be given to the dependents of dead at the rate of Rs. Two lakhs
Despite continuous court judgments and judicial interventions against the spreading Jehadi menace, both the CPM and the Congress are pampering the likes of Madhani, NDF etc. for the fish and loaves of vote banks. Kerala has become the terror factory of the whole world with kerala jehadis available all over.
Sunday, February 14, 2010
a satire
Pakistan's common man is innocent.
Pakistan's common man is not in Pakistani militarty. Pakistani military is consisting of Dutch, Africans and Japanese people.
Pakistan's common man do not give votes to India hating politicians. All the voters in Pakistani voter list are from Moskow and Timbaktu and France.
Believe me, I am telling honestly that common pakistani is innocent and wants peace with India.
But you Indians are making so much of noises while dieing just to disturb the peace talks.
Indians are really very cruel people.
Pakistan's common man is not in Pakistani militarty. Pakistani military is consisting of Dutch, Africans and Japanese people.
Pakistan's common man do not give votes to India hating politicians. All the voters in Pakistani voter list are from Moskow and Timbaktu and France.
Believe me, I am telling honestly that common pakistani is innocent and wants peace with India.
But you Indians are making so much of noises while dieing just to disturb the peace talks.
Indians are really very cruel people.
Wednesday, February 10, 2010
"misquote as politicians’'
Quote, misquote as politicians’ last resort
What our editors should know is that some reporters do not attend meetings but get their information from someone who did; such reporters should be sharply pulled up. They are not doing their job, for which they are paid.
TWO issues stand out in the matter of the Shashi Tharoor case which need to be addressed. One is of being misquoted by the media. That is a serious enough charge, and needs to be immediately looked into. How can one possibly misquote a speaker if one is an attentive listener? In his presidential summing-up Tharoor was quoting Lord Bhiku Parekh who, apparently, was critical of both Mahatma Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru. The media ignored what Lord Bhiku Parekh said, which is bad enough. Then Shashi Tharoor was charged with criticising the Mahatma and Nehru when he was merely quoting Lord Parekh. That is worse. What our editors should know is that some reporters do not attend meetings but get their information from someone who did; such reporters should be sharply pulled up. They are not doing their job, for which they are paid. That is only one aspect of the problem.
A more serious one is the right of a politician to criticise his predecessors in the party. Mahatma Gandhi does not need anyone to defend him. In his time he was the unquestioned leader not just of the Congress, but of the country at large. In that sense, so was Nehru. Both made certain grievous mistakes. Nehru, for instance, should not have taken the Kashmir issue to the UN Security Council. In retrospect many have questioned Gandhi’s demand that the British should Quit India in 1942.
Happily, the media has risen to the occasion. The DNA (January 12) conceded that the media has erred in its reportage. But then it also pointed out: “The Congress Party is so steeped in its culture of worship, especially of the Nehru legacy, and to a lesser extent of Mahatma Gandhi, that it cannot countenance any criticism of its greats.” The paper pointed out that even when both Gandhi and Nehru were alive they had come in for regular criticism in the public domain, and even from within the party itself. Said DNA: “The (Congress) Party could just as well take a mature stance on what its members say about historical figures. It might help most Indian political parties if they encourage a little internal debate and discussion in the merits of democracy rather than take immediate umbrage. Party discipline need not be taken to Stalinists heights or depths as the case may be.” DNA did not say so, but the Congress is suffering from a major inferiority complex and for its behaviour deserves condemnation.
The Asian Age (January 12) said that the Congress (represented by its spokesmen) seems to go into an overdrive and it is “time someone reined them in”. “The whole affair is disgraceful,” said the paper, adding: “The country’s oldest party can surely do better.” Importantly, it asked: “Since when has there been a ban in the Congress on making a critical appraisal of Nehru or his foreign policy? If so, Jawaharlal would be mortified, were he alive…. His was a life that naturally lends itself to penetrating analysis by scholars, statesmen and admirers… If Gandhi, Marx and Mao can be criticised, why not Nehru unless we choose to subscribe to unending hypocrisy and shaming sycophancy?” The paper pointed out that Tharoor is a Nehru scholar and that “ a great many things Nehru did and thought are no longer a part of the Congress’ make-up today”. It asked: “Will the party’s spokesmen arraign their leadership for this? Or do they prefer to emulate their counterparts in Beijing who say praise-be to Mao Zedong even as they run down in practice everything the great revolutionary leader stood for?”
The Asian Age didn’t say this, but who are Sonia Gandhi and Dr Manmohan Singh to defend the Congress when they were nowhere near the party from 1929 to 1949? How spineless can the Congress be? The Telegraph (January 12) pointed out that “dissent is going to be stifled within the Congress” and “there seems to be a tendency to make the Congress into a replica of a communist party with a ‘line’ on everything and on all subjects”. “If that were to happen,” said the paper, “the Congress would become a monolithic and a doctrinaire party”. Noting that “the Congress has always had an umbrella character and under that umbrella many have been called” and that the Congress has never been known to have a ‘line’ the paper said that “it cannot be anybody’s argument that Gandhi and Nehru—or for that matter any other major and charismatic Congress leader—are above criticism and historical re-evaluation”.
In conclusion, it said: “Every generation looks at past historical figures in its own terms. This is one of the unchanging principles of democratic discussion. The Congress, ever since its inception, has been part of such discussions and has always upheld debates in the best democratic tradition. The past must be open to interpretation; history cannot be frozen. Unfortunately, some elements within the Congress in a bid to display their loyalty are trying to overturn democratic traditions and turn the Congress into a party to which many are called and one voice is heard. It is necessary to nip those totalitarian tendencies in the bud. Otherwise the Congress will catch a tartar.”
