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October Month Articles

October Month Articles

    • by Sharat Pradhan

    • Congress president Sonia Gandhi performed puja at the Kashi Vishwanath temple, dedicated to Lord Shiva, in Varanasi on Tuesday morning. .....
     
    • by Guardian

    • Republican leaders withdrew their support of a state House candidate who questioned whether her opponent can represent Iowans since she is an immigrant from India. .....
     
    • by Balbir K. Punj

    • If the results of the recently held elections in Pakistan, which General Musharraf conducted to give his rule the veneer of a popular mandate, have come as a surprise, it is mostly to the peaceniks of our country, like Kuldip Nayar and his entourage. .....
     
    • by Vir Sanghvi

    • Few Prime Ministers have been as hard to read as Atal Bihari Vajpayee. I never saw him in action during his heyday as a fiery Jan Sanghi orator opposing the Congress and fighting for the cause of the Hindi language. But over the last decade or so, the press has consistently got him wrong. .....
     
    • by The Asian Age

    • The principal of Fr Agnel School in Vashi, Navi Mumbai, Fr Saturnino Almeida, is a troubled man. A case was framed against him and the school under section 153 (a) and 295 (a) for passing hurtful statements against a religion after Bajrang Dal activists protested against an essay topic in an examination paper. .....
     
    • by Sankara. Mahadevan

    • Even as an eleven-member Constitutional bench of the Supreme Court of India is seized with deciding upon the definition of "minorityeducational institution" for months, the Tamilnadu Chief Minster J.Jayalalitha did last week something unprecedented. She snubbed the managers of the Church-run educational institutions in Tamilnadu with threats of unleashing ESMA on them, when they bandied that well-worn weapon of "in protest, we shall close down minority institutions" on October 24. They did. .....
     
    • by Eric Fingerhut

    • Israel, India and the United States are all fighting terrorism, a common enemy that has helped spur another partnership -- between the American Jewish and Indian American communities. .....
     
    • by N S Rajaram

    • In an article "Cosmology in the Rigveda- The Third Premise" (The Hindu, 9-7-2002) Patriazia Norelli-Bachelet made sweeping statements regarding the Rigveda and its cosmic meaning-through her 'cosmic' interpretation boiled down to imposing astrological readings on the hymns with ideas that came much later. She also made the preposterous claim: "The ancients were not at all concerned with keeping records for posterity as we do today." .....
     
    • by Organiser

    • The Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee has called for keeping up the efforts of security forces to get the better of terrorism. Speaking at the DGPs and IGPs conference in Delhi recently, Shri Vajpayee said that Pakistan must be held accountable for its continued sponsorship of terrorism in India and our diplomatic initiatives should be intensified to remind the leading nations of the international coalition against terrorism about their pledge in this regard. .....
     
    • by M V Kamath

    • It is shocking and painful to watch the extent to which secularists would go to defame the Government on every conceivable occasion. Recently, opponents and critics of the Bharatiya Janata Party decided to oppose the new Government policy on secondary education as propounded by the National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT) and took it to the Supreme Court. .....
     
    • by Prof Cyriac Thomas

    • Religion and spirituality form essential features of Indian life and culture. In fact they provide the very essential base of our Indian society. In India, religion is part of society and normally an unavoidable component in one's personal life also. This is so because here religion and spirituality are taken as intertwined and complementary. Between them a line of separation is almost impossible and even if traced it can be a very thin one. .....
     
    • by Shyam Khosla

    • The Supreme Court's landmark judgment upholding the new syllabus for secondary education formulated by NCERT is a vindication of HRD Minister Dr. Murli Manohar Joshi's new educational policy. Dr. Joshi has been under attack on the floor of Parliament and outside for his policy that seeks to remove distortions introduced in Indian history books by leftist historians and permits educational institutions to educate students on fundamentals of all religions. .....
     
    • by Indian Currents

    • A Marian shrine in Karnataka resembled a Hindu festival site as thousands of saffron-clothed devotees overflowed the area to celebrate the Blessed Mother's birthday. .....
     
    • by

    • "Who am I to prevent them? IF I HAD POWER AND COULD LEGISLATE, I SHOULD CERTAINLY STOP ALL PROSELYTISING. It is the cause of much avoidable conflict between classes and unnecessary heart burning among missionaries". .....
     
    • by The Indian Express

    • VHP vice-president Acharya Giriraj Kishore is busy these days planning the next Dharma Sansad, scheduled for February 2003, which is bound to revive the Ayodhya Mandir issue just before the assembly elections in nine states.With a triple masters degree, including one in political science, the 82-year-old Kishore is an expert at combining politics with religion. He has been in and out of almost all main organisations of the Sangh Parivar. He joined the RSS in 1940, the Jan Sangh by 1970 and the VHP in 1982. In an interview with Ajit Kumar Jha of The Sunday Express, Kishore defends the VHP .....
     
    • by The Indian Express

    • As Director, Military Operations, during the Chinese aggression in the autumn of 1962, Major General D.K. Palit, then a brigadier, played a key role. Speaking to Saikat Datta, he says he authored War in the High Himalayas, years later, as an ''answer to the lies'' that had been written about the war so far. .....
     
    • by The Hindu

    • The School Education department has issued notices to all schools which closed on Thursday, as part of the agitation by minority groups against the Prohibition of Forcible Conversion of Religion Ordinance. .....
     
    • by Afternoon Despatch and Courier

    • MATARAM. Mater. Mother. Ma. Amma - the word produces a beautiful, soothing sound. A mystery is revealed. There is no goddess here, no religion. An uplifting, nowhere image. It is a word understood all over the world. It is the first word. Looks like the baby knows the word from the day it is born. .....
     
    • by Hindus of Greater Houston

    • What do you call a twenty-nine year old man from Varanasi, dressed in saffron, who twice went to Puri to claim the seat of Shankaracharya and both times left following judicial orders and police intervention?  What do you call a man in saffron who says that India's Home Minister L. K.  Adwani is the world's worst terrorist and claims that Iraq's President Saddam Hussain is a great bhakta (lover of God). .....
     
    • by Aziz Haniffa

    • Frank Pallone, Congressman and New Jersey Democrat, has slammed the United States administration for ignoring Pakistan's involvement in supplying North Korea critical equipment that was used to start a covert nuclear programme by Pyongyang. .....
     
    • by www.secularism.org.uk

    • The Labour MP for Keighley, West Yorkshire, Ann Cryer, has set alarm bells ringing in her constituency after claiming that physical abuse of children attending religious classes at mosques could be widespread. .....
     
    • by CATO Institute

    • As the United States expands its anti-terrorist operations into Pakistan, a new study from the Cato Institute argues that Pakistan is an unreliable ally that is likely to turn on America in the long run. .....
     
    • by Leon Hadar

    • President George W. Bush has declared that the next phase of the anti-terrorism campaign would be aimed at pressing Iraq, Iran, and North Korea -- the so-called Axis of Evil -- not to develop chemical, biological and nuclear weapons. He also stressed in his State of the Union Address that the war against terrorism would be grounded in a set of universal values, including the rule of law, religious freedom and respect for women. .....
     
    • by Balbir K Punj

    • Four years ago, when the Government led by Mr Atal Bihari Vajpayee first took charge in New Delhi, the prophets of doom were quick to question its longevity. In 1999, when the NDA came to power, again with Mr Vajpayee at the helm, cynicism about its durability was natural since no non-Congress Government had completed two years in Parliament. Today the issue is not how long the NDA Government will last, but how well it will perform. .....
     
    • by MV Kamath

    • Let the world know even if the deaf and blind European Union refuses to accept the fact that in Jammu & Kashmir, democracy won an impressive victory. When, speaking in Copenhagen, Prime Minister Vajpayee said that the people of Jammu & Kashmir have given their verdict and the winner, clearly, is Indian democracy, he was telling the bare truth. But it is more than that. .....
     
    • by Jim Hoagland

    • The discovery that North Korea has been secretly enriching uranium for the nuclear weapons program it promised to freeze in 1994 demonstrates the dangers of putting faith in a confirmed and practiced liar. So does the news that Pakistan provided the nuclear technology and perhaps uranium to Kim Jong Il's regime. .....
     
    • by K.P. Nayar

    • Three weeks after New Delhi rubbished a recommendation by the US Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) asking the state department to declare India as a "country of particular concern" (CPC) on account of the recent events in Gujarat, Vaghela told a press conference here yesterday that he would invite members of the Commission to visit India if he is in power. .....
     
