By MD Nalapat
It has been nearly two months since the Swiss parliament decreed that tax evasion is a crime if committed by citizen of a country where it has that legal status. But no request has gone from India with a list of names, asking for details of their bank accounts. This despite the fact that substantial evidence exists about fund transfers to foreign countries.
It ought to be a simple matter to get, for instance, details on the stays abroad of leading political, official and businesspersons, and check if the funds recorded as spent are matched by legal transfers.
At the outset, let it be clear that this columnist does not blame
Manmohan Singh for the failures of the UPA. He has only a solitary MP supporting him in Parliament, that too in the Rajya Sabha, and his name is Manmohan Singh. Indeed, this very weakness is why he has been selected by the owner of the Congress Party, ?Madam? Sonia Maino, to handle the job of Prime Minister of India, together with other senior colleagues who are similarly challenged politically. Which is why each of them is so obsequious to her, seeking frenetically to translate each whim of hers into reality. The most effective has been Palaniappan Maino, now Home Minister of India, during the stint while he was in charge of the Finance portfolio. Small wonder that there are no questions raised in the ?free? media about yet another unnatural death among the close (Indian) relatives of the Mainos, or any effort at asking if an exhaustive post-mortem was conducted, and what the reasons could be for the apparent suicide of Rajinder Vadra, father-in-law of Priyanka Vadra. Contrast this with the shrillness of the pack of hounds going after the middle-class, zero-influence parents of Arushi Talwar. Without a shred of evidence, the most astonishing sexual and social innuendos were brandished before the cameras about the Talwars and their friends, in contrast to the veil of silence that has descended on the death of Rajinder Vadra, who lost other loved ones in the past, in circumstances that remain unexplained. Perhaps the charm of the surviving son, Robert Vadra, and the way in which the authorities act in a manner that can charitably be described as deferential, can explain the silence of the media over the goings-on in the Vadra household, as it does their reticence on the Mainos.
Sonia Maino has on record said that her ancestral property in Italy is worth Rs 18 lakh. If the value mentioned by the lady is correct?and we should not doubt the word of the boss of India?s PM?then Sonia Maino?s ancestors must have come from a hole in the ground, for even that is these days worth a lot more than Rs 18 lakh in Italy.
Of course, we are told nothing about her family in Italy, including the travails of her father during World War II, when credible information states that he took an extended (in terms of time) tour of the then USSR, settling (hopefully comfortably) in a room in a state-run facility near Vladimir, an establishment recently visited by a VVIP from India in transport provided by the Russian government, of course without any media attention. Not one of our numerous television channels has examined the purported value of the farmhouse mentioned among the assets, which is presumably the same as that bought by Indira Gandhi. If what has been claimed to be the value is correct, this farmhouse must be only a few square yards in area, and having perhaps a mud hut on it. However, Chief Election Commissioner Navin Chawla?whose mother was tutor to Sanjay and Rajiv Gandhi?seems to have accepted Sonia Gandhi?s declaration of assets at face value. Certainly his close ties to the Mainos must have played no part in such a curious decision. In contrast, Varun Gandhi?the son of the man who was responsible for the rise to prominence of Navin, Sanjay?seems to have grabbed the attention of the Election Commission in a spectacular way, although this must surely not be because his rise in politics may represent a threat to the other branch of the family, that having a bevy of (disappearing) Indian relatives and a joyous lot of Italian kinsfolk, many of whom seems to love India enough to attract them towards making long stays in the country, again unremarked upon by the media of ?the world?s biggest democracy?.
But why blame the media? Since the UPA came to power, the powers of the Income-tax department have been increased to a level where a relatively junior officer can send into financial ruin any target of his or her attention. Sadly, such zeal seems to extend only to those seen as distant from the power centre now in command in Delhi, and hoping to be given a fresh lease of life on May 16. Had the Prime Minister (an individual who deserves compassion) been a free agent, he would surely have ordered the income-tax department to begin collecting details of the foreign assets of the key luminary residents of the country, so that these can be sent to Switzerland and other tax havens for further investigation. Although it has been nearly two months since the Swiss parliament decreed that tax evasion is a crime if committed by a citizen of a country where it has that legal status. But no request has gone from India with a list of names, asking for details of their bank accounts. This despite the fact that substantial evidence exists about fund transfers to foreign countries. It ought to be a simple matter to get, for instance, details on the stays abroad of leading political, official and businesspersons, and check if the funds recorded as spent are matched by legal transfers.
Hopefully, those officials within the income-tax department who are conscientious and honest?and there are still several?will now be quietly gathering data on such persons, so that in time, a patriotic government can formally ask the Swiss banks to reveal the details of such bank accounts.
Instead of doing this, Manmohan Singh has deliberately downplayed the estimate of $1.4 trillion in Indian money in foreign tax havens, when he is aware that the Institute of Global Banking & Research has estimated such funds at more than Rs 8.5 lakh crore, or about $1.68 trillion
Even 20 per cent of this sum would be equal to the country?s foreign exchange reserves, and an amnesty scheme reach double-digit growth in a period of global recession), Manmohan Singh is in effect seeking to prevent the erosion of deposits of foreign banks that would take place, in case an amnesty was to be announced in India. Even a tax rate of 15 per cent on the returned savings would be enough to fund the deficit, thus returning to health the country?s fiscal situation, and leading to a rise in the value of the rupee to Rs 30 per US$. It is a shame that the Indian rupee has so diminished in value even against a dollar that it is facing meltdown in its home economy. Of course, foreign banks benefit, as seems to be the intention in some quarters.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has presided over a regime of crippling tax rates, a vicious and regressive tax administration and interest rates that are at least double of what they ought to be. Those abroad who benefit from the slowdown that such policies have caused to the Indian economy will be gambling on the return to power of Sonia Maino. Others will look forward to a government that acts on behalf of the people of India, and puts in place a regime of low-interest rates and low taxes, as well as an amnesty scheme for foreign assets that can bring in at least Rs 2 lakh crore into India, at the cost of foreign banks.
Monday, February 7, 2011
Judev: A crusader against conversions
Varun is being condemned before his so-called crime was investigated and tried in a court of law. The Election Commission in his case acted in post-haste and functioned as a complainant, investigator, forensic expert, prosecutor, and the court? all by itself. He was not accorded the opportunity to defend himself which is his right.
We in BJP have always respected the freedom of every individual to have faith in any religion and adopt any mode of worship. My stand against conversion is too obvious and well known. I will not allow a single dalit to be converted through coercion and allurements.
Shri Dalip Singh Judev is much more than just a BJP candidate for Bilaspur parliamentary constituency in Chhattisgarh. Although an erstwhile Jashpur ruler, in reality he is a faqir owing less property (worth Rs 1.70 crore) than does his opponent (worth Rs. 2.47 crore), Dr. Renu Jogi, wife of former CM Shri Ajit Jogi. He is an untiring crusader against conversions on false promises, through coercion and allurements. He is a person who himself washes the feet of the tribals who return to their religion on realising that they had been misled into it. He is perhaps the only person in the world on whom more than a lakh youth have reportedly applied tilak with their own blood offering their support to his crusade. Amba Charan Vashishth spoke to Shri Judev during his hectic campaign in Bilaspur a few days back. Excerpts:
What does it mean to you, fighting as the BJP candidate for the Bilaspur Lok Sabha seat?
It means a lot to me. I am a disciplined soldier of BJP. I have always taken-up my position at whatever post of duty I was assigned by the Party to fight.
I feel overwhelmed by the love, affection and trust with which the party has nominated me to contest. I am equally overwhelmed by the faith of the people with which they are supporting me in every way. Equally beholden I am to the rank and file of the party sweating it out for me at this hour.
Now that Congress has ?substituted? its candidate with Smt. Renu Jogi as its candidate, the contest has become interesting. How do you see this challenge?
It is no challenge at all. With the support of the people I shall defeat the Congress. That is sure.
Now that a woman is your main opponent in the election, do you see it as an advantage or disadvantage?
I am looking at it as an electoral fight to win. I am not concerned who is my rival ? a man or a woman. For me my opponent is not Smt. Renu Jogi, it is only the Congress. This feeling is also shared by the electorates in the constituency. Actually Shri Jogi is waging a proxy electoral fight against me.
But why did the Congress not nominated Shri Jogi and instead fielded his wife?
It is for the Congress to explain. But to me, it looks, the Congress thought he was a losing candidate and had many minus points. So they did not bet for him and preferred his wife.
How does it make an effect in the elections?
Nothing at all. For all intents and purposes, for me and for the people Shri Ajit Jogi is the candidate. People will make Smt Jogi to pay for the sins of her husband.
Then why was she nominated?
It appears to be their strategy. They know we Indians respect women the most. Because of this our opponents are repeating the old trick which our foreign invaders used in similar circumstances when faced with imminent defeat. They would put a row of women or cows to stand in the front row of their troops. They knew Indian forces will never use their weapons against women and cows. Our opponents have adopted that very strategy. But the Congress leaders should also not forget that our forces adopted some other techniques to defeat their enemies. BJP will defeat Shri Ajit Jogi and the Congress decisively frustrating all their ill designs.
Congress is alleging that you are an ?outsider? for this seat. What would you say?
It is again a ploy by Shri Ajit Jogi and the Congress who are trying to befool the people. They have nothing to say against me and the BJP. Congress has always adopted the ?divide and rule? policy of the British. It was because of this that the Congress was able to rule the country for so long. But now the people have seen through their game. By raising this bogey they have indirectly admitted their defeat beforehand. In desperation they are now trying to divide Chhattisgarh into regions, castes, creeds and dialects. But their game will not succeed. People know Judev and know that for me the whole of Chhattisgarh is one for all intents and purposes socially, culturally and historically.
In these circumstances, what is your main strategy?
My strategy is simple. To defeat Shri Ajit Jogi for whatever he stands for. I will be exposing all his lies and wrongs he has done to the State and its people.
We in BJP have always respected the freedom of every individual to have faith in any religion and adopt any mode of worship. My stand against conversion is too obvious and well known. I will not allow a single dalit to be converted through coercion and allurements. I have always welcomed with open arms by cleansing the feet, with my own hands, of all those who had been made to go astray on false promises.
By ?substituting? its earlier candidate with Smt. Renu Jogi, the Congress has tried to polarise the elections between those who support and those who oppose conversions. Of all the 11 parliamentary constituencies in Chhattisgarh, Congress President Smt. Sonia Gandhi has singled out Bilaspur only for her election campaign. This message is clear and loud to the people and they have seen through the Congress intentions. BJP is fully geared up to defeat their design.
What is your strength?
My strength is my people, my party, my own conviction, my determination to serve the people at all costs and the righteousness of my stand. Truth will prevail, I am sure.
Would you like to say something on Varun episode?
Invoking of NSA against Varun is palpably wrong. This has obviously been done only to prevent Varun from fighting the election himself and campaigning for BJP. My only regret is that he is being condemned before his so-called crime was investigated and tried in a court of law. The Election Commission in his case acted in post haste and functioned as a complainant, investigator, forensic expert, prosecutor, and the court ? all by itself. He was not accorded the opportunity to defend himself which is his right. The Union Government is providing every help, assistance and opportunity to Kasab involved in 26/11 terrorist attack on Mumbai to defend himself and prove himself innocent, but denying it to Varun.
Railway Minister Lalu Prasad Yadav had said that had he been Home Minister, he would have crushed Varun under a roadroller come what may. Would you like to comment?
What Shri Lalu Prasad has said is no less a crime than that alleged against Varun. Lalu cannot be treated differently and the least that should be done is to give the same treatment as given to Varun. EC too is now in the dock.
What will your victory mean?
It will be a defeat of the forces which were playing a divisive vote bank politics and of those who had failed to curb prices, to curb terrorism, and of those who are responsible for making thousands of farmers to commit suicides.
We in BJP have always respected the freedom of every individual to have faith in any religion and adopt any mode of worship. My stand against conversion is too obvious and well known. I will not allow a single dalit to be converted through coercion and allurements.
Shri Dalip Singh Judev is much more than just a BJP candidate for Bilaspur parliamentary constituency in Chhattisgarh. Although an erstwhile Jashpur ruler, in reality he is a faqir owing less property (worth Rs 1.70 crore) than does his opponent (worth Rs. 2.47 crore), Dr. Renu Jogi, wife of former CM Shri Ajit Jogi. He is an untiring crusader against conversions on false promises, through coercion and allurements. He is a person who himself washes the feet of the tribals who return to their religion on realising that they had been misled into it. He is perhaps the only person in the world on whom more than a lakh youth have reportedly applied tilak with their own blood offering their support to his crusade. Amba Charan Vashishth spoke to Shri Judev during his hectic campaign in Bilaspur a few days back. Excerpts:
What does it mean to you, fighting as the BJP candidate for the Bilaspur Lok Sabha seat?
It means a lot to me. I am a disciplined soldier of BJP. I have always taken-up my position at whatever post of duty I was assigned by the Party to fight.
I feel overwhelmed by the love, affection and trust with which the party has nominated me to contest. I am equally overwhelmed by the faith of the people with which they are supporting me in every way. Equally beholden I am to the rank and file of the party sweating it out for me at this hour.
Now that Congress has ?substituted? its candidate with Smt. Renu Jogi as its candidate, the contest has become interesting. How do you see this challenge?
It is no challenge at all. With the support of the people I shall defeat the Congress. That is sure.
Now that a woman is your main opponent in the election, do you see it as an advantage or disadvantage?
I am looking at it as an electoral fight to win. I am not concerned who is my rival ? a man or a woman. For me my opponent is not Smt. Renu Jogi, it is only the Congress. This feeling is also shared by the electorates in the constituency. Actually Shri Jogi is waging a proxy electoral fight against me.
But why did the Congress not nominated Shri Jogi and instead fielded his wife?
It is for the Congress to explain. But to me, it looks, the Congress thought he was a losing candidate and had many minus points. So they did not bet for him and preferred his wife.
How does it make an effect in the elections?
Nothing at all. For all intents and purposes, for me and for the people Shri Ajit Jogi is the candidate. People will make Smt Jogi to pay for the sins of her husband.
Then why was she nominated?
It appears to be their strategy. They know we Indians respect women the most. Because of this our opponents are repeating the old trick which our foreign invaders used in similar circumstances when faced with imminent defeat. They would put a row of women or cows to stand in the front row of their troops. They knew Indian forces will never use their weapons against women and cows. Our opponents have adopted that very strategy. But the Congress leaders should also not forget that our forces adopted some other techniques to defeat their enemies. BJP will defeat Shri Ajit Jogi and the Congress decisively frustrating all their ill designs.
