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Wednesday,
May 9, 2001, Chandigarh, India  
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Wheat as reject maal A matter of grave
concern Tehelka with a whimper |
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Serious problems ahead for the country Flip-flop on regulating stock markets
Leading a life of dignity and
respect
Sanskrit is not a “dead language”
Couch
potatoes on the rise
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Wheat as reject maal The Union Food Ministry received a nasty blow when Iraq rejected a consignment of 35,000 tonnes of wheat. More than the marketing embarrassment, this shocking event has highly complicated the country’s efforts to unload at least three million tonnes of the grain in the international market. What is inexplicable is that the quality of the wheat was found unacceptable and there is no other way than to bring it back. Normally rejected or damaged goods are auctioned but in this case that option is not open since the foodgrain trade is totally in government hands and the Iraq Grain Board is unlikely to claim the grain in an auction what it has refused to accept as a barter deal. Yes, the export was against import by this country of crude permitted under the revised UN sanctions. It is not known if the government will find a buyer in any neighbouring country so that it can be used as cattlefeed. New Delhi has rushed a three-man team to Iraq to look into the mess. Normally export is undertaken by the FCI or MMTC; but in this case the last part of loading it on a ship and despatching it was handed over to a private party, Vishal Exporters. But FCI and STC officials had earlier cleared the quality of the consignment. What went wrong and at what point? It is obvious that either the quality clearance was perfunctory or the post-clearance handling was shoddy. Or, is it possible that the exporter got one lot approved but sent another? Anyway, this country’s credibility as a reliable exporter of quality wheat has been dented. Only a thorough enquiry and stringent punishment to the guilty and careless will restore confidence. This is a major setback to the government’s efforts to reduce the bulging stock, expected to cross the 50 million tonne mark at the end of the current procurement season. Another threat will come later in the year when the full impact of the drought is reflected in the grain availability. One research group has found that the area under foodgrains has shrunk by 12 per cent or 22 million hectares in the four states of Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat and Orissa. Output in these states will decline by about 2.5 million tonnes. That opens up a possibility and also poses a grim challenge to the Centre. It can use the likely shortage of foodgrains to ease its position by launching imaginative schemes. Otherwise, when the open market prices go up the affected people, invariably users of coarse grains, will find the temptation irresistible to buy imported foodgrains. As the research group points out that even after paying the increased custom duty, the retail price will work out to half that of the domestic product. That will lead to a curious situation of a country with a mountain of buffer stocks importing grains in a year of drought. There is not much time left for the Centre to act. |
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A matter of grave concern The crashing of a fighter aircraft during peace-time flying ought to be the rarest of rare occurrence. But MiG-21s have been tumbling out of the skies with such clock-work precision that the news about the catastrophe is now routinely tucked away inconspicuously in almost all newspapers. Only when the overall picture is painted, as The Tribune did on Tuesday, does the full gravity of the situation become manifest. One wonders if even this will be enough to make the authorities wake up from their slumber. In the past one decade, 185 MiGs have crashed, resulting in the death of as many as 50 pilots. The loss to the country is incalculable. And yet, obsolete, overworked machines continue to take to the skies. While much is made of the so-called upgradation of the planes that are well past their prime, the fact remains that these have become veritable "flying coffins", as these have been graphically described. Such unflattering conclusion is frowned upon, with the excuse that it will lower the morale of the defence forces. Actually, it is the accidents that dampen the spirits of the fliers who risk their lives for the country. The upkeep of the machines leaves much to be desired. Still, these continue to be flogged day in and day out. As The Tribune story points out, 60 per cent of flying is being done on MiG-21s. The poor condition of this particular aircraft is not the only cause of frequent accidents. There are several other contributory factors. One very vital aspect is the inadequate training of the pilots. There is no advanced jet trainer with the IAF. Most of the training is on the low-demand Kiran aircraft. When the pilots graduate to the high-demand MiGs, they find themselves out of their depth. Digging a little deeper, it is found that the IAF is not able to attract