This columnist who in his time has covered practically every AICC meeting from 1946 to 1955 and was present at the party meeting in 1942 when the Quit India resolution was passed, feels ashamed of the current Congress leadership to which they rose either by sheer accident or by planned design and not because of any sacrifice they made in the fight for freedom. Tharoor was defended in full by Arvind Adiga, author of the Booker Prize-winning book The White Tiger in another paper by claiming that Shashi Tharoor has written glowingly about Nehru’s contribution in creating a secular democracy and for giving India a role in international affairs that far exceeded military or economic strength. The truth is that today’s Congress leaders, whoever they are, do not deserve to be Congresswallahs. The Mahatma had realised it much before he was assassinated and had asked for its dissolution, which the party leadership declined to do. Perhaps the time has come now for the party to take some other name. It has no respect for past Congress tradition. Their leaders are all johnnies-come-lately attempting to cash in on the party’s great historic past. For them not democracy but power is all that matters. The Tharoor case has shown that in all nakedness. The best name for the party would be: Indian Sycophants Party—and that will reflect the truth.
What our editors should know is that some reporters do not attend meetings but get their information from someone who did; such reporters should be sharply pulled up. They are not doing their job, for which they are paid.
TWO issues stand out in the matter of the Shashi Tharoor case which need to be addressed. One is of being misquoted by the media. That is a serious enough charge, and needs to be immediately looked into. How can one possibly misquote a speaker if one is an attentive listener? In his presidential summing-up Tharoor was quoting Lord Bhiku Parekh who, apparently, was critical of both Mahatma Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru. The media ignored what Lord Bhiku Parekh said, which is bad enough. Then Shashi Tharoor was charged with criticising the Mahatma and Nehru when he was merely quoting Lord Parekh. That is worse. What our editors should know is that some reporters do not attend meetings but get their information from someone who did; such reporters should be sharply pulled up. They are not doing their job, for which they are paid. That is only one aspect of the problem.
A more serious one is the right of a politician to criticise his predecessors in the party. Mahatma Gandhi does not need anyone to defend him. In his time he was the unquestioned leader not just of the Congress, but of the country at large. In that sense, so was Nehru. Both made certain grievous mistakes. Nehru, for instance, should not have taken the Kashmir issue to the UN Security Council. In retrospect many have questioned Gandhi’s demand that the British should Quit India in 1942.
Happily, the media has risen to the occasion. The DNA (January 12) conceded that the media has erred in its reportage. But then it also pointed out: “The Congress Party is so steeped in its culture of worship, especially of the Nehru legacy, and to a lesser extent of Mahatma Gandhi, that it cannot countenance any criticism of its greats.” The paper pointed out that even when both Gandhi and Nehru were alive they had come in for regular criticism in the public domain, and even from within the party itself. Said DNA: “The (Congress) Party could just as well take a mature stance on what its members say about historical figures. It might help most Indian political parties if they encourage a little internal debate and discussion in the merits of democracy rather than take immediate umbrage. Party discipline need not be taken to Stalinists heights or depths as the case may be.” DNA did not say so, but the Congress is suffering from a major inferiority complex and for its behaviour deserves condemnation.
The Asian Age (January 12) said that the Congress (represented by its spokesmen) seems to go into an overdrive and it is “time someone reined them in”. “The whole affair is disgraceful,” said the paper, adding: “The country’s oldest party can surely do better.” Importantly, it asked: “Since when has there been a ban in the Congress on making a critical appraisal of Nehru or his foreign policy? If so, Jawaharlal would be mortified, were he alive…. His was a life that naturally lends itself to penetrating analysis by scholars, statesmen and admirers… If Gandhi, Marx and Mao can be criticised, why not Nehru unless we choose to subscribe to unending hypocrisy and shaming sycophancy?” The paper pointed out that Tharoor is a Nehru scholar and that “ a great many things Nehru did and thought are no longer a part of the Congress’ make-up today”. It asked: “Will the party’s spokesmen arraign their leadership for this? Or do they prefer to emulate their counterparts in Beijing who say praise-be to Mao Zedong even as they run down in practice everything the great revolutionary leader stood for?”
The Asian Age didn’t say this, but who are Sonia Gandhi and Dr Manmohan Singh to defend the Congress when they were nowhere near the party from 1929 to 1949? How spineless can the Congress be? The Telegraph (January 12) pointed out that “dissent is going to be stifled within the Congress” and “there seems to be a tendency to make the Congress into a replica of a communist party with a ‘line’ on everything and on all subjects”. “If that were to happen,” said the paper, “the Congress would become a monolithic and a doctrinaire party”. Noting that “the Congress has always had an umbrella character and under that umbrella many have been called” and that the Congress has never been known to have a ‘line’ the paper said that “it cannot be anybody’s argument that Gandhi and Nehru—or for that matter any other major and charismatic Congress leader—are above criticism and historical re-evaluation”.
In conclusion, it said: “Every generation looks at past historical figures in its own terms. This is one of the unchanging principles of democratic discussion. The Congress, ever since its inception, has been part of such discussions and has always upheld debates in the best democratic tradition. The past must be open to interpretation; history cannot be frozen. Unfortunately, some elements within the Congress in a bid to display their loyalty are trying to overturn democratic traditions and turn the Congress into a party to which many are called and one voice is heard. It is necessary to nip those totalitarian tendencies in the bud. Otherwise the Congress will catch a tartar.”
This columnist who in his time has covered practically every AICC meeting from 1946 to 1955 and was present at the party meeting in 1942 when the Quit India resolution was passed, feels ashamed of the current Congress leadership to which they rose either by sheer accident or by planned design and not because of any sacrifice they made in the fight for freedom. Tharoor was defended in full by Arvind Adiga, author of the Booker Prize-winning book The White Tiger in another paper by claiming that Shashi Tharoor has written glowingly about Nehru’s contribution in creating a secular democracy and for giving India a role in international affairs that far exceeded military or economic strength. The truth is that today’s Congress leaders, whoever they are, do not deserve to be Congresswallahs. The Mahatma had realised it much before he was assassinated and had asked for its dissolution, which the party leadership declined to do. Perhaps the time has come now for the party to take some other name. It has no respect for past Congress tradition. Their leaders are all johnnies-come-lately attempting to cash in on the party’s great historic past. For them not democracy but power is all that matters. The Tharoor case has shown that in all nakedness. The best name for the party would be: Indian Sycophants Party—and that will reflect the truth.