Congress is alleging that you are an ?outsider? for this seat. What would you say?
It is again a ploy by Shri Ajit Jogi and the Congress who are trying to befool the people. They have nothing to say against me and the BJP. Congress has always adopted the ?divide and rule? policy of the British. It was because of this that the Congress was able to rule the country for so long. But now the people have seen through their game. By raising this bogey they have indirectly admitted their defeat beforehand. In desperation they are now trying to divide Chhattisgarh into regions, castes, creeds and dialects. But their game will not succeed. People know Judev and know that for me the whole of Chhattisgarh is one for all intents and purposes socially, culturally and historically.
In these circumstances, what is your main strategy?
My strategy is simple. To defeat Shri Ajit Jogi for whatever he stands for. I will be exposing all his lies and wrongs he has done to the State and its people.
We in BJP have always respected the freedom of every individual to have faith in any religion and adopt any mode of worship. My stand against conversion is too obvious and well known. I will not allow a single dalit to be converted through coercion and allurements. I have always welcomed with open arms by cleansing the feet, with my own hands, of all those who had been made to go astray on false promises.
By ?substituting? its earlier candidate with Smt. Renu Jogi, the Congress has tried to polarise the elections between those who support and those who oppose conversions. Of all the 11 parliamentary constituencies in Chhattisgarh, Congress President Smt. Sonia Gandhi has singled out Bilaspur only for her election campaign. This message is clear and loud to the people and they have seen through the Congress intentions. BJP is fully geared up to defeat their design.
What is your strength?
My strength is my people, my party, my own conviction, my determination to serve the people at all costs and the righteousness of my stand. Truth will prevail, I am sure.
Would you like to say something on Varun episode?
Invoking of NSA against Varun is palpably wrong. This has obviously been done only to prevent Varun from fighting the election himself and campaigning for BJP. My only regret is that he is being condemned before his so-called crime was investigated and tried in a court of law. The Election Commission in his case acted in post haste and functioned as a complainant, investigator, forensic expert, prosecutor, and the court ? all by itself. He was not accorded the opportunity to defend himself which is his right. The Union Government is providing every help, assistance and opportunity to Kasab involved in 26/11 terrorist attack on Mumbai to defend himself and prove himself innocent, but denying it to Varun.
Railway Minister Lalu Prasad Yadav had said that had he been Home Minister, he would have crushed Varun under a roadroller come what may. Would you like to comment?
What Shri Lalu Prasad has said is no less a crime than that alleged against Varun. Lalu cannot be treated differently and the least that should be done is to give the same treatment as given to Varun. EC too is now in the dock.
What will your victory mean?
It will be a defeat of the forces which were playing a divisive vote bank politics and of those who had failed to curb prices, to curb terrorism, and of those who are responsible for making thousands of farmers to commit suicides.
Western duplicity An Indian response
By Kunal Ghosh, Professor, Aerospace Engineering, IIT Kanpur
The only justification seems to me that it has a Catholic majority population and therefore is a part of a civilisation characterised by Western Christianity, a la Huntington (Ref: Clash of Civilizations and Remaking of World Order, published in 1996). Timor Leste?s independence in 1999 was immediately followed by large scale Muslim-Christian violence in different parts of Indonesia.
I discover a calculated and calibrated method where Harsh V. Pant discovers only a ?muddle-headed approach?. To start my arguments I must first give the reader an idea of the clout wielded by Jewish Americans and Jewish Britishers, while the former in very large numbers hold dual citizenship of Israel and USA.
He signals coming out of Obama?s Washington DC and the message conveyed by foreign secretary of UK, David Miliband during his trip in India (January 2009) are concerted. Miliband conveyed in no uncertain terms that Kashmir is an issue and India should get a move on with the Kashmir issue and not stick to the status quo. So there is a method and it is designed to take the eye off the Israel-Palestinian conflict. Israel?s invasion in January 2009 of Gaza was brutal and has been condemned by global human rights activists. It has attracted tremendous media coverage all over the world. Israel continues to occupy illegally large chunk of Palestinian land in the West bank. It continues to expand its illegal settlements on Arab land and construct more concrete walls, complete with barbed wire and watch towers, to cut off Arabs from their cultivable lands, schools, mosques etc which become reachable only through check-posts.
Initially President Obama toyed with the idea of appointing Richard Holbrook, as a Special South Asia envoy and bringing the Kashmir issue under his purview, integrated with the Pakistan-Afghanistan imbroglio. Hard-nosed Indian diplomacy has made him change tack and Holbrook has been made only a Pakistan-Afghanistan envoy. But India should not think that Democrats in America has gone off their pet Kashmir theme. The statements coming out of Washington and London in late March and April 2009 show that western powers are once again submitting to Pakistani blackmail and are once again connecting war against the Taliban in Af-Pak Theater to a shift from status quo in Kashmir to Pakistan?s satisfaction. The renewed and massive infiltration of terrorist columns across the LoC, even before the snow has melted, in April 2009 is a Pakistani tactic to goad the West to pressurise India.
In an article, titled, ?Obama Magic Unlikely to Work with India?, Harsh V Pant (Ref; Feb. 1, 2009, Special to The Japan Times, http://search.japantimes.co.jp), says,
...clearly the most troubling aspect of Obama?s foreign policy for India is a suggestion gaining ground in the policymaking circles in Washington that the success of US endeavours in Afghanistan depends on greater American activism with regard to Kashmir. It is the sort of muddle-headed approach to South Asia that historically has made US policy toward the region such a catastrophic failure, and it is once again coming back with a vengeance.?
I discover a calculated and calibrated method where Harsh V. Pant discovers only a ?muddle-headed approach?. To start my arguments I must first give the reader an idea of the clout wielded by Jewish Americans and Jewish Britishers, while the former in very large numbers hold dual citizenship of Israel and USA. Jewish financiers such as George Soros and the Rothschilds and their likes hold an enormous stake in the banking and finance industry of the USA and UK. The number of Jewish millionaires in both these countries is out of proportion to their number in the population. The Jews have a huge control on the mass media such as the print media and film industry. They are more than well represented in the senate and Parliament, in the membership of both the mainstream parties (Republican and Democrats in the USA; Conservatives and Labour in the UK) and the corridors of power. USA and UK are consistently following a policy in geo-politics for the last two decades that is influenced by the Western-Christianity-Judaism-Kinship factor or in short WCJK factor. I have opted to use the term Western-Christianity instead of Protestant-Catholic because Samuel Huntington uses this term in his famous book ?Clash of Civilizations and Remaking of World Order?. He deliberately avoids clubbing Judaism and Israel along with Western Christianity in the same ?civilisation group? and avoids discussing the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as a ?Fault-Line Conflict?. His motive, I suspect, is to avoid rubbing the powerful Jewish lobby in America the wrong way up and embarrassing the American foreign policy top brass (Ref: Ghosh Kunal (2007), ?Strategic Alliance with the USA in a World of ?Civilization?-based Alignment, Mainstream, New Delhi, Oct 26 - Nov 01, pp. 15 - 22).
The western policy
The policy, referred to above, is simple. It conveys an unambiguous message to the Palestinian freedom fighters and their Islamist-terrorist global allies that if they attack America, West Europe or Israel, the retribution would be swift and Western powers would come down on them like a ton of bricks and smash them to smithereens. But if they attack other countries/civilisations such as Orthodox Russia and Serbia, Hindu India, Buddhist Thailand or Communist China, then they can expect at least moral support and in some cases even material support from the Western powers. The appeasement of Islamism in certain locations/situations is necessary to counter-balance the hostility the West manifests to Islamic sentiments in the Israeli-Palestinian Theater or wherever there is a conflict between Western Christianity and Islam. It should be expressly noted that the Western economies depend much on the petroleum issues of the Islamic world. I shall cite five examples to prove my point: 1. Indonesia-East Timor, 2. Serbia-Kosovo, 3. Kashmir of India, 4.. Xinjiang of China, and 5. Russia-Chechnya.
Indonesia-East Timor
Here is an example of how the West acts, under the influence of the WCJK factor, against the legitimate sentiments of a Muslim majority country just because a Catholic Christian kin is involved. Portugal had a tiny enclave of a colony in the Indonesian archipelago called East Timor. It was the eastern half of a small island called Timor, with a population of less than a million (lesser than the cities of Agra or Mysore) and size of approximately 69 miles by 80 miles (5500 square miles). Before colonial times all of Timor had been a part of different kingdoms, usually based on Java, ruling the Indonesian archipelago. During the Portuguese rule the eastern half of the island became Catholic Christian majority, although a small Muslim and Hindu minority remained. In 1975 Portugal relinquished control and East Timor declared independence, but Indonesian army promptly occupied it. Since then there was a resistance movement against Indonesian rule led by Leftist FRELIMO guerrillas. General Suharto, the army strongman who ruled Indonesia, crushed the Left all over Indonesia and also East Timor, and his American mentors were quite happy. In late 1980s and early 1990s the Soviet Union collapsed, China embraced Capitalism in the garb of Market Socialism and there was a decline of the Left in the East Timorese resistance. The resistance movement started aligning more and more with the ex-colonial master Portugal and the Catholic element came to the fore. Bishop Carlos F.X. Belo travelled widely in the West, championed the cause of independence from Indonesia and was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1996. In late 1990s all of South East Asia suffered an economic melt down and Indonesian military dictatorship became weak. It wilted under Western pressure led by Australia and America and gave independence to East Timor that immediately adopted a Portuguese name, Timor Leste, and the Portuguese language as the official language.
East Timor?s history is very similar to India?s Goa which was liberated by the Indian army from Portuguese rule in 1961, except that Goa never became Catholic majority in spite of the strenuous and highly coercive efforts of Saint Xavier. What is the justification of separating such a tiny economically unviable one-half of an island, Timor Leste, from Indonesia? The only justification seems to me that it has a Catholic majority population and therefore is a part of a civilisation characterised by Western Christianity, a la Huntington (Ref: Clash of Civilizations and Remaking of World Order, published in 1996). Timor Leste?s independence in 1999 was immediately followed by large scale Muslim-Christian violence in different parts of Indonesia. In my opinion the Wahhabisation process of Indonesia and growth of radical Islam started in true earnest from that event. The world still remembers the Bali terrorist bombings of 2002 and 2005 that killed more than a hundred Western tourists.
The only justification seems to me that it has a Catholic majority population and therefore is a part of a civilisation characterised by Western Christianity, a la Huntington (Ref: Clash of Civilizations and Remaking of World Order, published in 1996). Timor Leste?s independence in 1999 was immediately followed by large scale Muslim-Christian violence in different parts of Indonesia.
I discover a calculated and calibrated method where Harsh V. Pant discovers only a ?muddle-headed approach?. To start my arguments I must first give the reader an idea of the clout wielded by Jewish Americans and Jewish Britishers, while the former in very large numbers hold dual citizenship of Israel and USA.
He signals coming out of Obama?s Washington DC and the message conveyed by foreign secretary of UK, David Miliband during his trip in India (January 2009) are concerted. Miliband conveyed in no uncertain terms that Kashmir is an issue and India should get a move on with the Kashmir issue and not stick to the status quo. So there is a method and it is designed to take the eye off the Israel-Palestinian conflict. Israel?s invasion in January 2009 of Gaza was brutal and has been condemned by global human rights activists. It has attracted tremendous media coverage all over the world. Israel continues to occupy illegally large chunk of Palestinian land in the West bank. It continues to expand its illegal settlements on Arab land and construct more concrete walls, complete with barbed wire and watch towers, to cut off Arabs from their cultivable lands, schools, mosques etc which become reachable only through check-posts.
Initially President Obama toyed with the idea of appointing Richard Holbrook, as a Special South Asia envoy and bringing the Kashmir issue under his purview, integrated with the Pakistan-Afghanistan imbroglio. Hard-nosed Indian diplomacy has made him change tack and Holbrook has been made only a Pakistan-Afghanistan envoy. But India should not think that Democrats in America has gone off their pet Kashmir theme. The statements coming out of Washington and London in late March and April 2009 show that western powers are once again submitting to Pakistani blackmail and are once again connecting war against the Taliban in Af-Pak Theater to a shift from status quo in Kashmir to Pakistan?s satisfaction. The renewed and massive infiltration of terrorist columns across the LoC, even before the snow has melted, in April 2009 is a Pakistani tactic to goad the West to pressurise India.
In an article, titled, ?Obama Magic Unlikely to Work with India?, Harsh V Pant (Ref; Feb. 1, 2009, Special to The Japan Times, http://search.japantimes.co.jp), says,
...clearly the most troubling aspect of Obama?s foreign policy for India is a suggestion gaining ground in the policymaking circles in Washington that the success of US endeavours in Afghanistan depends on greater American activism with regard to Kashmir. It is the sort of muddle-headed approach to South Asia that historically has made US policy toward the region such a catastrophic failure, and it is once again coming back with a vengeance.?
I discover a calculated and calibrated method where Harsh V. Pant discovers only a ?muddle-headed approach?. To start my arguments I must first give the reader an idea of the clout wielded by Jewish Americans and Jewish Britishers, while the former in very large numbers hold dual citizenship of Israel and USA. Jewish financiers such as George Soros and the Rothschilds and their likes hold an enormous stake in the banking and finance industry of the USA and UK. The number of Jewish millionaires in both these countries is out of proportion to their number in the population. The Jews have a huge control on the mass media such as the print media and film industry. They are more than well represented in the senate and Parliament, in the membership of both the mainstream parties (Republican and Democrats in the USA; Conservatives and Labour in the UK) and the corridors of power. USA and UK are consistently following a policy in geo-politics for the last two decades that is influenced by the Western-Christianity-Judaism-Kinship factor or in short WCJK factor. I have opted to use the term Western-Christianity instead of Protestant-Catholic because Samuel Huntington uses this term in his famous book ?Clash of Civilizations and Remaking of World Order?. He deliberately avoids clubbing Judaism and Israel along with Western Christianity in the same ?civilisation group? and avoids discussing the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as a ?Fault-Line Conflict?. His motive, I suspect, is to avoid rubbing the powerful Jewish lobby in America the wrong way up and embarrassing the American foreign policy top brass (Ref: Ghosh Kunal (2007), ?Strategic Alliance with the USA in a World of ?Civilization?-based Alignment, Mainstream, New Delhi, Oct 26 - Nov 01, pp. 15 - 22).
