Indian Interests

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SanjayC
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Re: Indian Interests

Post by SanjayC »

Britain took more out of India that it put in – could China do the same to Britain?
Large parts of India's economy were destroyed by British technology in the 1800s, and by deals that favoured British shareholders. Today, it's China that holds that kind of power
putnanja
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Re: Indian Interests

Post by putnanja »

Security briefings on PM agenda
New Delhi, June 23: Prime Minister Narendra Modi will take monthly briefings from each of the three military chiefs turning on its head the UPA’s policy of keeping the armed forces away from the centre of decision-making on security policy.

For successive years military veterans have complained that the top brass was not adequately consulted by the government despite the inputs they could give in assessing security situations.
...
...
Prem
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Re: Indian Interests

Post by Prem »

Avarachan
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Re: Indian Interests

Post by Avarachan »

SanjayC wrote:
schinnas wrote:SanjayC -
Not sure if you are really aware of the dynamics between Church and gays. Church is the big enemy for gay rights movements. I had a hearty laugh when I read your theory that church is instigating gay rights movements. Besides 377 is NOT exclusively about gay rights or gay sex. You are over-dosing on CTs here..
Dude, you have no clue about how Western imperialism works. America is the sworn enemy of communists but has no problem in creating communist / Maoist movements in other countries to destabilize them. Nepal's Maoists and Latin American leftist guerrillas are CIA creations. I may detest shit but I won't have any problem in picking it up and rubbing it on the face of my enemies if it serves my purpose. America is sworn enemy of Islamic terrorists too -- did it have any problem in creating Taliban to screw USSR in Afghanistan?
SanjayC, you are correct. The book that really opened up my eyes to this is Mark Curtis's "Secret Affairs: Britain's Collusion with Radical Islam." It's a sober, professional work; Curtis quotes British diplomatic cables which discuss this strategy explicitly.
LINK

In terms of the games that the Roman Catholic Church plays, I would recommend reading this article by Saker about the creation of Ukraine. http://vineyardsaker.blogspot.com/2014/ ... s-and.html
Prem
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Re: Indian Interests

Post by Prem »

16 Facts About India That Will Blow Your Mind
http://www.businessinsider.com/mindblow ... z35aI6Gli8


India's road network is long enough to loop around Earth over 117 times and more.
abhishek_sharma
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Re: Indian Interests

Post by abhishek_sharma »

Once upon an Emergency: Inder Malhotra

Thirty-nine years ago, on this day, began India’s tryst with despotism.
abhishek_sharma
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Re: Indian Interests

Post by abhishek_sharma »

Image

from facebook
Rony
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Re: Indian Interests

Post by Rony »

Hinduism is not just a faith, says Pranab
Hinduism is not just a faith, President Pranab Mukherjee said Monday, as he received a copy of the "Encyclopaedia of Hinduism" at an inter-religious gathering.

Speaking on the occasion, Mukherjee complimented Swami Chidanand Saraswatiji of the Parmarth Niketan for undertaking the "massive effort" of bringing out the encyclopaedia.

Swami Saraswatiji is the founder chairman of India Heritage Research Foundation,

The president said that Hindu religious philosophy identified 'dharma', 'artha', 'kama' and 'moksh' as the foremost objectives of a human being, a Rashtrapati Bhavan communique said.

Quoting former president and noted philosopher S.Radhakrishnan, Mukherjee said Hinduism was not just a faith, but the union of reason and intuition that cannot be defined but is only to be experienced.

He said the basic tenet of Hinduism was happiness, health and enlightenment for everyone and suffering, pain and agony for none.

The president quoted Mahatma Gandhi to say: "If I were asked to define the Hindu creed, I should simply say: Search after truth through non-violent means. A man may not believe in God and still call himself a Hindu.

"Hinduism is a relentless pursuit after truth? Hinduism is the religion of truth. Truth is God. Denial of God we have known. Denial of truth we have not known."


Among the dignitaries present on the occasion were BJP leaders L.K. Advani, ministers Ravi Shankar Prasad and Uma Bharti, Karan Singh, chairman of Auroville Foundation, Swami Saraswatiji and R.K. Pachauri, head of TERI.

Among the religious leaders present on the occasion were Acharya Lokesh Muni, Fr Anil Jose Tomas Couto, the Archbishop of Delhi, Maulana Kalbe Sadiq, the vice president of the Muslim Personal Law Board, Giani Gurubachan Singh, the chief Jathedar of Akal Takht, and Sadhvi Bhagawati Saraswati.

Hinduism Losing its Sheen in India, Says Marulasiddappa
Writer and critic Dr K Marulasiddappa on Tuesday expressed concern that India is losing its hold on cultural values and failing to uphold the principles of Hindu religion.

At the launch of the book ‘Hindudharma Pathanada Hadiyalli’, the Kannada translation of Dr S Bhimmappa’s English book ‘India Towards Islam’ by Prof G Sharanappa, he said, “Those who wave the Hinduism’s flag are the ones who are responsible for its downfall.”

“The book is a knowledge bank on Hindu religion. We have to look into the past to understand the current scenario of the country,” he said.

Criticising the caste system, Marulasiddappa said: “The biggest reason for the downfall of Hinduism is caste system. If it is eliminated, the religion will prosper. Reservation system should be given a second thought. If the reservation increases, there is a problem for Hindus.”

Islam is becoming popular and this is a cause of concern. By 2017, India will have 20.2 per cent Muslims, by 2151 it would have increased to 31 per cent and 2201 they would be a majority,” he said.
Prem
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Re: Indian Interests

Post by Prem »

One Quarter Of India Is Turning Into Desert
( Plantimg 2 Billion Trees is step in right direction)

http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2014/0 ... ia-desert/
According to Forbes, in 2007, India’s Council of Scientific and Industrial Research predicted that by 2050 a little less than 10 percent of the country would have desertified beyond use. Javadekar’s estimate puts the country ahead of schedule — in the worst way — by about 100 to 140 years.“Land is becoming barren, degradation is happening,” Javadekar told The Economic Times. “A lot of areas are on the verge of becoming deserts.”The desertification numbers released by the environment minister match with a report by the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD) Secretariat which estimated that 81.45 million hectares, or 24.8 percent of the country’s geographic area, is undergoing desertification. Recent heat waves across several northern and eastern Indian states over the last month have killed hundreds and caused widespread power outages and riots. In a sign of the times, authorities in northern India last week ordered the closure of a Coca-Cola bottling plant, citing water shortages.India receives 80 percent of its precipitation during the monsoon season, which usually stretches from the beginning of June through September. But over just the last 50 years, as the climate has warmed, the monsoon has become increasingly erratic and interspersed with extreme weather events that can lead to deadly flooding when parched areas are suddenly hit with massive amounts of rain. A 2009 report by the Indian Meteorological Department’s Mumbai office found that temperatures in the city had risen by 1.62°C over the last 100 years and that there has been a tripling of natural disasters compared to the 1960s. This year, the monsoons arrived on India’s southwest coast about a week later than usual. Currently, the rains have spread to about half of the country, but many areas are still waiting for relief and even in the areas where rain has begun to fall, it is still less than normal. The India Meteorological Department (IMD), focused on the so far weak and tardy monsoon in its latest report on the situation in the country. Rainfall from June 1-18 has been deficient across India — on average, 45 percent less than usual. Rainfall was 53 percent below the average in northwest India. In many areas of the country, conditions are on par with those of June in 2009, which was the worst drought to strike the country in 30 years. The 2014 monsoon was predicted to be weaker than normal, and if El Niño does continue to develop, the rains could be even less. Ten of India’s last 13 droughts occurred in El Niño years.
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Re: Indian Interests

Post by chetak »

TOWARDS RECIPROCITY
By reaching out dramatically to our neighbours and other major powers so rapidly after winning the general election, has Narendra Modi been unusually pro-active or unexpectedly defensive? Inviting immediate neighbours and Mauritius to the swearing-in ceremony is out-of-the-box thinking that underlines the importance India intends attaching to improved relations with neighbours and to ties of kinship with more distant countries with sizeable populations of Indian origin. Affirming India’s natural leadership of our region might also have been in mind. All this would be in tune with Modi’s inspired style of functioning.

