December 6 - Another aniversary of the great day

It has been 13 years since the old structure that stood in place of Ram Mandir in Ayodhya was brought down and a make shift temple was built in its place. So many ups and downs and changes in the history of Bharath since then. Hindus thought that, a grand temple will take shape once BJP government comes in the centre. The BJP govt came, ruled for 6 years and got defeated. We the people, don't know what efforts it did in the direction of temple building!? Till to date, temple is a distant dream. The RSS and VHP had very seriously taken up this issue and made many sacrifices! But BJP took the advantage and came to the centre stage of Indian politics. They utilized people like Uma Bharathi and Sadvi Ritambara to win elections. Today Uma Bharathi is expelled from the party!! The party which was started to cleanse the Indian politics has taken the same path as that of Congress. I don't see any difference between the today's BJP and Congress! Hindus should not depend on these political parties to get their work done. They have to unite behind RSS or VHP and fight for their cause. I feel pained to see that many of my hindu friends still don't understand the issue of Ram Mandir in Ayodhya. They talk about secularism when Ayodhya issue comes up. The reason can be that, we read only the news magazines and believe whatever comes in that. Nobody tries to check the facts. Nobody reads history!! I asked my friend, in what way Ayodhya fight is against secularism? He said, you people destroyed the mosque which belongs to Muslims and want to build a Hindu temple in its place. So, I asked him, who is Babar? Why did he destroy the Ram temple? He was in a distant land and for what purpose he came upto Ayodhya? My friend didn't have the answer. He appreciates the fact that Babar is an invader. I also told him that, the muslims of our country are our muslims. They are not descendents of Babar. When somebody invades our country, we should not look at his religion/caste and then decide whether he is an enemy to me or not. So, even though Babar is a muslim, he is an enemy to each and every muslim in this country. He wanted to announce his victory over this country and that's the reason he destroyed the famous temple in Ayodhya. So, it was a black mark in History of Bharath. So, Ayodhya fight is not against muslims or any other caste. But, the politics made it more confusing and our media was always there to add more confusion. All of them made it out that, it is against muslims (thinking that they will get bulk votes of muslims)!! Hope a beautiful Ram Mandir will be built soon. And that muslims understand that they are the children of this soil only and not descendents of Babar.

Churún Merú or ANGEL Falls - World's highest waterfall

In total it is 15 times higher than Niagara Falls with a total of 3212 feet.

In the western part of Canaima National Park, is the Auyantepuy, one of the largest and better known "tepuy" (A flat top mountain ending with vertical walls). Angel Falls - spills from the Auyantepui into what is known as the Devil's canyon 979 Meters below. The indigenous people call it Kerepakupai-merú. It is located in the Guayana highlands, one of five topographical regions of Venezuela. It plunges off the edge of a "tepui", or table-top mountain, and falls to the river below, making it the tallest waterfalls on earth. The waters fall freely some 807 meters (2,648 feet) and reach the bottom of the valley as a misty spray that gathers into a small creek which eventually finds its way into the north-bound Churun River. The original name of this "Highest Waterfall" is Churún Merú or Kerepakupai-merú and is known to the local Indians for a long time. (I really wonder, whether these Indians were influenced by Hindus of India!? 'Meru' is a Sanskrit word for Mountain and som many mountains of India have names ending with Meru) But the rest of the world was not aware of it till 1933! American aviator jimmy angel first saw the falls in 1933 while searching for a valuable ore bed. He returned in 1937 with his wife, Gustavo Heny and Heny's gardener, and landed on top of the tepui. His Falamingo monoplane settled down into the marshy ground atop Auyan-tepui and remained there for 33 years before being lifted out by a helicopter. Jimmy Angel and his three comapnions managed to descend the tepui and make their way back to civilization in 11 days. And since then it has been named after him as "Angel Falls"!

Laptops for $100!!

Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Media Lab, has taken up this project. Although no contracts with governments have been signed, current plans call for producing five to ten million units beginning in late 2006 or early 2007, with tens of millions more a year later. They are aiming to place the laptop in the hands of 100 to 150 million students. Under present plans, the first production version of the laptop will be powered by an AMD microprocessor and use an open-source Linux-based operating system supplied by Red Hat. Open-source software is not patent protected and can be copied for free. To get the price down, an eight-inch diagonal screen -- smaller than standard notebook computers -- will run in two modes, with a high-resolution monochrome mode for word processing and a lower-resolution color mode for Internet surfing. It will be powered by both a power adapter, if electricity is available, or through a wind-up mechanism. The device will have wireless capabilities and can network with other units even without Internet access. Here is the url for the news: http://www.pcworld.com/resource/article/0,aid,120845,pg,1,RSS,RSS,00.asp http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/4292854.stm They are planning to have a open source OS and Red Hat is on their mind. Why not Solaris? If anybody who has contacts in MIT can take up this, it will be wonderful news for Sun and Solaris.

-Narendra

Have you ever seen such a small monkey!?

This is a Brazilian Monkey!!

World's highest bridge

Three disturbing news items

Last week, I read about three news items. All of them are related to attack on Hindutva and will do lot of harm! First one is regarding, the Ramayana and Mahabharata in History books. Read the following paragraphs from the updated class IX NCERT book on ancient history: "Archaeological evidence should be considered far more important than long family trees given in the Puranas. Puranic tradition could be used to date Rama of Ayodhya around 2000 bce, but diggings and extensive explorations in Ayodhya do not show any settlement." And another portion tells like this about Krishna: "...though Krishna plays an important part in the Mahabharata, inscriptions and sculptural pieces found in Mathura between 200 bce and 300 ce do not attest his presence. Because of such difficulties, ideas of an epic age based on Ramayana and Mahabharata have to be discarded...." And another paragraph reads like this: "Ancient India's march to civilization was accompanied by growth of social discriminations. The attempt to bring back the past will mean perpetuation of social inequity which plagued the country." This change is not done by a Muslim or Christian, but by a Hindu Prof.Ram Sharan Sharma!! Imagine about the impact of this on future generations! Lord Mecaulay must be laughing in his tomb!! The second news is about the Christian missionary activity, in Tirupathi. Evangelists are targetting the sacred site of Tirumala and in a direct affront to the Hindu community, which has for centuries regarded all seven hills as holy, have starting gathering on the slopes in groups for public prayers. Clearly we are witnessing the development of a major assault upon one of the most venerated sites of the Hindu community. Should it happen, it will be a desecration at par with that of the Mylapore Shiva temple in Chennai. Hitherto, there has never been any question of a structure other than the shrine of Lord Venkateshwara on these hills, and it bears remembering that it is the hills that are holy and not merely the mandir which adorns them. For instance, a temple along a busy thoroughfare would be holy, but the adjacent land would not be deemed sacred. What lends urgency to Hindu fears is the fact that six large churches have already sprung up on the road to Tirumala (Bye-pass road and new Bye-pass road) that leads to Alipiri, the foot of the hills. It is therefore imperative that the State Government recognize the entire seven hills as the sacred abode of Shri Venkateshwara, and ensure that no structure of any other religion is allowed to come up there. Third news was regarding the Masjid constructed inside the premises of Belur Chennakeshava temple! I was very surprised to know that it was completely constructed and had to be brought down after protests. So, what was the local Hindu samaj doing when the construction was going on? How did the muslims dare to construct a masjid within the premises of hindu temple? Is this the secularism that our politicians keep talking about? Imagine what would have happened, if a temple was constructed in the premises of Jama masjid? Leave temple construction. Even they don't allow national flag to fly there! That is what happened in Hubli in the Kittur Chennamma grounds on August 15th. Even the police and government stood with muslims. Just because a Idga wall is constructed in a public ground, they are not allowing the national flag to fly there, national anthem to be sung there! When will our Hindu samaj realize this and raise its voice against all these anti-social activities? When will it give final warning to all those who talk or act against the interests of Hindu samaj and Bharat?

New chapter in (distorted) history books of NCERT says: Prithviraj coward, Jaichand hero!!

Lucknow, July 12: "Prithviraj Chauhan was a coward who ran away to save his life during the second battle of Tarain with Mohammad Ghauri."

"Jaichand (generally believed to be a traitor) was, in fact a ‘hero’ who gave up his life while fighting the forces of Ghauri."

