Fanfundamentalism

Appointment of CVC: Sushma meets Pratibha to register protest

2010-09-07T10:34:00.000-07:00

Appointment of CVC: Sushma meets Pratibha to register protest

After palm chopped off, Kerala prof is axed

2010-09-04T15:50:00.000-07:00

After palm chopped off, Kerala prof is axed

After palm chopped off, Kerala prof is axed
THIRUVANANTHAPURAM, Sept 04, DHNS:

Prof T J Joseph whose right palm was chopped off by suspected activists of the Popular Front of India for allegedly insulting Prophet Mohammed in a question paper has now lost his job, too.

The management of Newman’s College at Thodupuzha in Idukki district has terminated the services of the professor from September 1.

Monsignor Thomas Malekkudy, manager of colleges run by the Diocese of Kothamangalam, said the decision follows an inquiry conducted by them and the recommendation of the disciplinary committee. The management felt that the professor had hurt the religious feelings of a community by framing the controversial question resulting in loss of goodwill for the Church and even leading to law and order problems.

“We felt that tendering a mere apology by the professor was insufficient to undo the damage that his action had caused to the community and the institution. Hence we are constrained to terminate his services,’’ Fr Malekkudy said. Interestingly, the college management has indicated that the professor can contest its decision in court.

However, Prof Joseph and his family said they were stunned by the dismissal decision. “I was mentally preparing to get back to work at the earliest and had even begun to learn writing with my left hand when this jolt came,’’ Joseph said. His sister Sr Stella, a Catholic nun, said the college’s decision was nothing short of “double punishment.”

Kerala Education Minister M A Baby said the management’s action was extreme and that the professor could approach the university tribunal or the government against it.

Prof Joseph was attacked by a gang on July 4 when he was returning after Sunday mass with his sister and son. His palm was chopped off and thrown away which was later recovered and surgically joined together in a hospital on Kochi.

The attack on the professor who taught Malayalam in the college preceded almost two weeks of violence and protests by Muslim organisations in Idukki against the question that he framed.

Mahatma Gandhi University to which Newman’s College is affiliated had initiated disciplinary action against Joseph and later withdrawn it.

The police have so far arrested 51 people, most of them activists of the PFI, in connection with the case though some of the key accused are still absconding.

The property of those absconding have been attached and even the top leaders of the PFI have been questioned. The investigators have stumbled on evidence linking Bangalore blasts key accused Thadiyantavide Naseer with the PFI leadership.

Director-General of Police Jacob Punnose said more information was being awaited to establish whether Naseer had stayed at the PFI office in Ernakulam district as reported

I don't regret Iraq war... world should get ready to attack Iran: Blair - UK - World - The Times of India

2010-09-01T06:20:00.000-07:00

I don't regret Iraq war... world should get ready to attack Iran: Blair - UK - World - The Times of India

Anti-Obama book author pulls Hamas into NYC Islamic center controversy | Media Matters for America

2010-08-16T15:28:00.000-07:00

Anti-Obama book author pulls Hamas into NYC Islamic center controversy | Media Matters for America: "The right-wing media have found yet another way to keep their controversy surrounding a Manhattan Islamic center front and center -- by loudly trumpeting Hamas' apparent endorsement of the proposed mosque and thereby showing that the terrorist organization is on the same side as President Obama (the secret Muslim who -- as Pam Geller put it -- 'has, in effect, sided with Islamic jihadists.')"

Taliban stones couple to death in northern Afghanistan

2010-08-16T07:47:00.000-07:00

The Hindu : News / International : Taliban stones couple to death in northern Afghanistan

BBC News - Thousands of blogs shut down over 'terrorist material'

2010-07-20T05:45:00.000-07:00

BBC News - Thousands of blogs shut down over 'terrorist material'

The Left Behinders have got it wrong

2010-07-17T15:11:00.000-07:00

Dylan's lectionary blog: Proper 27, Year A

2010-07-17T15:08:00.000-07:00

Dylan's lectionary blog: Proper 27, Year A

Iran imposes media blackout over stoning sentence woman | World news | The Guardian

2010-07-09T16:07:00.000-07:00

Iran imposes media blackout over stoning sentence woman | World news | The Guardian

Deshabhimani, Malayalam News, Online Malayalam News, Malayalam Varthakal, Malayalam Daily, Malayalam Newspaper, Daily Newspaper of Kerala, Latest News, Lead News, and Kerala News, World/International News

2010-07-06T16:10:00.000-07:00

Deshabhimani, Malayalam News, Online Malayalam News, Malayalam Varthakal, Malayalam Daily, Malayalam Newspaper, Daily Newspaper of Kerala, Latest News, Lead News, and Kerala News, World/International News
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Malegaon blast: Shabridham ashram inmates questioned

