Quote:CHANDIGARH/VALTOHA: Union home minister P Chidambram’s categorical no to including Sikhs in the ‘welcome-back’ call extended to Kashmiri youth who had gone over to PoK, has come as a rude shock for Punjab, where people are slamming the government’s stand as ‘‘discriminatory and unjust’’.



Soon after PC’s offer to PoK youths, the Jathedar of Akal Takht, in an exclusive interview with the TOI, had asked the minister to make the same offer to Sikh youths on February 13. On Thursday, Chidambram’s party colleague and former Punjab chief minister Amarinder Singh said he ‘‘did not agree with the (PC’s) decision’’.



‘‘There has to be some logic to it. When we are extending this offer to those who are still resorting to violence (in J&K), then why can’t we call back those who have shunned arms years ago and returned to the mainstream,’’ said Amarinder, who had, during his chief minister’s tenure, carried back a list of 50-odd such youths from Canada for having their names cleared from the High Commission, after taking clearance from Indian authorities. He also took up the matter with External Affairs ministry later.



BJP MP from Amritsar, Navjot Sidhu called the decision ‘‘a shocking violation of Indian constitution where Union government was indulging in discrimination on the basis of caste, colour and creed. Anybody, who violates the constitution should be made to face action,’’ Sidhu told The Times of India on phone from Indore.



Even as criticism is pouring in from Sikh leaders cutting across party lines, human rights lawyer Navkiran Singh has decided to file a PIL in the Punjab and Haryana High Court challenging PC’s decision on the ground that ‘‘all the citizens are equal in the eyes of India’s constitution but the Union government is discriminating against Sikhs while appeasing Muslim community.’’



Meanwhile, Punjab CM Parkash Singh Badal, known to be a moderate face among radical Sikh leaders during militancy, also finally joined the chorus and declared PC’s decision as ‘‘unfortunate’’. Talking to TOI, Badal said, ‘‘I am sorry to hear the statement of the home minister, because the policy should be the same for all Indian nationals.’’ He added that he would take up the issue with Chidambram during latters visit to Amritsar on February 20. “All we want is that the Sikh youth who had to leave the country under some kind of duress, repression or implication in false cases, should be considered for a similar opportunity.”



SGPC chief Avtar Singh Makkar, who had asked black-listed Sikh youths to approach the Akal Takht with their details about six months back, said his office had received over 100 such names, where people have been denied the chance visit their home country, even though they have no criminal cases against them. ‘‘The entire community was angry about Operation Bluestar and many of them held public protests. Why should this be held against them,’’ asked Makkar, who said he would be writing to the PM for a review of this decision.



The state battled militancy for over one and a half decades, though, normalcy returned to the state in the mid-90s, many Sikhs were put on an ‘adverse list’, commonly known as ‘black list’, and have not been allowed to return to India all these years.



Akal Takht Jathedar Giani Gurbachan Singh, described the home minister’s statement on Wednesday as a ‘gross injustice with Sikhs’.

Quote:01 Mar 2010 10:26:50 AM



THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Bharatiya Vichara Kendra director P. Parameswaran has criticised painter M.F. Hussain for consistently denigrating Indian culture.



In a press release issued on Sunday in the background of the news that Hussain had accepted Qatar nationality, Parameswaran said that in the name of artistic freedom Hussain had painted Hindu gods and goddesses and even Bharat Matha in a manner, which deeply hurt the sentiments and sensibilities of patriotic Indians.



That M.F. Hussain has accepted Qatar nationality is good news, good for him and good for India.



He got what he desired and lost what he hardly deserved, the statement said.



He had to leave India because of the intense anger of his misusing artistic freedom. Now, he is free to utilise his newly-won nationality to make full commercial benefit of his negative artistic talents while staying abroad, the statement said. A number of human right activists are raising a hue and cry against the denial of M.F. Hussain’s fundamental right to live in India. Their argument is that he has done only what has already been in vogue in India a long time back.



In many Hindu temples, figures have been painted in an obscene manner. But it must be remembered that great Indian patriots like Swami Vivekananda have openly condemned such paintings and described such paintings as degenerate and not representing true Indian art. Nobody now admires them and no artist reproduces such paintings except Hussain, the statement said. It was against such paintings that the great Indian artists Raja Ravi Varma produced hundreds of portraits of Hindu gods and goddesses and won worldwide acclaim, the statement said. It was an act of sheer arrogance on the part of the Kerala Government that it recently decided to honour M.F. Hussain by giving him Raja Ravi Varma award.



It is another matter that they could not succeed in this nefarious attempt due to public protest and judicial intervention, the statement said.



