Selecting a Charity
By Narayanan Komerath
(Indic Journalists’ Association International)

The British activist charity “ActionAID” claims that over $20B of the $50B global poverty-alleviation budget is pocketed by consultants (Mathiason, The Observer, May 29). Years ago, another British report concluded that much of their Gujarat Earthquake relief funds fed SUV dealers. Hardly surprising.

Charitable organizations fill a critical need of US desis. They help us to “give back” and make a difference. With 1$ buying over Rs. 43, charities help us achieve our dreams of helping to improve many lives in our native land, leaving us free to focus on earning a living. Given this emotional aspect, the fierce debate about charities is not surprising. Today, one must take the time to be aware of where one’s money may be used. Let me share some pointers I’ve learned from research on these:

1) Social and development work is not easy, so those who do it full-time must be strongly motivated. What is that motivation? Type 1 is the “religious” MNC seeking to convert others to their faith – which in turn brings more money and market share. Not very different from the East India Company. Type 2 buys votes for political power. Type 3 is the scam, whose “overhead” may exceed 50%. Type 4 is the personality cult, set up to praise one individual. Type 5 is a club of well-intentioned socialites. Is there really a Type 6? A class of people to whom helping others fulfills their own purpose in life, believing that “Service to fellow humans is the best service to the Almighty”? Such people accept only a minimal livelihood, but work hard to help those in dire need. This seems incredible to us in “modern” society where one “bills” by the minute, but the evidence proves that there are indeed such – spread through many organizations. We put our trust in them, and have every reason to be proud of that decision.

2) An example may illustrate the distinction. Most of us are horrified by images of poverty and suffering, and some are dazed by the realization of having the near-Divine power to change a human life for less than the cost of a haircut. The recruitment pamphlet of a certain US-based “charity” with ties to India, uses the metaphor of a man who stood on a beach, picking up fish squirming on the sand, and tossing them back into the water. He responds to a sneering passer-by who questions his sanity: “It sure made a difference to THAT one!” Touching, no doubt, but they miss an important point. Fellow-Indians are not fish. They are proud, sensitive citizens of a great nation. Their lack of bank accounts and clothes as expensive as ours does not make them inferior or less intelligent. An organization set up to stoke its donors’ and fund-raisers’ egos, is less likely to use our money effectively. Predictably, their project reports, read carefully, reveal the reality that Indian villagers usually lose patience with their antics and ask them to leave.

3) How honest is the organization? Recently, a US-based charity hastily purged its websites and blithely disowned its grassroots relief-delivery partners in India, when questioned about their political colors. The leaders seemed confident that their ludicrous contortions would please gullible donors, instead of amplifying suspicion.

4) Do your funds get used to play politics or pay politicians? The US Internal Revenue Service is very specific about tax-deductions for donations to “501 c3” charitable organizations. If your “charitable” leaders march with banners saying: “Brick by Brick, Wall by Wall, US Rule Is Gonna Fall!” or “Allah Will Destroy America and India!” it may be time to worry. Ditto for political grandstanding with $20,000 “PadaYatras” etc. Political activism is not charity.

5) Does your charity simply throw money at poor people and walk away? Or do they actually help the local people to get educated, plan projects, make their own decisions, and then fund those projects with clear budgets, timelines and milestones? Yes, Indians in rural areas are smart and disciplined enough to do these. Anything else is just a waste of money. As the expensive British study concluded, and as I could have told them for free, “local buy-in” is critical. This means that the project will be cast in the locals’ realities, not yours. Religious metaphors and icons rooted in local culture and legend may adorn their workplaces. They will use names in Indian rather than western dialects and traditions, and praise the Almighty in every sentence. If all this offends your secular purity, you may be better off tossing the money from 30,000 feet and imagining that it did a lot of good. You’ll be happier than if you really find out just how the self-proclaimed “secular” organizations spend your money, or who paid for those new SUVs and “OSAMA IS OUR HERROW!” banners, not to mention AK-47s.