Oh God! All in the name of God
A Ph.D thesis on how to develop a church planting movement in India
www.rickross.com
HERE comes one more revealing document—a research conducted by a Missionary, interestingly to submit as his Phd thesis on Developing a Church Planting Movement in India!
These studies, especially from the Horses Mouth itself will have the right effect on true secular Hindus, who are unaware of these crookedness. There is a need to spread this among secular Hindus who fight tooth and nail to protect the undue rights granted to them by our pseudo secular Government.
One who goes through it can unearth their sinister designs and their dangerous game plan. More surprisingly how well they are implementing the same in our day-to-day life by fooling the majority.
In this thesis they highlight the importance to develop a new generation of Crypto Christians who can keep Hindu names, surname, can use Hindu sacred symbols, marks like tilak, bindi, can adorn hair partition with Kumkum to maintain their secrecy.
Christian missionaries on one hand preach high moral values, yet at the same time, they follow the lowest most despicable ones in order to convert people to their religion. Missionaries especially prey on the poorest, most rural folk under the guise of helping them out of poverty when in fact they have chosen to convert them because they are the most uneducated and therefore most likely to fall for their deception.
One common tactic employed by missionaries is to give a sick villager fake medicines which have no medicinal value and ask them to worship in the name of their faith for wellness. After several days, the missionary gives the villager an identical dose of the medicine, but this time it is the real medicine. Then the missionary will instruct the villager to now pray to Jesus. Soon after, due to the medicine and not due to Jesus, the villager will be cured. The uneducated and gullible villager, however, will attribute his cure to Jesus and convert to Christianity.
In villages in India, missionaries place a stone or metal idol of a Hindu deity in a bucket of water. The statue will sink in the bucket. Next the missionary brings a wax-coated idol of Jesus or Virgin Mary (though Christianity prohibits idols) and places that in the bucket. Due the wax-coat, the Christian idol will float. The missionary will then conclude that because the Christian idol floated, it is “higher” and, therefore, better than the Hindu one. The uneducated villager, not knowing anything about buoyancy or density, falls for the missionary’s ridiculous explanation and converts to Christianity.
Often missionaries will disguise themselves as religious leaders of the local religion and subtly attempt to convert the locals.The classic example was that of Robert de Nobili, a Jesuit from France, who came to India in the early 17th century. He adopted the saffron robe, started to live in a hut, squatted on the floor for conducting his discourses, became a vegetarian and gave up liquor, projected that he was a Brahmin saint from Rome and that the Bible was one of the lost Vedas (Hindu holy scriptures), and generally tried to pass himself as another Hindu sanyasi.
www.rickross.com
HERE comes one more revealing document—a research conducted by a Missionary, interestingly to submit as his Phd thesis on Developing a Church Planting Movement in India!
These studies, especially from the Horses Mouth itself will have the right effect on true secular Hindus, who are unaware of these crookedness. There is a need to spread this among secular Hindus who fight tooth and nail to protect the undue rights granted to them by our pseudo secular Government.
One who goes through it can unearth their sinister designs and their dangerous game plan. More surprisingly how well they are implementing the same in our day-to-day life by fooling the majority.
In this thesis they highlight the importance to develop a new generation of Crypto Christians who can keep Hindu names, surname, can use Hindu sacred symbols, marks like tilak, bindi, can adorn hair partition with Kumkum to maintain their secrecy.
Christian missionaries on one hand preach high moral values, yet at the same time, they follow the lowest most despicable ones in order to convert people to their religion. Missionaries especially prey on the poorest, most rural folk under the guise of helping them out of poverty when in fact they have chosen to convert them because they are the most uneducated and therefore most likely to fall for their deception.
One common tactic employed by missionaries is to give a sick villager fake medicines which have no medicinal value and ask them to worship in the name of their faith for wellness. After several days, the missionary gives the villager an identical dose of the medicine, but this time it is the real medicine. Then the missionary will instruct the villager to now pray to Jesus. Soon after, due to the medicine and not due to Jesus, the villager will be cured. The uneducated and gullible villager, however, will attribute his cure to Jesus and convert to Christianity.
In villages in India, missionaries place a stone or metal idol of a Hindu deity in a bucket of water. The statue will sink in the bucket. Next the missionary brings a wax-coated idol of Jesus or Virgin Mary (though Christianity prohibits idols) and places that in the bucket. Due the wax-coat, the Christian idol will float. The missionary will then conclude that because the Christian idol floated, it is “higher” and, therefore, better than the Hindu one. The uneducated villager, not knowing anything about buoyancy or density, falls for the missionary’s ridiculous explanation and converts to Christianity.
Often missionaries will disguise themselves as religious leaders of the local religion and subtly attempt to convert the locals.The classic example was that of Robert de Nobili, a Jesuit from France, who came to India in the early 17th century. He adopted the saffron robe, started to live in a hut, squatted on the floor for conducting his discourses, became a vegetarian and gave up liquor, projected that he was a Brahmin saint from Rome and that the Bible was one of the lost Vedas (Hindu holy scriptures), and generally tried to pass himself as another Hindu sanyasi.
Monday, January 25, 2010
Hajj Subsidy: An Instrument of Muslim Appeasement in Indian Politics
Dr Radhasyam Brahmachari
The Indian government, outrageously contravening its Secular Constitution, spends huge sums of money to subsidize Muslim Hajj pilgrimage to Mecca as appeasement for Muslim votes...
Hajj: The fifth Pillar of Islam
Islam stands on five pillars, namely (1) Kalema or six sentences of oath to Islam, (2) Namaaj or prayer, five times a day, (3) Roja or fasting in the month of Ramadan, (4) Zakat or giving away a part of income (2.5%) for the sake of Jihad (i.e. for terrorist activities) and (5) Hajj or pilgrimage to Mecca.