The “righteous indignation!’’ of the human rights activists in the case of Hussain is to be seen in comparison to to their silent acquiescence of the Tibetan spiritual leader Dalai Lama half-a- century-old exile in India. Hussain had to leave India for denigrating Indian culture, whereas Dalai Lama was forced to leave Tibet in order to protect and practise the millennium-old tradition and culture of Tibet.



[color="#0000ff"]It will indeed be interesting to watch if Hussain utilises his freedom as a Qatar national to produce paintings of Islamic symbols in the manner in which he has been painting Hindu icons and symbols. That would also show how genuine is his secularism and the independence of his vociferous supporters in India, he said.[/color]

Quote:New Delhi, March 02, 2010 First Published: 19:15 IST(2/3/2010)



Former president APJ Abdul Kalam and industrialist Ratan Tata top the list of 100 most trusted Indians [color="#0000ff"]while artist MF Husain is at 91 [/color][color="#0000ff"]and Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati is at the very bottom[/color], according to a survey by the Reader's Digest.



Prime Minister Manmohan Singh is ranked seventh, one place below chess grandmaster Vishwanathan Anand, Sachin Tendulkar is at number eight and Nobel laureate Amartya Sen at 10th place along with Wipro chairman Azim Premji and Indian Space Research Organisation M Madhavan Nair.



Congress general secretary Rahul Gandhi is ranked 29th in the survey published in the March edition of Reader's Digest that hit the stands Tuesday.



Others in the top 10 list of India's most trusted Indians are former police officer Kiran Bedi (3rd), Infosys co-founder Narayana Murthy (4th), music composer AR Rahman (5th) and cartoonist RK Laxman (9th).



Among [color="#0000ff"]India's most trusted professions, teachers are at the top,[/color] followed rather surprisingly by firefighters and farmers follow at number three.



[color="#0000ff"]Scientists and members of the armed forces share fourth position[/color], with doctors at sixth, pilots at seventh, pilots at seventh, surgeons at eighth, nurses at ninth and engineers at 10th.



[color="#0000ff"]At the bottom end of the scale of 40 most trusted professions are religious leaders (35)[/color], lawyers (36), police officers (37), government officials (38), realtors (39) and politicians (40).



“The survey was conducted online by market research firm Digital Edge that sent out 5,000 invitations, with 761 people responding by the cutoff date,” Digest editor Mohan Sivanandan told IANS on the phone from Mumbai.



“The survey covered 30 cities, with two-thirds of the respondents being under 35, possessing a bachelor's degree and three-fourth's male,” he added.



Given this, Sivanandan has added a caveat in his editorial in the Digest.



“[color="#0000ff"]Although we cannot claim this survey to be absolutely scientific,[/color] you’ll agree with me that the overall results mirror public perceptions fairly accurately. Equally interesting are the views and explanations from experts. On a personal note, I don’t have cause to rejoice, because journalists are ranked 30th among 40 professions, just below plumbers,” the editorial says.



Thus, the survey has more than its share of surprises, with cricket captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni ranked at 42nd, way below shooter Abhinav Bindra (25th), while tennis star Sania Mirza is at 81st.



The respondents gave a massive thumbs down to politicians and sports administrators.



Bharatiya Janata Party leader L.K. Advani is at 94, Railway Minister Mamata Banerjee at 96, Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar at 97, Communist Party of India-Marxist general secretary Prakash Karat at 98 and former railway minister Lalu Prasad at 99.



Indian Premier League commissioner Lalit Modi is just one notch above Advani.



Bollywood and the small screen have their share of places with actors Amitabh Bachchan and Aamir Khan at 14 and 18 respectively, with TV comic Jaspal Bhatti at 43, scriptwriter Javed Akhtar at 46, Shah Rukh Khan at 53, Sushmita Sen at 64, Rajnikanth at 67, Kamal Haasan at 71, director Anurag Kashyap at 78, Malayalam actor Mohanlal at 80, Aishwarya Rai Bachchan at 82 and TV serial producer Ekta Kapoor at 95.



Among the other surprises in the list, President Pratibha Patil is ranked way below at 67, Planning Commission Deputy Chairman Montek Singh Ahluwalia at 41, Home Minister P. Chidambaram at 50, novelist Khushwant Singh at 51 and environmentalist R.K. Pachauri at 61 along with TV anchor Rajdeep Sardesai.



Congress president Sonia Gandhi is at 72, Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee at 73, Minister of State for External Affairs Shashi Tharoor at 84, Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha Arun Jaitley at 86, Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi at 87 and Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah at 89.