On the other hand, for 12 years Modi has been ceaselessly projected as a divisive, communal and polarizing figure by the political class, the media and intellectuals in India. This campaign has also tarnished his image in similar circles abroad. Conscious of this image-deficit, Modi may have wanted to immediately disarm concerns about his ascension to power by going out of the way to signal moderation and willingness to engage without prejudice. How will this unforeseen political messaging be understood abroad? Some, sceptical about Modi, may see in these tactical moves to first shape external opinion favourably by acting contrary to expectations and then, with the political space created, pursue India’s interests vigorously in line with the “India First” ideology.

Others, more open-minded, may see Modi’s moves reflecting a sense of responsibility that normally accompanies power. They would reason that Modi could be a divisive figure to win elections but has to be a unifying figure to govern successfully, especially given his development focus that can get blurred if peace and stability are disturbed inside and outside the country. His early initiatives could thus be construed as well-considered steps to stabilize India’s external environment and alter the perception that as a strong, decisive and politically combative person he will be a problematic interlocutor.

If Modi is right in wanting to give priority to the economy, improve investment sentiment and revive growth, and to this end pursue conciliatory policies, the question remains how far he can go in this direction. Can conciliatory policies be sustained if others expect their demands to be met but are unwilling to respond to our concerns? A related question is whether our seeming anxiety to remove the apprehensions of others might actually reduce pressure on them to accommodate a presumably more assertive government in New Delhi. Looked at differently, would they not have reason, as before, to press India for concessions while they make none themselves?

China’s alacrity in engaging the Modi government, for instance, is without promise of moving forward on the border issue. The Chinese foreign minister, in spite of the opportunity given him to be the first foreign leader to greet the new government, has almost mockingly dismissed our objections to the stapled visas regime for Arunachalis by calling it a “goodwill gesture” — a flexible “special arrangement”, which does not undermine or compromise “our respective positions” on “big parts” of disputed territory. This hollows out the relevant guiding principle for border settlement against disturbing settled populations. China’s strategy is to consolidate border management mechanisms that would limit, in its view, provocative patrolling by India while they have freedom of action in areas they consider incontestable. Its declared aim is to reduce the impact of border differences on bilateral relations to the “minimum level”.

China’s conduct does not merit the positive way in which we officially project our bilateral ties. Our strategic partnership is not founded on Chinese friendship and goodwill. On the contrary, China is most responsible for strategically damaging us gravely by arming Pakistan with nuclear and missile technologies. Its policies in the rest of our neighbourhood undermine our interests. It is the only country, along with Pakistan, that has territorial claims on us. We are being drawn towards China because of its phenomenal economic success, not any alignment of regional interests. In the economic domain, too, we are not recipients of any Chinese largesse. China has limited our access to its domestic market; the trade gap last year of $31 billion is unsustainable. We now seem to be courting Chinese investment in infrastructure and industrial parks, for which Wang Yi expects “more preferential policies and investment facilitation for Chinese businesses”, implying no significant results for now. Based on existing ground realities and assessment of future Chinese policies, India and China, contrary to Wang Yi’s claim are not “natural partners”. Even a stronger economic relationship is no guarantee of the solidity of future ties as is shown by the China-Japan equation, which too is vitiated by territorial differences.

Getting the relationship back on track with the United States also does not mean addressing our concerns about its Pakistan policy, the lack of transparency in its dialogue with the Taliban, its new immigration law, the imposition of costs on our IT industry by hiking the fees for H1B and L1 visas, the lack of movement on the totalization agreement, the targeting of our trade, investment and policies on intellectual property rights in response to sectoral interests of select US corporations, closing the Devyani Khobragade case and removing Modi from the visa blacklist. It actually means that India is delivering on US demands, those of boosting the confidence of foreign businesses, lifting foreign investment caps in the insurance and defence sectors, placing more orders for US defence equipment, opening the market to US agricultural products, removing local content rules in certain product areas, revising our nuclear liability legislation and so on, with the the American vice-president’s mirage of a $500 billion annual India-US trade in the next five years in view.

In Pakistan’s case, too, the more we reach out to it, the more it expects us to make concessions. We have not been able to deal with this predicament because of our urge to engage Pakistan. Its long-standing narrative is that India blocks peace efforts by refusing to respond to its overtures, including not taking advantage of Nawaz Sharif’s declared goodwill towards us. Unsurprisingly, Pakistanis are complaining that Nawaz Sharif’s India visit has produced nothing substantial even though he defied the military and the Islamists to attend Modi’s swearing-in. Pakistan’s touchstone for progress in relations is a “result-oriented” dialogue on Kashmir, culling the “low-hanging” fruit of Siachen and Sir Creek, addressing Pakistan’s water-related concerns, without it delivering on terrorism, trials of those responsible for the Mumbai massacre, curbing jihadi leaders or granting “most favoured nation” status to India. To finesse India’s desire to change the dialogue format, Nawaz Sharif has cleverly proposed raising the dialogue on Kashmir and terrorism to the political level, knowing that this will enable him to demonstrate success in enhancing the profile of the Kashmir issue and, as before, side-step India’s terrorism concerns by claiming that Pakistan is a bigger victim of terrorism. He also proposes joint mechanisms to deal with unfounded Indian accusations.

The new government is right to focus on the priority task of building a prosperous India in collaboration with all partners, existing and prospective. The challenge is to engage and obtain reciprocal responses from others, which is not assured unless our policies are backed by national strength.

The author is former foreign secretary of India sibalkanwal@gmail.com
Prem
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Re: Indian Interests

Post by Prem »

Bangalore With 26,453 New Workers Grows Tech Talent Faster Than Silicon Valley With 28,516 New Workers
http://www.forbes.com/sites/saritharai/ ... on-valley/
More software programmers moved to Bangalore, India’s technology hub, in the past year than the original Silicon Valley, says data by LinkedIn. While Bangalore clocked 44% new residents with technical talent, the San Francisco-Bay Area region had 31%.Along with Bangalore, its neighboring Chennai and Hyderabad, as well as Pune, further afield, were among the top global destinations for technical talent. Gurgaon, in the suburbs of Delhi was the sixth Indian city in the top 10.Silicon Valley came fifth, after the four Indian cities, and was followed by Seattle and Austin.
LinkedIn said in its official blog that it mined data from over 300 million member profiles to identify the 52 top cities across the globe.“For the 52 cities we looked at, the median percentage of new residents with tech skills was 16% or just under 1 in 6. Several Indian cities were clocking in more than double that,” the blog said.In absolute numbers, Bangalore with 26,453 new technology workers is just behind Silicon Valley with its 28,516 workers. But the Bay Area has a higher level of companies doing more complex technology work. The sophistication levels of talent in the two cities are quite different. Further, the cost of living in Silicon Valley makes it an exclusive club that the average technology worker might find difficult to penetrate.Nevertheless, it is impressive that Bangalore is a magnet for technology talent in comparable numbers to the Valley, said Sanjay Swamy, managing partner at Angel Prime, a seed stage venture capital fund headquartered in Bangalore. “There is very high caliber of startups happening in Bangalore in the past couple of years, a dramatic improvement since even 2010,” he said. With cloud and mobile-based distribution, access to customers and the ability to provide similar customers, there is very little difference whether a company is based in Bangalore or San Francisco, he said.Srivatsa Krishna, the IT Secretary of the government of Karnataka of which Bangalore is the capital, said the city would overtake Silicon Valley by 2020 in having the highest number of technology workers on the planet, some 2 million of them. “The overall ecosystem is a magnet that attracts young technology talent,” he said
harbans
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Re: Indian Interests

Post by harbans »

This is a 2012 article on the National herald case and well explained:

It is a criminal Fraud
Rony
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Re: Indian Interests

Post by Rony »

Blackboard turns 'green' in classroom, sparks protest in Kerala
A blackboard has been replaced by "green board" in a primary school in Malappuram district in Kerala, sparking protests from different quarters since green is the colour of the flag of Indian Union Muslim League (IUML) whose representative is the education minister.