None of this in any way excuses deliberate discrimination by religion, caste, color or gender, let alone any sort of violence. Many desis who depend on CNN or “OUTLOOK” for their news, find it hard to accept that poor Indians can indeed conduct projects without such nonsense. The reality of human relations in India is far more complex and beautiful, though it can no doubt turn very ugly as well. We find that Indians even in the deepest, most remote parts are kind, caring, compassionate people whose first instinct is to be friendly and generous to their neighbors – and even more to strangers. Working with them, and helping them with the opportunity to achieve their dreams, can make one’s own life richer beyond anything that mere money can achieve. And finally, one must not lose interest and give up just because the task looms huge – or because someone lies about or tries to “label” the charity one supports. Take the time to find out the truth – and press for positive changes whenever possible. Meaningful achievement takes time, patience, and dedication.

Satyam eva jayate

<b>Vajra Shakti Military Exercise</b> | 9th May 2005 @ Near Jalandhar, Punjab, India
<b>Click here to view Information, Photographs, Video</b>


<b>Know Your Army - Indian Army Exhibition</b> | May 2005 @ Bangalore
<b>Click here to view Photographs</b>


<b>Aero India 2005, Asia's Premier Air Show</b> | 9th-13th February 2005 @ Yalhanka, Bangalore, India
<b>Click here to view Information, Photogrpahs</b>

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I try my best to provide a web source for as many events as possible. If anybody has information, news, photographs etc on upcoming events please contact me!

<b>Miraculous birth of the Macaulay gotra</b>

<i>Kalavai Venkat</i>

“We can all be proud Macaulay-putras!” declares Jaithirth Rao because Macaulay introduced English education in India. Rao traces our success and even our collective identity to this momentous act of Macaulay.

Needless to say, English education has been one of the main contributing factors to the successes that India and her citizens have experienced. But, is it the only factor? Does Macaulay deserve to be eulogized for that? Macaulay introduced English education not only in India but also in what is today Pakistan, Afghanistan and Bangladesh. None of these states is a poster-boy of economic progress, democratic ideals, hi-tech revolution or academic excellence. So, what made the difference in India?

One man: Jawahar Lal Nehru. He recognized that India needed schools of higher learning and autonomous research labs. He recognized the need to usher in scientific temperament. He tied up with foreign providers of technology. That vision paid dividends where it matters the most. India established IIT, IIM, AIIMS, DRDO and ISRO, built damns, nuclear reactors, put satellites in the orbit and built the super computers to drive them. Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan lacked a visionary like Nehru and so a mere introduction of English education by Macaulay didn’t carry them far.

Nehru had his failures too. Only half the journey is complete when you create autonomous centers of excellence. You need a vibrant capitalist economy that will nourish those institutions and motivate investment and innovation to create wealth. Nehru’s ill fated obsession with socialism ensured that India didn’t capitalize on her initiatives for decades to come. In the 90s, India made her forays into capitalist economy, albeit half-heartedly, and began to capitalize on the investments that Nehru had made in her institutions of learning and research. Even this hesitant flirtation with capitalism ensured that India emerged as the leading software and hi-tech outsourcing hub, leveraging, as Thomas Friedman [<i>The World is Flat</i>] points out, the critical mass of scientific learning which Nehru envisioned and pioneered decades ago.

At the time when Nehru started implementing his visions, he had his share of detractors. Gandhi clearly lacked a scientific temperament. Many leaders clamored for education in mother tongue under the unproven belief that it is offers greater benefits. The emerging consensus in neuroscience is that a child that is exposed to multi-lingual learning early in life becomes equally proficient in all the languages. Most importantly, English language education has ensured that Indians have access to the finest scientific literature and media that are published in English. Education in mother tongue would’ve shut this door on Indians. We owe our thanks to Nehru for this too.

Should we credit Macaulay for what he neither intended nor implemented? Macaulay introduced his English education in the 1830s to train Indians to be able clerks of the English masters, not to usher in scientific temperament. Not surprisingly, India had to wait another 120 years before Nehru could transform a mere accidental introduction of English education into a constructive vision.

Lest I sound like blindly eulogizing Nehru I should also add that his understanding of our cultural heritage was minimal and everything he knew about that was borrowed from European writers because Nehru couldn’t read any Indian script. Thus blinded, he was also instrumental in creating a battery of Leftist Taliban that would subsequently deny teaching and researching of Sanskrit at Leftist bastions like JNU. Ironically, the man that ushered in scientific temperament was also responsible for the destruction of objective learning in humanities, art and culture and for the politicizing of these fields by the self anointed Leftist eminences. In a development that Nehru wouldn’t have anticipated, the Leftist students of JNU might soon stop brushing their teeth!