2008-11-09T08:08:00.000-08:00

Sunday, 09 November , 2008, 19:03

Bardoli: The Maharashtra Anti-Terrorist Squad (ATS) has questioned some members of the Shabridham ashram in Dangs in connection with the Malegaon blasts, police sources said today.
The ATS team from Maharashtra had visited the ashram couple of days ago and questioned some of its members in connection with the Malegaon blasts, they said.
The Shabridham ashram is run by one Swami Ashimanand, police sources said. Police are searching for Swami Ashimanand who is believed to have gone into hiding after Ramji alias Ramsu, the Swami's trusted aide and chauffeur, was picked up by Mumbai ATS with Gujarat Police's assistance on Thursday. more

M.S.N. Menon provoked to write

2008-10-22T02:58:00.000-07:00

Organiser June 29, 2008

I am provoked to write this
By M.S.N. Menon

Yes. When I’m told that Hindus “live in darkness” I’m provoked.

I’m a Hindu, not the usual one, for I took the trouble to make a special study of human civilisations and religious atrocities. Naturally, I see religions in a different light. Not the way the “faithful” see them.

Religions are full of lies and false claims. The Jews claimed they were “the chosen people of God.” Where did this delusion take them? To the worst persecution known to man! They remain the object of the longest hate in human history.

Take Christianity. What is its claim and what is the reality? It claims to have civilised Europe. In fact, it destroyed one of the greatest civilisations of man—the Greek civilisation. Vassili Vassilevsky, one of the most stimulating authors of Greece, says: “It took us inheritors of a joyous paganistic culture, a long time to internalise the notion of ‘guilt’. Even today we do not wholly accept the idea that the body is the source of evil.” And yet Jesus had said that the “Kingdom of God is within you.” Then, who put the Devil inside the Christian to torment them? The Organised Church.

And it also destroyed the Roman empire. One of the first acts of the Christians (that of Emperor Theodisius), when they came to power in Rome, was to order the destruction of the most splendid library in the temple of Serapis. Obviously, the Church had no desire for enlightenment. The Hindus pray for light daily.

The Church converted the pagan temples into tombs, says W.E.H. Lecky, “for the adoration of the bones of the basest and most depraved of men among the Christian monks.” (History of the Rise and Influence of the Spirit of Rationalism in Europe”, Vol.II)

And a Christian mob stripped and cut into pieces a gifted, virtuous and beautiful lady in Alexandria. What was her crime? That she was the leader of the Neo-Platonists!

The Roman empire had produced some of the great men in history like poets Horace and Virgil, historians like Livy and Polybius, philosophers like Epictetus and Plotinus, orators like Cicero, lawgivers like Cato. What did Christianity produce in the 1500 years of its dominance over Europe? Not one man of greatness! And almost every great man who was born in Europe after the Renaissance was outside the Church.

And the Roman empire spread the Hellenistic civilisation in half the world. What has the Christian empire to show?

It is the claim of the church that it made a major contribution to the growth of morality in Europe. In fact, it made little contribution. It called Descartes, father of moral philosophy, an atheist! The Church gave its blessings to both capitalism and imperialism. And later to colonialism. Secretary of State Amery (UK) says that an active empire and an inactive Church cannot go together.

The Church had a big hand in slave trade. If there was a conscience problem, it helped to ease it by saying that the black man was the son of the Devil.

Denouncing the trade in black men, Lord Palmerston says: “If all crimes committed from creation down to the present day were added together, they would not exceed, I am sure, the guilt of the diabolic slave trade.” In America Lincoln had to fight a civil war to outlaw the trade. The Church was behind the rebel southern States.

According to the Church, the dark races were not required in God’s scheme of things.

The genocide of the Incas, Mayas and others has no parallel in human history. They were more civilised than the Europeans. “By millions upon millions” says Draper “whole races and nations were remorselessly cut off. The Bishop of Chiape affirmed that more than 15 million were terminated in his time. From Mexico and Peru, a civilisation that might have educated Europe, was crushed out.” (Intellectual Development of Europe, Vol. II)

On Galileo’s incarceration, Draper writes: “What a spectacle! This venerable man, the most illustrious of his age, forced by the threat of death to deny the facts…treated with remorseless severity during the remaining ten years of his life….” In the dungeon.

There is nothing in human history as diabolic as the Inquisition. It was created by the Popes to perfect the “art” of torture of the apostates. I can only think of the gas chambers of the Nazis, which did away with six million Jews. “What strikes me most in considering medieval torture is not so much this diabolic barbarity, which is impossible to exaggerate, as the extraordinary variety and what may be termed the artistic skills they displayed”. (Lecky)

What else can one expect from a religion which had thought of eternal hell fire as a punishment for even small wrongs of men!