It was in the Government Upper Primary School in Kakkad in Tirur where the blackboard in a classroom was replaced as part of the infrastructure development work taken up with the support of the MLA's development fund.

While the League leaders dismissed the decision as having any political bearing, former education minister and CPM leader M A Baby took exception to it."In a democratic society, it would be wrong to take decisions unilaterally and without being bothered about their fallout," Baby said.

Justifying the decision, IUML MLA from Tirur, C Mammootty, said the "greenboard" concept was thought of since it was more visually pleasing than blackboard."It is unfortunate that an unnecessary controversy is being kicked up by certain quarters over this. The idea of greenboard was thought of as part of improving the academic standard and physical infrastructure of the schools in the area to international standards," Mamootty told PTI.He said it was the global trend to make everything 'green" as the shade associated with the nature and in many campuses around the world there is a switch over to green boards.
devesh
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Re: Indian Interests

Post by devesh »


yes yes. Hinduism is ether in the sky. it has no form. no shape. no structure. it just exists, but doesn't exist. it's there, but invisible. it flies with the wind without making a sound.

Bullshit. this is how the very State that rules the Hindus is not in Hindu hands.
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Re: Indian Interests

Post by abhishek_sharma »

Coomi Kapoor's Column
Chinese Check

The Japanese government is upset with Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s decision to postpone his visit to Japan. It was expected to be Modi’s first major official meeting with a foreign head of government since taking office. The Japanese, incidentally, learnt of the postponement from the Indian media. The official reason for re-scheduling the PM’s trip is that Modi would not have been able to make any substantial policy offers just days before the Budget. However, the Japanese suspect the hand of China behind the postponed visit, since Chinese President Xi Jinping is scheduled to meet Modi at the BRICS summit in Brazil on July 15-16. The Japanese are not the only ones upset by the PM’s changed plans. The RSS also noted with concern that the Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi took a full hour with the PM rather than the customary 15 minutes during his recent visit to the capital. They fears the PM is too enamoured of China, whom the Sangh views with great suspicion.

Sip of water

The CBI probe into the death of Maharashtra leader Gopinath Munde is likely to reveal that it was a sip of water, given to Munde at his own request, after the accident on Prithviraj Road, which became the cause for his death. Due to the impact of the Tata Indica which slammed into the Maruti Swift in which he was travelling, Munde’s cervical vertebra suffered a fracture between C1 and C2 vertebrae. It is at this joint at the base of the skull through which the vertebral artery, which supplies blood to the brain, passes. The artery was lacerated due to the spinal cord fracture. When Munde’s head was eased back so he could drink water, the neck, already in a fragile condition, snapped. At least this is what the AIIMS trauma centre believes caused his death.

Monkey menace

Now that he is the Finance Minister, it has become difficult for Arun Jaitley to take his daily walks in Lodhi Gardens. On his walk, he is accosted by all manner of favour-seekers who have requests for jobs, transfers and postings. The minister who is to move into 2, Krishna Menon Marg, may shift his morning walk to the spacious confines of the Lutyens bungalow that has been allotted to him. The compound has a special walking track built by its previous occupant, Sushil Kumar Shinde. Incidentally, the road is notorious for monkeys, which create a major nuisance in the area. This is reportedly the reason why former solicitor general Mohan Parasaran didn’t move into the house earmarked for solicitor generals on the same road. The new Solicitor General Ranjit Kumar is now in a dilemma on whether to move into his official quarters.

Forgotten territory

West Asian envoys are a tad miffed since President Pranab Mukherjee’s address to the joint session of Parliament failed to make any reference to India’s relations with countries in the region. Previous such addresses have always made a mention of India’s close ties with these countries. The slip may not have been deliberate but the slight has been compounded by the fact that Narendra Modi has not yet had the time to reply personally to the congratulatory notes from leaders of this region following his election as the PM.

Room reservation

For several years, Room No. 1 of the guesthouse of the Cochin Port Trust in Kochi had been reserved for just one person. The room has a stunning view of the harbour, but permission was usually denied to bureaucrats, politicians or foreign dignitaries who wished to stay there, even when it was vacant. This was because there was a standing instruction from the PMO to keep the room reserved for T K A Nair, the former principal secretary to Manmohan Singh. Nair is also Chairman of the office of the Cochin Port Trust. Now that he is no longer in the PMO, perhaps the coveted room can be allotted to other guests as well.

Briefing day

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has changed the day for Cabinet meetings from Thursday to Wednesday. He has also set a new tradition. He has informed President Pranab Mukherjee that he will brief him about new decisions in the government every alternate Thursday.

Also a victim

The Independent Evaluation Office, which released a report this week suggesting the virtual scrapping of the Planning Commission and that the responsibility of allocation of funds which is now with the Planning Commission should be vested with the Finance Ministry, is itself a victim of the Planning Commission’s ‘high-handedness’. It has not received funds for the last several months. :mrgreen:
Rony
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Re: Indian Interests

Post by Rony »

Poor Muslim women want an end 4 wives and triple talaq. The middle class / educated Muslims support it.

No second wife, please
Of the seven years taken to arrive at this draft, two were spent talking to Muslim women, most of them poor, uneducated and living in ghettos. It was these women who were desperate for a change, urging the BMMA to “quickly change the law, get us justice.”

But the middle class, supposed to be the pioneer for reform, left Noorjehan disillusioned. A US-returned Muslim in Hyderabad baulked at the BMMA’s proposal to make 18 and 21 the minimum age of marriage for women and men respectively. “It should be 18 for both,” she suggested. Muslim male lawyers in Karnataka saw nothing wrong in a 13-year-old getting married as long as she had attained puberty. But in the bylanes of Bhopal, uneducated Muslim women suggested 21 and 25 instead. “Our daughters graduate at 21,” they pointed out.

“Middle class Muslims kept saying: ‘Don’t tamper too much with the shariat.’ They have well-off families and education to fall back on; the unjust decisions of qazis don’t affect them much,’’ explains Noorjehan. What kept the BMMA going was the response of poor women.
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Re: Indian Interests

Post by ramana »

X_post.....
Brad Goodman wrote:Zukerberg himself needs to create something else(facebook is dying). Indian versions of FB and Twitter are bad idea. For chinese they work due to combination of things. Unlimited money provided by CCP to create these sites. Internet censorship to make like impossible to use FB & Twitter and language handicap. In India all these conditions fail. Even if someone copes entire source code of these sites and creates an indian version no indian would touch it with long pole. Our people want to be there Americans and Europeans are. We are too different from Russians and Chinese.
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Re: Indian Interests

Post by Pratyush »

Rony wrote:Poor Muslim women want an end 4 wives and triple talaq. The middle class / educated Muslims support it.

No second wife, please
Reading the article above, it seems that the poor are more pragmatic and can take more balanced decisions. In order to better them selves. I hope that the right people draw the right conclusions from it and are able with the support of the poor people, execute a change in the conditions faced by such poor people.
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Re: Indian Interests

Post by abhishek_sharma »

Coomi Kapoor's column
Achche din for DD

The present regime has been avoiding private media and is instead focusing on Doordarshan. In fact, it seems to be a return to the old days when DD was the favoured one and sometimes the only news medium allowed at functions attended by the prime minister. These days, even ANI TV, DD’s usual rival, is missing from the PM’s programmes. When External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj visited Bangladesh recently, only official and semi-official media were part of the accompanying press party. Similarly, private media was not permitted to fly with Petroleum Minister Dharmendra Pradhan to Moscow for the World Petroleum Conference. Environment Minister Prakash Javadekar didn’t take journalists with him to Nairobi for the World Climate Conference, reportedly on Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s instructions. Modi did not invite journalists on his trip to Bhutan though his plane was flying half-empty. So far, the PMO has not asked the private media to fly with the Prime Minister to the BRICS summit in Brazil beginning July 14.

Mega park for Kashi

Modi has ambitious plans for his Varanasi constituency. He wants to set up a special amusement park. But this will be no Disneyland for children. Instead, it will showcase the art and culture of the different states of India. Modi is paying special attention to not just his constituency but to the entire state of Uttar Pradesh which played a big role in his party’s victory in the recent parliamentary election. P K Mishra, additional principal secretary in the PMO, has been designated as the point-person for all requests from MPs and MLAs for development projects in the state.