The western policy
The policy, referred to above, is simple. It conveys an unambiguous message to the Palestinian freedom fighters and their Islamist-terrorist global allies that if they attack America, West Europe or Israel, the retribution would be swift and Western powers would come down on them like a ton of bricks and smash them to smithereens. But if they attack other countries/civilisations such as Orthodox Russia and Serbia, Hindu India, Buddhist Thailand or Communist China, then they can expect at least moral support and in some cases even material support from the Western powers. The appeasement of Islamism in certain locations/situations is necessary to counter-balance the hostility the West manifests to Islamic sentiments in the Israeli-Palestinian Theater or wherever there is a conflict between Western Christianity and Islam. It should be expressly noted that the Western economies depend much on the petroleum issues of the Islamic world. I shall cite five examples to prove my point: 1. Indonesia-East Timor, 2. Serbia-Kosovo, 3. Kashmir of India, 4.. Xinjiang of China, and 5. Russia-Chechnya.
Indonesia-East Timor
Here is an example of how the West acts, under the influence of the WCJK factor, against the legitimate sentiments of a Muslim majority country just because a Catholic Christian kin is involved. Portugal had a tiny enclave of a colony in the Indonesian archipelago called East Timor. It was the eastern half of a small island called Timor, with a population of less than a million (lesser than the cities of Agra or Mysore) and size of approximately 69 miles by 80 miles (5500 square miles). Before colonial times all of Timor had been a part of different kingdoms, usually based on Java, ruling the Indonesian archipelago. During the Portuguese rule the eastern half of the island became Catholic Christian majority, although a small Muslim and Hindu minority remained. In 1975 Portugal relinquished control and East Timor declared independence, but Indonesian army promptly occupied it. Since then there was a resistance movement against Indonesian rule led by Leftist FRELIMO guerrillas. General Suharto, the army strongman who ruled Indonesia, crushed the Left all over Indonesia and also East Timor, and his American mentors were quite happy. In late 1980s and early 1990s the Soviet Union collapsed, China embraced Capitalism in the garb of Market Socialism and there was a decline of the Left in the East Timorese resistance. The resistance movement started aligning more and more with the ex-colonial master Portugal and the Catholic element came to the fore. Bishop Carlos F.X. Belo travelled widely in the West, championed the cause of independence from Indonesia and was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1996. In late 1990s all of South East Asia suffered an economic melt down and Indonesian military dictatorship became weak. It wilted under Western pressure led by Australia and America and gave independence to East Timor that immediately adopted a Portuguese name, Timor Leste, and the Portuguese language as the official language.
East Timor?s history is very similar to India?s Goa which was liberated by the Indian army from Portuguese rule in 1961, except that Goa never became Catholic majority in spite of the strenuous and highly coercive efforts of Saint Xavier. What is the justification of separating such a tiny economically unviable one-half of an island, Timor Leste, from Indonesia? The only justification seems to me that it has a Catholic majority population and therefore is a part of a civilisation characterised by Western Christianity, a la Huntington (Ref: Clash of Civilizations and Remaking of World Order, published in 1996). Timor Leste?s independence in 1999 was immediately followed by large scale Muslim-Christian violence in different parts of Indonesia. In my opinion the Wahhabisation process of Indonesia and growth of radical Islam started in true earnest from that event. The world still remembers the Bali terrorist bombings of 2002 and 2005 that killed more than a hundred Western tourists.
Compromising Indian citizens? lives for vote bank
UPA has failed India on terror
G-20 slams India for going soft on terrorism
By Naresh Minocha
India scores ?nil? against the parameter titled ?number of other terrorists under UNSCR 1373 for which a freeze order has been issued?.
The report says that India?s six casinos operating in Goa are not regulated for AMF and CFT. The implicit message is terrorists can thus easily channel funds through casinos in India as well as Nepal, which has also kept casinos out of the ambit of AML and CFT.
Minority vote-bank politics has delayed the enforcement of amended laws as well as amendment of other laws.
The outgoing UPA government is leaving the aam aadami and the nation highly vulnerable to terrorists, according to irrefutable evidence emerging from both within and outside the country.
What the aam aadami knows is that the Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh earlier this month rubbed shoulders with other Heads of State from the world?s most powerful group of 20 countries (G-20) in London.
What the public does not know the UPA government?s shameful record in preventing terrorism as assessed on the G-20 report card titled Measures to Combat the Financing of Terrorism?Summary of Country Measures.
It compares 19 countries and the European Union that collectively constitute the G-20 on 15 parameters. India?s performance on most crucial parameters is nothing but a scandal.
The UPA-led India scored ?nil? on three crucial parameters and ?No? on two other vital parameters.
The country scored ?nil? against the parameter regarding the number of Al-Qaida and Taliban terrorists listed under two United Nations Security Council Resolutions (UNSCR) 1333/1390 for which assets freeze order has been issued.
It is obvious that the United Progressive Alliance?s (UPA?s) obsession for minority community votes that compels it either go soft or drag feet against terrorism. Islamic countries such as Turkey and Saudi Arabia, on the other hand, don?t have such minority fixation. The latter thus reported 503 cases and the former 182 against this parameter.
India again scores ?nil? against the parameter titled ?number of other terrorists under UNSCR 1373 for which a freeze order has been issued?.
The report card assigns India zero on the issue of amount of assets accounts (of terrorists) frozen.
The country has been assigned a big ?No? against the query: ?Can freeze be simultaneously??
It again gets ?No? against the query titled specific risk-based measures in place to ensure that non-profit organisations (NPOs) cannot be abused for the financing of terrorism.
India?s laxity in the area of anti-money laundering (AML) and CFT has also been reported in an international study titled Vulnerabilities of Casinos and Gaming Sector, which was released a few days back.
The study has been prepared jointly by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) and a global informal forum named Financial Action Task Force (FATF), which spearheads AML and countering the financing of terrorism (CFT) initiatives.
The report says that India?s six casinos operating in Goa are not regulated under AML and CFT.
The implicit message is terrorists can thus easily channel funds through casinos in India as well as Nepal, which have also kept casinos out of the ambit of AML and CFT.
Here it is pertinent to remind aam aadami about UPA?s half-heartedness in implementing recommendations from various government-constituted entities.
The Administrative Reforms Commission (ARC?s) recommendation on (CFT), for instance, has not been acted upon.
In its report submitted in June 2008, ARC recommended incorporation of a separate chapter in the ational Security Act (NSA) to provide legal framework for freezing assets including bank accounts in cases ?when there is reasonable suspicion of their intended use in terrorist activities?.
UPA government has to simply issue an ordinance to implement such a sage recommendation and thus avoid hundreds of terrorist-inflicted casualties in a year.
In its report on terrorism, ARC observed: ?When faced with the need to protect national security and integrity, there is ample justification for having strong anti-terrorism provisions in the law. In fact, many western countries with strong traditions of democracy and civil liberty have enacted such legislations to deal with the threat of terrorism.?
Similarly, the Law Commission had also recommended a water-tight and comprehensive definition of terrorism that should include raising funds for or fostering activities of the banned organisations. This and several other recommendations to protect the life and limb of aam aadami are contained in the Commission?s 173rd report on Prevention of Terrorism Bill that was submitted in April 2000.
Later, the BJP-led NDA government had enacted Prevention of Terrorism Act (POTA), 2002 to deal with terrorism, whose legal definition included raising funds for terrorist activities.
As put by a General Manager of Training College, Reserve Bank of India (RBI) in 2003, POTA ?seeks to deal with types of heinous crimes like subversion, insurgency and terrorism in place of the existing criminal justice system, which is not designed to deal with such horrific crimes. The Act replaces the Ordinance that was first promulgated on October 24, 2001 and re-promulgated thereafter in December 2001. The Act also meets the requirement of the United Nations resolution calling upon member nations to enact a model deterrent law to curb the growing menace of internal and global terrorism.?
Turning a blind eye to such independent assessment, UPA government repealed POTA due to compulsions of minority politics, thereby giving a major encouragement to terrorism in 2004.
Forget amending NSA, UPA government has not even framed rules under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Amendment Act 2008, which provides for punishment for raising funds for terrorist activities.
Same is the case with the Prevention of Money Laundering (Amendment) Act (PMLA), which was yet to be notified after its passage by both the houses of Parliament in January 2009. The amended law is supposed to counter financing of terrorism.
Minority vote-bank politics has delayed the enforcement of amended laws as well as amendment of other laws.
The UPA?s lack of political will to take on terrorism is also confirmed from its failure to replace outdated The Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Act, 1976 with a new law, though the Foreign Contribution (Regulation) (FCR) Bill 2006 was prepared in 2006.
India would have won half its war against terrorism had it paid heed to advice from various international entities.
In 2003, Asian Development Bank (ADB), for instance, recommended: ?Countries should review the adequacy of laws and regulations that relate to entities that can be abused for the financing of terrorism. Non-profit organisations (NPOs) are particularly vulnerable, and countries should ensure that they cannot be misused by terrorist organisations posing as legitimate entities?
In its policy paper on combating money laundering and terrorist funding, ADB said terrorists can exploit legitimate entities as conduits for terrorist financing, including for the purpose of escaping asset freezing measures; and to conceal the clandestine diversion of funds intended for legitimate purposes to terrorist organisations.
The US Department of State, in its International Narcotics Control Strategy Report (INCSR), published in March 2009, has also raised alarm bell at the chinks in Indian legal framework in combating terrorism.
INCSR recommends: ?Given the number of terrorist attacks in India and the fact that in India hawala is directly linked to terrorist financing, the GOI (Government of India) should prioritize cooperation with international initiatives that provide increased transparency in alternative remittance systems. India should devote more law enforcement and customs resources to curb abuses in the diamond trade.?
Stressing the urgency for passing the FCR Bill 2006 to prevent terrorist financing through NPOs, the report says: ?GOI regulations governing charities remain antiquated and the process by which charities are governed at the provincial and regional levels is weak.?
Had the FCR bill been enacted into a law, India would have been to crack down on the channeling of terrorism funds through dubious non-government organisations (NGOs)/NPOs.
Had that been the case, India would have moved a step closer to membership of FATF, whose 40 AML recommendations and 9 CFT recommendations (40 plus 9) have become the global gold standard in tackling money laundering and terrorism funding.
The country at present participates in FATF only as an observer though it was invited to file an application for membership way back in 1998.
India is at present a member of two other regional FATF-type groups ? Asia Pacific Group (APG) and Egmont group.
Membership of FATF would not only help India strengthen its capability to take on terrorists but also strengthen its case to access vital data on thousands of crores of rupee of black money stashed away in foreign banks by rich businessmen and politicians in tax havens.
India?s readiness on AML-CFT front would be known only after 2nd independent assessment called ?mutual evaluation? jointly by APG and FATF in the fourth quarter of 2009.
The first such assessment by APG in 2005 found India?s non-compliant with several crucial (40 plus 9) recommendations.
As put by a Finance Ministry official, ?We had not covered all of what are called 20 serious predicate offences.?
The APG report said: ?India has not undertaken any comprehensive threat assessment of money laundering or terrorist financing. Its legislative efforts have been concentrated on fight tax evasion and the large black money component in its economy.?
It is thus not surprising to learn that finance amended the definition of ?suspicious transaction? in PMLA rules in May 2007 only to specifically provide for reporting of suspected transactions relating to terrorist financing.
The ministry?s anti-money laundering arm, Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU), is also implementing leisurely its information technology project named FINnet, which was conceived in 2006.
It had twice invited bids for selection of system integrator for the project in 2008 and later extended the last date for submission of bids to January 7, 2009.
FINet is crucial for both AML and CFT initiatives. It, for instance, would be capable of automated detection of suspicious patterns using data mining tools. It would also deploy advanced trend analysis using business intelligence tools.
By the time India becomes fully compliant with 40 plus 9 recommendations, terrorists would continue to get funds easily to carry forward their agenda. Thousands of more aam aadamis would perhaps have to pay for UPA?s lack of political will to nip terrorism in the bud.
Bhay (Fear) Ho! Jai Ho!! Jai Ho!!!
G-20 slams India for going soft on terrorism
By Naresh Minocha
India scores ?nil? against the parameter titled ?number of other terrorists under UNSCR 1373 for which a freeze order has been issued?.
The report says that India?s six casinos operating in Goa are not regulated for AMF and CFT. The implicit message is terrorists can thus easily channel funds through casinos in India as well as Nepal, which has also kept casinos out of the ambit of AML and CFT.
Minority vote-bank politics has delayed the enforcement of amended laws as well as amendment of other laws.
The outgoing UPA government is leaving the aam aadami and the nation highly vulnerable to terrorists, according to irrefutable evidence emerging from both within and outside the country.
What the aam aadami knows is that the Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh earlier this month rubbed shoulders with other Heads of State from the world?s most powerful group of 20 countries (G-20) in London.
What the public does not know the UPA government?s shameful record in preventing terrorism as assessed on the G-20 report card titled Measures to Combat the Financing of Terrorism?Summary of Country Measures.
It compares 19 countries and the European Union that collectively constitute the G-20 on 15 parameters. India?s performance on most crucial parameters is nothing but a scandal.
The UPA-led India scored ?nil? on three crucial parameters and ?No? on two other vital parameters.
The country scored ?nil? against the parameter regarding the number of Al-Qaida and Taliban terrorists listed under two United Nations Security Council Resolutions (UNSCR) 1333/1390 for which assets freeze order has been issued.
It is obvious that the United Progressive Alliance?s (UPA?s) obsession for minority community votes that compels it either go soft or drag feet against terrorism. Islamic countries such as Turkey and Saudi Arabia, on the other hand, don?t have such minority fixation. The latter thus reported 503 cases and the former 182 against this parameter.
India again scores ?nil? against the parameter titled ?number of other terrorists under UNSCR 1373 for which a freeze order has been issued?.
The report card assigns India zero on the issue of amount of assets accounts (of terrorists) frozen.
The country has been assigned a big ?No? against the query: ?Can freeze be simultaneously??
It again gets ?No? against the query titled specific risk-based measures in place to ensure that non-profit organisations (NPOs) cannot be abused for the financing of terrorism.
India?s laxity in the area of anti-money laundering (AML) and CFT has also been reported in an international study titled Vulnerabilities of Casinos and Gaming Sector, which was released a few days back.
The study has been prepared jointly by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) and a global informal forum named Financial Action Task Force (FATF), which spearheads AML and countering the financing of terrorism (CFT) initiatives.
The report says that India?s six casinos operating in Goa are not regulated under AML and CFT.
The implicit message is terrorists can thus easily channel funds through casinos in India as well as Nepal, which have also kept casinos out of the ambit of AML and CFT.