The Islamic Hajj, i.e. pilgrimage to Mecca, is an obligation that every able-bodied Muslim, who can afford, is expected to perform at least once in life. This ritual demonstrates the solidarity of the Muslim people, and their submission to the Allah, the Islamic God. The Hajj occurs from the 8th to the 12th day of Dhul Hijjah, the 12th month of the Islamic lunar calendar.
It should be mentioned here that the Hajj ritual was considered ancient even in the times of Prophet Muhammad in the 7th century AD. Islamic scriptures say that it was practiced even in the days of Ibrahim (Abraham of Bible). In ancient times, tens of thousands of pagan pilgrims used to join processions, simultaneously converging on the ancient idol-temple of Kaaba in Mecca for the Hajj, and perform a series of rituals. Many believe that initially the Kaaba was a temple of Lord Shiva, Hajj was a Hindu practice, and later on included into Islam by Prophet Muhammad. In ancient tradition, the pilgrims would walk counter-clockwise seven times about the Kaaba, a process called Tawaf, kiss the Hazr-e-Aswad (the Black Stone), then run back and forth from the Zamzam Well near the Kabah back and forth between the hills of Al-Safa and Al-Marwah, then go to the plains of Mount Arafat to stand in vigil, then proceed to Muzdalifah to gather appropriate pebbles, which they would throw at three pillars in Mina to perform the ritual of the “Stoning the Devil”. The pilgrims would then shave their heads, perform an animal sacrifice, and celebrate the three day global festival of Eid-ul-Adha. Muslims continue to imitate the same.
Every male Muslim, proceeding toward Mecca to perform the Hajj, must clad himself with Ihram, namely two pieces of white cloth, one to wear and the other to cover the upper part of his body and thus he enters a state called Muhrim. A person in the state of Muhrim must not tie any knots or wear any stitched items except for a money belt if it is needed. He should allow the ankle and back of foot to be exposed. Furthermore, whilst in the state of Muhrim, a Muslim must also not use any scented things at all on himself or on clothes. For women, there is no clear prescription. Women's clothing, therefore, varies considerably and reflects regional as well as religious attitudes. In general, female pilgrims clothe themselves in long white robes, covering the body from head to foot and leaving the face exposed. The simple, white Ihram clothing is indeed a Hindu practice, which is still continuing as part of the Hajj pilgrimage.
Last year (i.e. 2009 AD), an estimated 2.5 million Muslims from around the world converged on Mecca in November for the Hajj pilgrimage, of which 160,491 from India. Indian pilgrims were the first to arrive, when the Hajj Terminal opened for the season on Oct. 20, according to the Consulate General of India, who coordinated the arrangements of 115,000 pilgrims coming through the Mumbai based Hajj Committee of India. The remaining 45,491 pilgrims came through private tour operators. About 500 buildings were hired to accommodate the pilgrims in the Mecca region; 70,000 pilgrims grouped ‘green’ stayed within one kilometer from the Holy Masjid-ul-Haram (i.e. Kabaa); 13,000 grouped ‘white’ between 1 and 1.6 km from it and 32,000 others in Aziziyah. The Indian mission set up a 50-bed hospital in Mecca. About 1,100 stayed in various accommodations (Ribats) set up by erstwhile princely states of India.
Hajj subsidy spending
In 2007, the Hajj subsidy paid by the Indian government was 5.95 billion rupees and Rs. 7 billion for 2008 (Rs. 45 = US$ 1). Since 1994, the roundtrip cost to Jeddah, Saudi Arabia has been fixed at Rs. 12,000 per pilgrim, and the government has footed the rest of the bill. In 2007, this difference came to Rs. 47,454 per passenger. The total Government spending for the 2009 Hajj subsidy is not yet clearly known. Many estimate that it could be as high as over 18 billion rupees (Rs. 1800 crore).
According to Hajj Committee CEO Mohammad Owais, the committee has been asked by the Ministry of External Affairs to collect Rs 12,000 from each person towards airfare. According to Owais, accepting financial assistance like subsidized airfare for Hajj pilgrimage is un-Islamic. He also believes that one should not be under any obligation while undertaking Hajj and the pilgrims should be allowed to travel by any airline of their choice. “We should be allowed to place bulk orders with the airline, which quotes the lowest price for a ticket. As of now, we are bound by the Government to travel by Air India only”, adds Mr Owais.
It should be pointed out here that considerable criticism has been leveled against this practice, both by Hindu organizations and by Muslim religious groups. However, after the filing of a Public Interest Litigation by B.N. Shukla and former BJP Rajya Sabha member Prafull Goradiyam, seeking an end to Hajj subsidies. The Supreme Court of India, although declared the practice unconstitutional, ruled that the subsidy may be continued.
History
The practice of providing subsidized airfare by the Government of India began as early as 1959, as a policy of appeasing Muslims, in contravention of the secular principle of the government. While commenting on it, Bipin Pal, in his article The Haj subsidy: A Himalayan shame, writes, “How absurd, if not sad, that India is the only country in the world that provides a subsidy to its second-biggest majority for pilgrimage to Mecca; in the pretext of her constitutional obligation (of secular) and later enacted as the Hajj Act, way back in 1959! Thanks to Janab Jawaharlal Nehru, who chose to give this gift to the second-biggest majority! Thanks to his stream of secular ideologists and India's urban English press that even after 27th May 1964 (after the Janab's demise), that they chose to remain silent on the Act that can surpass all the Constitutional provisions that can make a mockery of democratic republic India's secular image.”
In 1992, after the demolition of the disputed structure at Ayodhya, Mr P V Narasinha Rao, the then Prime Minister of India, to cool down aggrieved Muslims, increased both the Hajj quota and amount of subsidy. It may be mentioned here that the government does not provide any such subsidy to the Hindu pilgrims, who go to visit Kailash-mansarobas in China, or to Amarnath in Kashmir or Gangasagar in West Bengal. On the contrary, the government imposes direct and indirect pilgrimage taxes on them.