EC divided

The Election Commission presided over by CEC V S Sampath met earlier this week. One of the issues discussed was the culpability of former Maharashtra CM Ashok Chavan in the paid news scam. Chavan is accused of omitting from his declared election expenses the money he paid to certain newspapers for carrying flattering write-ups about himself during the last Assembly elections. But there was no unanimity in the Commission about whether Chavan, now an MP, could be disqualified for allegedly violating the law.

Blatant salesman

French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius held a press conference for the Indian media during his visit last week. While winding up his conference, Fabius announced that he had a surprise for the journalists. He introduced a French businessman who had invented an iPhone app which, he said, would be of use to Indian tourists visiting France. The application translates Hindi into French, and has information on tourist sites and other useful data. The Ministry of External Affairs was taken aback that the French minister was blatantly plugging for a private corporation. In India, a minister speaking on behalf of a private entrepreneur would have immediately attracted a barrage of criticism.

Lucky strike rate

With five BJP spokespersons being elevated as ministers — Ravi Shankar Prasad, Smriti Irani, Nirmala Sitharaman, Prakash Javadekar and Piyush Goyal — party members realise the spokesperson’s job is the quickest route to greater glory. The other national party spokespersons — Shahnawaz Hussain, Sudhanshu Trivedi, Bhupendra Yadav and Meenakshi Lekhi — are hoping that some luck would rub off on them as well. In fact, Lekhi, MP from New Delhi, nurses ambitions of being projected as the party’s chief ministerial candidate for Delhi. Trivedi, a close associate of Home Minister Rajnath Singh, has opted to continue as a spokesperson rather than becoming an aide to Singh in the ministry, a position he held the last time Singh was a minister in the Vajpayee regime.

Shahenshah Modi

The delay over the announcement of Amit Shah as BJP president is because a section in the RSS believes that if Shah leads the party, power will be concentrated in Narendra Modi’s hands. The Sangh feels that an individual should not be more important than the organisation. There are several people in the BJP who secretly share the belief that Modi’s writ will go completely unchallenged if his right-hand man is appointed head of the party. Though it is clear that Shah has the requisite organisational skills — as is evident from the party’s victory in UP — and his rivals for the post are not as dynamic, there are a number of senior leaders in the BJP who are working behind the scenes against Shah. Rajnath Singh and Nitin Gadkari are part of the team which has to take a final call in the matter.
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Re: Indian Interests

Post by nawabs »

Patients have become consumers and they are the losers: Dr Samiran Nundy

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Home ... 875974.cms
Dr Nundy, chairman of the department of surgical gastroenterology and organ transplantation at Sir Ganga Ram Hospital and editor-in-chief of the journal, Current Medicine Research and Practice, stirred a hornet's nest with his recent editorial on corruption in healthcare in India in the British Medical Journal. The editorial exposed the widespread practice of doctors taking cuts for referrals and pre scribing unnecessary investigations and procedures for profit. Dr Nundy talks to Rema Nagarajan about the urgent need to fight this corruption to deliver trustworthy and quality healthcare to the people.

Corruption in healthcare is not new. Why did you choose to write about it now?

The corruption existed, but I guess I thought nothing could be done about it.

Most people think, why get involved when nothing will come of it. Then I saw the Australian doctor's article about his experience of widespread corruption while practicing in India. And I thought I ought to do something as, at this stage in life, I have little to lose in life, I have little to lose by sticking my neck out.

Do you think things can change?

There is tremendous hope. After my article, many senior doctors called me to say they want to join me in a movement against corruption in medi cine. To begin with, the Medical Council of India (MCI), currently an exclusive club of doctors, has to be reconstituted. Half the members must be lay people like teach ers, social workers and patient groups like the General Medical Council in Britain where, if a doctor is found to be corrupt, he is booted out by the council.

How do doctors get away by doing unnecessary procedures?

Audits of all procedures and interventions done in each department ought to be mandatory. It does not happen here. In the US and the UK surgical departments cannot get certified for training unless they have such regular audits in place. Computerization of records is very important. Doctors have to be taught how to use the electronic system so that all transactions with the patient can be recorded. Nowadays doctors only write prescriptions. Most doctors don't write patient history -what examination was done, investigations carried out, diagnosis and the modality of treatment decided upon.

That makes it easy to track the treatment.

Has the corruption and cut system become worse?

I have been practicing in India since 1976. After the first 21 years in AIIMS, when I shifted to the private sector I was told that I would have to wine and dine the general practitioners (GPs) every Friday as every one got patients referred to them through the GP system. That informal system has been transformed into the cut system with the corporatization of health. Now, marketing managers work on the patients.

Patients have become consumers and they are the losers.

What can be done when majority of the people access healthcare through the private sector?

You cannot ban private practice but you need to regulate it strictly. I believe the patient has the right to choose a doctor charging Rs 100 or Rs 1,000. For instance, a person might choose to eat in the dhaba or in a fivestar, but the quality of food in both places has to be regulated.

What is the fallout of corporatization?

If you are paid more than you think you are worth, you are in big trouble. Working in the corporate sector is a nightmare. They offer crores of rupees as salary. But the small print in the contract says the salary will be reviewed in six months to see if the doctor is able to bring in the money expected. I have heard of people whose salaries went down by 30% after such reviews and some were even forced to leave because they could not deliver the profits expected. They have financial experts who ask doctors to justify the salaries they are being paid, especially if the revenue they have generated for the hospital from investigations and operations falls short of the targets set for them. There are even places where one-third of the doctor's salary is taken away for marketing and they are forced to give talks to GPs and canvass them to send patients.

Why do doctors allow such practices?

It is all very well for an established practitioner like me to pontificate. I am established and I was privileged as I came to the private sector after 21 years in AIIMS. What about young doctors who are starting out? What can they do? The corporate hospitals are the dominant employers. This is happening in top hospitals. No doctor likes this, but they have no choice.

We need to ask ourselves, what kind of a system are we offering our young doctors? Is it possible for them to stay honest in such a system?
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Re: Indian Interests

Post by Ardeshir »

A pampered lot: why India gives NRIs special status
In Britain recently I came across two groups of NRIs who are trying to interfere and I believe their interference should concern Indians back home.
On the 30th anniversary of Operation Bluestar I found myself trying to inject some balance and reason into a radio-phone in discussing that incident. Agitated British Sikhs who are attempting to get the British government to demand a United Nations inquiry into the events of 1984 denied that Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale had committed any wrong. On the contrary several Sikhs who phoned-in were surprised I didn’t believe that the government had been planning Operation Bluestar for some time as a deliberate attack on their community. They even made the bizarre allegation that the drug problem in Punjab had been created by the government, claiming that the state has been deliberately “flooded with drugs” so that young Sikh men would fall victim to drug-addiction rather than revive the Khalistan movement.
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The second interference in Indian affairs by NRIs was an attempt by 75 academics, most of Indian origin, judging by their names, teaching in British or other foreign universities, to influence the outcome of the recent general elections. In their letter published in the Independent, a national daily, the academics expressed “deep concern at the implications of a Narendra Modi-led government for democracy, pluralism, and human rights in India”. Academics are expected to be balanced but this letter was wholly one-sided. The academics recalled the “extreme violence by the Hindu right in Gujarat in 2002” but they didn’t mention the findings of the Special Investigation Team set up by the Supreme Court. They condemned Modi as authoritarian and described his economic model as being linked to big business and “harmful to the poor”. They didn’t examine the other side of the argument about the Gujarat model, nor did they mention that Modi had won three assembly elections and therefore the people of his state, who are the people on the ground, would appear to judge his performance rather differently from the academics living outside India.
There is an element of irresponsibility in expatriates publicly taking up extreme positions on what is happening in their own country. There is an air of condescension about the academics’ letter also. It smacks of that assumption of superiority that I sometimes note among NRIs — the assumption that because they are successful in a country like Britain or America they are superior to those who have stayed behind.
Excellent article by Mark Tully.
devesh
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Re: Indian Interests

Post by devesh »

Mark Tully has also written other "excellent" articles over the years. If you want to criticize NRI's at least pick an Indian as your mouthpiece. Not this British migrant.

