Orissa: A Gujarat in the making

pmishra #40,

thanks for your offer to join the ``santana dharma`` but frankly speaking, monkey and cow gods dont interest me a lot so i think i would rather not convert to hinduism.

however, you did not answer the question i put forwad. ``can a newly coverted hindu be a brahmin?``

it is nice that to your egalitarian mind caste does not matter but to majority of indian hindus it does. wonder how many brahmins in india will be willing to share a meal with a sudra....

pmishra - lets try it again (more civil this time) - is it so hard to discuss the CONTENTS of this article and not the author for once. Judging by your answer you have no argumetn except to shout out the other person. But I guess you have nothing else to add.

arjun-m - so are you saying this is a figment of her imagination?
contrary to what you believe - the fact that someone is an extremist does not make their arguments bullshit.

I dont understand some of the interactors responses. Either they take it as a personal attack or indulge in finger pointing - it is happening in China, in Pakistan in Timbuktoo so big deal if it happens in India. Atleast we have IT to sustain us. And ends in a chorus - we are the best we are the best.

opps after read this type of articles every day in english newspapers i think india is doomed.but why can`t is see this type of situation which painted by these ppl anywhere around me .may be as a simple person i dont had that much IQ to see this.wht can i say?this ppl are know abt gujarat or orissa or any state then who live in these states.

#28 yagacho

You want to convert to be a hindu? Excellent. But understand that there is no special merit in converting to hinduism. This is neither a good nor a bad event. It is a personal decision you choose to make.

Here are links that will help you:

http://www.himalayanacademy.com/basics/conversion/09steps.html

http://www.terravista.pt/nazare/2643/become.htm


As for caste, you should be aware that this a portuguese word and not found in any indic writing. The designators jati and varna are used instead. Jati roughly corresponds to ethnic background: you can be of pathan jati or turkic jati or islamic jati or whatever designator you feel describes your ethnic background. Varna corresponds more closely to western notions of caste: brahmin, kshatriya, vaishya, sudra etc.

Pick one that please you as it has little meaning for forward looking people. Historically, varna of a jati has changed over time and many ``low`` varnas have had high learning and status. My own view is that in the modern world we are all sudras: workers who contribute to society through labor whether manual or intellectual.

And by the way, please be careful

---

you will be amazed to know that there are still religous systems where punishment for conversion is death !!! Strange but so true...

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#21 saminasha

I see you are back with your naive prattlings. The last time you tried to pass yourself off as an expert on hindus and their culture I asked you two questions:

(1) When and where was the VHP formed as an organization?

(2) What were its stated goals?

Do you have the answers to these questions? Otherwise don;t waste our time with your ignorant ramblings.

Ref pmishra2 #15

[#14 ixno
Dear Mr. Hypocrite,

Do you or do you not support the right of Christians and Muslims to aggressively proselitise and convert people to their respective religions?

Please answer: YES or NO. If Yes, what is the difference between them and the activities this person describes. PLEASE EXPLAIN.]

Mishraji, you hit the nail on the head but at a slight angle.

The question should have been: do you or do you not support the right of Christians to aggressively proselytise and convert people to their religion in Pakistan, Malaysia, Indonesia, Afghanistan, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Egypt (you can add the 35 Muslim countries to this list)?

Why isn`t the Lady with an Opinion on Everything aka the Fearless Investigative Journalist from Mumbai not opining here?

[Finally, similar to anti-semitism, there is also an attitude called hindu-phobia. This involves mindless hatred of hindu traditions and approaches. It is completely exemplified by the following sentence:

[quote]
Hindu ascendancy is assisted by the degree to which the authority of religion and the enabling cultural and gender hierarchies are enshrined deep within the popular psyche of the nation. This dominance assumes that to restrict religion to the private realm would deny India its historical `consciousness
[end-quote]

This makes it clear that the core issue is mindless and total hatred for hindu traditions. It should not be allowed to permeate the nation because it is necessarity unfair and perhaps even evil!!

Every other tradition is OK; others may freely and agrressively proselitise but not hindus. If hindus organize themselves aggressively, in a manner that is in fact a simple copy of aggressive christianity and islam, then it must be very wrong and fascism.

What kind of nonsense masquerading as logic is this? Only hypocrites and the completely deluded would accept this kind of blather.]

This is the nonsense that I have lived with and through in Tamil Nadu. The idiots who denounce Hindu rituals and traditions go to Eid dinners saying that even rice congee is nutritious. (These happen to be the mentors of Chowk`s own Soysauce.)

Ref jang #9

[Also, their is enough Govt. spending on stuff like Kumb Mela. A typical PWD Ex. Engg makes a couple of crore during the bandobast. However, the diff is, all this spending is local, and does not fill coffers of S. Arabia, as is due to Haj Subsidies.]