the best of talent for a career in flying. It has to make do with borderline cases. It is very difficult to inculcate the right aptitude in them. Enquiries reveal that most of the pilots involved in the crashes are those with a lower flying aptitude. In technical parlance, it is called human error. In plain English, it means that those behind the control of the aircraft are not always equal to the job. If the situation has to be redeemed, adequate incentives have to be provided to attract the most suitable men for the challenging job. Not only the pay packet but also the promotion avenues vis-à-vis the civilian stream have to be revised. Then comes the question of proper training on an AJT, and the need for acquiring the state-of-the-art aircraft. Only the finest men can bring out the best in the latest machine and vice-versa. Right now, exactly the opposite seems to be happening. |
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Tehelka with a whimper Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee did not waste much time in going to town about what would have happened had the conspiracy to kill Tehelka Chief Editor Tarun Tejpal not been nipped in the bud by an amazingly alert police force in Delhi. He told an election rally in Thiruvananthapuram that the ISI plot to kill the Tehelka boss was part of a larger conspiracy to destabilise the government and create disturbances. The success of the plot would indeed have brought the government down and damaged the electoral prospects of the Bharatiya Janata Party and its allies in the states where assembly elections will be held on May 10. But the story which has appeared has far too many holes for it to hold even a drop of water. Senior police officers are unable to explain why the first information report, based on intelligence inputs, was registered at the Lodhi Road police station. A day after the filing of the FIR the gangsters were nabbed near Mukarba Chowk in North-West Delhi. They were declared as being on the payroll of the omnipresent ISI on the basis of evidence which the police is not willing to share with the media. Why the ISI chose Avdesh for killing Tarun Tejpal (Home Minister L. K. Advani too was on the gang’s hit list) too is difficult to understand. Avdesh is a fringe operator and has yet to establish his reputation as an efficient contract killer. His area of operation is confined mostly to Uttar Pradesh and Bihar. He knows virtually nothing about Delhi. Why did the ISI depart from the established practice of giving such an important assignment to the professionally more organised outfits of Dawood Ibrahim or Chhota Shakeel? The senior officers are also having difficulty in explaining why the FIR in the case was sealed shortly after it was registered which resulted in their remaining in the dark about its content until after the criminals were nabbed under dramatic circumstances. There is no doubt that Tarun Tejpal became a marked man the moment the Tehelka tapes were made public. There is also no denying the fact that his killing in the middle of the “election season” would have resulted in what Mr Vajpayee said at the election rally in Kerala. On the basis of current evidence he spoke a little too soon on the subject. The entire operation may have been masterminded by his well-wishers, without taking him into confidence, for influencing the outcome of the electoral battle in the five states. Will the Delhi Police care to fill in the details for the picture to become clear and the conspiracy theory more credible? |
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Serious problems ahead for the country The stalemate in Parliament and the chaotic scenes witnessed were unprecedented. The refusal of the NDA government to accept a JPC on the Tehelka scam or refer it to the CBI and the unwillingness of the Congress party to be content with the judicial inquiry contributed to the crisis. This was the picture on the surface but much more was involved, such as lack of trust between the principal political parties, the BJP and the Congress, and a sense of vindictiveness which has come to pervade national politics. The Tehelka scam was only the beginning of many more scams which have since come to the fore. The stock market collapse in Mumbai and Kolkata at the instance of a cabal headed by Ketan Parekh is a scandal far worse than that of Harshad Mehta’s. A few industrialists, media adventurers, bankers, Ketan Parekh and his cronies conspired to take a dozen stocks to dizzy heights which inevitably collapsed. In this process thousands of small investors suffered and lost well over Rs 1 lakh crore. There was no alternative for the government represented by the Finance Ministry, the Reserve Bank of India and SEBI except to act, though belatedly. Ketan Parekh and some of his associates were arrested and directives issued to cooperative banks not to lend against stocks from brokers. In the USA, which is the quintessential capitalist country, any stock broker or businessman, irrespective of his status, is handcuffed and taken to the court before being remanded if there is evidence of insider trading, which is the minimum form of stock market manipulation. But here in India, Ketan Parekh was first taken