What about Islam? Space compels me to make it a short review. In his book “In the path of Mahatma Gandhi”, George Catlin, the American philosopher, asks: “What has Islam to offer to compare with the philosophy of Vedanta and the Upanishads?” So much for its “Superiority” claim!

Be that as it may, what is the record of Islam’s atrocities? “The Islamic conquest of India is probably the bloodiest story in history,” says Will Durant, the American historian.

The Muslims do not want to be reminded of their past. But it is necessary, says S.Bashiruddin, former Vice Chancellor of Dr. Ambedkar Open University. (See his ‘Deen and Dharma”). He says: “Through the present generation of Muslims is not responsible for what has been done centuries ago, an awareness of such a legacy can sensitize the Muslim opinion leaders…”

With such a record of their past, I would like to know from Christian and Muslim brothers, in which way they are “superior” to the Hindus. Do not tell me that your religious texts do not permit these things. This is an easy explanation. I don’t take it. Men are judged by what they do, not by what they believe or by what is written in their scripture.

source

Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik on Communal Violence in Orissa

2008-10-13T18:55:00.000-07:00

Church in India Under Attack

Singed by communal fire byVarghese K. George

2008-10-13T18:39:00.000-07:00

Hindustan Times

New Delhi, October 14, 2008

Nearly 150 people have been killed in sectarian violence in the country in the last three months — roughly one-eighth of the toll of the 2002 Gujarat carnage which left 1,200 people dead.

More than the number of casualties, what makes this season of hate dangerous is its geographical spread — across eight major states. And, the fact that it will continue into election season — over the next two months Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Rajasthan, and then Delhi and Jammu and Kashmir will go to the polls.

The general elections are due early next year. The tension is simmering and prolonged and, but with no rows of bodies, which would have embarrassed the perpetrators.

The Opposition BJP and mentor Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh (RSS) have raised the pitch on several policy initiatives of the ruling Congress-led United Progressive Alliance (UPA), particularly the ones such as the Sachar committee report that calls for affirmative action for Muslims and Ranganath Mishra commission which favours reservation benefits for Dalits who have embraced Christianity or Islam.

In the first week of November 2007, the RSS national executive in Dharward in Karnataka passed resolutions opposing both the reports. A resolution also asked the Hindu Dalits and tribals to oppose the government’s moves and offered support.

During Christmas, the first round of violence broke out in Kandhamal in Orissa and the area is yet to see peace. A demand by Dalit Panos — who are mostly Christians — that they be counted as tribals has been a point of conflict with Kandh tribals, after whom the district is named.

Tribals get reservation benefits irrespective of religion and the Kandhs don’t want to share the benefits with the Panos.

Recurring incidents of terrorist violence driven by Islamism, has allowed the Sangh Parivar to keep its Hindutva agenda alive in a subtle and veiled fashion. Repeated references to terrorism – though as a governance issue — tremendously helped the BJP to come to power in Gujarat and Karnataka.

The idea of an “enemy within” has been strengthened by “jihadis” and the failure of the Congress and allies to effectively tackle it, both at political and governance levels.

When the Muslim-majority Kashmir Valley erupted in protest against a move to hand over a piece of land for facilities for pilgrims to Amaranth shrine in August, it strengthened the rhetoric.

Controlled friction, without rows of bodies, over a large area will keep the Congress — accused of facilitating illegal migration in Assam and pampering Muslims from Kashmir to Bangalore — on the defensive. The reason why this season could be too long for comfort. courtesy

Six in a family burnt alive in Adilabad

2008-10-12T18:05:00.000-07:00

Six burnt alive in Adilabad

The Hindu October 13, 2008
S. Harpal Singh

BHAINSA (ADILABAD DT.): Six members of a family, including three children, were burnt alive at Vatoli village near Bhainsa town in Adilabad district of Andhra Pradesh in the early hours of Sunday.

The incident comes as a sequel to the communal flare-up that claimed three lives in Bhainsa town on October 10.

The six belonged to a tailor’s family, one of only two families belonging to a particular community in this small village about 12 km from the communally sensitive Bhainsa town. The badly charred bodies of the head of the family, his wife, daughter and three grand children were extracted from the debris in one of the three rooms of the tiled house. The daughter had come home from Himayatnagar in Maharashtra with her child and her aunt’s two sons. more

Krishna Mohan Banerjee's Conversion, 1832

2008-10-10T18:49:00.000-07:00

Conversion to Christianity

On completion of his studies in 1829, he joined the Pataldanga school as an assistant teacher. In 1832, he converted to Christianity, under the influence of Duff. As a result of his conversion, he lost his job in David Hare’s school.