Very few of these Europeans settled in India should actually even be considered as Indian.
JE Menon
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Re: Indian Interests

Post by JE Menon »

^^Disagree. Every European who has settled and received an Indian passport should be considered Indian, until the opposite is seen in legal light.

We want the same to apply to Indians settled in Europe.

More than most, Tully has understood India and Indians. On some issues it would appear his positions are more right of centre than some of us on the forum. This man is a far cry from someone like Dalpymple...
Ardeshir
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Re: Indian Interests

Post by Ardeshir »

Devesh, I find no reason to pick an NRI as a "mouthpiece". As JE Menon said, his being of British descent is irrelevant here. He has made this country his home, and I find absolutely nothing wrong with the article. What lines from it do you actually disagree with?
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Re: Indian Interests

Post by sivab »

http://indiatoday.intoday.in/breakingnews.html
India accepts UN court verdict giving 25,000 sq miles to Bangladesh
India accepts UN Tribunal verdict that awarded 25,000 square miles to Bangladesh, MEA spokesman Syed Akbaruddin says 'we respect verdict of tribunal and are in process of studying award and implication'.
SSridhar
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Re: Indian Interests

Post by SSridhar »

The Hindu says,
. . . . with a United Nations tribunal awarding Bangladesh 19,467 sq. km of the 25,602 sq. km sea area of the Bay of Bengal.
Under provisions of UNCLOS, the award is final and binding. No appeal is possible.
ramana
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Re: Indian Interests

Post by ramana »

Thanks to Pulekeshi for the article in Hindu

A 1000 year old Constitution from Cholas


Highlighting relevant and timeless precepts in the code which would have eliminated quite few indbags and charlatans in last elections.
Constitution 1,000 years ago
T.S.SUBRAMANIAM

A perfect electoral system existed, inscriptions found in Uthiramerur reveal.

Photos: S. Thanthoni

OUTSTANDING DOCUMENT: The mantapa of the Vaikuntaperumal temple.


It may be hard to believe that nearly 1,100 years ago, a village had a perfect electoral system and a written Constitution prescribing the mode of elections. It was inscribed on the walls of the village assembly (grama sabha mandapa), which was a re ctangular structure made of granite slabs. “This inscription, dated around 920 A.D. in the reign of Parantaka Chola, is an outstanding document in the history of India,” says Dr. R. Nagaswamy, former Director, Tamil Nadu Department of Archaeology, referring to Uthiramerur in Chingleput district.

“It is a veritable written Constitution of the village assembly that functioned 1,000 years ago,” Dr. Nagaswamy says in his book, “Uthiramerur, the Historic Village in Tamil Nadu.” The book, in both Tamil and English, has been published by the Tamil Arts Academy, Chennai.

Dr. Nagaswamy says: “It [the inscription] gives astonishing details about the constitution of wards, the qualification of candidates standing for elections, the disqualification norms, the mode of election, the constitution of committees with elected members, the functions of [those] committees, the power to remove the wrong-doer, etc…”

And that is not all. “On the walls of the mandapa are inscribed a variety of secular transactions of the village, dealing with administrative, judicial, commercial, agricultural, transportation and irrigation regulations, as administered by the then village assembly, giving a vivid picture of the efficient administration of the village society in the bygone ages.” The villagers even had the right to recall the elected representatives if they failed in their duty!

It has a 1,250-year history

Uthiramerur has a 1,250-year history. It is situated in Kanchipuram district, about 90 km from Chennai. The Pallava king Nandivarman II established it around 750 A.D. It did exist earlier as a brahmin settlement. It was ruled by the Pallavas, the Cholas, the Pandyas, the Sambuvarayars, the Vijayanagara Rayas and the Nayaks. It has three important temples, the Sundara Varadaraja Perumal temple, the Subramanya temple and the Kailasanatha temple. Plans are under way for the conservation and restoration of the Kailasanatha temple, which is in ruins.

All the three temples have numerous inscriptions — those of the great Raja Raja Chola (985-1015 A.D.), his able son, Rajendra Chola and the Vijayanagar emperor Krishnadeva Raya. Both Rajendra Chola and Krishnadeva Raya visited Uthiramerur.

Uthiramerur, built as per the canons of the agama texts, has the village assembly mandapa exactly at the centre and all the temples are oriented with reference to the mandapa.

R. Vasanthakalyani, Chief Epigraphist-cum-Instructor and R. Sivanandam, epigraphist, both belonging to the Tamil Nadu Department of Archaeology, said that while village assemblies might have existed prior to the period of Parantaka Chola, it was during his period that the village administration was honed into a perfect system through elections. “About 1,100 years ago, during the period of Paranataka Chola, Uthiramerur had an elected village panchayat system, which was a step ahead of the modern day democratic system,” she said.

According to Dr. Sivanandam, there were several places in Tamil Nadu where inscriptions are available on temple walls about the prevalence of village assemblies. These villages included Manur near Tirunelveli, Tiruninravur near Chennai, Manimangalam near Tambaram, Dadasamudram near Kanchipuram, Sithamalli and Thalaignayiru near Thanjavur, Jambai near Tirukovilur and Ponnamaravathy near Pudukottai. “But it is at Uthiramerur on the walls of the village assembly (mandapa) itself, that we have the earliest inscriptions with complete information about how the elected village assembly functioned,” said Dr. Sivanandam. It is learnt that the entire village, including the infants, had to be present at the village assembly mandapa at Uthiramerur when the elections were held, pointed out Vasanthakalyani. Only the sick and those who had gone on a pilgrimage were exempt.

{Unlike CEC Sampath who excelled in removing voters from electoral rolls}

The Tamil inscriptions elaborate on the election procedure followed several centuries ago.

There were committees for the maintenance of irrigation tanks, roads, to provide relief during drought, testing of gold and so on. Sivanandam himself has written a book in Tamil called, “The Archaeological Handbook of Kanchipuram district,” (published by the Tamil Nadu Department of Archaeology in 2008) in which he says the original sabha mandapa’s superstructure was made of timber and bricks. After the superstructure collapsed and only the base of the mandapa made of granite slabs remained, Kulotunga Chola I built a Vishnu temple on the base towards the end of the 11th century.

The village sabha mandapa, with its invaluable inscriptions, is now called Vaikuntaperumal temple. Dr. Nagaswamy says: “The village assembly of Uttaramerur drafted the Constitution for the elections. The salient features were as follows: the village was divided into 30 wards, one representative elected for each. Specific qualifications were prescribed for those who wanted to contest. The essential criteria were age limit, possession of immovable property and minimum educational qualification. Those who wanted to be elected should be above 35 years of age and below 70…”

Only those who owned land, that attracted tax, could contest.
Another interesting stipulation, according to Dr. Nagaswamy, was that such owners should have possessed a house built on legally-owned site (not on public poromboke). A person serving in any of the committees could not contest again for the next three terms, each term lasting a year. Elected members, who suffered disqualification, were those who accepted bribes, misappropriated others’ property, committed incest or acted against public interest.