to a star hotel for preliminary enquiries before being arrested and taken for remand. Why did SEBI, the RBI and the Finance Ministry not act in time? Did they not know what was happening in the stock market for the past six months? SEBI has taken action against certain well-known companies which indulged in price rigging in collusion with stockbrokers three years ago. Harshad Mehta and his companies have only now been banned from doing business in stock markets. There are several allegations against SEBI. The RBI ban on cooperative banks on lending against stocks came too late. Why didn’t the Finance Minister and his bureaucrats look into the chaotic rigging going on in the Bombay Stock Exchange and direct some prompt investigations much earlier? Recent evidence shows that manipulation in the financial markets in the country is much more deep-rooted. The collusion between the Unit Trust of India and the Global Trust Bank leading to its tentative merger was only the tip of the iceberg though the merger was aborted. The UTI’s purchases of large chunks of shares of Ketan Parekh’s favourite companies like HFCL, Zee Telefilms and, Cyberspace, which were artificially manipualted to dizzy heights by Ketan and his cronies, are suspect. The UTI does not deserve to have the word Trust any more and hopefully, the Finance Minister will take firm action soon in the matter . The list of scams is now quite long. A leading national weekly has given detailed facts and figures to show that a telecom scam of high magnitude was worked out at the instance of two senior officers of the PMO. The telecom policy was twisted and this would have favoured some big business houses. Mr P.R. Das Munshi, a Congress MP demanded a full-fledged inquiry. The magazine has commented that the tussle is political, with politicians sharply divided along non-partisan lines. It charged the PMO with having misled the country and that it was part of a pattern of indecisiveness that had cost the country dearly and that the constant flip-flops had a deplorable effect on the business climate. This correct assessment is demonstrated by the fact that foreign direct investment during 2000-2001 sank to $1.6 billion while India was expressing the hope, year after year, that it would be about $10 billion every year. To make this picture even more murky the Enron muddle would suffice. Phase-1 of this super power project was cleared by the Sharad Pawar government but the Shiv Sena government, which came to power soon after, threatened to cancel the agreement. Ms Rebecca Mark, very pushy Enron representative, worked her way to seeing the Shiv Sena supremo Bal Thackeray with the dramatic result that not only Phase-I of the project was agreed to but phase-II was also sanctioned. To cap it all, the short-lived Vajpayee government in 1998 provided the counter-guarantee only a few minutes before the Prime Minister went to meet the President, followed by the government’s fall. Today the Enron agreement and the counter-guarantee represent everything that should not be done while dealing with a foreign company, whether it is investing in power or any other infrastructure scheme. Enron is now all set to dispose of its assets in India and this episode has generated serious adverse reactions all over the capitalist world. The Balco deal was a class by itself. Sterlite is headed by an NRI and it is one of the three companies banned from trading in the stock market for two years because of its price rigging activities three years back. When the Congress party created a furore in Parliament, BJP stalwarts were stoutly defending the deal. But now Mr Dattopant Thengdi, the veteran BJP labour leader, has termed the deal “a fraud.” Thereby goes the disinvestment hope through the window. The “Customsgate” has unfolded itself after the arrest of Chairman B.P. Verma and a large number of officers of the Indian Customs Service throughout the country. It has blown the lid open to show an unbelievable proportion of corruption and systematic swindling of the country by venal Customs officials in collusion with importers and brokers. It would not be wrong to believe that if only the Customs officers from top to bottom worked honestly and efficiently the total revenue would be more than double the present figure. To a large extent this also applies to the Income Tax Department. The Chief Vigilance Commissioner was not at all wrong when he said that the revenue services were the most corrupt in the country. The unfolding economic situation in the country in the coming months is going to be alarming. Widespread drought is forecast during this summer in parts of Gujarat, Rajasthan, MP, Maharashtra, Jharkhand, Orissa and some other areas. Some of them had experienced drought even during the past two years. Already large-scale migration of landless labour has been reported from many states in the North. In the South, it is a different type of crisis, whether it is Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka or Tamil Nadu. Farmers are either unable to get remunerative prices for their crops or pay back the loans taken when their crops fail due to pests. A large number of suicides by farmers has been reported from Andhra Pradesh. The series of