We shouldn’t lose sight of what Macaulay’s schemes destroyed even if Macaulay might not have intended that. In his brilliant researches, drawing upon authentic British records and surveys, the eminent scholar and Gandhian, Dharampal [<i>Beautiful Tree - Indigenous Indian Education in the 18th century</i>] demonstrates that even till the 1820s India had an excellent infrastructure of schools. There were well over a 1, 00, 000 schools in Bengal alone. We get a similar picture no matter whether we look at Punjab or Tamilnadu. These schools provided vocational training to members of every community including women. They imparted training in a wide range of subjects from traditional medicine to jurisprudence. The infrastructure of traditional institutions which sustained these schools ensured that the students received their education free.

In contrast, the system that Macaulay ushered in was forbiddingly expensive. Most sections of the society couldn’t afford it. For most Indians, it had no vocational relevance. By the 1880s, vast sections of the society had been deprived of education as the traditional schools had been destroyed. As evident from the British records, by then most of the students that enrolled for the system of education that Macaulay introduced were upper caste boys that aspired for British clerical jobs. But, it didn’t come cheap. As evident from the incisive writings of the great revolutionary thinker and freedom fighter Suddhananda Bharati, many families pledged all they had to acquire an English education for their son. Quite often, their dreams of getting a British job didn’t materialize. Many families were ruined and many a youth committed suicide. It is not a coincidence that early revolutionary phase of our freedom struggle attracted such youth.

Macaulay didn’t understand any Indian language. Nor was he connected to the Indian culture. But he expressed nothing but contempt for anything Indian. He was not particularly any more racist than the average Englishman of that time but nevertheless the racism that underlined his worldview is unmistakable. He declared that the ‘lower castes’ were lax in their morals. In case the wife of a ‘lower caste’ man committed adultery, wrote Macaulay, “The husband would gladly have taken a few rupees and walked away.” Nor did conversion to Christianity help much for a converted Indian was merely “as good a convert as a missionary can make in this part of the world.”

His ignorance of Indian philosophy, Sanskrit, Pali, Persian and Tamil literature didn’t prevent him from making sweeping remarks, which in all fairness to Macaulay, he had merely borrowed from a few other European Orientalists: “A single shelf of a good European library is worth the whole native literature of India and Arabia.” India had pioneered many advances in theoretical and applied sciences starting with the invention of Baudhayana’s formulas and Arybhatta’s astronomy to the discovery of inoculation. Some familiarity with the Indian scene would’ve informed Macaulay but in his ignorance he declared that the so called sciences of India will evoke laughter in an English school girl. [<i>George Otto Trevelyan, Life and Letters of Lord Macaulay</i>]

Do we have to trace an imagined lineage to an ignorant man that had contempt for us? E V Ramaswamy Naicker, the British lackey and South Indian strongman, contemptuously called Tamil “The language of the barbarians.” Strangely, the separatist Dravidianist parties that came to rule Tamilnadu hailed him as the father of the Tamil race and he received the appellation “Thanthai Periyar,” meaning “The Great Father.” For some years, the Dalitists have been glorifying Macaulay oblivious to what he thought of them. Today we find Macaulay elevated to a similar status on a pan-Indian scale.

We are witnessing the miraculous birth of the <b>‘Macaulay gotra’</b> !

INDIA - CONVENTIONAL WAR ASYMMETRY


Modern day warfare technology which is privy to western powers and Russia is slowly inching up towards Indian shores in the guise of thrust vectoring system, powerful phased array radars, sophisticated avionics, precision guidance mechanism, and telemetry – some of the components that are embedded in our cruise missiles, also known as currency of power in conventional war parlance.



Talking about cruise missiles and other ballistic missiles as started during 1975 under Integrated Guided Missile Development Program which was the brainchild of late prime minister Indra Gandhi whose endeavors have finally culminated fruitfully for Indians who have obtained prized catch of the day – BRAHMOS – a deadly supersonic cruise missile which can alter the battlefield scenario a la stinger in Afghanistan which made the graveyard of Russian choppers and forced Russians to flee.