His conversion to Christianity raised a storm in Hindu society. The journals of the day became full of angry tirades against the activities of the Christian missionaries. He himself was too independent a man to remain silent. He declared his determination to pursue with steadfastness his course of action and endure with patience all opposition. The campaign against Hindu College led to the dismissal of Derozio.

When the missionary society was later established he became the first Bengali priest. In 1833, he was convicted of forcibly converting a young boy to Christianity. That did not daunt him. He converted his wife, his brother Kali Mohan, and Ganendra Mohan Tagore, the son of Prasanna Coomar Tagore. Subsequently, Ganendra Mohan married his daughter Kamalmani and became the first Indian to qualify as a barrister. He was also instrumental in the conversion of Michael Madhusudan Dutt. He became a deacon of the Anglican Church in 1836 and was superintendent of the Mirzapur School of Christ Church. He used to preach and deliver sermons in Bengali.

Throughout the 1840s and 1850s, he sought to convince the Brahmins of their folly and take the plunge into Christendom. While Krishna Mohan Banerjee always propagandized the superiority of Christianity over other religions and wrote extensively, Rajnarain Bose questioned how he could claim that Christianity represented the most advanced stage of religious evolution when it was still so full of superstition, mystery and miracles.

Demand to ban Bajrang Dal to distract attention: BJP

2008-10-06T08:53:00.000-07:00

Oct 6th, 2008 | By Sindh Today | Category: India

‘The Congress-led United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government has failed to contain terror activities. As a result, they are now unnecessarily demanding a ban on our organisations,’ Uttar Pradesh BJP spokesperson H.N. Dixit told reporters here Monday.

Lucknow, Oct 6 (IANS) The sole intention of some parties demanding a ban on the Bajrang Dal and Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) was to distract public attention from increasing cases of terrorism, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has alleged.

He referred to Azamgarh, home to the two suspected terrorists killed in the Jamia Nagar shootout last month for their alleged involvement in the Sep 13 serial bombings in Delhi, and said, ‘Chief Minister Mayawati must convene an all-party meet to formulate a strategy to combat terror.’ read

Fundamentalism in India: License to rape and kill people?

2008-10-05T16:45:00.000-07:00

Deccan Herald

MAIN ARTICLE

Parallel streams of anger: One for every taste

M J Akbar

Who gave any fundamentalist the right to rape and kill innocent people?

Dr Manmohan Singh said, on his return from France, that incidents in Orissa had shamed India before the world.

That is important, but far less important than the fact that the violence in Orissa has shamed Indians in India. I measure what Indians do, not by the standards of France, but by the values of modern India, which strengthened the spirit of our freedom movement against western colonialism and were enshrined in that noble document called the Constitution of India. The Bajrang Dal has shamed India before Indians.

Nicolas Sarkozy lives by French values, which is perfectly reasonable, for he is a Frenchman. But I am a little underwhelmed by the selective secularism of France, which permits schoolchildren to wear a small cross but will not allow a Sikh child to wear a turban or a Muslim to wear a hijab. One can’t complain: if those are the values of the French, they are entitled to them. If Sarkozy wants to hand out medals to Bangladeshi author Taslima Nasreen (now given safe custody in India by Dr Manmohan Singh) that is his privilege. No one has accused Taslima of being a claimant to the Nobel Prize for Literature, but Sarkozy is entitled to the nuances of his critical faculties. more

Singhal justifies violence against Christians

Ayodhya, Oct 05: VHP president Ashok Singhal on Sunday justified the violence against Christians in Orissa and threatened there will be more attacks in the state.

"What Hindu organisations including VHP, Bajrang Dal and RSS are doing in Orissa is all legal and is the reaction of the murder of VHP leader Laxmananand Saraswati who was like Jesus Christ to us", he said.

Singhal was addressing a hurriedly called press conference in Karsewak Puram, the VHP headquarters in Ayodhya.

Read Zee News Bureau Report

The rise of religious fascism in India

2008-09-27T23:54:00.000-07:00

The rise of religious fascism in India

Martin Rynja, publisher of The Jewel of Medina, escapes firebomb

2008-09-27T22:54:00.000-07:00

From The Sunday Times

September 28, 2008

Muslim gang firebombs publisher of Allah novel, Martin Rynja

David Leppard

Scotland Yard's counter-terrorist command yesterday foiled an alleged plot by Islamic extremists to kill the publisher of a forthcoming novel featuring sexual encounters between the Prophet Muhammad and his child bride.

Early yesterday armed undercover officers arrested three men after a petrol bomb was pushed through the door of the north London home of the book’s publisher.

The Metropolitan police said the target of the assassination plot, the Dutch publisher Martin Rynja, had not been injured.

The suspected terror gang was being followed by undercover police and the fire was quickly put out after the fire brigade smashed down the front door.