This is the "new" history that students of Class 11 will learn under the CBSE and ICSE courses from this academic session. The revised history book, Medieval India History, published by NCERT, demolishes old beliefs and tramples over heroes of history.

Edited by Prof. Satish Chandra, the fifth chapter of the book on Medieval History clearly states that Prithviraj Chauhan tried to run away from the battle, but was taken prisoner. The book says that when Prithviraj accepted the supremacy of Mohammad Ghauri, the latter allowed him to continue as ruler of Ajmer. Prithviraj was later killed on charges of treason, according to the book, which goes on to say that Jaichand’s valour was unmatched and that he was killed while fighting the forces of Ghauri in Kannauj.

History, till now, had taught that Jaichand was a coward and a traitor who first betrayed Prithviraj Chauhan, and then was drowned while trying to flee the forces of Ghauri (History of Rajasthan, page 156).

The NCERT history book also demolishes the belief that the main cause of bitterness between Prithviraj and Jaichand was the fact that the latter’s daughter Sanyogita had eloped with Prithviraj and that Jaichand never forgave them. According to the new book, there were major political differences between the two kings and Sanyogita was not part of it.

While the NCERT book throws new light on Prithviraj Chauhan and Jaichand, the Class 11 book Ancient India History, written by Prof. Ram Sharan Sharma, discards the presence of Lord Krishna during the Mahabharata. The book says, "Although Krishna plays an important role in the Mahabharata, inscriptions and sculptural pieces found in Mathura dating back to 200 BC and 300 AD do not attest to his presence. Because of this, ideas of an epic age based on the Ramayana and Mahabharata have to be discarded."

On Ayodhya, the book says, "Archaeological evidence should be considered far more important than long family trees given in the Puranas because Puranic tradition can be used to date Ram of Ayodhya to 2,000 BC, but diggings and extensive exploration in Ayodhya do not show any settlement of the time."

The "new theories" being propounded in these history books have expectedly created controversy Uttar Pradesh. While the BJP is up in arms over references to Ayodhya and the Mahabharata, caste organisations are livid about "the attempt to demolish the aura of Prithviraj Chauhan".

State BJP president Kesri Nath Tripathi said the manner in which history was being distorted by the UPA government was nothing short of "blasphemy". He said he had already apprised the BJP leadership about the issue and would be going to Delhi shortly to finalise the party’s strategy on the issue.

Meanwhile, Mr R.K. Singh "Vishven", general secretary of the Akhil Bhartiya Kshatriya Mahasabha, has announced an agitation against the efforts of Central government to "discredit" Prithviraj Chauhan. "Prithviraj Chauhan is a kshatriya hero and we will never tolerate any attempt to rip off his aura and image," Mr Singh said.

(Courtesy: The Asian Age; July 13, 2005)

(URL: http://www.asianage.com/main.asp?layout=2&cat1=1&cat2=24&newsid=168971&RF=DefaultMain )

Will we remember 1947 after another 50 years!?

We are in the centenary year of "Vanga Bhanga movement". "Vanga Bhanga" was a historic occation. It was the first time after 1857 Bharat stood as one and raised a revolt against the British. We had lost in 1857, but we won the battle during "Vanga Bhanga". It gave a big and important turning point to the history of freedom struggle. "Vande Mataram" occupied the centre stage and fuelled the feelings of patriots. Indian National Congress got transformed into a platform of freedom fighters! Surendra Natha Byanerjee who was leading the agitation in Bengal had this to say about it: "What we could not achieve in several years of agitation was achieved just within 3 months of 'Vande Mataram' agitation". Also, swadeshi got a boost and burning foreign cloths/goods became a fashion. Britishers had to ban singing of "Vande Mataram"! Youths filled jails shouting "Vande Mataram". Morle and Minto who visited Bharat in 1905 told that, it was wrong on the part of Lord Curzon to have partitioned Bengal. But they concluded that, it cannot be undone as "It is a settled fact". But, leaders of freedom movement didn't accept and gave a call to "Unsettle the settled fact". In 1911, the govt had to take back the ordinance and the "settled fact was thus unsettled"!! Such was the impact of this whole movement. I think it has much more importance than "Non Co-operation movement" and "Quit India Movement". But, today people have forgotten this important milestone of our freedom struggle! Most of the youth I talked to, does not know about this movement!! What a pity:-( People who have forgotten their past, how can they build a better future? I think other than Sangh nobody else is thinking about this :-( With sensored and distorted history, what else can be expected? Lord Mecauley must be jumping with joy that, what he couldn't achieve, the "Mecauley Putra's" have achieved. During this centenary year, we must take an oath, that: Whether government does it or not, whether our history books are changed or not, I am going to do whatever little I can. I will try to spread the true history to people around me. I will try to educate them. When I say this, one story is coming to my mind. Once a boy was walking on the shores of a sea. That day sea had rised and had brought many fishes ashore. At the same time, he saw a sanyasi throwing the fishes back to sea! The boy was surprised and thought he must be mad. He went near the sanyasi and told him: "Swamy, there are tens of thousands of fishes that have come to shore. And it is impossible to throw all of them back to sea. You can only throw back a few hundred fishes and it is negligible compared to what is still left! So, what you are doing is a waste of time and energy and it is not going to make any difference!" Sanyasi looked up at the boy, threw back the fish that was in his hand and told "It will make difference to this fish" and continued in his work!