When the government builds a road, the PWD engineer makes money on the side. When the Electricity Board builds a distribution system to your village, the EB engineer makes some money on the side. When Air India buys planes, a few politicians make some money on the side.

So go back to the 7th century with no roads, no electricity and camels for transportation.

Making security arrangements where a huge crowd is likely to gather is different than subsidizing the Haj pilgrimage. Running additional trains to Allahabad isn`t the same as offering cut-rate tour packages only to Muslims and only to Mecca.

Ref trinity #10

[Why doesn`t BJP repeal these subsidies and salaries? or are they hoping for the muslim vote bank???]

The Government proposed to limit the Haj subsidy only to those Muslims in eed and also to only once in a lifetime. There were cries that the Haj subsidy was being politicized, by no less than Omar Abdullah, who happens to be a partner of the BJP in the NDA coalition.

So much for rational discussion on the Haj subsidy.

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28 by yagacho on November 5, 2003 6:08am PT
the sangh parivar needs a dose of reality. what india needs is toilets not temples. problem of india is not lack but excess of religion.

Agreed.

``#24 by ijaz_gul on November 5, 2003 6:08am PT
Revealing and worse than I could imagine sitting here across the Indian fence!``

Yes. You are great. So is every Pakiskani.. Boss. where were you 1971 when something happened. OH nothing happened. You are great. Agreed

Agreed too.

Your write was something I felt as my own. I too scaled.


You scaled great hights raping and looting in 1971. when is next. There were some ice bergs as you say. Only swiss.. blah ... Blah.. Blah were dead.


#26 by gujjubania


We are not that way. That is not our way. Think. Think.

Talk to me. This is great write up. This is the one that exposes what these idiots always think what is India should do.

Moo Samloo tame ``ganda``.

We know both ways. But.. There is always a better way we like. Don`t we?


Aniket

Ref nazarhayatkhan #20

[Angana Jee

``Intent on constructing the `ideal` woman who decries the `loose morals` of feminism, the sangh seeks to train Hindu women to confront the `undesirable` sexual behaviour ``endemic`` to Muslims and Christians. Such training endorses `masculanisation` of the Hindu male looking to protect the fictively threatened Hindu woman. ``

Religious Extremists in all religions agree on one point - woman is evil and woman needs to be controlled. All have a compulsive fear of a free woman.]

Maybe I should just look up Angana while I am in the Bay Area and ask her out on a date. Maybe she will be in the mood to rebel against the Sangh`s attempt to train Hindu women to confront their own `loose morals` and `undesirable sexual behavior`.

[Good insight into the fanatic fringe in India.]

Just think: this so-called fanatic fringe didn`t exist until one started seeing mass conversions in the aboriginal/tribal belts of India.

By the way, would you accept conversion of Indian Muslims to Christianity? I would favor it because a) it would at least reduce Hindu-Muslim tensions and b) no Christian is demanding a subsidy to go to Rome or Jerusalem. At least, not yet.

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Ref yagacho #28

t[he sangh parivar needs a dose of reality. what india needs is toilets not temples. problem of india is not lack but excess of religion.]

Then by the same logic, conversions should be prohibited, right? What those Adivasis need are education, hygiene, clean drinking water, the ability to earn a livelihood, etc. Do you think Christ provides all these? Does Allah? But of course Bhagwan doesn`t, right? And the failure of their indigenous beliefs can be seen in their miserable existence. What kind of logic is this?

[a question is ``when sanghis attain their ultimate goal:converting a individual to hinduism, then what is the caste assigned to the new hindu? can he/she be a brahmin? maybe some of sangh sympathisers on this discussion have a answer...]

The age-old custom is to leave them alone. So they can continue to worship their stones and ancestors. If they choose to come to a Hindu temple, that is fine. If like Soysauce they want to build a temple to a movie star and worship there, that is fine too with us Hindus.

If they have divisions within their society, Hindus say let them keep it. If they don`t, that is okay too.

In Bali, the Balinese are divided into Brahmanas, Ksatriyas, Weseyas, and Sudras. The number of subdivisions among these castes is less than 50 as opposed to 4000 or so in India. That is conversion to Hinduism in action for you!

So Arundathi Roy and Angana Chatterjee are correct!

How many millions of people does the Three Gorges Dam in China displace? Do they have one word to say about it? At least in India, they took the Narmada Dam dispute all the way to the Supreme Court and then they lobbied the World Bank to see if the loans could be stopped.

Yo Angana, we want to hear from you on the Three Gorges Dam, the suppression of the Falun Gong movement, the repression in Tibet and Eastern Turkestan (Zinjiang).

When Hell freezes over? Just as I thought!

the sangh parivar needs a dose of reality. what india needs is toilets not temples. problem of india is not lack but excess of religion.

a question is ``when sanghis attain their ultimate goal:converting a individual to hinduism, then what is the caste assigned to the new hindu? can he/she be a brahmin? maybe some of sangh sympathisers on this discussion have a answer...