The foiled terrorist attack recalled the death threats and uproar 20 years ago following the publication of Salman Rushdie’s Satanic Verses, and the worldwide protests that followed the publication in a Danish newspaper in 2005 of cartoons deemed offensive to Islam, in which more than 100 people died.

Security officials believe Rynja was targeted for assassination because his firm, Gibson Square, is preparing to publish a romantic novel about Aisha, child bride of the Prophet Muhammad. The Jewel of Medina, by the first-time American author Sherry Jones, describes an imaginary sex scene between the prophet and his 14-year-old wife.

It was withdrawn from publication in America last month after its publisher there, Random House, said it feared a violent reaction by “a small radical segment” of Muslims. It said “credible and unrelated sources” had warned that the book could incite violence.

Random House reacted after Islamic scholars objected to its contents, saying it treated the wife of the Prophet as a sex object. One of them, Denise Spellberg, of the University of Texas at Austin, described the novel as “soft-core pornography”, referring to a scene in which Muhammad consummates his marriage to Aisha. She called it “a declaration of war” and a “national security issue”.

At the time, her warnings were dismissed by the author. “Anyone who reads the book will not be offended,” said Jones. “I wrote the book with the utmost respect for Islam.” However, Jones admitted receiving death threats after the book was withdrawn.

Yesterday, Natasha Kern, Jones’s agent, said she was shocked to learn of the attack.

“I honestly believe that if people read the book they will see it is not disrespectful of Muhammad, and moderate Muslims will not be offended. I don’t want anyone to risk their lives but we could never imagine that there would be some madmen who would do something like this. I’m so sad about this act of terrorism. Moderate Muslims will suffer because of a few radicals.”

The Jewel of Medina is due to be published next month. more

--------------------------------

Firebomb attack on book publisher

Firm had bought rights to a controversial novel about the Prophet Muhammad's child bride

Author Sherry Jones explains why Random House Publishing canceled her book on the prophet Muhammad's first wife, The Jewel of Medina. Photograph: James Snook/ AP

The London home of the publisher of a controversial new novel that gives a fictionalised account of the Prophet Muhammad's relationship with his child bride, Aisha, was firebombed yesterday, hours after police had warned the man that he could be a target for fanatics.

A petrol bomb is believed to have been thrown through the door of Martin Rynja's £2.5m town house in Islington's Lonsdale Square, which also doubles as the headquarters of his publishing company, Gibson Square. Three men have been arrested on terrorism charges.

Written by US journalist Sherry Jones, the book was due to have been published in August by US giant Random House. But amid controversy the company halted publication, a move denounced by Salman Rushdie, author of The Satanic Verses, as 'censorship by fear'.

Rynja bought the UK publishing rights earlier this month. 'The Jewel of Medina has become an important barometer of our time,' Rynja said at the time. 'As an independent publishing company, we feel strongly that we should not be afraid of the consequences of debate.'

The book, despite being described by one critic as 'a rarity in Islamic-themed literature: an attempt by a Western woman to fictionalise the personal life of the Prophet and to bring to a wider audience one of the great feminist heroines of the Middle East', has attracted criticism. One sex scene has been described as 'softcore pornography' by an American academic, Denise Spellberg, an influential professor of Middle Eastern Studies at the University of Texas.

Spellberg made the comments after Random House sent her the book hoping for a favourable comment to publish on its jacket. Instead, in an email that was leaked to the US press, Spellberg described the novel as a 'very ugly, stupid piece of work'.

'I don't have a problem with historical fiction,' Spellberg wrote. 'I do have a problem with the deliberate misinterpretation of history. You can't play with a sacred history and turn it into softcore pornography.'

It appears Spellberg was instrumental in drawing attention to the book among segments of the Muslim community. In April, Shahed Amanullah, an editor of a popular Muslim website, claimed Spellberg had told him the book 'made fun of Muslims and their history'.

The resulting furore prompted Random House to pull the book, a move that dismayed its author, who received a $100,000 advance. 'To claim that Muslims will answer my book with violence is pure nonsense,' Jones told a German newspaper last month. 'Anyone who reads the book will see that it honours the Prophet and his favourite wife.'

Ways to construct a culture of hatred

2008-09-14T23:14:00.000-07:00

[WaronTerror] 650 truths Hindus must know

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date		Mon, Sep 15, 2008 at 2:00 AM
subject		[WaronTerror] 650 truths Hindus must know

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650 truths Hindus must know
by P. Deivamuthu
Editor, Hindu Voice

1. There are nearly 57 Muslim countries. Show one Muslim
country which provides Haj subsidy.

2. Show one Muslim country where Hindus are extended the special
rights that Muslims are accorded in India?

3. Show one Muslim country which has a Non-Muslim as its
President or Prime Minister.

4. Show one country where the 82% majority craves for the
indulgence of the 18% minority.

5. Show one Mullah or Maulvi who has declared a `fatwa' against
terrorists.

6. Hindu-majority Maharashtra, Bihar, Kerala, Pondicherry, etc.
have in the past elected Muslims as CMs; Can you ever imagine
a Hindu becoming the CM of Muslim-majority J&K or Christian-
dominated Nagaland/Mizoram?