Such is the deadly force of accurate, menacing Brahmos that Some have even warned that the US Navy's largest ships, the massive carriers, have now become floating death traps, and should be mothballed.


So far none has seen the massed cruise missile attack, but should it happen with multiple salvo, above is stark reality, even if not, such is the precision of Brahmos that its guidance system is able to distinguish an aircraft carrier from its escorts when locked on mode. Its land version has demonstrated its accuracy by pinpointing its target among the cluster of decoys and now follows Sea version which would be ultimately followed by Air version.


Please note the salient point here that the Brahmos missile is as deadly and precise as SS-N- 22 Sunburn or Moskit as called in Russia, another supersonic cruise missile whose technology has roots in Brahmos. In her testimony before the US House of Representatives Armed Services Committee, leading defense expert June Teuffel painted the following scenario about SS-N-22:

<b>QUOTE:</b>

<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->"Nine feet above water, traveling at twice the speed of sound, with a 200-kiloton nuclear warhead, the radar-guided Sunburn missile can weave its way through smaller ships until it reaches its real target -- a US aircraft carrier. At the last instant, it would pop up from the ocean's surface, smash into the side of the carrier and set off a nuclear explosion six times as powerful as Hiroshima. The US Navy has nothing that can stop it." <!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->


This is the only missile that has hit the bulls eye during a test which was marked *X*, other missiles just hit the moving decoy or decommissioned tugs/vessles. So did our Brahmos, which hit the chosen target on its head, hidden among decoys.


Had Argentina possessed about fifty Exocet missiles (instead of five which downed two UK frigates/destroyers) during the Falkland war or Guerra De Las Malvinas, they could have converted all British ships to underwater museums. Such is the ferocity of missiles in today's conventional war asymmetry.


Now imagine punching a hole in one of the US aircraft carrier (which comprises of several sister escort ships) and rendering it inoperable or sinking it with couple of more strikes, that would change the course of any war.

US aircraft carriers or floating airports as they are known, which are the weapons of choice of USG that during the crisis any president is left asking where are our aircraft carriers, cause they don't need any permission from host countries as they perform in international waters and not littoral.




More, when the adversary knows the deadly power of its enemy, it thinks over and during the war crisis, changes the tough attitude, instead looks for the truce or middle ground.




Although India's blue water navy has long way to go, but if India is to retain its regional power status, it better keep up with changing technologies and weapons of choice to maintain the cutting edge because the influence and the leverage matters in today's power matrix with international ramifications.





But as I have said before and let me reiterate my pet phrase ' Migs and Mirages wont make any difference to India, Mir jafars of India will '. Thirty three years without using our combat birds and our tanks against our external threat, versus India’s fifth column who is silently stabbing Indians within our borders and goes unpunished, Its time we join hands or perish we will, Because Indians are at receiving end when it comes to internal security.



Time to think 3D.


Keshto patel

Cool down Guys!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I started this topic to discuss anything related to Arya Samaj. It's contributions to Hindu society have been great and need not be repeated here. Also I just wanted to discuss negative aspects of arya samaj as well (like contributing to the alienation of sikhs by calling Guru Nanak a pretender etc) and also the reasons for the decline of arya samaj. I will start off the topic by giving a short passage from Koenraad Elst's book "Who is a Hindu?" in which he discusses whether Arya Samaj is Hindu:

6.6. Is the Arya Samaj Hindu?

Many Hindus feared that a different outcome in the RK Mission court case might have had a disastrous precedent value for other organizations with a weak Hindu self-identification. Jagmohan, former Governor of Jammu & Kashmir and a hero of the Hindutva movement, comments: “Had the Supreme Court come to the same conclusion as the Calcutta High Court, many more sects and denominations would have appeared on the scene claiming positions outside Hinduism and thereby causing further fragmentation of the Hindu society.”37

Then again, perhaps the effect of a recognition of the RK Mission as a minority would not have been nearly as dramatic as Jagmohan expected, for in several states, another Hindu reformist organization has enjoyed minority status for decades without triggering the predicted exodus. Jagmohan himself has noted a case where “the temptations in-built in Article 30 impelled the followers of Arya Samaj to request the Delhi High Court to accord the status of a minority religion” but “the Division Bench of the Delhi High Court rightly rejected the contention of the Arya Samaj”.38 However, as early as 1971, the Arya Samaj gained the status of “minority” in Panjab. Then already, it had that status in Bihar, along with the Brahmo Samaj.39