    • by The Indian Express

    • Two Bangladeshi nationals Were arrested after police recovered bombs from the Ganesh Murthy Nagar Zopadpatti adjoining the highly sensitive Navy Nagar in Colaba during a combing operation this afternoon.  The suspects have been identified as Hazrat Rashid Sheikh and Mohammed Anwar.  Their backgrounds are being ascertained, said the police. .....
     
    • by The Hindustan Times

    • The Labour's subtle approval of the efforts basically by Mirpuri and pro-Pakistan leadership to carve a Muslim group within the party has caused considerable resentment, not only among its Indian suppporters, but even quite a few party MPs are also aghast. .....
     
    • by Claude Arpi

    • If someone asked me what is the greatest scam since Independence, I would have some difficulty answering. I might initially consider the 'Jeep case' involving Krishna Menon, or the smoking guns of Bofors. .....
     
    • by O.P. Gupta

    • In August, 2002, one case of committing sati and two failed attempts to commit sati in Madhya Pradesh were reported by the media. .....
     
    • by Tom Carter

    • The Islamic world is engaged in a cultural war with the West and the worst is still to come, Italian author Oriana Fallaci told a receptive Washington audience last night. .....
     
    • by Yahoo News

    • Former Indian prime minister Indira Gandhi may still be held in great esteem but she was a woman of many weaknesses who encouraged corruption and was intolerant to dissent, says a new book by a former aide. .....
     
    • by NDTV.com

    • In an unlikely twist to the BJP's election campaign in Gujarat, the party has said that it will introduce an anti-conversion law, if it returns to power. .....
     
    • by Jon Henley in Paris and Gwladys Fouché

    • A Paris court yesterday cleared Michel Houellebecq, the enfant terrible of French letters, of provoking religious and racial hatred by calling Islam "the most stupid of religions". .....
     
    • by Scott Baldauf

    • Javed's parents always talk about what Kashmir used to be - a land where Hindus and Muslims were friends, celebrated holidays and weddings together, ate each other's food. .....
     
    • by WORLD TRIBUNE.COM

    • The United States has identified the sources of Al Qaida funding and found they were fewer in number than earlier estimated. .....
     
    • by Swami Dayananda Saraswati

    • I welcome the promulgation of the ordinance by the Government of Tamil Nadu to ban religious conversions " by use of force or by allurements or by any fraudulent means." This is a long-awaited step. A step that ensures for the citizens of Tamil Nadu the most basic of human rights. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights adopted by General Assembly resolution 217 A (III) in December 1948, holds in Article 18 that " Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion; this right includes freedom to change his religion or belief.." .....
     
    • by Newsinsight.net

    • The missiles-for-nukes barter deal between Pakistan  and North Korea has a more direct Chinese angle than the fact that  these two rogue states are allies of China. .....
     
    • by B. Raman

    • In articles written since 1998, I have been saying, on the basis of information from reliable Pakistani sources, that North Korea's assistance to Pakistan in the development of its missile capability has been as a quid pro quo for the latter's assistance to North Korea in the development of its military nuclear capability. .....
     
    • by Maria Ressa

    • The Islamic group suspected of involvement in last weekend's deadly bombing of a nightclub in Bali is believed to have set up cells inside Australia, Southeast Asian intelligence officials have told CNN. .....
     
    • by Suzanne Goldenberg

    • Pakistan was a key supplier to North Korea's secret nuclear programme, US officials said yesterday, confirming suspicions that first arose when Benazir Bhutto, the then Pakistani prime minister, went shopping for missile technology in Pyongyang and Beijing nearly a decade ago. .....
     
    • by Aloke Tikku

    • Trust the ruling party to ask the government to gift-wrap a prime plot, as The Statesman reported yesterday. And trust the CPI-M, ordinarily reflexive critics of the BJP, to abuse ?trust? to land a deal. .....
     
    • by The Statesman

    • The recent attacks on Durga puja pandals and systematic breaking of idols by ?unidentified? people in Bangladesh is a matter of concern not only for the country?s minority but also for its secular traditions. The attacks have unnerved the minority community so much that the office bearers of the National Durga Puja Celebrations Committee .....
     
    • by Kelly Burke

    • The census figures show that we have not become more godless in the past five years. If anything we have become more spiritual or more confused, depending how the data is interpreted. .....
     
    • by Daniel Pipes & Jonathan Schanzer

    • The recent bombing of a nightclub in Bali, Indonesia, killing at least 183 and injuring hundreds, fits into a larger pattern. Militant Islam used to be mostly confined to Middle Easterners, but in recent years it has spread to Muslims in other parts of the world. .....
     
    • by Mita Mukherjee

    • For 25 years of Left rule, Christian missionary schools here had held out against the march of the CPM to which one educational institution after another had fallen. No more. .....
     
    • by Sandhya Jain

    • The Tamil Nadu Government's unexpected Ordinance banning religious conversions through force, fraud or inducement, has brought a prickly issue into the open. While the move has upset communities that are not content with the constitutional freedom to practise their faith freely, it has been received with a sense of relief by groups that are not driven with the desire to eradicate other creeds. .....
     
    • by R. Ilangovan

    • In a sharp reaction to the spontaneous consolidation of minorities and secularists against the Tamil Nadu Government Prohibition of Forcible Conversion of Religion Ordinance, Hindu leaders and heads of various mutts have extended `wholehearted' support to the Chief Minister, Jayalalithaa, for taking a "bold and timely" step to stop conversions in the State. .....
     
    • by Diana West

    • In a time of more controlled chaos, linking the Rev. Jerry Falwell to French author Michel Houellebecq would be unthinkable. After all, what could the founder of the Moral Majority possibly have in common with uh Franch authair known for novels of emotional desolation and sexual explicitness? Not much -- until lately. .....
     
    • by The Indian Express

    • Paula Richman has studied the Ramayana for the last 15 years. She is a Professor of Religion at Oberlin University in the USA and put together the book Many Ramayanas about the diversity of this narrative tradition. Currently on research leave, Richman lectured on her subject at the Sahitya Akademi in New Delhi last weekend. Excerpts from an interview with Renuka Narayanan. .....
     
    • by Amelia Hill

    • The terrorist network led by Osama bin Laden struck deals in 'blood diamonds' worth over $20 million in the months before the attacks of 11 September 2001. .....
     
    • by CNN News

    • Explosives packed inside a bicycle frame detonated Sunday outside a Roman Catholic shrine in the Southern Philippines city of Zamboanga, killing a Philippine marine and wounding 16 people, police said. .....
     
    • by indahnesia.com

    • Terrorist mastermind Osama bin Laden has been linked to last week's Bali nightclub bombing, which killed at least 183 people and injured more than 300 mostly foreign tourists, following a testimony by one of his senior lieutenants. According to a confession made by Omar Faruq, described as Bin Laden's envoy in Southeast Asia, who was arrested in Indonesia in June and handed over to the CIA in Afghanistan, a series of plots were hatched to kill westerners, Indonesians and Israelis. .....
     
    • by Anil Bhat

    • The loss of erstwhile East Pakistan was a rude shock to the military establishment of Pakistan - one from which it is still smarting. It also amounted to a loss of foothold in that region for the purpose of motivating and arming India's North-Eastern insurgent groups in collusion with China through Myanmar. .....
     
    • by The Times of India

    • Even as Tamil Nadu demands much-needed water from neighbouring Karnataka, people in this state are renovating disused water tanks in temples in their efforts to conserve the precious resource. .....
     
    • by The Indian Express

    • Hindu priest Mangku Gama sits cross-legged inside a roadside temple on Bali skewering pieces of meat onto bamboo sticks and wondering if the weekend bomb blasts have disrupted the island's tranquillity for good. Cauldrons of chicken and duck are cooking and meat carcasses are being strung up from the roof. Women in fancy sarongs and ornate hair pieces shuttle in and out. .....
     
    • by Andhra Online

    • Five persons were killed and 20 others injured, some of them seriously, in two separate attacks on Durga puja pandals by militants in lower Assam's Bongaigaon district on Sunday night, official sources said on Monday. .....
     
    • by Urmi A Goswami

    • Nearly 6,000 Fijians of Indian origin are leaving the island every year. At such high levels of migration, Indians are expected to become a much smaller minority ethnic group in the Fijian islands. .....
     
    • by Rory Callinan

    • Ten Pakistani clerics are being held under guard in connection with the Bali bomb blast, Indonesian police have confirmed. .....
     
    • by Ramu Bhagwat

    • Nagpur: RSS chief K S Sudarshan on Sunday defended the ordinance brought out by the Tamil Nadu government banning conversions by force or allurement. He also recommended a law on the same lines for the whole country. .....
     
    • by Santanu Banerjee

    • The CPI(M)-led West Bengal government has asked for a central grant of Rs 11 crore for a "total" development package for Dakshineshwar Kali Temple. .....
     