7. Today Hindus are 82%. If Hindus are intolerant, how come
Masjids and Madrassas are thriving? How come Muslims are
offering Namaz on the road? How come Muslims are proclaiming
5 times a day on loudspeakers that there is no God except
Allah?

8. When Hindus gave to Muslims 30% of Bharat for a song, why
should Hindus now beg for their sacred places at Ayodhya,
Mathura and Kashi?

9. Why temple funds are spent for the welfare of Muslims and
Christians, when they are free to spend their money in any
way they like?

10. When uniform is made compulsory for school children, why
there is no Uniform Civil Code for citizens?

11. In what way, J&K is different from Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu or
Uttar Pradesh, to have Article 370?

12. Why Gandhiji supported Khilafat movement (nothing to do with
our freedom movement) and what in turn he got?

13. Why Gandhiji objected to the decision of the cabinet and
insisted that Somnath Temple should be reconstructed out of
public funds, not government funds, when in January 1948 he
pressurised Nehru and Patel to carry on renovation of the
mosques of Delhi at government expenses?

14. If Muslims & Christians are minorities in Maharashtra, UP, Bihar,
etc., are Hindus not minorities in J&K, Mizoram, Nagaland,
Arunachal Pradesh, Meghalaya, etc?. Why are Hindus denied
minority rights in these States?

15. Do you admit that Hindus do have problems that need to be
recognized. Or do you think that those who call themselves
Hindus are themselves the problem?

16. Why post-Godhra is blown out of proportion, when no-one talks
of the ethnic cleansing of 4 lakh Hindus from Kashmir?

17. In 1947, when India was partitioned, the Hindu population in
Pakistan was about 24%. Today it is not even 1%. In 1947, the
Hindu population in East Pakistan (now Bangladesh) was 30%.
Today it is about 7%. What happened to the missing Hindus?
Do Hindus have human rights?

18. In contrast, in India, Muslim population has gone up from 10.4%
in 1951 to about 14% today; whereas Hindu population has
come down from 87.2% in 1951 to 81.5% in 2001. Does any
politician have the guts to ask Muslims to go for family planning?

19. Do you consider that - Sanskrit is communal and Urdu is
secular, Mandir is communal and Masjid is secular, Sadhu is
communal and Imam is secular, BJP is communal and Muslim
League is secular, Dr. Praveen Thogadiya is anti-national and
Bhukari is national, Vande Matharam is communal and Allah-
O-Akbar is secular, Shriman is communal and Mian is secular,
Hinduism is communal and Islam is secular, Hindutva is
communal and Jihadism is secular, and at last, Bharat is
communal and Italy is secular?

20. When Christian and Muslim schools can teach Bible and Quran,
why Hindus cannot teach Gita or Ramayan?

21. Abdul Rehman Antuley was made a trustee of the famous
Siddhi Vinayak Temple in Prabhadevi, Mumbai. Can a Hindu -
say Mulayam or Laloo - ever become a trustee of a Masjid or
Madrassa?

22. Dr. Praveenbhai Thogadiya has been arrested many times on
flimsy grounds. Has the Shahi Imam of Jama Masjid, Delhi,
Ahmed Bukhari been arrested for claiming to be an ISI agent and
advocating partition of Bharat?

23. When Haj pilgrims are given subsidy, why Hindu pilgrims to
Amarnath, Sabarimalai & Kailash Mansarover are taxed?

24. In 2003-2004 - A Muslim President, a Hindu Prime Minister
and a Christian Defence Minister, running the affairs of the
country, with a unity of purpose. Can this happen any where
except in a Hindu Nation - Bharat?

25. In Kerala, MLAs, MPs & Ministers take oath in the name of
Allah and Infant Jesus, which is against the Constitution. Can
a Hindu take oath in the name of Ram or Krishna?

26. Arabic language is promoted in India at Govt. expenses. but
not Sanskrit? Is Arabic more national than Sanskrit?

27. IMTD act in Assam gives legal rights to Bangladeshi Muslims
to settle and become Indian citizen, whereas Indians cannot
settle in Jammu & Kashmir. Why this double standard?

28. J&K with about 1 crore population has been provided with aid
worth Rs.24,000 crores, i.e. Rs.24,000/- per head, whereas in
other states the per head aid is less than 5% of this amount. Is
this not a reward for anti-nationalism?