Here it is pertinent to remind aam aadami about UPA?s half-heartedness in implementing recommendations from various government-constituted entities.
The Administrative Reforms Commission (ARC?s) recommendation on (CFT), for instance, has not been acted upon.
In its report submitted in June 2008, ARC recommended incorporation of a separate chapter in the ational Security Act (NSA) to provide legal framework for freezing assets including bank accounts in cases ?when there is reasonable suspicion of their intended use in terrorist activities?.
UPA government has to simply issue an ordinance to implement such a sage recommendation and thus avoid hundreds of terrorist-inflicted casualties in a year.
In its report on terrorism, ARC observed: ?When faced with the need to protect national security and integrity, there is ample justification for having strong anti-terrorism provisions in the law. In fact, many western countries with strong traditions of democracy and civil liberty have enacted such legislations to deal with the threat of terrorism.?
Similarly, the Law Commission had also recommended a water-tight and comprehensive definition of terrorism that should include raising funds for or fostering activities of the banned organisations. This and several other recommendations to protect the life and limb of aam aadami are contained in the Commission?s 173rd report on Prevention of Terrorism Bill that was submitted in April 2000.
Later, the BJP-led NDA government had enacted Prevention of Terrorism Act (POTA), 2002 to deal with terrorism, whose legal definition included raising funds for terrorist activities.
As put by a General Manager of Training College, Reserve Bank of India (RBI) in 2003, POTA ?seeks to deal with types of heinous crimes like subversion, insurgency and terrorism in place of the existing criminal justice system, which is not designed to deal with such horrific crimes. The Act replaces the Ordinance that was first promulgated on October 24, 2001 and re-promulgated thereafter in December 2001. The Act also meets the requirement of the United Nations resolution calling upon member nations to enact a model deterrent law to curb the growing menace of internal and global terrorism.?
Turning a blind eye to such independent assessment, UPA government repealed POTA due to compulsions of minority politics, thereby giving a major encouragement to terrorism in 2004.
Forget amending NSA, UPA government has not even framed rules under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Amendment Act 2008, which provides for punishment for raising funds for terrorist activities.
Same is the case with the Prevention of Money Laundering (Amendment) Act (PMLA), which was yet to be notified after its passage by both the houses of Parliament in January 2009. The amended law is supposed to counter financing of terrorism.
Minority vote-bank politics has delayed the enforcement of amended laws as well as amendment of other laws.
The UPA?s lack of political will to take on terrorism is also confirmed from its failure to replace outdated The Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Act, 1976 with a new law, though the Foreign Contribution (Regulation) (FCR) Bill 2006 was prepared in 2006.
India would have won half its war against terrorism had it paid heed to advice from various international entities.
In 2003, Asian Development Bank (ADB), for instance, recommended: ?Countries should review the adequacy of laws and regulations that relate to entities that can be abused for the financing of terrorism. Non-profit organisations (NPOs) are particularly vulnerable, and countries should ensure that they cannot be misused by terrorist organisations posing as legitimate entities?
In its policy paper on combating money laundering and terrorist funding, ADB said terrorists can exploit legitimate entities as conduits for terrorist financing, including for the purpose of escaping asset freezing measures; and to conceal the clandestine diversion of funds intended for legitimate purposes to terrorist organisations.
The US Department of State, in its International Narcotics Control Strategy Report (INCSR), published in March 2009, has also raised alarm bell at the chinks in Indian legal framework in combating terrorism.
INCSR recommends: ?Given the number of terrorist attacks in India and the fact that in India hawala is directly linked to terrorist financing, the GOI (Government of India) should prioritize cooperation with international initiatives that provide increased transparency in alternative remittance systems. India should devote more law enforcement and customs resources to curb abuses in the diamond trade.?
Stressing the urgency for passing the FCR Bill 2006 to prevent terrorist financing through NPOs, the report says: ?GOI regulations governing charities remain antiquated and the process by which charities are governed at the provincial and regional levels is weak.?
Had the FCR bill been enacted into a law, India would have been to crack down on the channeling of terrorism funds through dubious non-government organisations (NGOs)/NPOs.
Had that been the case, India would have moved a step closer to membership of FATF, whose 40 AML recommendations and 9 CFT recommendations (40 plus 9) have become the global gold standard in tackling money laundering and terrorism funding.
The country at present participates in FATF only as an observer though it was invited to file an application for membership way back in 1998.
India is at present a member of two other regional FATF-type groups ? Asia Pacific Group (APG) and Egmont group.
Membership of FATF would not only help India strengthen its capability to take on terrorists but also strengthen its case to access vital data on thousands of crores of rupee of black money stashed away in foreign banks by rich businessmen and politicians in tax havens.
India?s readiness on AML-CFT front would be known only after 2nd independent assessment called ?mutual evaluation? jointly by APG and FATF in the fourth quarter of 2009.
The first such assessment by APG in 2005 found India?s non-compliant with several crucial (40 plus 9) recommendations.
As put by a Finance Ministry official, ?We had not covered all of what are called 20 serious predicate offences.?
The APG report said: ?India has not undertaken any comprehensive threat assessment of money laundering or terrorist financing. Its legislative efforts have been concentrated on fight tax evasion and the large black money component in its economy.?
It is thus not surprising to learn that finance amended the definition of ?suspicious transaction? in PMLA rules in May 2007 only to specifically provide for reporting of suspected transactions relating to terrorist financing.
The ministry?s anti-money laundering arm, Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU), is also implementing leisurely its information technology project named FINnet, which was conceived in 2006.
It had twice invited bids for selection of system integrator for the project in 2008 and later extended the last date for submission of bids to January 7, 2009.
FINet is crucial for both AML and CFT initiatives. It, for instance, would be capable of automated detection of suspicious patterns using data mining tools. It would also deploy advanced trend analysis using business intelligence tools.
By the time India becomes fully compliant with 40 plus 9 recommendations, terrorists would continue to get funds easily to carry forward their agenda. Thousands of more aam aadamis would perhaps have to pay for UPA?s lack of political will to nip terrorism in the bud.
Bhay (Fear) Ho! Jai Ho!! Jai Ho!!!
Tuesday, November 16, 2010
CPM’s Muslim reservation in West Bengal
CPM’s Muslim reservation in West Bengal
Challenged in Supreme Court
By Asim Kumar Mitra
The State government which has followed the recommendation of Justice Ranganath Mishra Commission Report, is not tenable here for the simple reason that the Commission’s report has only been submitted to the Parliament. But it has not yet been tabled in the Parliament for discussion let alone any decision taken on the matter. When the Central government has yet to take any decision on its implementation, how come that the State government could take any such decision?
PENDING Assembly elections of West Bengal, all political parties including CPM, INC, TMC etc. are busy appeasing the Muslim community in their own way. The ruling conglomerate of the State - CPM-led Left Front has outwitted other parties by offering extraordinary facilities of 10 per cent job reservation in government offices for the Muslims.
This has sparked off a strong State-wide reaction. They are of the opinion that after the judgment of the Apex Court prohibiting reservation on the basis religion in the case of Andhra Pradesh, the West Bengal government cannot take such decision. It is not only unethical, it is illegal.
One Joydeep Mukherjee has gone to the Supreme Court to lodge a Public Interest Litigation (PIL). The apex court has accepted the case. The constitution bench of the apex court headed by the Chief Justice S H Kapadia has admitted this case and they have fixed up the hearing date after Deepavali.
In the meantime State government officials have said that they have not yet received any notice from the Supreme Court. But they have information that such a PIL has been admitted by the Supreme Court. They have said that as they are aware of the judgment given in AP case regarding reservation on religious basis, they have taken all precautions so they could not be caught on wrong foot. They have claimed that the notification circulated by the State government in this regard on 24-2-2010 is a testimony for it. The government has minutely followed the recommendations of Justice Ranganath Mishra Commission report on minority. The State government officials have further pointed out that the Supreme Court, after admitting the PIL, did not stay the notification circulated by the State government.
But Joydeep Mukherjee has demanded that the State government circular has specifically mentioned that out of 108 OBC (Other Backward Classes) groups the State government has chosen only 56 OBC groups for providing with the facility of 10 per cent job reservation, and these groups are essentially Muslims. Of course, mention of one or two other community is also there. But with this they could not hide their ill motive behind this circular.
Mukherjee further mentioned that the State government which has followed the recommendation of Justice Ranganath Mishra Commission Report, is not tenable here for the simple reason that the Commission’s report has only been submitted to the Parliament. But it has not yet been tabled in the Parliament for discussion let alone any decision taken on the matter. When the Central government has yet to take any decision on its implementation, how come that the State government could take any such decision?
Hence it is obvious that the ruling conglomerate of the State is all out to take advantage of the situation without caring the constitutionality of the matter. He is confident that the Supreme Court will not allow this unconstitutional step to be implemented.
Challenged in Supreme Court
By Asim Kumar Mitra
The State government which has followed the recommendation of Justice Ranganath Mishra Commission Report, is not tenable here for the simple reason that the Commission’s report has only been submitted to the Parliament. But it has not yet been tabled in the Parliament for discussion let alone any decision taken on the matter. When the Central government has yet to take any decision on its implementation, how come that the State government could take any such decision?
PENDING Assembly elections of West Bengal, all political parties including CPM, INC, TMC etc. are busy appeasing the Muslim community in their own way. The ruling conglomerate of the State - CPM-led Left Front has outwitted other parties by offering extraordinary facilities of 10 per cent job reservation in government offices for the Muslims.
This has sparked off a strong State-wide reaction. They are of the opinion that after the judgment of the Apex Court prohibiting reservation on the basis religion in the case of Andhra Pradesh, the West Bengal government cannot take such decision. It is not only unethical, it is illegal.
One Joydeep Mukherjee has gone to the Supreme Court to lodge a Public Interest Litigation (PIL). The apex court has accepted the case. The constitution bench of the apex court headed by the Chief Justice S H Kapadia has admitted this case and they have fixed up the hearing date after Deepavali.
In the meantime State government officials have said that they have not yet received any notice from the Supreme Court. But they have information that such a PIL has been admitted by the Supreme Court. They have said that as they are aware of the judgment given in AP case regarding reservation on religious basis, they have taken all precautions so they could not be caught on wrong foot. They have claimed that the notification circulated by the State government in this regard on 24-2-2010 is a testimony for it. The government has minutely followed the recommendations of Justice Ranganath Mishra Commission report on minority. The State government officials have further pointed out that the Supreme Court, after admitting the PIL, did not stay the notification circulated by the State government.
But Joydeep Mukherjee has demanded that the State government circular has specifically mentioned that out of 108 OBC (Other Backward Classes) groups the State government has chosen only 56 OBC groups for providing with the facility of 10 per cent job reservation, and these groups are essentially Muslims. Of course, mention of one or two other community is also there. But with this they could not hide their ill motive behind this circular.
Mukherjee further mentioned that the State government which has followed the recommendation of Justice Ranganath Mishra Commission Report, is not tenable here for the simple reason that the Commission’s report has only been submitted to the Parliament. But it has not yet been tabled in the Parliament for discussion let alone any decision taken on the matter. When the Central government has yet to take any decision on its implementation, how come that the State government could take any such decision?
Hence it is obvious that the ruling conglomerate of the State is all out to take advantage of the situation without caring the constitutionality of the matter. He is confident that the Supreme Court will not allow this unconstitutional step to be implemented.
Obama visiting Tomb
This is UPA secularism
Veil on Hindu India, minority extravagance
By Dr R Balashankar
Arriving a day after Deepawali, the UPA government could have shown the visiting dignitaries how the festival lights up the city and hearts of people. A trip to Jantar Mantar would have gladdened the President. For a modern architectural wonder, a private initiative, Akshardam temple would have given him the fragrance of India.
THE government’s handling of the visit of US President Barack Obama and his wife set yet another black milestone in the UPA’s track of undermining the Hindu ethos of India.
The government selectively showcased places and people that had no touch of Hindu. The visiting dignitary was taken to a mausoleum first thing when he arrived. Can there be a more inappropriate beginning to a trip? And that mausoleum happened to be that of an invader ruler who laid the foundations of Islamic rule in this country. Was that the reason that spot was chosen? So far we had not heard that Humayun Tomb was such an architectural splendour. Is Humayun’s tomb an architectural marvel or is Humayun considered historically such a tall person? To our understanding neither is the case.
The minister in waiting was Salman Khurshid, again the question why? The answer seems to be that he is a Muslim, more importantly not a Hindu.
In fact, as though to compensate for the UPA’s indiscretion or deliberate ignoring of India’s rich cultural history and heritage, Obama reminded our MPs about the greatness of our nation. ‘You invented the zero’ he said. ‘You unlocked the intricacies of the human body and the vastness of our universe’ he highlighted.
Arriving a day after Deepawali, the UPA government could have shown the visiting dignitaries how the festival lights up the city and hearts of people. A trip to Jantar Mantar would have gladdened the President. For a modern architectural wonder, a private initiative, Akshardam temple would have given him the fragrance of India. The President could have been taken to Chandni Chowk where Guru Teg Bahadur laid his life down in protecting the cause of the Hindus, taking on the emperor Aurangzeb. It would have sent the message of our courage and zero-tolerance to terror.
The list of people who were invited to the official dinner also was queer. Shabana Azmi and her husband Javed Akhtar, A R Rehman, Amir Khan, and the list goes on in these lines. It was as though the government, led by a selected Sikh PM and controlled by a Catholic Christian wanted to give a message to the US President, that India today is dominated in all spheres by non-Hindus.
Obama and his wife were introduced to Indian music, only it turned out to be the Christian choir from Meghalaya.
At the hotel, girls decked up as brides received the President. What a vulgar gesture! Brides are decked up to receive their husbands-to-be, not some stranger, and definitely not a respected visitor. If only someone had told Obama this, he might have had second thoughts accepting the welcome. And the hotel prides itself in ‘reserving’ this welcome to ‘special dignitaries.’
In fact ever since the UPA took over, both its first and second versions, there has been a systematic attempt to deny the nation its Hindu character. Does anyone recall the last time Deepawali and Holi were celebrated in the official residence of the Prime Minister?
On the eve of the Commonwealth games, newspapers took out sponsored supplements on the landmarks of Delhi. All the sites mentioned were mausoleums of known and unknown Muslims. There was not even a mention anywhere that the first city of Delhi was created by the Pandavas or there is a Delhi from which Prithviraj Chauhan ruled.
William Darlymple in his book City of Djinns has wondered why the Archaeological Survey of India never made any attempt to excavate the area that was known as Indraprastha. The Purana Quila region, including where the Pragati Maidan stands today are full of potential archaeological evidences that would throw light on the connection to Mahabharata.