suicides by weavers from Telengana districts of AP is another depressing factor. If modernisation by powerlooms resulted in driving the weavers into poverty, the government has to take up appropriate schemes to rectify the same and coopt the affected weavers in the modernisation schemes in such a way that they are not affected adversely. In Tamil Nadu, which has 50 per cent of the country’s textile mills producing yarn, the industry is in doldrums as the demand has seriously fallen while the price of cotton and power has increased. The scams in the stock markets, the delayed action by SEBI, the serious losses incurred by the UTI and the terrible Customs scandal all point to inadequate management at the Finance Ministry’s level, to put it mildly. Is there no political accountability either in the Defence Ministry or the Finance Ministry? Probably not, as the Prime Minister himself is hamstrung by the many problems arising out of the very nature of a coalition government which he is heading and the serious aberrations attributed to his own senior officials. The consequences of all this is that the nation seems to be heading towards an economic and political crisis. The writer is a former Governor of West Bengal and Sikkim. |
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Flip-flop on regulating stock markets The Security and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) took measures in the wake of the post-budget slump in the prices of stocks and shares to curb speculative trading on the stock markets. But once the position seemed to it to have stabilised somewhat, it has proposed lifting of the ban on the short sales and restoration of stock lending facilities to brokers. The flip-flop on regulating the stock market is quite remarkable. What seems to bother SEBI, which works under the direction and surveillance of the Finance Ministry, is not speculative activity as such. The Finance Ministry wants only upswing in the prices of stocks and shares. This is taken by corporate business as the success of the market-friendly economic policy. It is, however, upset when depression undermines the confidence of business corporations in the government. The sharp and sudden stock market fluctuation, which are supposed to result in the erosion as well as recovery of the dazzling paper wealth of individuals and companies in the form of stocks and shares, are a familiar global phenomenon. The role of the ubiquitous international financial investors (FIIs) in stock market fluctuations too has become brazen in India. The measures to regulate stock market trading and the ban on the activity of selected Indian brokers, significantly, are reported to have improved the market share of FIIs by four times in so many weeks. They are now able to freely mastermind wild fluctuations in the prices of shares and stocks. The domestic financiers are able to play only a subsidiary role. The snug talk of market prices of shares suddenly rising and generating new wealth of the order of billions of dollars or rupees overnight is, of course, balderdash. The wealth so generated melts away as quickly as it is created when share prices fall precipitously in India as well as many other countries. All that speculative trading on stock markets results in is redistribution of claims of individuals and corporations on the existing real assets out of which FIIs extract a large cut for themselves. The FIIs which, according to the jargon of the managers of their funds, are in the business of “buying value” and not real assets, have now gained a position in India to create and exploit opportunities to garner enormous returns on their investments. The stock markets can help domestic business corporations to mop up domestic and foreign savings and mobilise resources for investment and economic growth. When, however, the community savings so mobilised, instead of investment to build new productive assets in the economy, flow into the secondary markets, speculators come into play and disrupt productive investment. That small and even medium savers in India have tended to secure their savings by making deposits in the nationalised banks or other public savings instruments instead of entrusting their savings to the business corporations is not surprising either. These trends have gained strength in the wake of successive stock market scams. The social base of trading in the stocks and shares after a brief spurt in the wake of the launching of economic liberalisation policy early in the nineties has, therefore, dramatically shrunk when the FIIs became the lead players in the trading on the stock markets of India. The primary market has tended to be quiet, and speculative trading in the secondary market hectic in the second half of the nineties. The position has again become very volatile this year. According to a competent study, “The financial relationship between stock market development and economic growth is dubious in the Indian context.” The upshot is that the rate of investment by the domestic corporate business has slowed down for want of demand for its products in the domestic and global markets as well as for want of resources for the expansion and upgradation of its production capacity. Its ability