Dispute
“Regarding a trip to Mecca for performing Hajj pilgrimage, the Koran is very strict and says that those who perform Hajj have to do it only from their hard-earned money. Not only that, before setting off for the Hajj, he/she must repay his/her loans and return everything he/she might have taken as deposits from others. The question of accepting a subsidized trip is totally frowned upon pious Muslims. Particularly for the Indian pilgrims, the money for subsidizing the plane fare is Kafir's money! How can a true Muslim perform Hajj pilgrimage out of the dole or tax given by Kafir's comprising of Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists, Christians, Parsis and Atheists. Is it not Haram? Recently, Muslim ulemas could have understood the point and expressed their opinion that accepting subsidy for the Hajj pilgrimage is un-Islamic and unethical (haram)”, according to author G K Menon. It should be mentioned here that the Chennai-based Nawab of Arcot was the only Muslim, who was most vocal on this point and campaigned to stop the subsidy. But his pleas fell on deaf ears. The matter has also created confusion amongst Indian pilgrims. However, recently a group of Muslim MPs has requested the Central Government to discontinue the Hajj subsidy, and implement other means to ease the Hajj pilgrimage.
It has been suggested that a fund (Hajj Kitti) would be created and those, who are interested to perform the pilgrimage, would deposit money on monthly or yearly installments, and would withdraw the money during the journey. In fact, the present Government, led by the Indian National Congress, is considering such an alternative as the present practice is under severe criticism as an instrument of appeasing Muslims for votes by the certain parties. A case against the present UPA Government is also pending in the Allahabad High Court moved by a Hindu nationalist leader, because offering such a financial assistance to a religious group goes directly against the secular spirit of the Indian Constitution. Many believe that the present Prime Minister Manmohan Singh is determined to settle the issue within his tenure, which is going to end in 2014.
But there are indications that the dispute would continue. A spokesman of the National Hajj Committee has been reported to have said: “We are also citizens of this nation and, despite our hardships, we also pay tax to the government. We also contribute to the government exchequer. So, we have the right to enjoy government subsidies.”
But, as mentioned above, the matter is controversial even amongst Muslims. Meanwhile, K Rahman, the Vice Chairman of the Rajya Sabha has given a nod to an alternative arrangement as the Koran denounces accepting subsidy for the Hajj pilgrimage. Another influential Muslim leader, Shahid Siddiki, an MP of the Samajwadi Party, said, “Receiving Hajj subsidy is against the tenets of Islam,” adding that, except India, no other country in the world, even the Muslim countries, offer subsidy to Hajj pilgrims.
Demanding an end to the subsidy, Maulana Mehmood Madani, Rajya Sabha member and general secretary of the Jamiat-e-Ulema- e-Hind, says: “It is against the Shariat to be under any kind of obligation while undertaking Hajj. According to the Quran, only those Muslims, who can afford the expenses, should perform Hajj. It’s recommended only for adult, financially able and sane Muslims.” Others, like S Q R Ilyas, convener of the Babri Masjid Committee and a senior member of the All India Muslim Personal Law Board (AIMPLB), says, “The Hajj subsidy a sop to gain political mileage.”
In a recent article, the renowned scholar Dr Babu Susheelan said, “Hajj subsidy is irrational, unwise and illegal. It is for appeasing Muslims. Why taxpayer money should be channeled for Muslim visit to Saudi Arabia? Every Muslims going for Hajj is required by Islam to behead an animal in the name of their desert deity Allah. Why should a secular government subsidizing Jihadis for animal slaughter? I understand that animal slaughter to please God is banned in India. Then, it is natural for the public to ask the question why subsidizing Islamic animal slaughter in the name of Allah? Visit to Mecca with government money is for advanced training on beheading. Advanced skill building will help Jihadis for beheading kafirs. It is a self-inflicted suicidal policy of the secular government.”
It should be pointed out here that, for a Muslim of India, Hajj pilgrimage is indeed an expensive affair, which only the wealthy Muslims can afford; it is unthinkable for the common and poor ones. So, proving aid to this rich and well-off section of Muslims is unethical, too. In other words, it is simply carrying coal to Newcastle. However, the Indian Government is doing that for the sake of Muslim votes. Apart from that, the government is spending huge money on Muslims and providing many other facilities to appease them, e.g. paying monthly salary to Imams of mosques, expanding madrassa education, providing quota for Government jobs, providing easy bank loans, scholarships for Muslim students, and so on and so forth. Still the government is failing to earn their loyalty.
In India, the appeasement of Muslims for the sake of vote-bank politics has reached such a point that Muslims can commit many crimes without being convicted, can break any law even in front of the law-enforcement authorities, can do any kind of violence on Hindus and the people of other community under the protection of the political parties. Not a single political party is above this mess. It has been mentioned above that BJP, known to be a Hindu nationalist party, is raising hue and cry that the present Congress Party-led Government is indulging in Muslim appeasement through the Hajj subsidy. Yet, when BJP was in power, it increased the Hajj quota and the subsidy. Moreover, previously the Hajj pilgrims had to move to Mumbai to board the planes for Jeddah. But the BJP government, spending several thousand crores of rupees, erected Hajj rest-houses in every metropolitan city and made it possible for the Hajj pilgrims to board the planes for Jeddah in their home towns.
We have seen above that, though most of the ulemas are against accepting government subsidy for the Hajj pilgrimage, yet Hajj pilgrims are happily to avail the subsidized journey to Mecca, and performing Hajj. While Muslim dignitaries are probably ashamed of disclosing the truth, a Muslim cleric, nonetheless, has conceded that a subsidized Hajj would be haraam, provided the subsidy was un-Islamic. The injunctions of the Quran are for Muslims; they do not apply to non-Muslims and others. Therefore, a Hajj, subsidized by the secular Government of India, can still be halaal, because the subsidy, offered by the kafir government, is simply a kind of spoils or mal-e-ganimat, which Almighty Allah has made legal (halaal) in the Quran for the Muslims.
To conclude, it may be said that, whatever may be arguments and counter arguments, the Hajj subsidy by the Indian Government would continue so long the politics of Muslim appeasement persists in India.