And media laments about corrupt and criminals getting elected in modern India with all powerful CEC!!!
Had the Chola village code been in effect most of Congress would not have been elible to contest.
And the age code woul;d have debarred BJP toothless lions!!!!
sanjaykumar
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Re: Indian Interests

Post by sanjaykumar »

Fabulous.
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Re: Indian Interests

Post by Arjun »

Ancient caste system worked well, ICHR head says
The ICHR chief's views have triggered a debate among historians. Historian D N Jha said, "Rao's article is reflective of his primitive mentality. It is gross revivalism. If ancient caste system is justified in modern context, why not have a brahmin PM instead of Narendra Modi. Rao has been appointed by an OBC PM."
What complete idiocy from our supposedly 'eminent' historian DN Jha ! Do these guys even carry a semblance of logic in their pea-brains ? Here is Rao making a sophisticated and analytical argument distinguishing between caste and varna, and we have this jackass respond with non-sequitors.
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Re: Indian Interests

Post by ashish raval »

Ancient caste system was not solely based on birth. The tragedy was that It got corrupted somewhere with the time and ended up in bad shape. The main idea of caste system is that someone who has knowledge and skills (read brahmins, vaishyas including current obcs which includes skilled Workers and yes as per shashras brahmins should possess 64 skills including war fighting down to blacksmith and it was his job to impart this skills in the society whoever comes to learn) will not have power to govern while someone with knowledge will not even have money(read brahmins but have status and respect but society expecting them to live simple life devoid of posessions). Kshatriyas (read only kings) will have power and and money while other kshatriyas will only have power and fair money to live life but at cost of constant fear of death because of war and were compensated for that nicely. Vishyas including traders, farmers and skilled workers will have good money and live the life in riches but will not exhibit power or gain the knowledge on vedas. Shudras (those who do not fit the above three) will live the life without riches, power or knowledge. From the onset it seems shudras got unfair deal due to birth and are handsomely compensated since independence in studies, scholarships and government jobs to undo things which were unfair with caste system. But it could be that shudras were people who could not fit the army nor skilled working category and hence were forced to do cleaning jobs. It could be fair in sense that a person who is unable to acquire any skills does cleaning and menial jobs which is true in every society everywhere in the world what would have been unfair is that their children's may not have been allowed to acquire skills and prove themselves. I heavily doubt that a child of shudra will not be given a chance to prove the mettle in which case it will be unfair system. This is my read on the old caste system.
SanjayC
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Re: Indian Interests

Post by SanjayC »

This would be a good book to read.

Castes of Mind: Colonialism and the Making of Modern India

http://www.amazon.com/Castes-Mind-Colon ... 0691088950
When thinking of India, it is hard not to think of caste. In academic and common parlance alike, caste has become a central symbol for India, marking it as fundamentally different from other places while expressing its essence. Nicholas Dirks argues that caste is, in fact, neither an unchanged survival of ancient India nor a single system that reflects a core cultural value. Rather than a basic expression of Indian tradition, caste is a modern phenomenon--the product of a concrete historical encounter between India and British colonial rule. Dirks does not contend that caste was invented by the British. But under British domination caste did become a single term capable of naming and above all subsuming India's diverse forms of social identity and organization.

Dirks traces the career of caste from the medieval kingdoms of southern India to the textual traces of early colonial archives; from the commentaries of an eighteenth-century Jesuit to the enumerative obsessions of the late-nineteenth-century census; from the ethnographic writings of colonial administrators to those of twentieth-century Indian scholars seeking to rescue ethnography from its colonial legacy. The book also surveys the rise of caste politics in the twentieth century, focusing in particular on the emergence of caste-based movements that have threatened nationalist consensus.

Castes of Mind is an ambitious book, written by an accomplished scholar with a rare mastery of centuries of Indian history and anthropology. It uses the idea of caste as the basis for a magisterial history of modern India. And in making a powerful case that the colonial past continues to haunt the Indian present, it makes an important contribution to current postcolonial theory and scholarship on contemporary Indian politics.
The book is available in India too on Flipkart
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Re: Indian Interests

Post by RamaY »

ashish raval wrote:Ancient caste system was not solely based on birth. The tragedy was that It got corrupted somewhere with the time and ended up in bad shape. The main idea of caste system is that someone who has knowledge and skills (read brahmins, vaishyas including current obcs which includes skilled Workers and yes as per shashras brahmins should possess 64 skills including war fighting down to blacksmith and it was his job to impart this skills in the society whoever comes to learn) will not have power to govern while someone with knowledge will not even have money(read brahmins but have status and respect but society expecting them to live simple life devoid of posessions). Kshatriyas (read only kings) will have power and and money while other kshatriyas will only have power and fair money to live life but at cost of constant fear of death because of war and were compensated for that nicely. Vishyas including traders, farmers and skilled workers will have good money and live the life in riches but will not exhibit power or gain the knowledge on vedas. Shudras (those who do not fit the above three) will live the life without riches, power or knowledge. From the onset it seems shudras got unfair deal due to birth and are handsomely compensated since independence in studies, scholarships and government jobs to undo things which were unfair with caste system. But it could be that shudras were people who could not fit the army nor skilled working category and hence were forced to do cleaning jobs. It could be fair in sense that a person who is unable to acquire any skills does cleaning and menial jobs which is true in every society everywhere in the world what would have been unfair is that their children's may not have been allowed to acquire skills and prove themselves. I heavily doubt that a child of shudra will not be given a chance to prove the mettle in which case it will be unfair system. This is my read on the old caste system.
In ancient India, your Kula is different from Varna. Your Kula is your lineage and Varna is your temperament/social-role.

No one can change your Kula (lineage). Rama is Raghukulaatmaja. Often people carried their birth varna because it is a natural thing. However many changed their Varna thru Tapas (practice/research/hard-work). But most likely their offspring went back to their natural varna because it has natural advantage. Few were so good in their new varna, their offspring too were able to take up the new varna.

Best example is Viswamitra. He was a Kshatriya who became Brahmana varna thru penance. His children before his Brahmana transformation continued as Kshatriyas and children after his transformation continued as Brahmanas.

In modern times too Varna is left to individual. All the careers we choose fall into those four-varna categories. That's why we are seeing so many (so-called love) marriages between SA-varna people. On the other hand the arranged marriages are SA-Kula marriages because their origin is in familial ties.

No need for any Hindu to pull hair on these things. Just be aware of what we are doing because it is natural to have a kula and varna, no matter where you are born and what you become.

The problem is because people use a single English word Caste for both Kula and Varna and use it interchangeably based on context.
ramana
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Re: Indian Interests

Post by ramana »

X-Post...
rohitvats wrote:http://www.ndtv.com/article/opinion/man ... ode-552873

A piece by MSA on UCC and why it is a bad idea.

It's a pretty sophisticated arguments and I think BRF needs to pool in thoughts on the subject and come-up with detailed and factual counter arguments. This will be useful for BRF as well on social media. Some of us active on Twitter could use it to counter propaganda and other stuff.
Do the Hindus want a UCC?

{The title implies the writer is not part of the group that he refers to. So how is he qualified to comment on that?}

(Mani Shankar Aiyar is a Congress MP in the Rajya Sabha)

My Sikh wife and I were married 41 years ago under the Special Marriage Act, 1954. But for a slight hiccup when I had to suppress a giggle reading the prescribed oath, swearing that I was not married to anyone else "to the best of my knowledge and belief", the event went off smoothly. If, however, we had contracted a civil marriage before 1954, we would have first had to relinquish our respective religions before the knot could be tied. A Uniform Civil Code was available before 1954 only to agnostics and atheists who had proved their credentials by foreswearing the religion of their ancestors.

{He had to swear to that as bigamy is illegal. its not chuckle worthy. And bigamy was made illegal as measure of support to women. UCC is not only about marriages.}

This changed in 1954. The Special Marriage Act, read with the Indian Succession Act, 1925 (note the non-denominational adjective "Indian"), constitutes the voluntary Uniform Civil Code we gave ourselves sixty years ago. Yet the very Moditvists who have pledged to impose a compulsory Uniform Civil Code on our minorities have not deigned to explain why they themselves have not availed of the Uniform Civil Code that has been on our statutes for six decades. No, they prefer to get married under the Hindu code and regulate their personal lives in terms of Hindu Personal Law, embodied in a series of four laws enacted in 1955 and 1956 - that is, well after the voluntary Uniform Civil Code was bestowed on the country - while sneering at the minorities who baulk at their respective Personal Laws being substituted by a compulsory Uniform Civil Code.

{This is a strawman arguement. Any one can get married under the marriage act applicable to them. Just because he got married under the SPM he does not have to demand others also do so. Spurious non-sequitor argument}


Why this hypocrisy? Only to mock at Muslims, to claim that the Muslims are reactionary while the majority is progressive. There is no Personal Law more progressive than the laws under which I got married. That was a decision I made reluctantly and only because the priests at the temple my Father had built refused to perform the rites since the girl I wanted to marry was not a Brahmin. They offered instead a whisky priest who would do what was required for a small fee. Furious, I rejected the offer outright and opted instead, with her consent, for us to be married under a modern, secular law.