In the last term, UPA closed the Saraswati exploration project. The Dwarka underwater exploration, a pet project of Indira Gandhi was never taken to its logical conclusion.
An on-going exhibition in the heart of the capital, Delhi-The Heritage City has no space for the Hindu heritage. It is full of tombs and mausoleums. Hindus celebrate life, worship the dead in spirit. But never make them a showcase to tread on.
Veil on Hindu India, minority extravagance
By Dr R Balashankar
Arriving a day after Deepawali, the UPA government could have shown the visiting dignitaries how the festival lights up the city and hearts of people. A trip to Jantar Mantar would have gladdened the President. For a modern architectural wonder, a private initiative, Akshardam temple would have given him the fragrance of India.
THE government’s handling of the visit of US President Barack Obama and his wife set yet another black milestone in the UPA’s track of undermining the Hindu ethos of India.
The government selectively showcased places and people that had no touch of Hindu. The visiting dignitary was taken to a mausoleum first thing when he arrived. Can there be a more inappropriate beginning to a trip? And that mausoleum happened to be that of an invader ruler who laid the foundations of Islamic rule in this country. Was that the reason that spot was chosen? So far we had not heard that Humayun Tomb was such an architectural splendour. Is Humayun’s tomb an architectural marvel or is Humayun considered historically such a tall person? To our understanding neither is the case.
The minister in waiting was Salman Khurshid, again the question why? The answer seems to be that he is a Muslim, more importantly not a Hindu.
In fact, as though to compensate for the UPA’s indiscretion or deliberate ignoring of India’s rich cultural history and heritage, Obama reminded our MPs about the greatness of our nation. ‘You invented the zero’ he said. ‘You unlocked the intricacies of the human body and the vastness of our universe’ he highlighted.
Arriving a day after Deepawali, the UPA government could have shown the visiting dignitaries how the festival lights up the city and hearts of people. A trip to Jantar Mantar would have gladdened the President. For a modern architectural wonder, a private initiative, Akshardam temple would have given him the fragrance of India. The President could have been taken to Chandni Chowk where Guru Teg Bahadur laid his life down in protecting the cause of the Hindus, taking on the emperor Aurangzeb. It would have sent the message of our courage and zero-tolerance to terror.
The list of people who were invited to the official dinner also was queer. Shabana Azmi and her husband Javed Akhtar, A R Rehman, Amir Khan, and the list goes on in these lines. It was as though the government, led by a selected Sikh PM and controlled by a Catholic Christian wanted to give a message to the US President, that India today is dominated in all spheres by non-Hindus.
Obama and his wife were introduced to Indian music, only it turned out to be the Christian choir from Meghalaya.
At the hotel, girls decked up as brides received the President. What a vulgar gesture! Brides are decked up to receive their husbands-to-be, not some stranger, and definitely not a respected visitor. If only someone had told Obama this, he might have had second thoughts accepting the welcome. And the hotel prides itself in ‘reserving’ this welcome to ‘special dignitaries.’
In fact ever since the UPA took over, both its first and second versions, there has been a systematic attempt to deny the nation its Hindu character. Does anyone recall the last time Deepawali and Holi were celebrated in the official residence of the Prime Minister?
On the eve of the Commonwealth games, newspapers took out sponsored supplements on the landmarks of Delhi. All the sites mentioned were mausoleums of known and unknown Muslims. There was not even a mention anywhere that the first city of Delhi was created by the Pandavas or there is a Delhi from which Prithviraj Chauhan ruled.
William Darlymple in his book City of Djinns has wondered why the Archaeological Survey of India never made any attempt to excavate the area that was known as Indraprastha. The Purana Quila region, including where the Pragati Maidan stands today are full of potential archaeological evidences that would throw light on the connection to Mahabharata.
In the last term, UPA closed the Saraswati exploration project. The Dwarka underwater exploration, a pet project of Indira Gandhi was never taken to its logical conclusion.
An on-going exhibition in the heart of the capital, Delhi-The Heritage City has no space for the Hindu heritage. It is full of tombs and mausoleums. Hindus celebrate life, worship the dead in spirit. But never make them a showcase to tread on.
Saturday, October 16, 2010
Changing face of Russo-Pakistan ties
By MV Kamath
If Afghanistan will get Russian help, why would it want aid from India which would now have to face a Moscow-Kabul-Islamabad entente? But will a Russian-Pakistan relationship help in resolving Indo-Pakistan conflict? With Russia present once again in Afghanistan in a big way, would Pakistan be able to treat Afghanistan as a place to fall-back in case of a conflict with India?
IS Russia slowly but noticeably turning away from India for a more profitable relationship with Pakistan, unbelievable as it may seem? Is India’s tilt towards the United States slowly pushing Moscow to improve its relations with our immediate and hostile western neighbour, at our cost? For over half a century, during the Cold War and after, the Soviet Union and later Russia has stood by India, but now, it seems, the situation is perceptibly changing. It has now been brought to the notice of Indians by a remarkable expose in The Hindu (September 9) by a Russian correspondent, Vladimir Radyuhin which must wake up India from its political slumber.
The story is that early in August, this year, President Medvedev of Russia hosted a quadripartite summit, by inviting leaders of Afghanistan, Tajikistan and Pakistan to a Black Sea resort Sochi, for high-level discussions. Pakistan was represented by Asaf Ali Zardari. And what is the significance of this meeting? One, Moscow has decisively moved to de-hyphenate its relations with Delhi and Islamabad. Two, it has shown that Russo-Pak relations have been promoted to the highest-presidential-level. And three, that Moscow has overcome its former reluctance to develop full-fledged relations with Islamabad. These are ominous developments. Delhi remains stunned.
As Radyuhin remarks: "Little wonder then, that even after three weeks after the Summit, there has been no reaction from New Delhi". What has made Moscow do a turn-around in its relations with Pakistan? Radyuhin himself provides the answer. It is, he says, the realisation that seeing Islamabad as part of the region’s problems does not help to advance the Russian goal of playing a bigger role in the region". Moscow’s current belief is that "Pakistan must be part of the solution". Pakistan has so far had two powerful friends: the United States and China.
In order to fight India, from the beginning, Islamabad agreed to be the running dog of American imperialism. That paid Pakistan handsomely, in terms of money and material. It went overboard to obey Washington’s dictat and has now realised that this has only landed it in the soup.
The United States is now the most hated country in Pakistan and Zardari has to find a way out. For a long time, to balance US interests, Islamabad courted China, which willingly gave its support because it had its own ulterior motives. In the first place, it wanted to encircle India and cultivating Pakistan was a sound decision from Beijing’s point of view. Secondly, it wanted direct access to the Indian Ocean and the Persian Gulf and a friendly and purchaseable government in Islamabad was to China’s advantage. China has helped build Gwadar port in Baluchistan and can, in no time, send its forces from Zinjiang in Central Asia to Gwadar in 48 hours.
Now Moscow has woken up. In olden times Britain had tried to keep Russia away from the Indian Ocean-and succeeded. Now Britain is no longer in the picture. The United States by its unscrupulous high-handedness has not only humiliated Pakistan but has made it a victim of the very forces US helped raise for throwing Soviet forces out of Afghanistan -the jihadis. For Pakistan, closer cooperation with Russia would be more paying then continued subservience to Washington-and forget the painful past.
To gain Pakistan’s goodwill Russia has promised to aid in two major projects: One project-CASA (Central Asia South Asia) 1000, involves the export of electricity from power-rich Kyrgyzstan to Afghanistan and Pakistan. The other is a motorable road and a railway from Tajikistan to Pakistani across the Wakhan border in extreme northeast Afghanistan, thereby giving Pakistan direct access to the markets of Central Asia and Russia, while Tajikistan-and Russia-will get access to Pakistani ports, a dream long entertained by Russia.
It is suggested that China, too, will stand to gain, as the road is likely to be linked with the Karakorum Highway, connecting Pakistan with China’s Xinjinag region. That should slowly make US help irrelevant to Pakistan. What is significant is that Russia may go still further and become a donor of economic, social and military-political security for Afghanistan, Tajikistan and Pakistan-the ultimate irony! Understandably, Russia has a good reason to help the Islamic trio: it will clear the region of US and NATO forces. Already, it would appear that Dimitry Medvedev has renewed his country’s offer to re-build about 140 industrial and infra-structure projects in Afghanistan which the Soviet Union had originally set up during its decade-old military interception.
The deal may be worth one billion dollars, but it may help Moscow to get access to Afghanistan’s oil, gas and minerals. The investment would be eminently worthwhile. Russia’s come-back, in the circumstances, may also help persuade some two lakh Soviet-educated Afghans who had fled the Taliban to Russia, to return to their motherland.
What would this mean to India? It is too early to come to any conclusions. If Afghanistan will get Russian help, why would it want aid from India which would now have to face a Moscow-Kabul-Islamabad entente? But will a Russian -Pakistan relationship help in resolving Indo-Pakistan conflict? With Russia present once again in Afghanistan in a big way, would Pakistan be able to treat Afghanistan as a place to fall-back in case of a conflict with India? Alternately, will Russia be able to get Pakistan out of its anti-India mind-set and help set up peace at last in the Indian sub-continent? That is anybody’s guess.
Writes Radyuhin: "The Sochi Summit has dimmed India’s hope of gaining a strategic foothold in Tajikistan. India and Russia had planned to jointly use the Ayni airfield which India helped to renovate, but Indian presence there looks doubtful now, in the context of the emerging Russia-Afghanistan-Tajikistan axis. India will of course, remain Russia’s close friend and strategic partner but it will have to learn to live with the new Russian- Pakistani bonhomie, just as Russia has taken in its stride India’s entitlement with the US".
What seems obvious is that a whole new political equation is emerging in Central Asian sub-continental politics with consequences yet to be clear. With Pakistan likely to slip out of US control, Washington may wish to be courting India. Delhi would be wise to keep its distance from the US. Russia would still be its best bet, as it has been all these years. We don’t need to be America’s cat’s paw in South Asia.
If Afghanistan will get Russian help, why would it want aid from India which would now have to face a Moscow-Kabul-Islamabad entente? But will a Russian-Pakistan relationship help in resolving Indo-Pakistan conflict? With Russia present once again in Afghanistan in a big way, would Pakistan be able to treat Afghanistan as a place to fall-back in case of a conflict with India?
IS Russia slowly but noticeably turning away from India for a more profitable relationship with Pakistan, unbelievable as it may seem? Is India’s tilt towards the United States slowly pushing Moscow to improve its relations with our immediate and hostile western neighbour, at our cost? For over half a century, during the Cold War and after, the Soviet Union and later Russia has stood by India, but now, it seems, the situation is perceptibly changing. It has now been brought to the notice of Indians by a remarkable expose in The Hindu (September 9) by a Russian correspondent, Vladimir Radyuhin which must wake up India from its political slumber.
The story is that early in August, this year, President Medvedev of Russia hosted a quadripartite summit, by inviting leaders of Afghanistan, Tajikistan and Pakistan to a Black Sea resort Sochi, for high-level discussions. Pakistan was represented by Asaf Ali Zardari. And what is the significance of this meeting? One, Moscow has decisively moved to de-hyphenate its relations with Delhi and Islamabad. Two, it has shown that Russo-Pak relations have been promoted to the highest-presidential-level. And three, that Moscow has overcome its former reluctance to develop full-fledged relations with Islamabad. These are ominous developments. Delhi remains stunned.
As Radyuhin remarks: "Little wonder then, that even after three weeks after the Summit, there has been no reaction from New Delhi". What has made Moscow do a turn-around in its relations with Pakistan? Radyuhin himself provides the answer. It is, he says, the realisation that seeing Islamabad as part of the region’s problems does not help to advance the Russian goal of playing a bigger role in the region". Moscow’s current belief is that "Pakistan must be part of the solution". Pakistan has so far had two powerful friends: the United States and China.
In order to fight India, from the beginning, Islamabad agreed to be the running dog of American imperialism. That paid Pakistan handsomely, in terms of money and material. It went overboard to obey Washington’s dictat and has now realised that this has only landed it in the soup.
The United States is now the most hated country in Pakistan and Zardari has to find a way out. For a long time, to balance US interests, Islamabad courted China, which willingly gave its support because it had its own ulterior motives. In the first place, it wanted to encircle India and cultivating Pakistan was a sound decision from Beijing’s point of view. Secondly, it wanted direct access to the Indian Ocean and the Persian Gulf and a friendly and purchaseable government in Islamabad was to China’s advantage. China has helped build Gwadar port in Baluchistan and can, in no time, send its forces from Zinjiang in Central Asia to Gwadar in 48 hours.
Now Moscow has woken up. In olden times Britain had tried to keep Russia away from the Indian Ocean-and succeeded. Now Britain is no longer in the picture. The United States by its unscrupulous high-handedness has not only humiliated Pakistan but has made it a victim of the very forces US helped raise for throwing Soviet forces out of Afghanistan -the jihadis. For Pakistan, closer cooperation with Russia would be more paying then continued subservience to Washington-and forget the painful past.
To gain Pakistan’s goodwill Russia has promised to aid in two major projects: One project-CASA (Central Asia South Asia) 1000, involves the export of electricity from power-rich Kyrgyzstan to Afghanistan and Pakistan. The other is a motorable road and a railway from Tajikistan to Pakistani across the Wakhan border in extreme northeast Afghanistan, thereby giving Pakistan direct access to the markets of Central Asia and Russia, while Tajikistan-and Russia-will get access to Pakistani ports, a dream long entertained by Russia.
It is suggested that China, too, will stand to gain, as the road is likely to be linked with the Karakorum Highway, connecting Pakistan with China’s Xinjinag region. That should slowly make US help irrelevant to Pakistan. What is significant is that Russia may go still further and become a donor of economic, social and military-political security for Afghanistan, Tajikistan and Pakistan-the ultimate irony! Understandably, Russia has a good reason to help the Islamic trio: it will clear the region of US and NATO forces. Already, it would appear that Dimitry Medvedev has renewed his country’s offer to re-build about 140 industrial and infra-structure projects in Afghanistan which the Soviet Union had originally set up during its decade-old military interception.
The deal may be worth one billion dollars, but it may help Moscow to get access to Afghanistan’s oil, gas and minerals. The investment would be eminently worthwhile. Russia’s come-back, in the circumstances, may also help persuade some two lakh Soviet-educated Afghans who had fled the Taliban to Russia, to return to their motherland.