The Indian government, outrageously contravening its Secular Constitution, spends huge sums of money to subsidize Muslim Hajj pilgrimage to Mecca as appeasement for Muslim votes...
Hajj: The fifth Pillar of Islam
Islam stands on five pillars, namely (1) Kalema or six sentences of oath to Islam, (2) Namaaj or prayer, five times a day, (3) Roja or fasting in the month of Ramadan, (4) Zakat or giving away a part of income (2.5%) for the sake of Jihad (i.e. for terrorist activities) and (5) Hajj or pilgrimage to Mecca.
The Islamic Hajj, i.e. pilgrimage to Mecca, is an obligation that every able-bodied Muslim, who can afford, is expected to perform at least once in life. This ritual demonstrates the solidarity of the Muslim people, and their submission to the Allah, the Islamic God. The Hajj occurs from the 8th to the 12th day of Dhul Hijjah, the 12th month of the Islamic lunar calendar.
It should be mentioned here that the Hajj ritual was considered ancient even in the times of Prophet Muhammad in the 7th century AD. Islamic scriptures say that it was practiced even in the days of Ibrahim (Abraham of Bible). In ancient times, tens of thousands of pagan pilgrims used to join processions, simultaneously converging on the ancient idol-temple of Kaaba in Mecca for the Hajj, and perform a series of rituals. Many believe that initially the Kaaba was a temple of Lord Shiva, Hajj was a Hindu practice, and later on included into Islam by Prophet Muhammad. In ancient tradition, the pilgrims would walk counter-clockwise seven times about the Kaaba, a process called Tawaf, kiss the Hazr-e-Aswad (the Black Stone), then run back and forth from the Zamzam Well near the Kabah back and forth between the hills of Al-Safa and Al-Marwah, then go to the plains of Mount Arafat to stand in vigil, then proceed to Muzdalifah to gather appropriate pebbles, which they would throw at three pillars in Mina to perform the ritual of the “Stoning the Devil”. The pilgrims would then shave their heads, perform an animal sacrifice, and celebrate the three day global festival of Eid-ul-Adha. Muslims continue to imitate the same.
Every male Muslim, proceeding toward Mecca to perform the Hajj, must clad himself with Ihram, namely two pieces of white cloth, one to wear and the other to cover the upper part of his body and thus he enters a state called Muhrim. A person in the state of Muhrim must not tie any knots or wear any stitched items except for a money belt if it is needed. He should allow the ankle and back of foot to be exposed. Furthermore, whilst in the state of Muhrim, a Muslim must also not use any scented things at all on himself or on clothes. For women, there is no clear prescription. Women's clothing, therefore, varies considerably and reflects regional as well as religious attitudes. In general, female pilgrims clothe themselves in long white robes, covering the body from head to foot and leaving the face exposed. The simple, white Ihram clothing is indeed a Hindu practice, which is still continuing as part of the Hajj pilgrimage.
Last year (i.e. 2009 AD), an estimated 2.5 million Muslims from around the world converged on Mecca in November for the Hajj pilgrimage, of which 160,491 from India. Indian pilgrims were the first to arrive, when the Hajj Terminal opened for the season on Oct. 20, according to the Consulate General of India, who coordinated the arrangements of 115,000 pilgrims coming through the Mumbai based Hajj Committee of India. The remaining 45,491 pilgrims came through private tour operators. About 500 buildings were hired to accommodate the pilgrims in the Mecca region; 70,000 pilgrims grouped ‘green’ stayed within one kilometer from the Holy Masjid-ul-Haram (i.e. Kabaa); 13,000 grouped ‘white’ between 1 and 1.6 km from it and 32,000 others in Aziziyah. The Indian mission set up a 50-bed hospital in Mecca. About 1,100 stayed in various accommodations (Ribats) set up by erstwhile princely states of India.
Hajj subsidy spending
In 2007, the Hajj subsidy paid by the Indian government was 5.95 billion rupees and Rs. 7 billion for 2008 (Rs. 45 = US$ 1). Since 1994, the roundtrip cost to Jeddah, Saudi Arabia has been fixed at Rs. 12,000 per pilgrim, and the government has footed the rest of the bill. In 2007, this difference came to Rs. 47,454 per passenger. The total Government spending for the 2009 Hajj subsidy is not yet clearly known. Many estimate that it could be as high as over 18 billion rupees (Rs. 1800 crore).
According to Hajj Committee CEO Mohammad Owais, the committee has been asked by the Ministry of External Affairs to collect Rs 12,000 from each person towards airfare. According to Owais, accepting financial assistance like subsidized airfare for Hajj pilgrimage is un-Islamic. He also believes that one should not be under any obligation while undertaking Hajj and the pilgrims should be allowed to travel by any airline of their choice. “We should be allowed to place bulk orders with the airline, which quotes the lowest price for a ticket. As of now, we are bound by the Government to travel by Air India only”, adds Mr Owais.
It should be pointed out here that considerable criticism has been leveled against this practice, both by Hindu organizations and by Muslim religious groups. However, after the filing of a Public Interest Litigation by B.N. Shukla and former BJP Rajya Sabha member Prafull Goradiyam, seeking an end to Hajj subsidies. The Supreme Court of India, although declared the practice unconstitutional, ruled that the subsidy may be continued.
History
The practice of providing subsidized airfare by the Government of India began as early as 1959, as a policy of appeasing Muslims, in contravention of the secular principle of the government. While commenting on it, Bipin Pal, in his article The Haj subsidy: A Himalayan shame, writes, “How absurd, if not sad, that India is the only country in the world that provides a subsidy to its second-biggest majority for pilgrimage to Mecca; in the pretext of her constitutional obligation (of secular) and later enacted as the Hajj Act, way back in 1959! Thanks to Janab Jawaharlal Nehru, who chose to give this gift to the second-biggest majority! Thanks to his stream of secular ideologists and India's urban English press that even after 27th May 1964 (after the Janab's demise), that they chose to remain silent on the Act that can surpass all the Constitutional provisions that can make a mockery of democratic republic India's secular image.”