to compete against goods and services of transnational corporations (TNCs) has, therefore, further weakened in India and abroad. The flow of foreign portfolio investment to India is so managed by the FIIs that the movement of the prices of stocks and shares in the secondary market has ceased to be rational, and the primary market cannot revive. The developmental role of the stock markets in India, which has been always limited, has become irrelevant in the wake of opening the doors of the Indian market for foreign portfolio investment. Foreign investment in India as in all developing countries is cleverly arranged and coordinated by FIIs and TNCs. It is directed, above all, to take over profitable Indian companies, especially public sector undertakings (PSUs). Foreign investors evidently think that the political environment in India can now be exploited by them to garner short-term gains even as they prepare the ground for the long-term economic and political-strategic designs of the developed countries of their origin. Value addition by speculative trading in stocks and shares may appear to be useful and respectable for business activity in the developed economies. It may enlarge and consolidate their hegemony in the global trade and investment. But it is totally wasteful and counter-productive in the underdeveloped economies in which the first call on resources, business enterprise and management talent must be to increase production and productivity in primary (agricultural and allied activities) and secondary (industry and material infrastructure) sectors. Speculative trading on stock markets and foreign investment do not provide a reliable basis for sustainable, stable and equitable growth of the Indian economy. The maximisation of returns for the owners of capital, especially foreign capital, which has become the principal concern of official policy is not the way to increase production and productivity at the present state of social, political and economic development in India. To provide access to essential commodities and services at affordable prices to the mass of the people of India, resource mobilisation to step up public investment and develop efficient production capacity and social infrastructure is necessary. The attempts to whitewash the black money and push the savings of the community into stocks and shares has encouraged the business community, financial institutions and commercial banks to enhance their profits by the so-called innovative financial instruments and practices rather than investment for productive purposes based on social objectives. It is not surprising that the flow of foreign portfolio investment to garner speculative gains has exceeded even direct investment for setting up productive facilities under foreign ownership and management control in India. This has not helped in economic strengthening but has actually weakened the development of appropriate material as well as social infrastructure in India for self-sustaining growth. |
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Leading a life of dignity and
respect We will be witness to many positive as well as disturbing changes in our social set-up in the near future. Many of us will have no chacha-chachi, taya-tai, mausa-mausi or bhua-phuphar because of the positive impact of family planning. But on the other hand, on a more positive note, the number of eunuchoids will reduce rapidly and we can hope one day there will be none. Incidentally, as against the popular use of the expression ‘‘eunuch’’, the dictionary clarifies that those who are born with this deformity are called eunuchoids. And the ones who are castrated after normal birth are called eunuchs. Eunuchs have a hair-raising history. Castration was used as a form of punishment in Austria in the second millennium BC. In the Middle East, when poor people sold their boys they were castrated and used as slaves in the harems. Some of them even served as bodyguards, generals and admirals in several West African states. In China, during the period of Chou (1122-221 BC), eunuchs served as political advisers and this practice continued till the end of the imperial rule. After 750 AD, eunuchs were also used in Persia, Rome and Byzantine. The Italian practice of castrating boys to train them as adult Soprano singers (Castrati) was abolished by Pope Leo XIII (1878). Even till the 20th century, Muslim harems bought boys and castrated them to use them as slaves. As per Britannica, eunuchs also emasculated voluntarily for the avoidance of sexual sins or temptation — the Christian Theologian Origen (85 AD to 254 AD). It is the most celebrated example, which has appeared in several Christian periods basing their action on the text of Matthew 19:12; 5:28-30. In the third century, Valesii, a sect of eunuchs, castrated themselves and their guests in the belief that they were thereby serving God. Eunuchoids like any other polio-ridden, blind and mentally challenged, are merely children born with deformity. It is not known how and when the tradition of giving them away to the older eunuchs came into existence in India. These children are then condemned to live a life of social outcasts, who have to fend for themselves by seeking alms