In a way, the Arya Samaj is a minority: the Arya-Samajis are fewer in number than the non-Arya-Samajis.40 By this criterion, every Hindu sect is a minority, and every Hindu school which calls itself “Shaiva school” or “Ram bhakta school” would pass as a minority institution, protected by Art.30. But that is of course not how the courts and the legislators have understood it: in principle, all Hindu minorities within the Hindu majority are deprived of the privileges accorded to the “real” minorities.

In Swami Dayananda’s view, the term Arya was not coterminous with the term Hindu. The classical meaning of the word Arya is “noble”. It is used as an honorific term of address, used in addressing the honoured ones in ancient Indian parlance.41 The term Hindu is reluctantly accepted as a descriptive term for the contemporary Hindu society and all its varied beliefs and practices, while the term Arya is normative and designates Hinduism as it ought to be. Swami Dayananda’s use of the term Arya is peculiar in that he excludes the entire Puranic (as opposed to the Vedic) tradition from its semantic domain, i.e. the major part of contemporary Hinduism. Elsewhere in Hindu society, “Arya” was and is considered a synonym for “Hindu”, except that it may be broader, viz. by unambiguously including Buddhism and Jainism. Thus, the Constitution of the “independent, indivisible and sovereign monarchical Hindu kingdom” (Art.3:1) of Nepal take care to include the Buddhist minority by ordaining the king to uphold “Aryan culture and Hindu religion” (Art.20: 1).42 Either way, the semantic kinship of the two terms implies that the group which chose to call itself Arya Samaj is a movement to reform Hinduism (viz. to bring it up to Arya standards), and, not another or a newly invented religion.

The Arya Samaj’s misgivings about the term Hindu already arose in tempore non suspecto, long before it became a dirty Word under Jawaharlal Nehru and a cause of legal disadvantage under the 1950 Constitution. Swami Dayananda Saraswati rightly objected that the term had been given by foreigners (who, moreover, gave all kinds of derogatory meanings to it) and considered that dependence on an exonym is a bit sub-standard for a highly literate and self-expressive civilization. This argument retains a certain validity: the self-identification of Hindus as “Hindu” can never be more than a second-best option. On the other hand, it is the most practical choice in the short run, and most Hindus don’t seem to pine for an alternative.
http://voi.org/books/wiah/ch6.htm

And the following is a link to an online book by Swami Dayananad Saraswati (founder of Arya Samaj) titled "Satyaprakash":

http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Ithaca/3440/books.html

I would like to start the thread with links to discussion of Bharati Mukherjee's "Two ways of belonging in America" op-ed in New York TImes in 1996. She wrote that piece to contrast her way versus her sister Mira. The background was that the new INS reform bill denied benefits to non citizens. Mira her sister wrote in NYT as to how she feels about it having contributed to the system and how the rules were changed later.

Now we have Indira Nooyi, CEO of PEPSICO, speaking to the graduating class of Columbia Business school. Here she tries to put in prespective what the global world things of US.

Text of speech: Indira Nooyi at Columbia Business School-2005

Comments on her speech: Sample comments

Blog :Blog on the speech

looks like Indian Americans have come a long way since 1996.

I would like to Start a thread on International Society of Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON), it's Sampradhaya, Idealogies, and it's world-view of other traditions (Indic and non-Indic.)

<b>Purpose of the thread:</b> While many are enchanted by the "Hare Krishna" groups spreading the message of Krishna Consciousness, there is also an undercurrent that's quite unclear. With some Hindus being uncomfortable with the claims made by Hare Krishna (like "Darwin is a rascal, confusing the world" etc.) that we would like to understand. Some of the claim on Scientific and spiritual matters are questionable, and it is only by questioning can we clarify. (At this point the thread does not claim ISKCON is wrong. It only is seeking to understand the logic and motive behind the claims.)

Many traidional Vaishnavas do not feel comfortable with Iskcon Idealogy and the method in which it propogates it's idealogies.