    • by Rashmee Z Ahmed

    • India has reacted with shock to news of a car bomb attack in the Indonesian tourist resort of Bali, amid pointed comments urging the international community to end the practice of "conflicting views on the issue of terrorism or its perception". .....
     
    • by Roshni Olivera

    • An Indo-Pak Test match? Cricket buffs would love it, but former High Commissioner to Pakistan G Parthasarathy, a cricket buff himself, believes the match will have to wait. "We can't ignore the political dimension of playing cricket with Pakistan. Right now, there's tension and we have troops deployed on the border. How do you explain to a Jawan there who's unable to meet his family for six months that we are playing cricket with Pakistan? It doesn't make sense." .....
     
    • by Jhimli Mukherjee Pandey

    • 40-year old Narayan Shashtri and 19 year old Bibek Mukherjee are classmates in a unique school. The Purohit Paathshala on Haritaki Bagan Lane near Amherst Street, is provding hope for the unemployed who had for so long been contemplating nothing but a bleak future. .....
     
    • by The Times of India

    • The Pakistan Muslim League (Quaid-e-Azam), believed to be close to President Pervez Musharraf, emerged as the frontrunner on Friday as results came in from various parts of the country in the first general elections since the military leader came to power in a 1999 coup. .....
     
    • by J S Rajput

    • It was a debate that drifted from professed objectives. A nationwide discussion on the shape of school education in the 21st century could be a sound professional and academic exercise with valuable inputs from all the stakeholders. This is what NCERT attempted when it brought out the Discussion Document on National Curriculum Framework in School Education in January 2000. .....
     
    • by K T Sangameswaran

    • Despite the elimination of Imam Ali, a dreaded militant, and his associates in Bangalore six days ago, the continued support given by people to fundamentalist groups is causing concern to the police. They acknowledge that without the support of some elements, apart from his associates, Ali could not have escaped from police custody at Tirumangalam, near Madurai, and later sneaked out of the State. .....
     
    • by The Indian Express

    • The mastermind of the 1998 Coimbatore serial bomb blasts and member of the fundamentalist group Al-Umma, Imam Ali was shot dead early this morning along four of his associates by a joint team of the Karnataka and Tamil Nadu police. .....
     
    • by The Indian Express

    • Vivekjiwan Swami, spokesperson of the Bochasanwasi Shri Akshar Purushottam Swaminarayan Sanstha (BAPS) was one of those still stuck inside the temple complex late in the evening. From 'Reception 4' he spoke to The Indian Express at about 9 pm and narrated the whole incident to Janyala Sreenivas. .....
     
    • by Conal Urquhart

    • Hama, the Palestinian group responsible for suicide bombings in Israel, has launched an unlikely charm offensive aimed at convincing Palestinians it is capable of becoming their political voice. .....
     
    • by M V Kamath

    • When Human Resources Development Minister Dr Murli Manohar Joshi suggested that there is a good reason to re-write history there was a wave of protest from our Leftists. It was a gut reaction. The Left just cannot accept the fact that what they dismiss as the "Saffron Brigade" can ever do anything right. .....
     
    • by Kanhaiah Bhelari

    • Come to Purnea to die, goes an old saying. There was a time when people in the  area fell like flies to malaria. These days, criminals seem to have taken the place of mosquitoes and, in the process, have made sure that the saying is still relevant. Armed with sophisticated weapons, they spew blood and terror in the villages and towns of Araria, Kishanganj, Purnea and Katihar districts, which fall under Purnea division in Bihar. .....
     
    • by Mark Steyn

    • New Hampshire: An appeaser, said Churchill, feeds the crocodile in the hope that it will eat him last. But sometimes the croc eats him first anyway. For months, the US, Britain and Canada had warned the Indonesian government about terrorists operating within its borders. So had Singapore and Malaysia. President Megawati's administration responded by calling Washington anti-Muslim. .....
     
    • by The Telegraph

    • A class-lX student was stabbed to death by drunk assailants when he tried to resist their attempts to assault his mother near the Nabagram hospital quarters last night. .....
     
    • by The Hindu

    • Two organisations and a doctor working with polio patients have been chosen this year for the eighth Mahaveer awards for excellence in human endeavour in various fields. .....
     
    • by David E. Sanger and James Dao

    • American intelligence officials have concluded that Pakistan, a vital ally since last year's terrorist attacks, was a major supplier of critical equipment for North Korea's newly revealed clandestine nuclear weapons program, current and former senior American officials said today. .....
     
    • by Daniel Pipes

    • The very first line of defense for the U.S. homeland consists of those who issue visas (the consular division of the State Department) and those who control the borders (the Immigration and Naturalization Service, or INS). Trouble is, neither of those agencies has understood its security role. .....
     
    • by The Indian Express

    • The process of Talibanisation of Balochistan has got a big boost with the emergence in the October 10 election of the Jamaat-Ul-Islami-dominated Muttahia Majlis-e-Amal as the single largest party in the Provincial Assembly, as well as with its victory on the National Assembly seats reserved for Balochistan. This is a clear message from the voters. .....
     
    • by H. V. Seshadri

    • This happened, I believe, some 30-35 years back. A book by name 'Religious Leaders' by Thomas and Thomas was published in Europe. And, hold your breath, Muslim riots brake out in our country, in Bombay and elsewhere! As usual, the rioters began attacking Hindus, torching their shops and destroying public property. .....
     
    • by George Neumayr

    • If Jerry Falwell had described Quakerism as a violent religion, would Quakers have rioted? Would Quaker preachers have called for his death? .....
     
    • by Arvind Lavakare

    • While the electoral eclipse of the autocratic Abdullah dynasty and its non- governing National Conference has opened the gates of hope for the future of the commoner in Jammu and Kashmir, the state could well go from the frying pan into the fire if the People's Democratic Party takes its poll agenda too seriously in its role of a major partner in the coalition that is getting set to rule from Srinagar. .....
     
    • by The Free Press Journal

    • When you have a military ruler firmly in place, and who had further fortified himself with the power to make or break governments at his sweet will, the outcome of highly flawed elections to State and national legislatures ought to be of little consequence. At least to his own survival. .....
     
    • by B Raman

    • A massive explosion from a car bomb destroyed a night club at the Kuta beach resort on the tourist island of Bali in Indonesia on October 12, sparking a devastating fire that killed at least 187 people and wounded more than 300 -- many of them foreigners, mainly Australians, Germans, Canadians, Britons and Swedes. .....
     
    • by James Taranto

    • "Sectarian violence in India's Solapur city, triggered by a protest over comments by US Baptist minister Jerry Falwell against the Prophet Mohammed, has left eight dead and over 90 injured," Agence France-Presse reports. "Police had used gunfire Friday on crowds of rioters of Muslim youths who clashed with groups of Hindus as the protest against Falwell's remarks turned violent." .....
     
    • by The Daily Star

    • Controversial feminist writer Taslima Nasrin has been given one year's prison term for her derogatory comments on Islam in several of her books including 'Lajja.' .....
     
    • by G Vinayak

    • Three persons were killed and seven injured when unidentified miscreants lobbed grenades at a crowded puja pandal in lower Assam's Bongaigaon town late on Sunday night. .....
     
    • by Luke Harding

    • Seated in the front garden beneath a yellow canopy, his supporters waited patiently, bearers carrying trays of tea and lemon cake moving among them. Finally he appeared, an elderly, diminutive figure with a neat white beard and Jinnah hat. .....
     
    • by Dhiraj Nishant

    • This is with reference to R.P. Desai letter, 'Selfless Soul' (Oct 8), in which he questions the VHP's commitment to social service. Why is it that almost all so-called secularists delight in targeting the VHP? And why is that the same awkward questions are not asked of religious organisations that belong to the minority community? .....
     
    • by Charles Jacobs

    • Harvard President Lawrence Summers recently criticized those on his campus who speak in the name of human rights but selectively censure Israel while ignoring much greater problems in the Middle East. He described the divestment campaign against Israel on his campus as anti-Semitic ''in effect if not intent.'' But human rights (and media) attention is often disproportionate to the severity or urgency of human conflicts. .....
     
    • by Matthew Moore

    • If a lack of sympathy was a guide to guilt, then Indonesia's best-known radical Muslim would be rightly convicted of the Bali bombings. .....
     
    • by Hari Om

    • On October 1, NCERT released Contemporary India, a social science textbook for Class IX among other new texts. This has provoked a few left-oriented historians and activists to carry out a relentless vilification campaign against the NCERT and those who have authored the history portions of these condemned textbooks. .....
     