at weddings or at the birth of children by singing and dancing. Even their art of singing and dancing is a matter of ridicule as their appearance. Despite their existence for centuries, their art of singing and dancing has not progressed beyond a very basic level. Similarly, society too has not grown beyond looking at eunuchoids as the ones to be laughed at or simply as entertainers. Why the parents did not bring them up as normal children remains an unanswered question till date. According to medical experts their mental faculties are absolutely normal. While a polio-ridden child gets all the benefits of education and normal existence, eunuchoids are punished for no fault of their own. Madhu Sachdeva, President of the local group of eunuchoids of Chandigarh, has a heart-wrenching story of her life. She was born in a normal middle-class family. Her parents succeeded in keeping the secret of her being an eunuchoid for 14 years. All these years, she shared the love of her parents and two brothers and all other relations without anyone having sensed anything abnormal about her. She attended a good English-medium school in Delhi, where her parents lived. Then one day, when she was in Class X, her mother died suddenly. Despite the tragedy her life moved normally. A year later, her father remarried. Within a year, her stepmother leaked out the secret to everyone in the neighbourhood and relations. From a rosy, innocent and secure existence, Madhu was faced with a most traumatic situation when a group of eunuchoids came to claim her as part of their clan. ‘‘My family did not protest. They wanted me to leave with them who were total strangers to me. The entire neighbourhood preached and cajoled me to join the eunuchoids. They threatened me that if I did not go with them, I would have to face social shame. Nobody came to my rescue. I felt as if a judge had pronounced death sentence for me. Crying inconsolably like a lamb about to be butchered, I walked away from my home. ‘‘I felt alien in the home of the eunuchoids. Driven by traumatic developments in my life, I wanted to commit suicide. But I must tell you that they all showered me with love, care and emotional support in all those terrible days. They accepted my request to take me away from Delhi and eventually made me reconcile with my unavoidable situation. They brought me to Chandigarh and when I expressed my desire that I wanted to continue with my studies our Guruji, Maa Shyama Bai, ensured that I complete my graduation through correspondence courses along with my learning of singing and dancing with our clan.’’ Madhu has the confidence and poise of an educated person. An ardent reader of The Tribune, she translates important news for all her fellow beings. The Chandigarh unit of eunuchoids depends upon her for all official matters too. She has opened an ‘‘anganwari’’ school for poor children of Bapudham Colony. Unlike the eunuchoids of yesteryears who used to force parents to give away such children to them, Madhu very categorically says: ‘‘I do not want parents to give away their eunuchoid children. They should be brought up like any other normal child. I personally faced no problems when I went to school or played with the children in the neighbourhood. Society should be made aware that this status is yet another type of handicap. I know it will take ages but this stigma must go’’. It is her education that has helped Madhu understand that in future the number of eunuchoid children will automatically fall because of the wide use of ultrasound. Besides many families in Chandigarh have developed social relations with Madhu. On the other hand, Guru Shyama Bai has many followers who seek her blessings on every auspicious occasion. Her followers even believe that she can bless you with children if you are childless. In India today the scene of eunuchs and eunuchoids is changing. One group has created history and controversy by using its services to socially embarrass debtors. People can hire their services and the group not only visits the home of such a person but also his workplace. When the debtors eventually pays the group gets a handsome cut. The scheme has been extremely successful. It appears society is slowly unfolding its arms for these unfortunate ones to lead a life of dignity and respect. Many eunuchoids have successfully contested panchayat elections in many parts of India. One of them, Shabnam Bai, has even got elected as an MLA. Obviously, it is not only eunuchs and eunuchoids who have voted for her but also many other people contributed towards her victory. It is also for the first time that Census-2001 has included them in the counting of population. |