<b>Rules for discussion:</b>
(*) Focus will be on the idealogies. Any statement, when challenged, will have to be backed by a valid Source (pramaana.) This could be the Shruthi, Smrithi or logic according to Nyaaya shastra.
(*) The posts SHALL NOT contain any personal name-calling, flame baits on other derogatory remarks on forum members.
(*) If one member does not understand the argument/counter-argument, he/she shall state the assumption and ask for clarification.
(*) Try not to mock and throw sweeping allegations or character maligning if it is speculative and not supported by reference to available material.
(*) Keep the tone of conversation civil.
(*) All members are welcome to participate. Defend and challenge passionately, but not spitefully.

Hari Om.

http://iskcon.com/
http://science.krishna.org/
http://iskcon.com/education/culture/1.htm

To understand the Hindu thought of linkage between human being and ecology, one should realize that man is not just a body, but consciousness, a living energy that is self-aware and that possesses mind and memory. This process of involves development of consciousness, both qualitatively and quantitatively giving meaning and purpose to one’s life, as well as of lives of virtually all living beings. Merging with god is merging of environment and consciousness, and be aware of it.

Hindus believe that evolution of any individual soul starts with the first rudiments which are initially diffusive. This tiny spark then gets incarnated into bodies of plants, where it continues to grow, then it moves into animal bodies and finally into human ones. The human stage evolution of the soul implies, and not limited to, an understanding and experience of these fundamental principles of consciousness’ development as well as taking an active part in this process. Thus Hinduism's philosophical and religious principles treat “Ecology” as part and parcel of humanity.

Ashwatha is sacred to Hindus. Sankaracharya interprets ashwatha as representing the entire cosmos. Ashwatha is a unique and remarkable tree as the branches themselves morph into roots, and even when the original tree decays and perishes the young branches underneath continue to grow and enclose the parent. This eternal life of the Ashwatha has inspired many a Hindu philosophers over millennia.

There was a time in India when a Ashwatha was planted in the premises of every temple, and was regarded as the Tree of Life.

This thread is to collect articles that bring out the very aspect in Hindu Thought and culture (Concerns, Practices in preserving nature), promote pro-active environmental activism and awareness, based on Dharma the universal law, to prevent ecological imbalances and environmental disasters.

Let us re-learn it.

Xposted--

I think there are two lines of discussion around Arun's posts --
firstly, is there something that can be considered common in the
experience of the Indian traditions and secondly how should they be
classified.

I think there is reasonable consensus around the fact that the
Indian traditions cannot be described as religion as well as the
fact the phenomena is experienced differently within Western and
Eastern cultures.

http://encarta.msn.com/encyclopedia_7615...duism.html

Part of where we were stuck was the label of Hinduism -- i.e. even
if there is a commonality of experience (we won't say exactly what
right now), does the label Hinduism server to meaningfully
distinguish a category of phenomena from another one,
say "Buddhism." I think the point that Balu is making is that this
distinction is arbitrary and does not encapsulate a real category in
the world. In the new Encarta article on Hinduism we find:

"A Hindu is thus identified by a dual exclusion. A Hindu is someone
who does not subscribe to a religion of non-Indian origin, and who
does not claim to belong exclusively to another religion of Indian
origin—Buddhism, Jainism, or Sikhism. This effort at definition
produces a rather artificial distinction between Hinduism and other
dharmic traditions, which stems from an attempt to limit a system
that sees itself as universal to an identity that is strictly
religious. In many ways, labeling the other dharmic traditions as
non-Hindu has a basis that derives more from politics than from
philosophy. Indeed, greater differences of belief and practices lie
within the broad family labeled as Hinduism than distinguish
Hinduism from other dharmic systems.

Indian historian Irfan Habib makes this point when he quotes an
early Persian source that Hindus are those who have been debating
with each other within a common framework for centuries. If they
recognize another as somebody whom they can either support or oppose
intelligibly, then both are Hindus. Despite the fact that Jains
reject many Hindu beliefs, Jains and Hindus can still debate and
thus Jains are Hindus. But such discourse does not take place
between Hindus and Muslims because they do not share any basic
terms.
"

Clearly however, that way (people in) the Indian culture experience
phenomena is itself a commonality as well as a distinction from the
West. However, can one say more that is in common vs. the experience
of other societies that are non-religious?