    • by Rediff on Net

    • After attacking the National Democratic Alliance government for its economic reforms and "failure" to contain terrorism, Vishwa Hindu Parishad leader Ashok Singhal on Friday targeted an adviser of Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee. .....
     
    • by T V Parasuram

    • India could militarily intervene if Islamists gain control over Pakistan's nuclear weapons either through a coup or a civil war, a study by an American think tank says. .....
     
    • by M. S. N. Menon

    • India took a thousand years to get into the spirit of democracy. That spirit has stayed with us. Today, it is part of our reflex, part of our character, part of our civilisation. .....
     
    • by www.nation.com.pk

    • A Muslim separatist group operating in Thailand's south has vowed to pursue its independence struggle despite the sentencing to life imprisonment of three of its leaders, a report said Thursday. .....
     
    • by MV Kamath

    • The Tamil Nadu Prohibition of Forcible Conversion of Religion Ordinance should have been expected a long time ago. Many believe that it has not come a day too soon. The Ordnance issued by Governor, P. S. Ramamohan Rao, not only bars ``forcible'' conversions but hands imprisonment and a hefty fine to those found guilty. The Ordnance, besides requires that all conversions be reported to district magistrates. .....
     
    • by Jeff Gerth and Judith Miller

    • Al Qaedas terror network derives most of its financing from charities and individuals in Saudi Arabia, but the kingdom has "turned a blind eye to this problem," according to a new report by experts on terrorist finances. .....
     
    • by Sunil Jain

    • General Electric (GE) chairman Jeffrey Immelt may have got a lot of good press when he spoke glowingly of China in comparison with India, Congress Party's eco-whiz Jairam Ramesh told a select Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) gathering the other day, but he was being economical with the truth. What Immelt didn't tell you, Jairam says, was that India is one of the largest 'industrial laboratories' for GE. .....
     
    • by Francois Gautier

    • This column is specially addressed to my Christian brothers and sisters of India. At a time when again a Western missionary ministering in India (Father Marian Zelazek who works among leprosy patients in Orissa) has been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize, and when Mother Teresa's beatification - and later the canonisation - is being speeded-up by the Vatican, it is time to look into the real motives of Christian missionaries working in India. .....
     
    • by Reuters

    • An unidentified Saudi supplied funds to the Indonesian-based Jemaah Islamiah network to buy explosives that may have been used in the Bali bombing, an authority on Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda said on Wednesday. .....
     
    • by Steven Plaut

    • I certainly do not mean to detract for an instant from the horror and outrage over the Bali bombing, but at the same time I cannot leave without comment the dramatic differences in the reactions of the world to the Bali bombing and the countless Arab atrocities against Jews. .....
     
    • by Alex Perry

    • As it headed for port through the midwinter dusk, there was little about the M.V. Mecca that stood out from the other boats plying the waters off southern Bangladesh. Portworkers and fishermen noted the same squat deckhouse and plump hold that for centuries have sheltered fishermen from the cyclones of the Bay of Bengal. The Mecca had the usual rusted rigging and smoke-blackened stern. .....
     
    • by Ashok Das

    • Cyber savvy Andhra Pradesh is all set to enact a law making it compulsory to register all marriages. According to the law, any marriage - be it a mere exchange of garlands, betrothal conducted according to different customs, traditions, religions or even remarriage - will have to be registered with authorities. Interestingly, the legislation envisages punishment for an official if he fails to register a marriage. .....
     
    • by The Hindu

    • The anti-conversion ordinance is "not directed against any particular religion, least of all any minority religion", the Chief Minister, Jayalalithaa, has said. .....
     
    • by Balbir K Punj

    • The Indian media has a glorious tradition of being the watchdog of civil society as much in the post-Independence era as in the pre- Independence days. .....
     
    • by Najam Sethi

    • Thank you, General Pervez Musharraf, for delivering us from the likes of Nawaz Sharif and handing us over to Qazi Hussain Ahmad and Maulana Fazlur Rehman. .....
     
    • by The Daily

    • Unidentified miscreants demolished all images of Goddess Durga at the Durga Mandir at Shakharipara under Ataikula Upazila in Pabna yesterday. .....
     
    • by Vishwa Hindu Parishad

    • Every year Hindus of Bradford celebrate the sacred festival of Navraatri peacefully as it is celebrated in other British Cities. The difference here is that during every celebration Hindu worshippers are under constant threat of attacks from other minority community. Every year the Deepawali Lights are wantonly damaged, temple worshippers are confronted with severe abuse and hostility, Women and children spat at, Mandirs and Elderly Day centres are arson attacked and our youths are under severe intimidation. In the face of all these assaults Bradford Hindus have shown remarkable restraint, as this is second nature to them. .....
     
    • by Peter Chalk and Chris Fair

    • Since the September 11 attacks on the United States, Pakistan has figured prominently in Washington's global war on terrorism. Responding to a series of threats and inducements, President General Pervez Musharraf terminated support for the fundamentalist Taliban regime it had helped create and foster in Kabul, allowed Pakistani territory and airspace to be used for Operation Enduring Freedom, and provided important intelligence data to coalition forces targeting terrorist training camps on Afghan soil. .....
     
    • by Tym Parsons

    • Summary: Saudi Arabia is indisputably terrorism's biggest bankroller, even if Iran is its largest sponsor overall. The Saudis persistently stonewall efforts to cut off terrorist funding, and they'll never reliably change in that regard- too many powerful Saudis are fanatical terrorist sympathizers, due to their Wahabite fundamentalism. .....
     
    • by Bharat Jhunjhunwala

    • Our intellectuals often lament the decline of moral values and the dominance of materialism in the modern society. But the opposite indeed may be the case. The enslavement of India by the Mughal and British can be traced to the weakness, not strength, of materialism in our culture. Our kings were content playing second fiddle to the foreign rulers. .....
     
    • by The Hindustan Times

    • Is Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee reliving his Stalinist past? Of late, there has been much heat and dust over the Centre's harassment of Tehelka and other media organisations. .....
     
    • by Christian Persecution

    • Ongoing - Religious intolerance is highest in indigenous communities which see evangelical Christianity as undermining their traditional culture. It is reported that in the past 30 years at least 30,000 evangelical Christians have been expelled from San Juan Chamula, Chiapas. .....
     
    • by Baptist Fire

    • Many Bible believing Christians in the United States are often shocked and puzzled when they hear tales of persecution in neighboring Mexico. After all, Mexico is a big trade partner and borders on the freest country in the world. Is it really true that Bible believing Christians are being persecuted for their faith just beyond the U.S. border? .....
     
    • by MEMRI

    • As soon as the U.S. geared up for the war against the Taliban regime in Afghanistan, Muslim military personnel in the American armed forces began to deal with the question of the religious permissibility of their participation in battle. Army Chaplain Capt. Abd Al-Rasheed Muhammad, the Imam of Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington, D.C. sent an inquiry on the matter to the North American Fiqh (Islamic Jurisprudence) Council, which in turn referred the matter to clerics in the Arab world. .....
     
    • by MEMRI

    • Nearly every year, Egyptian television broadcasts special series for the month of Ramadan, which enjoy particularly high ratings. Frequently, these annual series make media waves in the Arab world. During Ramadan 2000, for example, the character of the Coptic woman married to a Muslim in one series sparked a heated debate on Christian-Muslim relations. More recently, the polygamist Hajj Mutawali, in a series for Ramadan 2001, engendered a storm about polygamy in the Islamic world. .....
     
    • by Ramtanu Maitra and Susan Maitra

    • Continuing terrorist actions and violent demonstrations over the last five decades have turned India's Northeast into a dangerous place. Large- scale introduction of narcotics and arms from neighboring Myanmar (Burma) and China has made this strategically crucial area a potential theater of violent secessionist movements. .....
     
    • by Vinod Kumar

    • In one discussion on a group, a participant wrote: ""For instance while there is just one verse in Koran which says "To you your religion, to me mine", there are scores (hundreds, actually) which promote hatred towards disbelievers."" .....
     
    • by

    • 'The defenders of the faith' are hysterical again. The same groups - the same editorialists, the same NGOs, the same 'eminent scholars', and the same news commentators - who are anti-Ayodhya movement, anti-Pokharan II, anti- NCERT syllabus, anti-changes-in the ICHR set up - simply put, the anti-Hindutva groups or Anti-Hindutva coalition. .....
     
    • by Catholic World News

    • Catholic natives of San Juan Chamula in the conflict-ridden southern Mexican state of Chiapas forced their town's mayor to resign as part of a conflict between them and a group of Evangelical natives. .....
     