{Mani Aiyer was able to use the SPM to get married as he wanted. We want to provide Muslims the same opportunity that he got. BTW what is a whiky priest? :eek: }

That modern, secular law being readily available, why did the majority community opt instead for their own Personal Law? Only because Hindu Personal Law is precious to Hindus. In which case, why should their respective Personal Laws not also be precious to other communities?

True, Hindu Law has been codified by Parliament while the other Personal Laws have not. But that is only because Mahatma Gandhi had ensured that our Freedom Movement was not only about ridding ourselves of foreign rule but also of shedding horrendous malpractices that had adhered to the religion and culture of the Hindus to the shame of the Hindu community. Codification had proved possible because it was the unfinished business of the struggle for Independence.

{So is it his argument that Islam has no repugnant malpractices that need to be shed? Also by selective modernising on only Hindu law as an unfinished business of Independence struggle, he imples Muslims were not part of that struggle.}


Indeed, long before Independence, in 1941, the British Indian government set up a Hindu Law Committee under B.N. Rau that took 6 years to complete its toils and reported to the Constituent Assembly on the eve of Independence. Another eight years were taken in getting the Hindu Marriage Act passed in 1955; the Hindu Succession Act in 1956; the Hindu Adoption and Maintenance Act, also 1956; and the Hindu Minority and Guardianship Act, also of 1956. Numerous amendments have since been brought to these laws, and this will doubtless continue. It could be regarded as a 'work in progress'. To expect other communities to act any sooner to reform their own laws would be invidious.

{Delay is the worst form of denial. Delay has been used by all recalcitrants to deny progress in all societies. And what makes Aiyer speak for Muslims and deny them progress in India? UCC does not apply in KSA. Most of the suggested reforms are already acceptable in North Africa and Middle East.}


It may also be noted that in the many debates in Parliament on the legislation that derived from the Rau committee's Hindu Code Bill, it was only Hindu MPs who took part; there was little or no Muslim, Christian or Parsi participation - for the non-Hindus felt, quite correctly, that it was for the Hindus, not others, to reform and codify their law. Then why should non-Muslims tell Muslims or other non-Hindus how to reform themselves?

{As the bill was about Hindu law reforms they were silent. The debate should from the begining have been about UCC then they would have participated. Its a fault of Nehruvian coterie. Its specuous to argue that non-Hindus did not participate in Hindu law reforms. Why would they whn it does not affect them!}


Reform is not easy. Hindu conservatives, from the President, Dr. Rajendra Prasad, down fought a rearguard battle to fend off reform as long as they could. And introduced so many loopholes in the code that there are more bigamous and polygamous marriages among Hindus than Muslims (1961 Census and 1974 Committee on the Status of Women). Besides, as a result of an amendment brought in 1964 to the Hindu Marriage Act, now, under Hindu divorce law, Hindu wives can be "simply expelled from the matrimonial home when the husband state(s) that, as far as he is concerned, the marriage ha(s) broken down". Triple talaq anyone? (I am not quoting myself, but an eminent jurist, Prof. Ajay Kumar, Dean of the Faculty of Law, Ambedkar University, Lucknow in his magnum opus, Uniform Civil Code: Challenges and Constraints, 2012). He goes on to quote another authority on Hindu law, Dr. JDM Derret, as saying the subsequent Marriage Laws (Amendment) Act, 1976 has led to "still more amazingly gender-insensitive case law". Flavio Agnes' celebrated article in The Economic and Political Weekly, 16 December 1995, documents a whole sheaf of such vicious case law.

Moreover, as Vice-Chancellor Farzana Mustafa of NALSAR University of Law, Hyderabad asks with regard to reformed Hindu law, "Has it resulted in the upliftment of Hindu women? How many Hindu women get a share in property? The amount of land actually inherited by Hindu women is only a small fraction of the amount of land they are entitled to under the reformed Hindu law. Changes in law do not bring about necessary social reform" And she concludes, "Normative changes in law certainly do not bring about necessary social reform". (The Hindu, 2 July 2014).

{So now we have an obviously Muslim named woman commenting on Hindu law for women. Shouldn't she first examine Msuilm law for women before venturing into other areas. "Physician heal thyself' comes to mind. Maybe she is not familar as Aiyer is with the Parliament debates when her community leaders chose to be silent.}

Which leads us to the key point, that is, reform must come from within a community if law is to translate into social changes on the ground. That is precisely what the Bharatiya Mahila Muslim Andolan (BMMA) is engaged in doing. Noorjehan Safia Nawaz, co-founder of BMMA has been quoted in The Hindu magazine section of 29 June 2014 as saying that after consulting with a wide cross-section of mostly poor Muslim women, running to thousands in 10 states over a period of seven years, they have drafted a new "Muslim Marriage and Divorce Act". She says, "Let the community debate our draft first".

{Congress by supporting antedilivian leadership for Indian muslims like the Imam Bukhari ensures ther ei no reforms in the community. And then they turn around and say there is no call for internal reforms!}

As several Muslim countries, including Pakistan, have shown, reform of Muslim Personal Law is certainly as feasible as the reform of Hindu Personal Law - but, as in the case of Hindus, only when the pressure for reform comes from within the community. Imposition from outside, especially when the community is in a minority, cannot but be resisted. That is why Begum Safia Nawaz states categorically, "We oppose the Uniform Civil Code". They want the Personal Law of their community to continue but believe they can reform it from within. Surely any patriotic Indian would laud that initiative.

It is argued, among others in obiter dicta pronounced from the Supreme Court, that a Uniform Civil Code would strengthen national integration. Quite to the contrary, attempts to precipitate legislation without general consensus will only provoke communal tension, even as denigratory remarks about another community's beliefs and practices only results in national disintegration. If, impatiently, we move to reform Muslim Personal Law by Parliamentary decree in a Parliament where Muslims are woefully under-represented, and before a consensus evolves within the Muslim community on the nature and details of reform, we would be in danger of transgressing the Constitution's "country-specific and situation-sensitive method of handling complex socio-legal issues." Kumar hits the nail on the head when he argues that because the Constitution "is typically Indian, full of the recognition of differences between various groups of people and respectful of diversity at many levels", it has succeeded in promoting "the existing plurality of laws, with the Personal Law system as a central element re-anchored within the over-arching framework of the Indian Constitution". At the same time, says Kumar, "The Indian State has acted purposefully, albeit silently, surreptitiously, cautiously and gradually (in) harmonizing various Indian personal laws along similar lines without challenging their status as separate personal laws." He cites, by way of example, the Prohibition of Child Marriage Act, 2006. That is the intelligent way forward.

So, while putting any Uniform Civil Code on hold, the Modi government might like to make a beginning towards giving the country a Uniform Fiscal Code. Why tax concessions for only Hindu Undivided Families (HUF)? Why not for any Undivided Family whatever the community? One expects Finance Minister Arun Jaitley to respond to that googly in his Budget speech next week.

Disclaimer: The opinions expressed within this article are the personal opinions of the author. NDTV is not responsible for the accuracy, completeness, suitability, or validity of any information on this article. All information is provided on an as-is basis. The information, facts or opinions appearing in the article do not reflect the views of NDTV and NDTV does not assume any responsibility or liability for the same.
He is a moron and confirms it everyday with his writings.
He promotes a divisisive museum-Native American reservation/camp mentality for Muslims.
Manny
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Re: Indian Interests

Post by Manny »

The caste thing is so overblown!

Just for disclosure I am not a Brahmin... I eat Beef and I really could care less about someones caste...But I am more interested to know if a desi is an Ahole so I can avoid them.. Is all! The "ahole" caste is the only caste I try to avoid.

I thought about this whole caste thing. People have been telling me that the caste thing is the most evil crap on this planet! I am like...really? No you little shit, its not the most evil thing ....actually its quite benign thing! If a Brahmin thinks he is the upper caste , then he is as delusional as a christian who think only he would get to go to heaven. Its no more than delusion of grandeur.

Lets analyze this.. What is this this caste thing for the most part? Its one of self segregation for the most part with some rare exception.