What would this mean to India? It is too early to come to any conclusions. If Afghanistan will get Russian help, why would it want aid from India which would now have to face a Moscow-Kabul-Islamabad entente? But will a Russian -Pakistan relationship help in resolving Indo-Pakistan conflict? With Russia present once again in Afghanistan in a big way, would Pakistan be able to treat Afghanistan as a place to fall-back in case of a conflict with India? Alternately, will Russia be able to get Pakistan out of its anti-India mind-set and help set up peace at last in the Indian sub-continent? That is anybody’s guess.
Writes Radyuhin: "The Sochi Summit has dimmed India’s hope of gaining a strategic foothold in Tajikistan. India and Russia had planned to jointly use the Ayni airfield which India helped to renovate, but Indian presence there looks doubtful now, in the context of the emerging Russia-Afghanistan-Tajikistan axis. India will of course, remain Russia’s close friend and strategic partner but it will have to learn to live with the new Russian- Pakistani bonhomie, just as Russia has taken in its stride India’s entitlement with the US".
What seems obvious is that a whole new political equation is emerging in Central Asian sub-continental politics with consequences yet to be clear. With Pakistan likely to slip out of US control, Washington may wish to be courting India. Delhi would be wise to keep its distance from the US. Russia would still be its best bet, as it has been all these years. We don’t need to be America’s cat’s paw in South Asia.
Atheism in India
Glimpses
Atheism in India
By MSN Menon
One would imagine that the age of Rama was one of great devotion to god. No, it was not. The Ramayana says that Jabali, the "great Brahmin scholar" tried to persuade Rama to return to Ayodhya. Jabali was an atheist.
TO doubt is the way of the Hindu. It could be traced back to the Vedas.
A hymn in the Rig Veda says:
Who is there who truly knows
And who can say, whence this
Unfathomed world?
And from what cause?
Or, even the gods do not know!
There was a profound doubt in the heart of Hindu thought. The rishi was not even sure whether the gods knew the answers.
No wonder, the Hindu set out on his eternal quest to know the truth about the "unfathomed world". And our first meeting was with Yajnyavalkya.
Yajnyavalkya (1200 BC), the great teacher of Hindu philosophy, perhaps marked the transition from Vedic gods to the Supreme Being (Brahma). The sage says "Brahma is limitless in time and space." The Vedic gods were limited,
Of the six great philosophic systems (Darshanas) (Sankhya, Nyaya, Yoga, Vaisesika and two Mimamsas) four (Sankhya, Nyaya, Yoga and Vaisesika) were not so sure whether gods existed.
Sankhya, the oldest and most profound philosophic system believes that the universe was not created by god, that Prakriti was the mother of everything. The law of Swabhava ruled the world. Even the Buddha took advantage of Sankhya.
Nyaya is more logic than philosophy or religion. There is only a casual reference to God in Nyaya.
Yoga is anterior to Nyaya. It is a means to acquire supernatural powers, even to surpass the gods. It is independent of the Vedas.
As for Vaisesika, it preceded Buddhism and Jainism, it saw no need to introduce god into the cosmic system.
One would imagine that the age of Rama was one of great devotion to god. No, it was not. The Ramayana says that Jabali, the "great Brahmin scholar" tried to persuade Rama to return to Ayodhya. Jabali was an atheist.
Buddhism and Jainism made atheism respectable. In fact, Buddhists were rulers in many parts of India till the advent of Islam. Buddha chose not to speak of god. There was no sharp division between man and god in Buddhism. Sunyata is the apex thought of Buddhism.
The Charvakas and Lokayatas were the greatest propagators of atheism. They gave life and blood to Sankhya. There was no place for god in Chanakya philosophy. Creation took place, they said, because "it is in the nature of things to happen." They called it Swabhava Vada, which is the only law of nature. It is the cornerstone of the Charvaka philosophy. The universe had always existed. It was not created. Virtue and vice were conventions, they said. The only good was the pursuit of pleasure. Hedonism was their ethics. They refused to be swayed by the Vedas. Kautilya hailed their philosophy an important doctrine. Mahabharata speaks highly of the Charvakas as "vanerable sages". It shows how India respected dissent. Charvaka had a powerful impact on the development of atheism in the world. Their remarkable logic and sweep of thought far outstripped the achievements of classical philosophy.
Lokayatas were popular atheists and free thinkers. They opposed the Vedic tradition. But they were not addicted to hedonism. They held moderation a virtue. The Lokayatas believed that the world alone was real. They rejected all authority other than theirs.
The advent of Islam brought about the complete destruction of the incipient civilization of the Hinduism. They took to Bhakti. It also meant the end of Buddhism in India. Islam could not tolerate atheism.
To conclude, the Hindu grew up in the cradle of atheism till the advent of Islam. Atheism brought about tolerance among Hindus. True, the Hindus withdrew into a shell. But that was to protect their faith. But in the process, all disputes ceased and the Hindu quest for the truth came to an end. Dear Reader, our task is to revive our old traditions - the tradition of bold enquiry.
Atheism in India
By MSN Menon
One would imagine that the age of Rama was one of great devotion to god. No, it was not. The Ramayana says that Jabali, the "great Brahmin scholar" tried to persuade Rama to return to Ayodhya. Jabali was an atheist.
TO doubt is the way of the Hindu. It could be traced back to the Vedas.
A hymn in the Rig Veda says:
Who is there who truly knows
And who can say, whence this
Unfathomed world?
And from what cause?
Or, even the gods do not know!
There was a profound doubt in the heart of Hindu thought. The rishi was not even sure whether the gods knew the answers.
No wonder, the Hindu set out on his eternal quest to know the truth about the "unfathomed world". And our first meeting was with Yajnyavalkya.
Yajnyavalkya (1200 BC), the great teacher of Hindu philosophy, perhaps marked the transition from Vedic gods to the Supreme Being (Brahma). The sage says "Brahma is limitless in time and space." The Vedic gods were limited,
Of the six great philosophic systems (Darshanas) (Sankhya, Nyaya, Yoga, Vaisesika and two Mimamsas) four (Sankhya, Nyaya, Yoga and Vaisesika) were not so sure whether gods existed.
Sankhya, the oldest and most profound philosophic system believes that the universe was not created by god, that Prakriti was the mother of everything. The law of Swabhava ruled the world. Even the Buddha took advantage of Sankhya.
Nyaya is more logic than philosophy or religion. There is only a casual reference to God in Nyaya.
Yoga is anterior to Nyaya. It is a means to acquire supernatural powers, even to surpass the gods. It is independent of the Vedas.
As for Vaisesika, it preceded Buddhism and Jainism, it saw no need to introduce god into the cosmic system.
One would imagine that the age of Rama was one of great devotion to god. No, it was not. The Ramayana says that Jabali, the "great Brahmin scholar" tried to persuade Rama to return to Ayodhya. Jabali was an atheist.
Buddhism and Jainism made atheism respectable. In fact, Buddhists were rulers in many parts of India till the advent of Islam. Buddha chose not to speak of god. There was no sharp division between man and god in Buddhism. Sunyata is the apex thought of Buddhism.
The Charvakas and Lokayatas were the greatest propagators of atheism. They gave life and blood to Sankhya. There was no place for god in Chanakya philosophy. Creation took place, they said, because "it is in the nature of things to happen." They called it Swabhava Vada, which is the only law of nature. It is the cornerstone of the Charvaka philosophy. The universe had always existed. It was not created. Virtue and vice were conventions, they said. The only good was the pursuit of pleasure. Hedonism was their ethics. They refused to be swayed by the Vedas. Kautilya hailed their philosophy an important doctrine. Mahabharata speaks highly of the Charvakas as "vanerable sages". It shows how India respected dissent. Charvaka had a powerful impact on the development of atheism in the world. Their remarkable logic and sweep of thought far outstripped the achievements of classical philosophy.
Lokayatas were popular atheists and free thinkers. They opposed the Vedic tradition. But they were not addicted to hedonism. They held moderation a virtue. The Lokayatas believed that the world alone was real. They rejected all authority other than theirs.
The advent of Islam brought about the complete destruction of the incipient civilization of the Hinduism. They took to Bhakti. It also meant the end of Buddhism in India. Islam could not tolerate atheism.
To conclude, the Hindu grew up in the cradle of atheism till the advent of Islam. Atheism brought about tolerance among Hindus. True, the Hindus withdrew into a shell. But that was to protect their faith. But in the process, all disputes ceased and the Hindu quest for the truth came to an end. Dear Reader, our task is to revive our old traditions - the tradition of bold enquiry.
KALIDAS
The scientific genius of Kalidas
By NR Waradpande
The phenomenon of day and night was well understood even in the days of the Rigveda. Hymn 1138 of the Rigveda speaks of the messengers of Vrtra wheering round the parinaha or the globe of the earth. The Aitareya Brahman affirms that the Sun neither sets nor rises, He takes a turn and causes day and night.
KALIDAS flourished at the court of Agnimitra Shunga of Vidisha as is clear from the Bharatavakya of the play Malavikagnimitra which says that when Agnimitra is ruling the subjects feel secure from calamities. The Bharatavakya is not a part of the play. It is sung after the play is over and even those characters which are dead in the play participate in it as actors and not as characters. So Agnimitra is not praised here by the characters but by living actors who have just performed the play.
This proves beyond doubt that Kalidas flourished at the time of Agnimitra Shunga in 150 BC. There are other arguments supporting this view but this is not the place to go into them. It is necessary to bear in mind the date of Kalidas for viewing the scientific statements of Kalidas in the background of science that is known to have existed in 150 BC.
Imagination is necessary for the poet as well as the scientist, but the poet and the scientist use their imagination for different purposes. The poet uses it for creating beauty while the scientist uses it for describing natural phenomena in a way which helps in predicting and even controlling it. But the two types of imaginations are seldom found in the same person. Kalidas is such a rare person.
The phenomenon of day and night was well understood even in the days of the Rigveda. Hymn 1138 of the Rigveda speaks of the messengers of Vrtra wheering round the parinaha or the globe of the earth. The Aitareya Brahman affirms that the Sun neither sets nor rises, He takes a turn and causes day and night.
Kalidas knows in addition to this that the movement takes place around the Meru or the North pole. I was surprised to note that even some students of Sanskrit do not know that Meru is the name of the North Pole though Bhaskaracharya clearly mentions it while explaining the day and night phenomenon at the poles and even Apte’s dictionary clearly mentions that Meru is the name of the north pole.
Kalidas recalls all this while describing the circumlocution of Aja and Indumati around the fire as a part of their marriage rite. The verse says: "The couple circumlocuting hand in hand around the fire whose flames were ascending, looked like the day and night circumlocuting the high peaked Meru with their limits marked by a common line.
Kalidas says that it is the day and night that rotate around the earth and not vice versa as Aryabhatta said in the fifth century. In this he was following science contemporary to him. But his genius lies in visualising how the phenomenon would appear to an observer outside the earth when he is stationary in relation to the Sun. I have met people who are incapable of visualising that to those who land on the moon, the earth will appear above them and not below.
Kalidas however anticipates science in places. In the 14th canto of the Raghuvansha Rama says about the calumny that befell Seeta: "Calumny is irresitible. Even the moon can not escape it. What is merely the earth’s shadow is proclaimed as a stain by all and sundry".
This statement is often mistaken to refer to the shadow of the eclipse. But the shadow of the eclipse is transitory. Again it is not regarded as a permanent stain on the moon. Moon’s escape from the shadow of the eclipse is celebrated.
The stain on the other hand is permanent and is widely described as a stain. It is undeniable that Kalidas regards the stain as the shadow of the earth and is NOT referring to the phenomenon of the eclipse.
This shows how apt the simile is and speaks for the poetic genius of Kalidas. But in addition to poetic fancy the simile is a scientist’s theorising which later on resulted in the astronomy of the eclipse. There is no evidence that the astronomy of the eclipse was understood in 150 BC. SB Deelhit’s History of Indian Astronomy does not refer to any astronomy of the eclipse before the period of Aryabhatta, which is 5th century AD.
The above quoted verse indicates how the imagination of Kalidas worked with heavenly phenomena. But heavenly phenomena engaged the human mind in the remotest of periods. Man took interest in things remotest far earlier than in things nearest i.e his own body and mind. Ancient man’s concern with his own soul should not be cited against this statement because this concern was more imaginative and emotional than scientific. But Kalidas displayed the capacity of understanding the phenomenon of perception on the lines of the Physics of light. Note the following verse in the Shakuntalam. The poet is describing the speed with which the chariot of Dushyanta was being driven.
"What is really curved is being seen as straight".
In order to have such an experience one must move with a speed of at least 50 miles per hour. Such speed was not possible in the days of Kalidas.
A little explanation of how such a perception occurs will not be out of place. This is the result of binocular vision. Two rays coming from the object seen to the two eyes make an angle. The nearer the thing the greater the angle. Points on a curved line are at different distances and therefore make different angles at different times in the movement whereas points on a straight line are at the same distance from the observer at different times in the movement. When the difference in the angle is noticed the thing is seen as curved, when it is not noticed it is seen as straight.
As in the psychology of vision Kalidas displays his insight in psychology of the unconcious also. Psychologists did not talk of the unconscious mind before Freud. That was in the twentieth century. But Kalidas not only had a grasp of this idea, he has even used it for dramatic purposes. Dushanta of the Mahabharata is an unprincipled womaniser who uses an innocent maiden just to satisfy his lust and feigns ignorance of the whole affair when called upon to take the responsibility of his own deed. Kalidas and the principles of Dramaturgy in his days did not allow such a "hero". He has therefore employed the sage Durvasa so that Dramaturgy is not violated and at the same time a very powerful and tragic dramatic scene could be presented. It is the curse of Durvsa to Shakuntala that makes Dushyanta forget Shakuntala. The curse erases the memory of Shakuntala but leaves intact all the emotions that could be revived by remembering her.
When he was sunk in such a blank past he heard one of his queens Hanspadika sing the following song:
‘Oh you droning bee, having kissed the mango blossoms with hasty flight you are now perched on the lotus, clean forgetting the blossoms.!
Polygamous husbands are habituated to such taunts but on this occasion Dushyanta felt he is being stung on a soft spot. This made him restless. He tried to pacify himself by the thought that some event in his past birth is throwing up these emotions without reviving the memory of those events.
This is anticipation of Freud two thousand years ago.
By NR Waradpande
The phenomenon of day and night was well understood even in the days of the Rigveda. Hymn 1138 of the Rigveda speaks of the messengers of Vrtra wheering round the parinaha or the globe of the earth. The Aitareya Brahman affirms that the Sun neither sets nor rises, He takes a turn and causes day and night.