    • by MSNBC

    • The leader of a Chicago-area Islamic charity was indicted on racketeering charges Wednesday, accused of fraudulently collecting donations to support Osama bin Laden's network and other terrorist groups. "It is sinister to prey on good hearts to fund the works of evil," Attorney General John Ashcroft said in announcing the charges against Enaam Arnaout, who has been under arrest since last April. .....
     
    • by The Telegraph

    • The West Bengal state administrative tribunal has revoked the suspension order of Biplab Das, VHP district secretary and an employee of the public works department posted at the Burdwan medical college. The authorities were asked "to allow Das to resume duty with all financial benefits immediately" in the October 3 order. .....
     
    • by The Hindu

    • Lord Ganesha has attracted new devotees in the capital and surprisingly in the embassy of Ireland, a predominantly Christian country. .....
     
    • by The Indian Express

    • Suspected terrorist mastermind Osama bin Laden is alive and regularly meeting Mullah Omar, the fugitive leader of Afghanis-tan's ousted Taliban, according to a phone call intercepted by US spy satellites. .....
     
    • by The Times of India

    • Suspected terrorist mastermind Osama bin Laden is alive and regularly meeting Mullah Omar, the fugitive leader of the Taliban, according to a telephone call intercepted by American spy satellites. .....
     
    • by Dina Nath Mishra

    • The Gujarat political situation is totally polarised after Godhra carnage, the reaction thereof and bombardment on the senses by pseudo secular parties, followed by the media. The impending elections have worried the Congress extremely. Baffled Congress leaders saw hope in Shanker Singh Vaghela, so the Congress president promptly nominated him as the president of the Gujarat unit to counter Narendra Modi, the caretaker Chief Minister of Gujarat. .....
     
    • by Fox Butterfield

    • Admitting membership in Al Qaeda, Richard C. Reid pleaded guilty today to charges of trying to blow up a trans- Atlantic flight in December with explosives hidden in his shoes. .....
     
    • by The Times of India

    • Taking the middle path in the battle of words between the VHP and the BJP, the RSS on Thursday said the Centre "has not done as much as it could to tackle terrorism". .....
     
    • by Rakesh Bhatnagar

    • In a blow to those who advocated Brahmins only for priesthood, the supreme court has ruled that non-Brahmins can also perform religious ceremonies and work as temple priests as long as they are well versed with the relevant rituals and rites. .....
     
    • by The Economic Times

    • Dreaded terrorist Imam Ali, the mastermind behind serial bomb blasts in Coimbatore and who had plans to assassinate LK Advani, Murli Manohar Joshi and Ashok Singhal, was today gunned down here along with four of his associates, including a woman, in a pre-dawn commando operation by a joint team of Tamil Nadu and Karnataka police. .....
     
    • by The Economic Times

    • In a not-so-veiled attack on the Haryana Police, which accorded VIP treatment to the prime accused in the Shivam Bhatnagar murder case, deputy prime minister LK Advani today said recent reports did not reflect well on the state of affairs. "We are worried about the criminal justice system, especially the division of police of two states. .....
     
    • by The Free Press Journal

    • Shiv Sena chief Bal Thackeray on Thursday lashed out at the BJP led NDA government over its inability to take stern stops against mounting terrorist attacks in the country and threatened to pull out of the BJP-led NDA government, if it failed to take any step now. Sounding tough, the Sena chief said that enough was enough. Stating that it was the end of ones tolerance, Thackeray had this to say for prime minister Atal Behari Vajpayee "enough of talk about end of tolerance. Deliver the goods, not words. We shall not sit quiet now". .....
     
    • by The Free Press Journal

    • "Those Islamic terrorist who carried out the Swaminarayan temple massacre did not come to the temple straight from Pakistan on the day of the killings. They definitely stayed in India and got support from the locals. Similar methods were used in a number of other terrorist incidents. Therefore, Indian Muslims should not support such Pakistani ventures, said Ashok Chowgule president of the Maharashtra and Goa branch of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP), at, a press conference in Mumbai on Thursday. .....
     
    • by The Indian Express

    • Two gunmen, burst into the offices of a Christian charity in Karachi on Wednesday and tied up and shot dead seven Christians, police said. The attack was the latest in a series of bloody assaults on Christian or Western targets. .....
     
    • by Masuma Bharmal

    • Shock and pride. Residents of Umej village in Junagadh district felt both sentiments as news of the death of Allahrakha Unadjam, the SRP constable of Group Three Mandana (District Banaskantha), Company 'C', while fighting terrorists at Akshardhamm reached them on Wednesday. .....
     
    • by Manoj Joshi

    • The largely incident-free second round of the Jammu and Kashmir elections will make Fakre Alam, a school teacher from Barabanki, a happy man. He plans to abandon the government-supplied bullet-proof vest and 'patka', an armoured headband that passes for a helmet in Kashmir, in the next phase. .....
     
    • by MEMRI

    • In an article in the sixteenth issue of the online magazine Al-Ansar, which is affiliated with Al-Qa'ida,[1] a columnist identified as Seif Al-Din Al-Ansari discussed the Koranic verse "Allah Will Torture Them [the Infidels] At Your Hands" .....
     
    • by MEMRI

    • In an open letter to the Egyptian Minister of Interior, the editor of the Egyptian Christian Coptic newspaper, Watani (My Homeland)[1] calls for the abolition of the Egyptian laws that prevent the construction of new churches. In making his argument, the editor refers to recent statements made by the Grand Mufti of Egypt, Dr. Nasr Farid Wasil, on the planned mosque in Nazareth .....
     
    • by Ahmed Rashid

    • Here is the real dilemma faced by the Western alliance in its continuing war against terrorism. Pakistan's military dictator, General Pervaiz Musharraf, has been responsible for the arrest and deportation of the largest number of al-Qa'eda militants of any nation in the world - 422 have been shipped out to Guantanamo Bay since December. But Gen Musharraf is also holding a heavily rigged election tomorrow, which promises to plunge Pakistan into political instability. .....
     
    • by AFP

    • A temple was torched and statues of deities were destroyed in three attacks on Muslim-majority Bangladesh's main religious minority ahead of a festival, officials and reports said on Tuesday.In the northern area of Kishoreganj, a temple was set ablaze and badly damaged on Saturday. A leaflet left behind called for an end to "idol worship" and for a mosque to be built in the temple's place, the Sangbad newspaper reported.One day later, a group destroyed statues of deities, made ahead of the major Hindu festival of Durga Puja on Thursday, in Narayanganj near the capital Dhaka. .....
     
    • by The Guardian

    • If George Bush's "war on terror" were remotely rational, or even roughly reasoned, then its next target might be Pakistan, not Iraq. It should be said that the US is not justified in pre-emptively and unilaterally attacking either country - or any other sovereign state for that matter. But on the basis of Mr Bush's own "axis of evil" criteria at least, Pakistan sits squarely in the theoretical firing line. .....
     
    • by The Indian Express

    • As Brigadier T. Sailo looks back on his two consecutive careers, he could well be rewinding to his native Mizoram's turbulent passage since India's independence. He joined the army in 1943, and upon retirement in 1974 immersed himself in Mizoram's politics as it went through a difficult phase of insurgency. He went on to become chief minister. Now in reflective retirement, he spoke to Mini Kapoor. Excerpts from an interview: .....
     
    • by Pravin Togadia

    • Bill Gates made a significant statement some years ago when he said he would shift his empire to Singapore or Bangalore if the American Government continued to needle him. .....
     
    • by Vinay Krishna Rastogi

    • Witness Ashok Chatterjee today stated before the high court here that he had gone to Ayodhya from 1962 to 1992 at least 40 times, but never saw a Muslim offer namaz at the disputed site during that period. .....
     
    • by The Pioneer

    • There is no better way to handle terrorist virulence than decisive police action. The gunning down of five terrorists in Bangalore on Sunday by a team of Tamil Nadu commandos came in the wake of last week's killing of two terrorists in the Akshardham temple in Gujarat. Both operations should set an example for the police force. .....
     
    • by www.jubilee.org

    • There are two great videos in this catalog; and 'A WORD ABOUT INDIA' These will be worth viewing to determine if we can expose this sham and send them packing. .....
     
    • by Yahoo News

    • Pakistan's military ruler General Pervez Musharraf warned foreign election observers on Monday against making comments ahead of polls designed to restore civilian rule, the official APP news agency reported. .....
     
    • by Vijay Thakur

    • Some organisations, supported by local Congress, BJP, Bajrang Dal and VHP leaders, have reportedly started a vilification campaign against missionary schools that are being run in Ajmer district. First, leaflets were distributed against these schools and effigies of some of the priests burnt. In certain cases, parents were forced to remove their children from the schools' rolls. And in an extreme step, all convent schools of Ajmer district were forcibly closed for some time last month. .....
     