If some idiot thinks he needs to take a bath if he touches me cause I eat beef or squirrels... Yeah I eat squirrels... after I went Squirrel hunting in Mississippi...(sue me), he has actually not done any harm to me...except maybe he gave me slight (insult..protected by free speech). Or if he washes his house on my visit or his place of worship clean after I have visited it, it does not chaff my butt one bit. ITs no different than Muslim,s not eating Prasad given to them by Hindus during Hindu religious holidays.. That is their right. In fact, this would be perfectly legal in today's America! All I can do is call him names in reutn...I have no other claim of harm from such an individual. If he practices social endogamy ...even that is his right... He has not done any harm to me.. Social Endogamy is practiced by Jews and Amish Christians and most Americans in some form or the other... So caste social endogamy is nothing unusual.

What is evil is, when one group tries to use their sense of superiority to exert dominion over others....like trying to ethnically cleanse, convert or enslave or lynch or commit the Holocaust done by the people of the Abrhamic faiths.. Now that is REAL EVIL!
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Re: Indian Interests

Post by Manny »

ramana wrote:X-Post...

He is a moron and confirms it everyday with his writings.
He promotes a divisisive museum-Native American reservation/camp mentality for Muslims.
If you are talking about leftist douche Mani Aiyer.. I have to agree... I have only one question for these "upper caste:" lefties like Mani Aiyer and the family that own that leftist trash newspaper "The Hindu". That is, Thjey all seem to have had arranged marriages....if so why did they not arrange to marry some nice Dalit woman? Why did these "egalitarian" leftist buggers arrange to marry only upper castes like them? Mani Aiyer is a phony arse leftist douchebag!

Its like the republicans..the "evil" conservatives like the Bush family actually have hispanics in their family. Mc Cain for e.g. has a brown skin Bangladeshi daughter...but the egalitarian liberal Kennedys are all Lilly white.,..and the only firang in their family is an Austrian.

The leftist liberal is the greatest humanitarian in the abstract...its real people they can't stand. :rotfl:
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Re: Indian Interests

Post by JE Menon »

Hilarious sequence of posts there Manny.... Right on the money (shanker Aiyar)
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Re: Indian Interests

Post by ashish raval »

RamaY wrote:
ashish raval wrote:Ancient caste system was not solely based on birth. The tragedy was that It got corrupted somewhere with the time and ended up in bad shape. The main idea of caste system is that someone who has knowledge and skills (read brahmins, vaishyas including current obcs which includes skilled Workers and yes as per shashras brahmins should possess 64 skills including war fighting down to blacksmith and it was his job to impart this skills in the society whoever comes to learn) will not have power to govern while someone with knowledge will not even have money(read brahmins but have status and respect but society expecting them to live simple life devoid of posessions). Kshatriyas (read only kings) will have power and and money while other kshatriyas will only have power and fair money to live life but at cost of constant fear of death because of war and were compensated for that nicely. Vishyas including traders, farmers and skilled workers will have good money and live the life in riches but will not exhibit power or gain the knowledge on vedas. Shudras (those who do not fit the above three) will live the life without riches, power or knowledge. From the onset it seems shudras got unfair deal due to birth and are handsomely compensated since independence in studies, scholarships and government jobs to undo things which were unfair with caste system. But it could be that shudras were people who could not fit the army nor skilled working category and hence were forced to do cleaning jobs. It could be fair in sense that a person who is unable to acquire any skills does cleaning and menial jobs which is true in every society everywhere in the world what would have been unfair is that their children's may not have been allowed to acquire skills and prove themselves. I heavily doubt that a child of shudra will not be given a chance to prove the mettle in which case it will be unfair system. This is my read on the old caste system.
In ancient India, your Kula is different from Varna. Your Kula is your lineage and Varna is your temperament/social-role.

No one can change your Kula (lineage). Rama is Raghukulaatmaja. Often people carried their birth varna because it is a natural thing. However many changed their Varna thru Tapas (practice/research/hard-work). But most likely their offspring went back to their natural varna because it has natural advantage. Few were so good in their new varna, their offspring too were able to take up the new varna.

Best example is Viswamitra. He was a Kshatriya who became Brahmana varna thru penance. His children before his Brahmana transformation continued as Kshatriyas and children after his transformation continued as Brahmanas.

In modern times too Varna is left to individual. All the careers we choose fall into those four-varna categories. That's why we are seeing so many (so-called love) marriages between SA-varna people. On the other hand the arranged marriages are SA-Kula marriages because their origin is in familial ties.

No need for any Hindu to pull hair on these things. Just be aware of what we are doing because it is natural to have a kula and varna, no matter where you are born and what you become.

The problem is because people use a single English word Caste for both Kula and Varna and use it interchangeably based on context.
Nicely put Ramay. The unfair bit was that one (read lower caste) have to do hard work to upgrade but one(read upper caste) will not be downgraded if one did not work hard. That is seemingly little unjust. Although there was provision of out casting but not sure how much was it done in practice. Also untouchability was practised because what people ate and how they lived. Many people did menial jobs and lived with poor sanitation practices which led to concept of untouchability. Even pappi jappi, handshake was not followed in sanatan dharma because of this reason. I dont think it was widespread because otherwise chanakya would not have taught chandragupta anything because although kshatriya by birth he lived like a lower caste in the fear of persecution and i for once dont believe chanakya would have done anything different even if he was lower caste. Hinduism clearly is based on rule that beef is haram so matter if you eat any other meat based on your tatva and guna. There are good reasons given in the past for that both philosophical as well as health related.
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Re: Indian Interests

Post by Prem »

http://www.csmonitor.com/The-Culture/Fa ... hout-walls
In response, architect Kabir Vajpeyi seeks to maximize the value of space in India’s schools by creating unified, enabling environments across school grounds, to facilitate a continuous learning process. Vajpeyi’s firm Vinyas, which he co-founded in 1996 with his wife Preeti, has helped spread the methodology of BaLA – Building as Learning Aid – to thousands of preschools and elementary schools across India.Just as education experts recommend integrating principles of empathy throughout school curricula,the BaLA framework offers guidelines for a holistically enriching built environment that feeds organically into formal instruction. Installing numbers, colors, maps, and units of measurement in a play yard, for example, encourages more peer learning and constructive engagement among schoolchildren, with a corresponding decrease in the incidence of conflicts and fights. Rather than being confined to a classroom, “the learning is happening across, and is not bounded by time or space. In other words, it lets the children interact with those elements at their own free will,” Mr. Vajpeyi says.BaLA is designed to spur frugal innovation in both new schools and retrofits through a few broad themes:
Vajpeyi advocates incorporating units of measurement – visible markers of distance and angles – throughout the school building and yard to help ground theoretical concepts in reality. He especially likes the idea of labeling pieces of furniture with their weight.“Children across the world throw furniture, irrespective of where they come from,” he says. “So if we write the weight on furniture, they’ll know that they’ve just thrown a stool that was 5 kilograms or a table that was 20 kilograms. It gives them a sense of measurement.”Through BaLA, the built environment should encourage children to move in ways that boost their development. Vajpeyi says many schools have begun transforming the iron bars in their window grills into colorful, undulating shapes that children can trace using small toys. This activity boosts hand-eye coordination and mimics the wrist, arm and shoulder movements required for writing.Just as office workers and hotel guests appreciate the incursion of the outdoors into their interior spaces through increased natural light and ventilation, schoolchildren likewise are inherently drawn to nature. In the classroom, BaLA encourages windows be kept curtain-free and placed low to the ground so small children can see outside. In the yard, planted trees have branches low to the ground, encouraging children to climb.Just as nature abhors a vacuum, an architect abhors “dead space” in a building that people avoid. BaLA seeks to maximize “loved spaces” that invite children to fill them and accommodate a range of peer group sizes and activities, much as Morgan Lovell strives for offices replete with spaces conducive to working and collaborating. Such BaLA principles appear at home in Google’s new Bay View, California, campus, which is being constructed as a “frictionless environment,” with spaces connected by a bike track and several landscaped “outdoor rooms” intended for contemplation and creativity.
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Re: Indian Interests

Post by Klaus »

RamaY wrote: SA-varna, SA-Kula
Kindly elaborate on SA-varna & SA-kula.
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