29. If painting is un-Islamic, why there is no Fatwa issued against
MF Hussain? If he still persists with painting, is he not doing
an un-Islamic act?

30. If music, singing and dancing are un-Islamic (because Islam is
a serious religion), why no Fatwa is issued against the many
Khans in the cinefield. What will they give up - Islam or Acting?

31. Do you think that India will remain secular and democratic if
Muslims become majority?

32. When Deepavali & Janmashtami are celebrated at White
House, House of Commons, Australian Parliament, etc. why
are they not celebrated in Indian parliament? Are we more secular
than USA, UK & Australia?

33. If the communal riots is due to RSS, VHP, Bajrang Dal, etc.
why there are riots in Bangladesh, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Iraq,
Turkey, Afghanistan, Indonesia, Chechhnya, China, Russia,
UK, France, Spain, Cyprus, etc. - where there is no RSS/VHP.

34. If Islam is a religion of peace, why Quran-reading and Gun-
wielding is taught in tandem?

35. How do you explain the Muslim psyche : Enjoying the freedom
in a democratic country like India, USA, UK, France, etc. and
still trying to make it an Islamic nation, where they lose all
freedom.

36. A former President, two former PMs, Sadhus and Sants have
demonstrated against the arrest of Kanchi Shankaracharya,
but the media says there is absolutely no protest. Do you think
violence is the only yardstick to measure people's agony?

37. When Quran does not believe in negotiation (it believes only
in defeating Kafirs in a war), do you think that the Ayodhya
problem will be solved by negotiation?

38. Do you trust that Islam and Christianity believe in Sarva Dharma
Samabhav? If yes, why do they believe in conversion.

39. Don't you believe that Islam and Christianity are political
ideologies, out to grab nations. They - through their Mullahs
and Fathers - achieve what Army, Navy and Air Force cannot,
by converting locals and destroying their culture.

40. Ishwar Allah tere naam - Can you show me one Muslim who
has agreed to this?

41. Don't you think that `Secular Muslim' is a misnomer? A person
can either be Secular or a Muslim, and not both? A Muslim
(who believes in the only God, Allah) cannot be secular
(believing in many Gods).

42. UN Charter says that minority means less than 10% of the
population. How can Muslims, who are nearly 14% in India be
called a minority?

43. Do you believe that Communists love our country, when they
refuse to admit that China was the aggressor in 1962?

44. Do you agree with the thesis of Communists that India is a
State of different nations, like the former USSR, (and not a
Nation of different states) and therefore is bound to break up?

45. How come a Muslim family peacefully lives in a predominantly
Hindu locality, whereas a Hindu family is not able to do so in a
Muslim locality?

46. Why Hindu dominated Bharat is secular for ages and Muslim
dominated countries are only Islamic with no powers to minorities?

47. Why Christian Missionaries do not go to Muslim-dominated
areas and start their social service there? Is it because they
will not get sufficient return to their `investment'?

48. Are you aware that India is the only country which openly invites
infiltrators from Bangladesh. Bihar, UP and West Bengal Govts.
provide them with immediate ration cards and make them voters.

49. Riots take place mostly after the Friday prayers (e.g. Marad,
Kerala). Is it not because of the fiery sermons of the Imams?

50. All Hindu-majority regions are peaceful. But all Hindu-minority
regions have become problematic - like J&K, North Eastern
parts, etc. Can you explain why?

51. A MLA, C.P. Shaji, said in Kerala Assembly that "the hands
that touches even a syllable of the Shariat will be chopped off
then and there" (Mathrubhumi, July 3, 1985). Do you concur
with this?

52. Do you agree that the policies of all political parties are
contradictory to the aim of uniting all sections of the people by
a stream of thought?

53. Are you aware that illegal Muslim immigrants have become a
deciding factor in the election of nearly 25 Lok Sabha and 120
MLA seats in India? - And they are voting for a particular party
lump sum - Congress, RJD, SP, ML or Communists - whichever
is likely to form the Govt.?

54. Are you aware that according to KPS Gill some of the NGOs
or even media organisations were actually front offices for
terrorist groups? He says there is a nexus between some of
the terrorist outfits parading as NGOs and human rights group.

55. Are you aware that the so-called secular Maulana Wahiduddin,
when asked to pray for the Indian soldiers fighting at Kargil, refused,
under the pretext that he cannot pray for people who are fighting
the Muslims? (Sonia and Priyanka attended his funeral later).

56. A Pakistani becomes Indian when he marries a Muslim girl
from J&K. But when the same girl marries a Hindu from any
part of India, he does not become a J&K citizen, but on the
contrary, she loses her J&K citizenship. What kind of law is this?