    • by Varsha Bhosle

    • I'd written this article two weeks ago, but, more dignified souls had persuaded me to hold it back. I've squirmed each night, tortured by the thought that I had let go unanswered, what are to me, grave accusations. And then, I read Vir Sanghvi's column on The Hindustan Times' face-off with The Times of India. And I thought, dignity be damned -- at least I'm not arguing over who reads whom more! .....
     
    • by The Pioneer

    • The FBI is tracking hundreds of mostly young Muslims in the US in the belief that al-Qaeda-trained terrorists remain in the country, senior law enforcement officials say. .....
     
    • by C. Gouridasan Nair

    • Who is afraid of Vellappally Natesan? The question has suddenly acquired sharp edge in Kerala with the Natesan-led SNDP Yogam deciding to hold anti-CPI(M) dharna at 100 centres in the State on October 11. .....
     
    • by John Mary

    • A prison is a place for criminals, not heroes. But that's only if you are not Abdul Nasser Madani. The rogue politician, an accused in the infamous Coimbatore blast that targeted L.K. Advani, will perhaps soon be set free-thanks to the four-and-a-half years he's spent in detention without being chargesheeted. Support for his release is growing in Kerala. .....
     
    • by www.globeandmail.com

    • U.S. authorities may have information that could exonerate a Canadian sentenced to beheading for a fatal bombing in Saudi Arabia but they have refused to co-operate with his defence team, says a lawyer in the case. .....
     
    • by Radha Venkatesan

    • In a move certain to trigger controversy, the Jayalalithaa Government today came out with a stringent ordinance banning religious conversions either "by force, allurements or fraudulent means''. .....
     
    • by The Free Press Journal

    • Saying that a military government in Pakistan has exacerbated tensions with India over Kashmir, a US-based analysis and advocacy group has warned that President Pervez Musharraf's plans to perpetuate military power could lead to instability, reports PTI. .....
     
    • by Lalit Koul

    • Mr President, before I let you know where Mishriwalla is and why it is time for you to plan a visit there, let me first congratulate you on becoming India's 11th President. This is truly an achievement. You have proven, by sheer hard work and perseverance, that anybody in this land of sadhus and rishis can achieve his/her goals. .....
     
    • by The Free Press Journal

    • Hundreds of al-Qaeda operatives in Karachi are being currently protected by Pakistani intelligence agency ISI, which is 'eager' to send them back to their native countries, according to a media report, reports PTI. .....
     
    • by B. Raman

    • Islamic terrorism in India is a bye-product of the US-inspired and orchestrated jehad of the 1980s against the Soviet troops in Afghanistan. To make the Soviet troops bleed, the USA's Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) encouraged Islamic fanaticism and incited unemployed Muslim youth all over the world to go to Afghanistan to carry on a jehad against Communism. Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) was entrusted by the CIA with the task of religiously-motivating, training and arming the jehadi mercenaries from different countries and sending them into Afghanistan for fighting against the Soviet troops. .....
     
    • by Hussan Haqqani

    • International observers must see Pakistan's October 10 general elections for what they are: a farce in the name of democracy going according to a preordained script. .....
     
    • by The Times of India

    • `The Vishwa Hindu Parishad-sponsored Dharam Raksha Sammelan on Sunday made it clear that the idol of Ram Lalla installed at the makeshift temple in Ayodhya would not be removed and the suggestion of the court regarding archaeological excavations was unacceptable. The sammelan also insisted that either the Muslims hand over the disputed land on their own or Parliament enact a law so that the land could be handed over to the Hindus failing which the people should be prepared for another Mahabharat. .....
     
    • by Sarah Downey and Michael Hirsh

    • When Zacarias Moussaoui arrived in Norman, Okla., to take flight lessons, one of his first stops was the white gated mosque just down the street from the university campus. .....
     
    • by Malhar Gokhale

    • It came to Mumbai in around 1980. It was not a much hyped movie.  It did not contain any fights, lewd scenes, teenage love or anything which is permanent feature of English movies sure to draw crowds. It did not have glamorous and rich scenes. The reviewers did not think it worth while beyond a simple mention of it in their columns. .....
     
    • by The Herald

    • Sri Ramjanmabhoomi Trust Chalrpun Paramhans Ramchandra Das said the trust would whole-heartedly welcome initiatives from any organisation or community in favour of the construction of the Ram temple at Ayodhya. .....
     
    • by India Infoline

    • "India's nuclear weapons programme would serve it well and is a strategy on the leading edge of nuclear thinking," said C. Raja Mohan, Editor, Strategic Affairs, The Hindu. This was also the core argument presented by the Senior Advisor from the US Embassy, Ashley J. Tellis who was speaking on the topic of "India's Emerging Nuclear Posture", organized by the Confederation of Indian Industry on Thursday. Tellis has also authored a book by the same topic published last year. .....
     
    • by Sukhmani Singh

    • Over the past one month, a strident anti-Christian movement has been building up in Rajasthan's Ajmer district, concentrated around schools run by missionaries. Today, a ceremony at Bhawanikhera, presided over by BJP Ajmer MP Rasa Singh Rawat, took it one step further when at the function, 12 Christian couples belonging to the Rawat Samaj were reconverted to Hinduism. .....
     
    • by The Indian Express

    • Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Jayalalithaa has banned religious conversions by ''force or fraud'' in the state, earning a pat on the back from the Sangh Parivar but criticism from Christian organisations. .....
     
    • by Subhash Mishra

    • For a district flung into obscurity like any other in Uttar Pradesh, Azamgarh is bizarrely flush with opulence. A study in brazen contrasts, its labyrinthine, dusty bylanes are dotted with palatial bungalows, with swimming pools set amid swathes of green. The Pathan Kot mohalla in Sarai Meer is one such locality. As lustily conspicuous is a multi-storeyed structure that towers over the adjacent homes. .....
     
    • by The Indian Express

    • NCERT chairman J S Rajput, at the hub of the controversy over new school textbooks, defends himself against allegations of bias. Excerpts from an interview with SANTWANA BHATTACHARYA of The Sunday Express: .....
     
    • by Lata Vaidyanathan

    • The NCERT has introduced new textbooks for Classes VI and IX. Was the exercise really required?
      There was definitely a need to update the facts. The sequential flow is much better in the new version and so is the designing. Even in terms of picture quality and child friendliness, these are definitely much better books. .....
     
    • by Dr Pravin Togadia

    • "The vicious and perverted defamation of Gujarati Hindus, who were the victims of Godhra train burning, and hypocritical indignation of those leaders who expressed shame for the post Godhra violence are responsible for triggering the attack on Akhshardham and the carnage that followed. But for the secularist media and cowardly political leaders, the jihadi forces would not have felt encouraged to attack Akshardham", said Dr Pravin Togadia of the VHP. .....
     
    • by K.S. Sudarshan

    • "Coming just some months after the heinous roasting alive of innocent Rambhaktas at Godhra on February 27, the vicious terrorist attack on the Swaminarayan temple at the Akshardham in Gandhinagar has once again deeply hurt the national psyche. Our security forces have gunned down the terrorists who were supposedly belonging to an outfit called "Tehrik-e-Kasas". .....
     
    • by C.M. Shejeval

    • A section of the Hindus converted to Christianity who have now become the so-called Dalit Christians have been subjected to all types of mental and physical harassment by the upper class Christians. According to historical records one Daivathan embraced Christianity at Thiruvalla in Pathanamthitta district in Kerala attracted by the promise of equality in the Church, sometime in 1854. But on the very first Sunday Daivathan alias Habel was driven out of the mass and was thoroughly beaten up in the churchyard, say the records. .....
     
    • by S. Chandrasekhar

    • The CPM is out of power and the illicit liquor baron Manichan has been sentenced to life-imprisonment, but the ghosts of the 30 died in Kollam district two years back consuming spurious liquor is still haunting the party. Also the pay-off diary, maintained by Manichan which gives details of crores of rupees given to CPM leaders, is giving sleepless nights to the comrades top to bottom. .....
     
    • by M.V. Kamath

    • So far as Kashmir is  concerned, for India, it is the end of the road. In future it can expect nothing from the United States which is concerned with its own selfish interests and it can expect nothing from Pakistan's President Pervez Musharraf who is frightened of his own shadow. What kind of negotiations can India possibly have with a man who says: "No leader, no government of Pakistan, can leave or abandon the issue of Kashmir. .....
     
    • by Jayaraj Sivan

    • The death of Imam Ali in Bangalore last week closed a chapter in the history of religious fundamentalism in Tamil Nadu. Ali, main accused in the 1993 bomb blast at the RSS office in Chennai, was wanted ever since he fled from custody in March this year, and his death in a police operation in Bangalore on September 29 has opened a can of worms the Tamil Nadu government needs to take a hard look at. .....
     