KALIDAS flourished at the court of Agnimitra Shunga of Vidisha as is clear from the Bharatavakya of the play Malavikagnimitra which says that when Agnimitra is ruling the subjects feel secure from calamities. The Bharatavakya is not a part of the play. It is sung after the play is over and even those characters which are dead in the play participate in it as actors and not as characters. So Agnimitra is not praised here by the characters but by living actors who have just performed the play.
This proves beyond doubt that Kalidas flourished at the time of Agnimitra Shunga in 150 BC. There are other arguments supporting this view but this is not the place to go into them. It is necessary to bear in mind the date of Kalidas for viewing the scientific statements of Kalidas in the background of science that is known to have existed in 150 BC.
Imagination is necessary for the poet as well as the scientist, but the poet and the scientist use their imagination for different purposes. The poet uses it for creating beauty while the scientist uses it for describing natural phenomena in a way which helps in predicting and even controlling it. But the two types of imaginations are seldom found in the same person. Kalidas is such a rare person.
The phenomenon of day and night was well understood even in the days of the Rigveda. Hymn 1138 of the Rigveda speaks of the messengers of Vrtra wheering round the parinaha or the globe of the earth. The Aitareya Brahman affirms that the Sun neither sets nor rises, He takes a turn and causes day and night.
Kalidas knows in addition to this that the movement takes place around the Meru or the North pole. I was surprised to note that even some students of Sanskrit do not know that Meru is the name of the North Pole though Bhaskaracharya clearly mentions it while explaining the day and night phenomenon at the poles and even Apte’s dictionary clearly mentions that Meru is the name of the north pole.
Kalidas recalls all this while describing the circumlocution of Aja and Indumati around the fire as a part of their marriage rite. The verse says: "The couple circumlocuting hand in hand around the fire whose flames were ascending, looked like the day and night circumlocuting the high peaked Meru with their limits marked by a common line.
Kalidas says that it is the day and night that rotate around the earth and not vice versa as Aryabhatta said in the fifth century. In this he was following science contemporary to him. But his genius lies in visualising how the phenomenon would appear to an observer outside the earth when he is stationary in relation to the Sun. I have met people who are incapable of visualising that to those who land on the moon, the earth will appear above them and not below.
Kalidas however anticipates science in places. In the 14th canto of the Raghuvansha Rama says about the calumny that befell Seeta: "Calumny is irresitible. Even the moon can not escape it. What is merely the earth’s shadow is proclaimed as a stain by all and sundry".
This statement is often mistaken to refer to the shadow of the eclipse. But the shadow of the eclipse is transitory. Again it is not regarded as a permanent stain on the moon. Moon’s escape from the shadow of the eclipse is celebrated.
The stain on the other hand is permanent and is widely described as a stain. It is undeniable that Kalidas regards the stain as the shadow of the earth and is NOT referring to the phenomenon of the eclipse.
This shows how apt the simile is and speaks for the poetic genius of Kalidas. But in addition to poetic fancy the simile is a scientist’s theorising which later on resulted in the astronomy of the eclipse. There is no evidence that the astronomy of the eclipse was understood in 150 BC. SB Deelhit’s History of Indian Astronomy does not refer to any astronomy of the eclipse before the period of Aryabhatta, which is 5th century AD.
The above quoted verse indicates how the imagination of Kalidas worked with heavenly phenomena. But heavenly phenomena engaged the human mind in the remotest of periods. Man took interest in things remotest far earlier than in things nearest i.e his own body and mind. Ancient man’s concern with his own soul should not be cited against this statement because this concern was more imaginative and emotional than scientific. But Kalidas displayed the capacity of understanding the phenomenon of perception on the lines of the Physics of light. Note the following verse in the Shakuntalam. The poet is describing the speed with which the chariot of Dushyanta was being driven.
"What is really curved is being seen as straight".
In order to have such an experience one must move with a speed of at least 50 miles per hour. Such speed was not possible in the days of Kalidas.
A little explanation of how such a perception occurs will not be out of place. This is the result of binocular vision. Two rays coming from the object seen to the two eyes make an angle. The nearer the thing the greater the angle. Points on a curved line are at different distances and therefore make different angles at different times in the movement whereas points on a straight line are at the same distance from the observer at different times in the movement. When the difference in the angle is noticed the thing is seen as curved, when it is not noticed it is seen as straight.
As in the psychology of vision Kalidas displays his insight in psychology of the unconcious also. Psychologists did not talk of the unconscious mind before Freud. That was in the twentieth century. But Kalidas not only had a grasp of this idea, he has even used it for dramatic purposes. Dushanta of the Mahabharata is an unprincipled womaniser who uses an innocent maiden just to satisfy his lust and feigns ignorance of the whole affair when called upon to take the responsibility of his own deed. Kalidas and the principles of Dramaturgy in his days did not allow such a "hero". He has therefore employed the sage Durvasa so that Dramaturgy is not violated and at the same time a very powerful and tragic dramatic scene could be presented. It is the curse of Durvsa to Shakuntala that makes Dushyanta forget Shakuntala. The curse erases the memory of Shakuntala but leaves intact all the emotions that could be revived by remembering her.
When he was sunk in such a blank past he heard one of his queens Hanspadika sing the following song:
‘Oh you droning bee, having kissed the mango blossoms with hasty flight you are now perched on the lotus, clean forgetting the blossoms.!
Polygamous husbands are habituated to such taunts but on this occasion Dushyanta felt he is being stung on a soft spot. This made him restless. He tried to pacify himself by the thought that some event in his past birth is throwing up these emotions without reviving the memory of those events.
This is anticipation of Freud two thousand years ago.
mecca masjid blast
‘Huji, not Hindu group, behind Mecca Masjid blast’
By Abhishek Sharan
THOUGH the CBI has sought to establish the hand of a Hindu terror group in the 2007 Mecca Masjid blast, a US counter-terrorism agency thinks otherwise. According to the National Counter-terrorism Center (NCTC), the blast was allegedly executed by a Pakistan-sponsored terror outfit, the Harkat-ul-Jehad-e-Islami (HuJI).
NCTC director Michael Leiter, submitted as much in his ‘Statement for the Record’ before the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, on September 22, 2010.
Before the CBI took over the case, the Hyderabad police too had named the HuJI as the blast’s alleged executor.
"The group also has been involved in multiple, high-casualty attacks... in India in May 2007 that killed 16," read Leiter’s statement.
He added, "HuJI has collaborated with Al-Qaeda on attacks and training for HuJI members. In January 2009, a federal grand jury indicted HuJI commander Mohammad Ilyas Kashmiri in absentia for a disrupted terrorist plot against a newspaper in Denmark."
The group was also allegedly involved in an attack against Pakistani intelligence and police facilities in Lahore in 2009 that killed 23, according to Leiter.
CBI’s probe findings, however, have claimed that an Indore-based terror outfit whose members were allegedly linked to the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh perpetrated the mosque attack.
The agency has arrested two accused in the case - Lokesh Sharma and Devender Gupta - and is looking for the alleged bomb makers, Sandeep Dange and Ramchandra Kalsangra.
"The NCTC does not seem to be updated with the developments in the case, which is surprising," said a senior CBI investigator when HT asked him about the US agency’s version on the attack’s suspected perpetrators.
(Courtesy:The Hindustan Times)
By Abhishek Sharan
THOUGH the CBI has sought to establish the hand of a Hindu terror group in the 2007 Mecca Masjid blast, a US counter-terrorism agency thinks otherwise. According to the National Counter-terrorism Center (NCTC), the blast was allegedly executed by a Pakistan-sponsored terror outfit, the Harkat-ul-Jehad-e-Islami (HuJI).
NCTC director Michael Leiter, submitted as much in his ‘Statement for the Record’ before the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, on September 22, 2010.
Before the CBI took over the case, the Hyderabad police too had named the HuJI as the blast’s alleged executor.
"The group also has been involved in multiple, high-casualty attacks... in India in May 2007 that killed 16," read Leiter’s statement.
He added, "HuJI has collaborated with Al-Qaeda on attacks and training for HuJI members. In January 2009, a federal grand jury indicted HuJI commander Mohammad Ilyas Kashmiri in absentia for a disrupted terrorist plot against a newspaper in Denmark."
The group was also allegedly involved in an attack against Pakistani intelligence and police facilities in Lahore in 2009 that killed 23, according to Leiter.
CBI’s probe findings, however, have claimed that an Indore-based terror outfit whose members were allegedly linked to the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh perpetrated the mosque attack.
The agency has arrested two accused in the case - Lokesh Sharma and Devender Gupta - and is looking for the alleged bomb makers, Sandeep Dange and Ramchandra Kalsangra.
"The NCTC does not seem to be updated with the developments in the case, which is surprising," said a senior CBI investigator when HT asked him about the US agency’s version on the attack’s suspected perpetrators.
(Courtesy:The Hindustan Times)
This is Ramjanmabhoomi
Ayodhya’s verdict:
By Rukmini Shrinivasan and Pervez Iqbal Siddiqui
AYODHYA, Sept.24: While the Supreme Court has postponed until September 28 its hearing on a plea to defer the Allahabad High Court’s verdict in the Ayodhya title suit, in the pilgrim town itself, there’s no dispute: The place was, and is, Ramjanmabhoomi for its Hindus.
Nowhere in Ayodhya, not in shop addresses or official signages, in the directions yelled out to lost visitors from teashops or police chowkies, or anywhere close to the disputed area, is the "spot" referred to as anything else but Ramjanmabhoomi. Even the official parlance refers to it as Janmabhoomi. For a disputed structure, there is remarkably little dispute.
"The point isn't that everyone calls it Ramjanmabhoomi; the point is, it is Ramjanmabhoomi," says Purshottam Kumar, owner of Shri Ram Chandra ki Sarvottam Samagri, a shop in the main market that sells religious paraphernalia: from headbands worn by karsevaks in 1992 to strings of prayer beads and saffron scarves. Kumar’s is the fifth generation that has lived and worked on the same spot and he explains that each generation has known that this is the place where Ram was born and that there was a temple. "What will the court’s judgment change? Nothing," he says smiling benignly. "Every Hindu knows in his heart that this is the Ramjanmabhoomi and it will not be anything else."
The security is heavy: two rings of fencing, one yellow, one barbed, guarded by village chowkidars, home guards, the PAC, Rapid Action Force and CRPF. CCTVs hover over, ominously overseen by armed men on watchtowers. At the entrance, every object on one's person including belts and pens is removed. There are five full-body checks. A group of women from Gujarat is on a pilgrimage. They will go from here to Nepal. "We’ve come to take Ram’s darshan. There used to be a mosque nearby but went long ago," explains Sushilaben Kanojia of Rajkot.
After walking for several minutes inside what feels like a labyrinth, devotees are deposited 10 feet away from a statue of Ram, Sita, Laxman and Bharat, a fence separating them from visitors. A sign reads 'Don't Wait Here’. The sanctum sanctorum is enveloped on all sides by a tent. This is where the Babri Masjid once stood. Not just the mosque, not even rubble is visible any more. Obviously, there is no Muslim worship here.
The first and only time that TOI saw or heard the word Babri all day was in a cramped two-room house where a 90-year-old man with a hearing aid was being harangued by journalists. ‘Babri Masjid Reconstruction Committee’ read the hand-painted words on the doorway to Mohammed Hashim Ansari’s house. One of the litigants, and the last surviving of the six who were on the same petition, Ansari demands that the court give its verdict soon. "At least in my lifetime," he says pleadingly, adding, "All of Ayodhya’s Muslims are waiting for this."
Bangle-seller Mohammed Arif’s family has lived here in the old city for four generations. "I was here when they broke the mosque and I saw the city aflame," he says softly and with no anger. "Everyone knows what happened. It was on TV. We don't want to stir up trouble. If that means not referring to the area as Babri any more, so be it," he says. Arif and his family have little interest in the verdict. "They can build a church if they want, I don't care," he says. But they’re all watching TV intently on the pavement outside his shop. "For news of trouble," says his teenaged daughter Saira.
"There are two parallel forces in the country, one that supports anarchy and one that supports the rule of law," says Khalid Ahmed, who heads the Helal Committee which offers legal help to the two disputing sides. "The first one gave its judgment on December 6, 1992, when it tore down the mosque, killed 17 Muslims in Ayodhya and burnt down 450 shops, punishing Muslims for the sins of their forefathers. We are still waiting for the judgment of the other force," says Ahmed.
(Courtesy:TOI)
By Rukmini Shrinivasan and Pervez Iqbal Siddiqui
AYODHYA, Sept.24: While the Supreme Court has postponed until September 28 its hearing on a plea to defer the Allahabad High Court’s verdict in the Ayodhya title suit, in the pilgrim town itself, there’s no dispute: The place was, and is, Ramjanmabhoomi for its Hindus.
Nowhere in Ayodhya, not in shop addresses or official signages, in the directions yelled out to lost visitors from teashops or police chowkies, or anywhere close to the disputed area, is the "spot" referred to as anything else but Ramjanmabhoomi. Even the official parlance refers to it as Janmabhoomi. For a disputed structure, there is remarkably little dispute.
"The point isn't that everyone calls it Ramjanmabhoomi; the point is, it is Ramjanmabhoomi," says Purshottam Kumar, owner of Shri Ram Chandra ki Sarvottam Samagri, a shop in the main market that sells religious paraphernalia: from headbands worn by karsevaks in 1992 to strings of prayer beads and saffron scarves. Kumar’s is the fifth generation that has lived and worked on the same spot and he explains that each generation has known that this is the place where Ram was born and that there was a temple. "What will the court’s judgment change? Nothing," he says smiling benignly. "Every Hindu knows in his heart that this is the Ramjanmabhoomi and it will not be anything else."
The security is heavy: two rings of fencing, one yellow, one barbed, guarded by village chowkidars, home guards, the PAC, Rapid Action Force and CRPF. CCTVs hover over, ominously overseen by armed men on watchtowers. At the entrance, every object on one's person including belts and pens is removed. There are five full-body checks. A group of women from Gujarat is on a pilgrimage. They will go from here to Nepal. "We’ve come to take Ram’s darshan. There used to be a mosque nearby but went long ago," explains Sushilaben Kanojia of Rajkot.
After walking for several minutes inside what feels like a labyrinth, devotees are deposited 10 feet away from a statue of Ram, Sita, Laxman and Bharat, a fence separating them from visitors. A sign reads 'Don't Wait Here’. The sanctum sanctorum is enveloped on all sides by a tent. This is where the Babri Masjid once stood. Not just the mosque, not even rubble is visible any more. Obviously, there is no Muslim worship here.