In 1992, after the demolition of the disputed structure at Ayodhya, Mr P V Narasinha Rao, the then Prime Minister of India, to cool down aggrieved Muslims, increased both the Hajj quota and amount of subsidy. It may be mentioned here that the government does not provide any such subsidy to the Hindu pilgrims, who go to visit Kailash-mansarobas in China, or to Amarnath in Kashmir or Gangasagar in West Bengal. On the contrary, the government imposes direct and indirect pilgrimage taxes on them.
Dispute
“Regarding a trip to Mecca for performing Hajj pilgrimage, the Koran is very strict and says that those who perform Hajj have to do it only from their hard-earned money. Not only that, before setting off for the Hajj, he/she must repay his/her loans and return everything he/she might have taken as deposits from others. The question of accepting a subsidized trip is totally frowned upon pious Muslims. Particularly for the Indian pilgrims, the money for subsidizing the plane fare is Kafir's money! How can a true Muslim perform Hajj pilgrimage out of the dole or tax given by Kafir's comprising of Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists, Christians, Parsis and Atheists. Is it not Haram? Recently, Muslim ulemas could have understood the point and expressed their opinion that accepting subsidy for the Hajj pilgrimage is un-Islamic and unethical (haram)”, according to author G K Menon. It should be mentioned here that the Chennai-based Nawab of Arcot was the only Muslim, who was most vocal on this point and campaigned to stop the subsidy. But his pleas fell on deaf ears. The matter has also created confusion amongst Indian pilgrims. However, recently a group of Muslim MPs has requested the Central Government to discontinue the Hajj subsidy, and implement other means to ease the Hajj pilgrimage.
It has been suggested that a fund (Hajj Kitti) would be created and those, who are interested to perform the pilgrimage, would deposit money on monthly or yearly installments, and would withdraw the money during the journey. In fact, the present Government, led by the Indian National Congress, is considering such an alternative as the present practice is under severe criticism as an instrument of appeasing Muslims for votes by the certain parties. A case against the present UPA Government is also pending in the Allahabad High Court moved by a Hindu nationalist leader, because offering such a financial assistance to a religious group goes directly against the secular spirit of the Indian Constitution. Many believe that the present Prime Minister Manmohan Singh is determined to settle the issue within his tenure, which is going to end in 2014.
But there are indications that the dispute would continue. A spokesman of the National Hajj Committee has been reported to have said: “We are also citizens of this nation and, despite our hardships, we also pay tax to the government. We also contribute to the government exchequer. So, we have the right to enjoy government subsidies.”
But, as mentioned above, the matter is controversial even amongst Muslims. Meanwhile, K Rahman, the Vice Chairman of the Rajya Sabha has given a nod to an alternative arrangement as the Koran denounces accepting subsidy for the Hajj pilgrimage. Another influential Muslim leader, Shahid Siddiki, an MP of the Samajwadi Party, said, “Receiving Hajj subsidy is against the tenets of Islam,” adding that, except India, no other country in the world, even the Muslim countries, offer subsidy to Hajj pilgrims.
Demanding an end to the subsidy, Maulana Mehmood Madani, Rajya Sabha member and general secretary of the Jamiat-e-Ulema- e-Hind, says: “It is against the Shariat to be under any kind of obligation while undertaking Hajj. According to the Quran, only those Muslims, who can afford the expenses, should perform Hajj. It’s recommended only for adult, financially able and sane Muslims.” Others, like S Q R Ilyas, convener of the Babri Masjid Committee and a senior member of the All India Muslim Personal Law Board (AIMPLB), says, “The Hajj subsidy a sop to gain political mileage.”
In a recent article, the renowned scholar Dr Babu Susheelan said, “Hajj subsidy is irrational, unwise and illegal. It is for appeasing Muslims. Why taxpayer money should be channeled for Muslim visit to Saudi Arabia? Every Muslims going for Hajj is required by Islam to behead an animal in the name of their desert deity Allah. Why should a secular government subsidizing Jihadis for animal slaughter? I understand that animal slaughter to please God is banned in India. Then, it is natural for the public to ask the question why subsidizing Islamic animal slaughter in the name of Allah? Visit to Mecca with government money is for advanced training on beheading. Advanced skill building will help Jihadis for beheading kafirs. It is a self-inflicted suicidal policy of the secular government.”
It should be pointed out here that, for a Muslim of India, Hajj pilgrimage is indeed an expensive affair, which only the wealthy Muslims can afford; it is unthinkable for the common and poor ones. So, proving aid to this rich and well-off section of Muslims is unethical, too. In other words, it is simply carrying coal to Newcastle. However, the Indian Government is doing that for the sake of Muslim votes. Apart from that, the government is spending huge money on Muslims and providing many other facilities to appease them, e.g. paying monthly salary to Imams of mosques, expanding madrassa education, providing quota for Government jobs, providing easy bank loans, scholarships for Muslim students, and so on and so forth. Still the government is failing to earn their loyalty.
In India, the appeasement of Muslims for the sake of vote-bank politics has reached such a point that Muslims can commit many crimes without being convicted, can break any law even in front of the law-enforcement authorities, can do any kind of violence on Hindus and the people of other community under the protection of the political parties. Not a single political party is above this mess. It has been mentioned above that BJP, known to be a Hindu nationalist party, is raising hue and cry that the present Congress Party-led Government is indulging in Muslim appeasement through the Hajj subsidy. Yet, when BJP was in power, it increased the Hajj quota and the subsidy. Moreover, previously the Hajj pilgrims had to move to Mumbai to board the planes for Jeddah. But the BJP government, spending several thousand crores of rupees, erected Hajj rest-houses in every metropolitan city and made it possible for the Hajj pilgrims to board the planes for Jeddah in their home towns.