    • by Tukoji R. Pandit

    • The Assembly polls in Jammu and Kashmir deserve an unqualified praise for the people of the state, the Election Commission and the var-ious security and military forces that super-vised the elections. The country has every reason to show its utter contempt for the wild accusations about the Kashmir elections being a "sham" levelled by the likes of Pakistan's Gen Parvez Musharraf, a dictator who surely invites ridicule when he questions India's democratic credentials. .....
     
    • by Chidanand Rajghatta

    • A US Congresswoman who was unseated in the Democratic primary election in August partly due to the political activism of local Indian-Americans has bitterly complained about Indian 'interference' in the American political process, citing a Times of India report to bolster her tirade. .....
     
    • by J S Rajput

    • September 12,2002 is a significant day as far as educational initiatives go with the Supreme Court judgment giving NCERT the green signal to go ahead with its initiatives to update and upgrade school education in the country An avoidable debate carried on over the last two years unfortunately ignored practically every professional issue and focused on ideologically-oriented apprehensions, pre-conceived notions and prejudices. .....
     
    • by The Times of India

    • Washington: Observing that some of the "worst schools for terrorism and religious extremism" exist in Pakistan, Washington has assured Islamabad of economy assistance required to defeat terrorists. .....
     
    • by The Times of India

    • One of the two terrorists who struck at Akshardham "was a local and was holed up in Ahmedabad long before his colleague arrived", investigators have claimed. .....
     
    • by Subrata Nagchoudhury

    • He can't very well tell journalists what to write, so West Bengal CM Buddhadeb Bhattacharya is now saying what they shouldn't. .....
     
    • by Hinduism Today

    • The substantial sums of Hinduism that Buddhism carried along on its historic spread across Asia is not always appreciated. Indian Mahayanist philosophers, such as Nagarjuna, directed Buddhism back towards Hinduism, away from the rigid atheism of Theravada Buddhism. It was Mahayana Buddhism that spread to China, Korea, Japan and Vietnam. As a result, some of the earlier schools in japan, such as Shingon, Kegon and Tendai, had largely Hindu pantheons. .....
     
    • by Satguru Bodhinatha Veylanswami

    • Megatrends is a term coined by futurist John Naisbitt in 1982 to name the major underlying forces, both positive and negative, that are transforming society and shaping the future. Naisbitt's best-selling book, Megatrends, was enormously influential at the time in helping individuals, communities and nations understand and adapt to the changing times. .....
     
    • by Chidanand Rajghatta

    • The US has acknowledged the right of countries to resort to preventive or pre-emptive strikes in self-defence but has cautioned that such a step should be considered after all other avenues are exhausted and that it does not necessarily apply in the India-Pakistan context. .....
     
    • by The Times of India

    • Deputy chief minister Chhagan Bhujbal, who belongs to the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), has categorically stated that the Maharashtra government has no plan to ban the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) and the Bajrang Dal-(BD). Minister of state for home Kripashanker Singh of the Congress had recently claimed that the government was planning to ban these bodies. He had even stated that the government would approach the Centre with such a request since these organisations were creating communal hatred. .....
     
    • by SAR News

    • Hindu fundamentalist organisations, including the Munnani, Arya Samaj and the Bharatiya Janata Party, staged a string of demonstrations here protesting the alleged conversion of a group of 250 Hindu Dalits from the villages of Madurai, Ramanathapuram, Them and Tirunelveli districts, by the Seventh Day Adventists at a function in their school premises here. .....
       
    • by Kenneth Woodward

    • Pope John Paul II will add the name of Josemaria Escriva de Balaguer, the Spanish founder of Opus Dei. The canonization this week will draw at least 250,000 spectators to Rome. Even its admirers know little about the inner workings of this shadowy church within the church. .....
     
    • by Jeff Israely

    • This Sunday, Pope John Paul II is set to declare the Spanish-born priest Josemaría Escrivá a saint. The canonization ceremony in St. Peter's Square - expected to draw some 250,000 faithful - will in effect bestow the church's most sacred honor on the movement Escrivá founded in 1928: Opus Dei, the conservative lay group that preaches strict Christian piety as the only path through the storms of modern life. .....
     
    • by Deccan Herald

    • The Rashtreeya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) today urged the BJP-led NDA government to take more 'firm and concrete action', against the menace of terrorism in the country. .....
     
    • by The Free Press Journal

    • The unprecedented wave of violence let loose by Pak-controlled mercenary militants has not changed the Kashmiri people's stand for the democratic process. In spite of the terrorist attack on about 25 booths, the murder of half a dozen security men and the spreading of terror in several constituencies, about 42 percent of voters have voted, giving a slap on the face of both Hurriyat and Musharraf. .....
       
    • by The Times of India

    • British author Salman Rushdie has defended a best- selling French writer, Michel Houellebecq, who is being taken to court on charges of racial insult and inciting religious hatred for having called Islam "the dumbest religion". .....
     
    • by The Times of India

    • Bangladeshi miscreants killed two Indians and kidnapped seven others while two of them were killed by village defence forces in retaliation in two separate incidents in Tripura since Wednesday night. .....
     
    • by Biswajit Roy

    • The post-9/11 fear and hatred of anything American, even medicines, has provoked resistance against polio immunisation among a section of mostly poor and illiterate Muslims in West Bengal. This has led to an increase in the number of polio cases in the minority dominated Murshidabad district. .....
     
    • by M.V. Kamath

    • Our "secularists" are nothing if not origi-nal and highly imaginative. They will cry "wolf" even if they see a rabbit. Even if there is no living thing anywhere, in sight. Crying wolf has become a habit with them. The slightest move on the part of HRD Minister Dr Murli Manohar Joshi to set education in India in the right direction and our secularists will see red. Actually, not red but saffron. .....
     
    • by R. Bhagwan Singh

    • Slain extremist Imam Ali on Tuesday got a hero's burial behind a mosque in Madurai as a huge crowd of mourners, mostly local Muslim youth and relatives from his hometown Melur nearby, chanted prayers, sobbed and raised slogans. .....
     
    • by Andrew Osborn in The Hague

    • Islamic groups in the Netherlands have reacted with fury to a suggestion that only Dutch should be spoken in the country's 450 mosques. .....
     
    • by Myra MacDonald and Sanjeev Miglani

    • Eighteen people died in the bloodiest polling day yet in Kashmir as a third round of elections were held in the troubled state. .....
     
    • by The Free Press Journal

    • Continuing its tirade against Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP), the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) on Tuesday said India needs strong leaders like George W. Bush and Arial Sharon , Presidents of America and Israel respectively to fight terrorists.  The country under the present leadership has proved ineffective. .....
     
    • by Seema Mustafa

    • Hizbul Mujahideen leader Syed Salahuddin, whose survival as an extremist is directly linked to his ability to keep his hate-India campaign going, has no reservations about allowing his sons to use government facilities in Jammu and Kashmir. .....
     
    • by The Free Press Journal

    • Observing that some of the 'worst schools for terrorism and religious extremism, exists in Pakistan Washington has assured Islamabad of economic assistance required to defeat terrorists, reports PTI. .....
     
    • by The Jang

    • A Muslim militant shot by police  commandos was given a hero's burial Tuesday by weeping relatives and admirers in the southern Indian city of Madurai, witnesses said. .....
     
    • by News

    • On his death-bed Allah's Apostle put a sheet over his-face and when he felt hot, he would remove it from his face. When in that state (of putting and removing the sheet) he said, "May Allah's Curse be on the Jews and the Christians for they build places of worship at the graves of their prophets." (By that) he intended to warn (the Muslim) from what they (i.e. Jews and Christians) had done. .....
     
    • by Balbir K. Punj

    • Terrorism, terrorism, terrorism. In the last few days we have heard this nine-letter word several times over. One year after, September 11 was a day of fear over half the world and not merely in the United States. .....
     
    • by Jyoti Malhotra

    • From the heartland of Hindutva, it takes a mere hour and a half for Ariana Afghan airlines to fly to Kabul. But Afghanistan's minuscule Hindu and Sikh population, having survived both the brutal persecution and the humourless whim of the Taliban, could still teach a few lessons in humanity and humility to their extremist co-religionists in India. .....
     
    • by Arvind Lavakare

    • At the end of all the views and perspectives, what's the final take on the Akshardham assault? Two Paki terrorists exterminated in exchange for the lives of 30-odd innocent Indians, considerable collateral damage and expense, and a feeling of national humiliation, of helplessness. That's the entire take -- period. .....
     