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Sanskrit is not a “dead language” Sanskrit is not a ‘dead language’, as many believe. It is true that it is no longer used in our day-to-day life, but it still exists on its own as a powerful classical language, more alive perhaps than Latin or classical Greek. It also survives through our many regional languages that have heavily borrowed and are still borrowing, Sanskrit words and phrases. This is true not only of the Indo-Aryan languages such as Hindi-Urdu, Bengali, Marathi, Gujarati, Oriya, Assamese, Rajasthani, Punjabi, Sindhi, Pashtu and Kashmiri, but also of the Dravidian languages, Tamil, Telegu, Kannada and Malayalam. Abroad, Sinhalese, the language of Sri Lanka, is derived directly from Sanskrit. In Europe, the Slavonic languages have much in common with Sanskrit, the closest being the Lithuanian language. If anything can kill Sanskrit, it is the type of misguided enthusiasm that Murli Manohar Joshi has been exhibiting lately. Backed by the Prime Minister, he proposes to introduce Sanskrit in schools and universities as a compulsory subject. This can only damage the prospect of making Sanskrit a truly living language. Anything that is made compulsory will invite resistance. And these days, when a student is already overloaded with subjects, especially in science and technology, it will be an intolerable burden for him or her to write examination in a language so difficult in its structure and grammar, and so removed from their personal lives. Sanskrit, thus, will become a pain instead of a pleasure as it should be. In Murli Manohar Joshi’s hands, Sanskrit, along with vedic astrology, is likely to become a tool with which to promote a type of education that fits in with the philosophy of the RSS. In the search for our glorious cultural past, and our “spirituality” we will be promoting obscurantism. Far from uniting Indian society which Sanskrit can do, it will divide it along the lines of Hindutva and Brahmin hegemony. It’s been reported that Sanskrit teachers in Gujarat, where the language is compulsory, are regularly sent to an RSS “skill development” centre. Joshi claims that Sanskrit is the mother language of India. This is a controversial claim. Tamil can claim to be older than Sanskrit. So are many of the lesser known languages and dialects spoken by pre-’Aryan’ people who inhabited the sub-continent. Sanskrit, in ancient times, must have been used by the elite, who jealously guarded it as their own. This tradition, as well as its close association with the Hindu religion, prevented the language from becoming a popular one. Vivekananda said ‘Sanskrit is the language of the gods’, which is a lot of nonsense. People like Murli Manohar Joshi, who respect orthodoxy, have no chance of promoting Sanskrit in order to bring it in line with other languages of the 21st century. That’s not their intention anyway. Until recent times, Sanskrit was made inaccessible to non-Brahmins who wanted to study the language. I remember, some 60 years ago, a German scholar telling us students at the Maharaja’s college in Trivandrum how he was refused admission for Sanskrit studies at the Maharaja’s college, Mysore, because he was a foreigner. Jawaharlal Nehru in his Discovery of India tells the story of Sir William James, an Englishman. He was already a linguist and a scholar, and when he came to India as a judge of the Supreme Court, he expressed his desire to learn Sanskrit. But no Brahmin would agree to teach the sacred language to a foreigner and an intruder, even though handsome rewards were offered. Jones, ultimately, with considerable difficulty, got hold of a non-Brahmin Vaidya, or medical practitioner, who agreed to teach him but on his own peculiar and stringent conditions. Jones agreed to every stipulation, so great was his eagerness to learn the ancient language of India. Sanskrit fascinated him and especially the discovery of the old Indian drama. “It was through his writings and translations that Europe first had a glimpse of some of the treasures of Sanskrit literature. In 1784 Sir William Jones established the Bengal Asiatic Society. To Jones and many other European scholars, India owes a deep debt of gratitude for the rediscovery of her past literature”. It is to men like Sir William Jones and Jawaharlal Nehru that we should turn to rediscover our past. The need of the hour is to save Sanskrit from the ugly meddling hands of those who claim to be revivers of the true Bharatiya Sanskriti. |
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Couch potatoes on the rise Australians love watching sports, but won’t come out to play, reveals a national sports attitude survey. It has surprised researchers, pointing as it does to the gap between the number of Australians who enjoy sport on radio, television and the print media, and the number who go out and exercise. The Sweeney Sports Report, independently researched by a sports doctor at the University of South Australia, has surprised other researchers because the findings go against expectations, revealing no significant increase in sports participation since the Olympics. The trend is probably taking hold in the whole of the developed world, where people are moving towards technology and a more sedentary lifestyle. According to the research, 40 per cent said they swam, 31 per cent said they walked and 27 per cent said they went to the gym; but non-aerobic golf, fishing and snooker ranked next. Australia’s inertia after the Sydney Olympics is in contrast to the 1996 Atlanta Games, when the interest in sport was at an all time high. Sporting groups that reported surges of interest immediately after the Olympics might have been seeing the effects of active people changing sports rather than newcomers taking to sport.