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One of the best photographs for this year!

This I got from a friend and is supposed to be one of the best photographs of this year! I don't know if it is true or not. But, look at the clarity of this photograph....!

Ayodhya attacked!

Militants are at it again!

This time they have tried to attack the Ayodhya temple and stir Hindu sentiments...... They have been trying to attack parliament, temples, military camps, etc without much success. But, still they are trying again and again!! Where do they get courage and motivation and what is their motivation!? See this surprising news: Hindu and Muslim leaders condemn attack! 10 years back we could not even imagine that muslim leaders will condemn terrorist attack on temples. Leave temple, even terrorists attacks in Kashmir are not condemned! After December 6, 1992 things have changed. Muslims are understanding the reality.......they know that if hindus get furiated, it would hit muslims hard and no secularist will come to their rescue!! We should welcome this change.

Another BIG step for science!

Few minutes back the "Deep Impact" has successfully hit the comet Temple-I in the head. (Clcik here to read the news) I consider this to be an achievement equal to that of landing on Moon! Here are some links related to this historic event: 1. NASA website: with latest info on Deep Impact. 2. Images. 3. Impactor. 4. Target. 5. Navigation. The successful strike 83 million miles (134 million kilometers) away from Earth occurred just before 1130 IST, according to mission control at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, which is managing the US$ 333 million (euro275 million) mission.

Beautiful - All 4 seasons!!

The same postion and angle taken for these four pictures in 4 different seasons! Very good imagination and technique by the photographer.......even the selection of the place is very good! I think this is a very rare set of pictures and posting them here.

Is this our Karwar!?

I saw this picture in the web and I can't resist asking the question: Is this a picture of Karwar? These are the pictures that is coming to my mind when I think about Karwar.....it was like this only everywhere......yes, without those snow/ice covered hills:-)

Rain....!?

When I think of rain, I am getting two contrasting pictures - Bellary and Karwar. Beechi has a famous joke about Bellary: Which are the two seasons in Bellary? "Basige matthu ati Besige":-) So, no rainy season!! But, Karwar is just the opposite! They get rain for almost 4 months! I was prachark in both these places!! Initially we got so much rain.......! Just one days rain flooded all the roads of Bangalore and traffic jam everywhere! I was very much worried about this rainy season.......... But, the actual rainy season hasn't yet started. Usually our rainy season starts by the end of May. Today is the last day of June.....still no sign of rain. Everyday it is cloudy, whether has become cold.....still no rain! Today it looks like we might get rain. Rain or No Rain......though it makes no much difference to Bangalore.....still we ask for rain......I don't know why! Is it not enough if it rains in villages and river basins and cachement areas!? No I can't think of any good reason other than filling up some tanks in Bangalore, clogging our drainage, filling all the potholes, creating traffic jams.....! Still I am praying the rain god to send rain to BANGALORE:-)

Restarted blogging!

Today, I faced problems while trying to get back into my previous blog! I have my regular id ssnkumar, that I have been using all these years..... But, I think when I created that blog, I forgot to select a template. So, today, When I tried to change the template, it is not allowing me!! And I tried all the possible ways and finally I am here, creating a new blog.