    • by Arnold Beichman

    • Media coverage of the Middle East has always been deficient in one area: Foreign correspondents have forever ignored the mosque and what the imams are telling their congregations. .....
     
    • by F.P. Report

    • Ever since extremist BJP has grabbed power in New Delhi in the wake of renewed fundamentalist Hindutva agenda, Indian security forces have become law unto themselves and are on a killing spree throughout India, Muslims being their favourite targets. .....
     
    • by Vasant Arora

    • Indian Finance Minister Jaswant Singh discussed the Iraq issue with US Secretary of State Colin Powell and later said cryptically that pre-emption was not the sole prerogative of any one country. .....
     
    • by The New Indian Express

    • A Division Bench of the Kerala High Court on Monday gave the custody of Deepa, who was allegedly abducted by Sali, to her parents, Dr P K Mohanlal, retired Director of Ayurveda Education, and Mrs Mohanlal, who have been directed to stay in a hotel or lodge in Ernakulam under police protection, till the court takes a decision on the habeas corpus writ petition relating to the disappearance of the 16-year-old girl, filed by Dr P K Mohanlal. .....
     
    • by The Times of India

    • Vandals broke into a Hindu temple in southwestern Pakistan and destroyed several statues of deities, police officials said on Monday. .....
     
    • by The Indian Express

    • The letters and phone calls simply haven't stopped pouring in since September 25, when the National Security Guards won the battle of wits and bullets at the Swaminarayan temple at Akshardham. Those who sent in their appreciation of the NSG's work in Gujarat include Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee, Deputy Prime Minister L.K. Advani, leader of the opposition Sonia Gandhi and Governor of Manipur Ved Marwah, who himself headed the force between 1988 and 1990. .....
     
    • by The Free Press Journal

    • Poor Narendra Modi! He is abused, if he governs. And also abused, if he does not govern. The secularists in the media and the polity have now risen in unison to cite the complete calm that prevailed during the two days of bandh in Gujarat following the Akshardham Temple atrocity as proof of his willful complicity in the riots that took place in the wake of the Godhra train carnage. .....
     
    • by Muzaffer Hussain

    • An article has been published in the August of the monthly "Tarajumanul Koran" published from Lahore in Pakistan.   The matter in this article is so sensational that ordinary citizen will not believe it. But it is all proper and necessary.  If the world wants to clear out terrorism, then it has to all these today or tomorrow.  Things which Egypt did during the last few days. .....
     
    • by Ilan Berman

    • As another war in Iraq seems to approach, Israelis can feel considerably more secure from missile attack than they did in 1991, when 39 Iraqi Scuds landed in Israel. The reason is the substantial improvement in Israeli missile defenses, an improvement that other nations understandably are seeking for themselves. .....
     
    • by Daily Star News

    • Bodies of two young girls kidnapped on September 24 were recovered from the field at Khasiara in Sreepur upazila yesterday. On information, police recovered the bodies of Yogmaya, 18, daughter of Priyanath Baroi and Kajol Bala, 18, daughter of Arbindu Bala of village Dhurun Nagar. .....
     
    • by The Free Press Journal

    • Contrary to popular perception, the concept of two-nation theory which led to the creation of Pakistan was not conceived by Mohammad Ali Jinnah, says a new book, reports PTI. .....
     
    • by The Times of India

    • The Bombay high court on Wednesday admitted a petition challenging the allotmcnt of a large plot at Nariman Point, by chief minister Vilasrao Deshmukh, to the Shankarrao Chavan Trust in March 2001 on an annual lease of Re 1. .....
     
    • by Dean Foust and John Carey

    • As the West Nile Virus spreads nationwide, some congressional leaders are asking whether the mosquito-borne illness could be linked to terrorism or to Iraq's bioweapons program. If so, a more troubling question may be whether Iraq's weapons efforts were unwittingly helped by U.S. scientists. .....
     
    • by Chicago Daily Tribune

    • "We who come from the East have sat here on the platform day after day and have been told in a patronizing way that we ought to accept Christianity because Christian nations are the most prosperous. We look at history and see that the prosperity of Christian Europe began with Spain. Spain's prosperity began with the invasion of Mexico. .....
     
    • by BJP Today

    • For a nation that honors democracy and freedom, the United States has a nasty habit of embracing foreign dictators when they seem to serve American interests. It is one of the least appealing traits of American foreign policy. Like his predecessors, President Bush is falling for the illusion that tyrants make great allies. If Mr. Bush is not careful, Washington will be mopping up for years from the inevitable foreign policy disasters that come of befriending autocrats who maintain a stranglehold on their own people. .....
     
    • by BJP Today

    • The Prime Minister is going to Pakistan oil 19th of this month. The avowed object of this visit, according to his statement in the Lok Sabha, is to sign the Canal Waters Treaty. But it does not take five long days to initial a document. Obviously, the time is to be utilized for discussing other problems pending between India and Pakistan. However, no definite agenda has been fixed. .....
     
    • by Organiser

    • On the occasion of Tulsi Jayanti on August 15, 2002, the foundation stone laying .ceremony of the Ramayana Centre was performed by Prime Minister of Mauritius Sir Anerood Jugnauth at Rose Belle in Mauritius. The ceremony began by lighting of the traditional lamp by Lady Sarojni Jugnauth. The simple ceremony of laying of foundation stone turned out to be synergy of Hindu unity as people overwhelmingly attended it. .....
     
    • by N K Pant

    • As America and the rest of the world prepare to pay homage to more than three thousand victims who died in the global. terror's worst holocaust on September 11, 2001, it is worthwhile doing Borne introspection and to seek answer to the question--why did such a ghastly thing happen? The massive destruction was masterminded by Saudi Arabia born Osama bin Laden, supreme head of the hardcore Islamic terrorist organisation Al Qaeda which was financed mostly by Islamic charities. .....
     
    • by S Chandrasekhar

    • A unique and path-breaking dialogue between the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) and Christian Intellectuals was held at Hosanna Mount in Pala, Kottayam District recently. The talks that is a sequel to the RSS-bishops dialogue, which was held a few months back in Kochi, was organised at the initiative of Dr Joseph Pulikunnel, Director, Indian Institute of Christian Studies (IICS) and Shri John Joseph, Member, National Minorities Commission. .....
     
    • by Dr. Joseph Pulikunnel

    • Dr. Joseph Pulikunnel, Christian intellectual and Director of the Indian Institute of Christian Studies (IICS), is a stormy petrel He has been excommunicated by the Church for openly opposing Churchianity and the hegemony of the Pope. He has now become the rallying point of many Christian intellectuals, reformers and social activists. In an interview to Organiser representative S. Chandrasekhar, he spoke about the ongoing dialogue and other issues. .....
     
    • by M V Kamath

    • For sheer impertinence and effrontery, Pakistan's General Pervez Musharraf is hard to beat. The man came to power after a military coup and has as much right to rule over Pakistan as any usurper of a throne. Speaking on Pakistan's Independence Day the visibly terrorised Chief Executive Officer, afraid of his own people, had the cheek to dismiss the proposed elections in Jammu and Kashmir as "a farce"; coming from the lips of a man with no respect for elections it is hilarious. .....
     
    • by Organiser

    • "DR Farooq Abdullah, Chief Minister of Jammu and Kashmir, has close links with Amanullah Khan, the president of Jammu Kashmir Liberation Front", alleged the renowned journalist and Padamshree awardee Muzaffar Hussain while kicking off the election campaign of the Jammu State Morcha (JSM) at Jammu. JSM is a newly-floated, RSS-backed political group. .....
     
    • by Organiser

    • The demand for trifurcation of Jammu and Kashmir State to give a separate statehood for Jammu and a Union Territory status for Ladakh may pose a serious challenge to the ruling National Conference which is raking up the issue of restoration of pre-1953 status to the State under the slogan of Autonomy. .....
     
    • by S L Sastry

    • The "Open page" debate in The Hindu on Harappan vs. Vedic Civilisations is attracting the attention of the serious readers. The conclusions of Dr. Michael Witzel (Mar. 5) separating Harappan civilisation from the Vedic culture on the main ground that while horses were abundantly discussed in Rig Veda, there was no trace of them in Harappa, were contested by Dr. R. Nagaswamy, ex-director of Archaeology, Tamil Nadu (Mar. 12) on the contention that horses' bones were found and were also subjected to carbon dating at Harappa. .....
     
    • by Mark Durie

    • Dhimmitude is an Islamic phenomenon. It defines the condition of submissive surrender to Islamic rule, yet without conversion to the Islamic faith. Under classical theological formulations developed in the first centuries of Islam, the region where Islam rules is known as Dar al-Islam 'the House of Islam'. .....



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