We have seen above that, though most of the ulemas are against accepting government subsidy for the Hajj pilgrimage, yet Hajj pilgrims are happily to avail the subsidized journey to Mecca, and performing Hajj. While Muslim dignitaries are probably ashamed of disclosing the truth, a Muslim cleric, nonetheless, has conceded that a subsidized Hajj would be haraam, provided the subsidy was un-Islamic. The injunctions of the Quran are for Muslims; they do not apply to non-Muslims and others. Therefore, a Hajj, subsidized by the secular Government of India, can still be halaal, because the subsidy, offered by the kafir government, is simply a kind of spoils or mal-e-ganimat, which Almighty Allah has made legal (halaal) in the Quran for the Muslims.
To conclude, it may be said that, whatever may be arguments and counter arguments, the Hajj subsidy by the Indian Government would continue so long the politics of Muslim appeasement persists in India.
Sunday, January 24, 2010
The precious Parijata Tree
By Manju Gupta
WHEN the great deluge occurred, everything was swept under the swirling waters. Even the most precious and irreplaceable things were washed away or got submerged deep in the ocean bed. The gods decided to retrieve whatever they could by churning the ocean. It was during the churning process that the Parijata tree emerged to the surface. It was the most beautiful tree that one could have laid eyes on. Even the gods and goddesses had not seen such a beautiful tree. It had star-shaped blossoms which spread their sweet fragrance in the air around. Indra saw the tree come out of the ocean and laid his claim to it. He thought, “This is the most beautiful tree that I have ever seen. I will take it away and plant it in my kingdom before anyone else sees it.”
The other gods too had seen the tree emerge from the ocean waters but they decided not to stake a claim to it because they all knew that once Indra had set his mind on anything, nothing could stop him from possessing it, come what may. Moreover, no one wanted to annoy him as they feared that an angry Indra could either release no rain and cause a drought on earth, or else release too much water and lead to floods.
As was expected, Indra took the Parijata tree to his garden and planted it, telling his wife Sachi to take good care of it. Sachi religiously watered the tree and nurtured it as her own child. Its enticing fragrance captivated the entire kingdom of Indra.
One day Sri Krishna decided to pay a visit to Indra. Krishna and his wife Satyabhama reached Indra’s palace and on getting the fragrance waft in the air, they were drawn to the source and found the Parijata tree blossoming in full glory. Satyabhama said to Krishna, “I want this tree in our kingdom. We have all kinds of trees but none emits such a fragrance as this one does.”
Krishna tried to dissuade her, “Dear wife, how can I take something which belongs to somebody else? Moreover, Indra will never forgive me if I took his tree.”
But Satyabhama insisted and refused to relent. She persisted, “Surely you can take this Parijata tree forcibly because you are more powerful than Indra.”
A reluctant Krishna gave in to his wife’s wishes. After meeting Indra and his wife Sachi, Krishna quietly uprooted the tree when Indra and Sachi had returned to their chamber. He took the Parijata tree to Dwarka and planted it in his garden. Indra soon discovered that his precious tree was taken away by Sri Krishna. He became livid with anger and collecting his army, launched an attack on Dwarka. A fierce battle ensued and ultimately Indra was defeated. Krishna told the humiliated Indra, “The tree will remain with me as long as I am alive. After my death, you can take it away to do whatever you want with it.”
The Parijata tree blossomed in Dwarka till Krishna’s death. On the seventh day, following his death, when the city of Dwarka began to get submerged under the deluge, Indra rushed to Dwarka and uprooted the Parijata tree to plant it in his own garden. He was happy and so was his wife Sachi.
WHEN the great deluge occurred, everything was swept under the swirling waters. Even the most precious and irreplaceable things were washed away or got submerged deep in the ocean bed. The gods decided to retrieve whatever they could by churning the ocean. It was during the churning process that the Parijata tree emerged to the surface. It was the most beautiful tree that one could have laid eyes on. Even the gods and goddesses had not seen such a beautiful tree. It had star-shaped blossoms which spread their sweet fragrance in the air around. Indra saw the tree come out of the ocean and laid his claim to it. He thought, “This is the most beautiful tree that I have ever seen. I will take it away and plant it in my kingdom before anyone else sees it.”
The other gods too had seen the tree emerge from the ocean waters but they decided not to stake a claim to it because they all knew that once Indra had set his mind on anything, nothing could stop him from possessing it, come what may. Moreover, no one wanted to annoy him as they feared that an angry Indra could either release no rain and cause a drought on earth, or else release too much water and lead to floods.
As was expected, Indra took the Parijata tree to his garden and planted it, telling his wife Sachi to take good care of it. Sachi religiously watered the tree and nurtured it as her own child. Its enticing fragrance captivated the entire kingdom of Indra.
One day Sri Krishna decided to pay a visit to Indra. Krishna and his wife Satyabhama reached Indra’s palace and on getting the fragrance waft in the air, they were drawn to the source and found the Parijata tree blossoming in full glory. Satyabhama said to Krishna, “I want this tree in our kingdom. We have all kinds of trees but none emits such a fragrance as this one does.”
Krishna tried to dissuade her, “Dear wife, how can I take something which belongs to somebody else? Moreover, Indra will never forgive me if I took his tree.”
But Satyabhama insisted and refused to relent. She persisted, “Surely you can take this Parijata tree forcibly because you are more powerful than Indra.”
A reluctant Krishna gave in to his wife’s wishes. After meeting Indra and his wife Sachi, Krishna quietly uprooted the tree when Indra and Sachi had returned to their chamber. He took the Parijata tree to Dwarka and planted it in his garden. Indra soon discovered that his precious tree was taken away by Sri Krishna. He became livid with anger and collecting his army, launched an attack on Dwarka. A fierce battle ensued and ultimately Indra was defeated. Krishna told the humiliated Indra, “The tree will remain with me as long as I am alive. After my death, you can take it away to do whatever you want with it.”
The Parijata tree blossomed in Dwarka till Krishna’s death. On the seventh day, following his death, when the city of Dwarka began to get submerged under the deluge, Indra rushed to Dwarka and uprooted the Parijata tree to plant it in his own garden. He was happy and so was his wife Sachi.
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