WFS
It’s time for nudes and weather Norway’s Radio Tango has become the world’s first radio channel to broadcast daily nude weather forecasts during its morning show. “This is a world exclusive, it has never been done before,” Radio Tango’s morning host Michael Reines Oredam says. Oredam said the idea for the frisky “more weather, less clothes” reports emerged during discussions about what would be nearly impossible to achieve on radio. “And it brings a certain atmosphere to the studio which we hope our listeners are able to pick up on,” Oredam said. The Oslo-based radio has a Web site at www.radiotango.no which provides a glimpse of a nude presenter. “Today we’ve had lots of hits on our Web page from people who want to see yesterday’s weather,” he said. The first nude radio weather presenter, Siv Johannessen, had her first day on the air Thursday, but needed more training before she would talk about, as well as strip to, the weather, said Maiken Mangen, editor of pornographic magazine Lek, which hires out models to appear on the weather show. “It became a little hectic for Siv yesterday when she was supposed to talk about the weather and strip at the same time,” Mangen said, adding that she expected Johannessen to get the hang of it in a couple of days. Radio Tango will have a new nude weather presenter every month.
Reuters
USA to sell fiasco
voting machines The voting machines at the centre of the US general election fiasco are to be auctioned off. The money raised will be used to buy more modern equipment. Officials in Florida’s Palm Beach County hope to start selling some or all of its 5,000 Votomatic machines on eBay, the online auction house. The Florida Legislature has voted to ban punch-ard ballots, which were at the centre of the chad debate. Proceeds from the sale will help buy new voting equipment expected to cost from $3 million (£2m) to $14 (£9.7m) million. The state will give the county $1.9 million (£1.3m) New machines will be bought whether or not the Votomatics are sold, she said.
Los Angeles Times
Palm tree-shaped islands to be built Dubai plans to build two of the world’s largest manmade islands in the shape of palm trees. Together they will cover 120 square kilometres and will be five kilometres off the coastline. Work on the first island is expected to start next month and will take about two years to complete. The island will be in the shape of 17 huge fronds surrounded by 12 kilometres of barrier reef. Each frond will feature a distinct architectural style There will be up to 80 hotels on the pair of islands, as well as luxury villas, shops and a marine park. Both islands will be linked to the mainland by bridges.
Sunday Times |
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SPIRITUAL NUGGETS He who purifies his soul of earthly passions shall be saved and shall not suffer ruin, but he who is overcome by his earthly passions should despair of life. ***** Eat and drink but do not be immoderate. ***** If you love God then follow me and walk along my path so that God may love you and forgive you your sins. He is Most Forgiving, Ever Merciful. ***** Thou dost most surely possess high moral excellence. ***** Keep your raiment clean and your bodies and your streets and the places where you sit. Take frequent baths and cultivate the habit of keeping your homes neat and tidy. ***** When you go on a journey, make all preparation and take necessary provisions so as to avoid having to beg. ***** When you eat give out of your food to him who asks and also to dogs and other animals and birds. ***** Approach not adultery. ***** Do not give that which is defective in exchange for that which is good. ***** Render not vain your alms by reproaches or injury. — The Holy Quran, 91:10-11; 7:32; 3:32; 68:5; 74:5-6; 2:198; 51:20; 17:33; 4:3; 2:265. You cannot judge any man beyond your knowledge of him, and how small is your knowledge. ***** The tribune of humanity is in its silent heart never its talkative mind. ***** Crime is either another name of need or an aspect of a disease. ***** Please do not whitewash your inherent faults with your acquired virtues. I would have the faults; they are like mine own. ***** We often borrow from our tomorrows to pay our debts to our yesterdays. — Kahlil Gibran, Sand and Foam |
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