The first and only time that TOI saw or heard the word Babri all day was in a cramped two-room house where a 90-year-old man with a hearing aid was being harangued by journalists. ‘Babri Masjid Reconstruction Committee’ read the hand-painted words on the doorway to Mohammed Hashim Ansari’s house. One of the litigants, and the last surviving of the six who were on the same petition, Ansari demands that the court give its verdict soon. "At least in my lifetime," he says pleadingly, adding, "All of Ayodhya’s Muslims are waiting for this."
Bangle-seller Mohammed Arif’s family has lived here in the old city for four generations. "I was here when they broke the mosque and I saw the city aflame," he says softly and with no anger. "Everyone knows what happened. It was on TV. We don't want to stir up trouble. If that means not referring to the area as Babri any more, so be it," he says. Arif and his family have little interest in the verdict. "They can build a church if they want, I don't care," he says. But they’re all watching TV intently on the pavement outside his shop. "For news of trouble," says his teenaged daughter Saira.
"There are two parallel forces in the country, one that supports anarchy and one that supports the rule of law," says Khalid Ahmed, who heads the Helal Committee which offers legal help to the two disputing sides. "The first one gave its judgment on December 6, 1992, when it tore down the mosque, killed 17 Muslims in Ayodhya and burnt down 450 shops, punishing Muslims for the sins of their forefathers. We are still waiting for the judgment of the other force," says Ahmed.
(Courtesy:TOI)
Thousand years of Brihadeeswara Temple
An architectural wonder.
By V Shanmuganathan
The great emperor of Chola dynasty, Raja Raja-I built a majestic temple for Lord Shiva in Thanjavur (Tanjore), Tamil Nadu. Called Peruvuidayar Kovil, or Brihadeeswarar Temple, or sometimes Rajarajeswaram it is on rolls of the UNESCO heritage sites as part of the circuit called "Great Living Chola Temples".
Tamil Nadu remains as the wonderful resort of classical India whether it is temple architecture, dance, vocal or instrumental music. It hosts the oldest living temples in India, which remained unaffected by iconoclasm of Turks, Mughals and Bahmani invaders.
ONE thousand years ago, the great emperor of Chola dynasty, Raja Raja-I built a majestic temple for Lord Shiva in Thanjavur (Tanjore), Tamil Nadu. Called Peruvuidayar Kovil, or Brihadeeswarar Temple, or sometimes Rajarajeswaram it is on rolls of the UNESCO heritage sites as part of the circuit called "Great Living Chola Temples". The Tamil Nadu government recently organised a grand function, spanning over five days, to celebrate the millennium of its consecration. A scintillating Bharatnatyam recital by 1,000 artistes, led by eminent danseuse Padma Subrahmanyam, took the cream of the cake. A host of events including exhibitions, cultural shows, seminars and deliberations were also organised to mark the occasion.
Tamil Nadu remains as the wonderful resort of classical India whether it is temple architecture, dance, vocal or instrumental music. It hosts the oldest living temples in India, which remained unaffected by iconoclasm of Turks, Mughals and Bahmani invaders. Temples in ancient India were not merely centres of religion, but also art, culture, literature and vocational training. The Brihadeeswarar Temple stands as a reminder to our great culture, art, architecture, religion and language. It is also a symbol of the great wealth and prowess of Chola dynasty, which expanded its empire on Indian Ocean.
The construction of this ‘Big Temple’ begun in 1003 AD and was completed in six years before being consecrated in 1010 AD. The unique archaeological feature of the temple is its Vimana (temple tower) standing 216 feet tall. The summit stone weighing about eighty tons was dragged on to the top through a slope path from a distant Village, called ‘Sarapallam’. It rises over the sanctum, on a square base about a hundred feet, dominates the whole structure. Its shadow never falls on the ground.
The valiant king Raja Raja-I, who reigned between 985 and 1014 AD, was renowned for land and naval conquests. He found peace at the feet of Lord Shiva. The construction of Brihadeeshwara temple coincides with a visible shift in his policies from military expansion to internal administration. But here is a lesson for us. Neither he, nor his illustrious son Rajendra I (who built the famous Shiva temple at Gangaikonda Cholapuram similar in design to Brihadeeshwara temple) neglected external and internal security unlike some people, who weakened the martial spirit of India through.
The distinct feature of Brihadeeshwara temple is magnificent monolith Nandi bull, the mount of Lord Shiva, facing the temple tower. The shrine of goddess Brihanayaki, Ganapati, Subrmanya, Dakshinamurty, Nataraja are finely carved. The corridor surrounding the sanctum is a treasure chest of Chola painting and sculpture. The walls of this cave-like corridor were plastered with lime and used as a large canvas for the paintings.
The paintings, which have survived time and a seventeenth century coat of paint, are very beautiful in detail and colour and accuracy.
The story of Sundaramurthy Nayanar reaching Kailash on a white elephant is depicted on another wall. Karuvur Thevar, the Guru of Raja Raja is portrayed in an impressive manner. While the sculptures of Shiva in this corridor are imposing and colossal, the series of eighty one dance poses are superb illustrations of the Natya Sastra.
There is an interesting and popular story about the deep personal interest that the King evinced in the construction of the temple. It is said that one day, when the chief sculptor was deeply absorbed in chiseling the huge Nandi, King Raja Raja Chola went and stood by his side. The sculptor, thinking that it was his boy attendent standing by his side ordered him to prepare a pan (betel leaf with araca nut and lime). The king calmly obliged, folded a couple of betel leaves and handed it over to the sculptor who received it without seeing the hands that supplied them. Chewing the pan in his mouth, the sculptor started uttering words of praise, appreciating the king who planned this unique monument. Later he asked his attendant to bring the spitton near him. The king silently obeyed. When the sculptor raised his head after spitting the chewed betel leaves, he was terribly shocked to see the great Raja Raja Chola standing in front of him. Immediately he touched the feet of the king with tears and made an apology to the emperor, in a voice choked with emotion. The king, with a smiling face, lifted him up and consoled him by telling that it was a rare privilege for him to serve the sculptor whose hands chiseled the sculptures of the magnificent temple. Raja Raja Chola, though a worshiper of Shiva, at the same time, was tolerant to other religions.
He endowed and built temple of Maha Vishnu. He granted a village to the Buddhist Vihara at Nagappattinam. The Brihadeeswara temple was not an act of royal fancy. It is iconic of the glory of Tamil Saiva Siddhanta. Amongst two principal schools of Bhakti cult prevalent in South India, Saivism has a larger following.
In Tamil districts of Sri Lanka Saivism holds unchallenged sway. In Saiva Siddhanta Shiva is believed to exercise the functions of creation, protection, destruction, prevention from lapses is the result of enjoyment of one’s action and beneficent action. These functions He is said to discharge with a view to release the struggling souls from the bondage of karma, and present unto them the ultimate knowledge of Shiva. The goal of individual souls is to realise that it is made of Shiva-Tatva (element of Shiva), and though not merging in Shiva, remain at its feet like beloved child. The icon of Lord Nataraja is most symbolic of Saiva Siddhanta. Temple worship is an indispensable part of Saiva Siddhanta. That might explain why Tamilians have an image of orthodox and scrupulous temple goers.
Raja Raja Chola’s period was one of height of Saivism. This had been made possible by the surge of Shiva devotion brought by Nayanar saints in previous centuries. The heart melting hymns (Devaram) to Lord Shiva by Sambandar, Appar and Sundaramurthy as well as Manikkavasagar in the 9th century who wrote Tiruvasagam are worth hearing. They, in reality, were the pioneers of Bhakti movement that later swept across other parts of India in the medieval age.
He was an extra ordinarily powerful king and a grand monrch of southern India. His army crossed the ocean by ships and conquered many islands. His was a versatile personality. It is a matter of pride that Tanjore temple attracted the appreciation of UNESCO for its art and architecture. Brihadeeswara Temple, is the shining jewel in the crown of Bharatmata. No doubt, it is, Tamil Nadu’s contribution to the pride of India. Let us all celebrate this one thousand years architectural wonder.
By V Shanmuganathan
The great emperor of Chola dynasty, Raja Raja-I built a majestic temple for Lord Shiva in Thanjavur (Tanjore), Tamil Nadu. Called Peruvuidayar Kovil, or Brihadeeswarar Temple, or sometimes Rajarajeswaram it is on rolls of the UNESCO heritage sites as part of the circuit called "Great Living Chola Temples".
Tamil Nadu remains as the wonderful resort of classical India whether it is temple architecture, dance, vocal or instrumental music. It hosts the oldest living temples in India, which remained unaffected by iconoclasm of Turks, Mughals and Bahmani invaders.
ONE thousand years ago, the great emperor of Chola dynasty, Raja Raja-I built a majestic temple for Lord Shiva in Thanjavur (Tanjore), Tamil Nadu. Called Peruvuidayar Kovil, or Brihadeeswarar Temple, or sometimes Rajarajeswaram it is on rolls of the UNESCO heritage sites as part of the circuit called "Great Living Chola Temples". The Tamil Nadu government recently organised a grand function, spanning over five days, to celebrate the millennium of its consecration. A scintillating Bharatnatyam recital by 1,000 artistes, led by eminent danseuse Padma Subrahmanyam, took the cream of the cake. A host of events including exhibitions, cultural shows, seminars and deliberations were also organised to mark the occasion.
Tamil Nadu remains as the wonderful resort of classical India whether it is temple architecture, dance, vocal or instrumental music. It hosts the oldest living temples in India, which remained unaffected by iconoclasm of Turks, Mughals and Bahmani invaders. Temples in ancient India were not merely centres of religion, but also art, culture, literature and vocational training. The Brihadeeswarar Temple stands as a reminder to our great culture, art, architecture, religion and language. It is also a symbol of the great wealth and prowess of Chola dynasty, which expanded its empire on Indian Ocean.
The construction of this ‘Big Temple’ begun in 1003 AD and was completed in six years before being consecrated in 1010 AD. The unique archaeological feature of the temple is its Vimana (temple tower) standing 216 feet tall. The summit stone weighing about eighty tons was dragged on to the top through a slope path from a distant Village, called ‘Sarapallam’. It rises over the sanctum, on a square base about a hundred feet, dominates the whole structure. Its shadow never falls on the ground.
The valiant king Raja Raja-I, who reigned between 985 and 1014 AD, was renowned for land and naval conquests. He found peace at the feet of Lord Shiva. The construction of Brihadeeshwara temple coincides with a visible shift in his policies from military expansion to internal administration. But here is a lesson for us. Neither he, nor his illustrious son Rajendra I (who built the famous Shiva temple at Gangaikonda Cholapuram similar in design to Brihadeeshwara temple) neglected external and internal security unlike some people, who weakened the martial spirit of India through.
The distinct feature of Brihadeeshwara temple is magnificent monolith Nandi bull, the mount of Lord Shiva, facing the temple tower. The shrine of goddess Brihanayaki, Ganapati, Subrmanya, Dakshinamurty, Nataraja are finely carved. The corridor surrounding the sanctum is a treasure chest of Chola painting and sculpture. The walls of this cave-like corridor were plastered with lime and used as a large canvas for the paintings.
The paintings, which have survived time and a seventeenth century coat of paint, are very beautiful in detail and colour and accuracy.
The story of Sundaramurthy Nayanar reaching Kailash on a white elephant is depicted on another wall. Karuvur Thevar, the Guru of Raja Raja is portrayed in an impressive manner. While the sculptures of Shiva in this corridor are imposing and colossal, the series of eighty one dance poses are superb illustrations of the Natya Sastra.
There is an interesting and popular story about the deep personal interest that the King evinced in the construction of the temple. It is said that one day, when the chief sculptor was deeply absorbed in chiseling the huge Nandi, King Raja Raja Chola went and stood by his side. The sculptor, thinking that it was his boy attendent standing by his side ordered him to prepare a pan (betel leaf with araca nut and lime). The king calmly obliged, folded a couple of betel leaves and handed it over to the sculptor who received it without seeing the hands that supplied them. Chewing the pan in his mouth, the sculptor started uttering words of praise, appreciating the king who planned this unique monument. Later he asked his attendant to bring the spitton near him. The king silently obeyed. When the sculptor raised his head after spitting the chewed betel leaves, he was terribly shocked to see the great Raja Raja Chola standing in front of him. Immediately he touched the feet of the king with tears and made an apology to the emperor, in a voice choked with emotion. The king, with a smiling face, lifted him up and consoled him by telling that it was a rare privilege for him to serve the sculptor whose hands chiseled the sculptures of the magnificent temple. Raja Raja Chola, though a worshiper of Shiva, at the same time, was tolerant to other religions.
He endowed and built temple of Maha Vishnu. He granted a village to the Buddhist Vihara at Nagappattinam. The Brihadeeswara temple was not an act of royal fancy. It is iconic of the glory of Tamil Saiva Siddhanta. Amongst two principal schools of Bhakti cult prevalent in South India, Saivism has a larger following.
In Tamil districts of Sri Lanka Saivism holds unchallenged sway. In Saiva Siddhanta Shiva is believed to exercise the functions of creation, protection, destruction, prevention from lapses is the result of enjoyment of one’s action and beneficent action. These functions He is said to discharge with a view to release the struggling souls from the bondage of karma, and present unto them the ultimate knowledge of Shiva. The goal of individual souls is to realise that it is made of Shiva-Tatva (element of Shiva), and though not merging in Shiva, remain at its feet like beloved child. The icon of Lord Nataraja is most symbolic of Saiva Siddhanta. Temple worship is an indispensable part of Saiva Siddhanta. That might explain why Tamilians have an image of orthodox and scrupulous temple goers.
Raja Raja Chola’s period was one of height of Saivism. This had been made possible by the surge of Shiva devotion brought by Nayanar saints in previous centuries. The heart melting hymns (Devaram) to Lord Shiva by Sambandar, Appar and Sundaramurthy as well as Manikkavasagar in the 9th century who wrote Tiruvasagam are worth hearing. They, in reality, were the pioneers of Bhakti movement that later swept across other parts of India in the medieval age.
He was an extra ordinarily powerful king and a grand monrch of southern India. His army crossed the ocean by ships and conquered many islands. His was a versatile personality. It is a matter of pride that Tanjore temple attracted the appreciation of UNESCO for its art and architecture. Brihadeeswara Temple, is the shining jewel in the crown of Bharatmata. No doubt, it is, Tamil Nadu’s contribution to the pride of India. Let us all celebrate this one thousand years architectural wonder.
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