57. In the Ayodhya case, the Supreme Court questioned the locus
standi of Vishwa Hindu Parishad. But the SC did not question
the locus standi of the Babri Masjid Action Committee or the
All India Muslim Personal Law Board. Is this not double standard
on the part of SC?

58. In the Ayodhya dispute, you say that Hindus must abide by
law. Do you know how many times the constitution has been
amended to overturn verdicts of the High Courts and Supreme
Court? - Shah Bano, unseating of Indira Gandhi, etc.

59. When you are asking for the resignation of CMs like Narendra
Modi, Uma Bharti, etc. on trivial grounds, why are you not
demanding the resignation of the CM of J&K, where thousands
of security personnel have been killed by terrorists? - where
nearly 4 lakhs Hindus have been ethnic cleansed.

60. The UP govt. confessed that it cannot abide by Supreme Court
judgement of 1986 on the Varanasi burial ground dispute
between Sunni and Shia Muslims. The Karnataka Govt. refused
to abide by the SC's order on the Cauvery water dispute. Is
this respecting court judgement?

61. When one Graham Staines is killed, the English press goes
overboard in condemning his killers. But when 58 Hindus,
including 30 women and children, were burnt aline in Sabarmati
Express, they kept silent. The victims are depicted as the villain.
Is this responsible journalism?

62. Farooq Abdullah, former CM of J&K who has married a
Christian, rejoiced at the marriage of his son Umar with a Hindu
girl. But when his daughter married a Hindu boy, he disowned
her. Is he the icon of secularism?

63. Have you ever visited a Muslim ghetto? If not please make it a
point to have a Darshan Yatra of place like Mumbra (near
Mumbai) or Mallapuram in Kerala. If you are a real secularist,
you will really `feel good'.

64. When Islam and Secularism/democracy have nothing in
common, why Hindus are made to watch this ugly dance in
their stupor?

65. According to law, human organs cannot be an election symbol
of any party. Then how come `Hand' symbol is allotted to
Congress. Is it not against the law?

66. Delhi Imam Syed Bhukari declared that Taliban is the ideal for
all Muslims and Osama Bin Laden is the hero? Do you consider
him a secular icon?

67. Delhi Imam Syed Bhukari is rearing a Black Buck in his
courtyard, which is against law. The Delhi police team which
went there to arrest him, came back calmly. Is he above law?

68. If Muslims do not want common civil code, will they clamour
for the Quaranic code of criminal justice? - eye for eye, leg for
leg, hand for hand, etc.

69. In J&K, about 2 lakh Hindu adults are voters for the
parliamentary elections, but not for the assembly. Why?

70. The duration of the J&K assembly is six years and not 5 years
as in other states. Why?

71. Do you support the building of a Memorial for Afzal Khan, who
plotted to kill Chatrapati Shivaji, in Pratapgarh (Maharashtra)?

72. Do you support the building of a Masjid for Babar, a looter and
invader, at Ayodhya?

73. Do you consider that celebrating Valentine (Lovers) Day on
14th Feb. is in tune with our culture? - when exactly after 9
months, i.e. on 14th Nov. you celebrate Children's day.

74. What is so special about Nehru liking children? Children are
liked by one and all. Is it not absurd to celebrate his birth day
as Children's' Day? The real Children's' Day should be
Gokulashtami - Yes Lord Krishna. along with his colleagues
did all the antics of a child.

75. Hindu girls are molested and gangraped in Bangladesh.
Temples are burnt or destroyed almost every day. Why none
of our secularists and Human Rights Activists raise their voice
for Hindus in Bangladesh. Are Human Rights only for Muslims?

76. Are you aware that Islam does not believe in nationalism and
national boundaries. It wants to bring the whole world under
Islam - from Darul Harab to Darul Islam?

77. A 65 years old Muslim has remarried his first-divorced wife for
the 54th time. What could have happened to the other 50+
wives he divorced. What type of society it would be, can you
just imagine? Do you want this type of society in India?

78. Why Muslims go after building Masjids and Madrassas, and
not schools and colleges? Do you think Madrassas churn out
Scientists and Engineers?

79. Mohurram processions are being taken out in Hindu majority
areas. But Hindu religious processions are not allowed through
Muslim localities. Why? Does this not perpetuate the communal
divide?

80. Is a Dist. Magistrate/Police Commissioner justified in treating
a particular area in our country as alien territory (by not allowing
Hindu processions there)? Is he not violating our constitution?
Is he not abetting communal divide?

81. In six states - J&K, Punjab, Arunachal Pradesh, Meghalaya,
Mizoram and Nagaland - where Hindus are minorities, they do
not have minority rights. But others who are in majority still
enjoy minority rights there? Is this not ridiculous?

82. In which Islamic States are Hindus extended the special rights
that Muslims are accorded in India? Likewise, in which Christian
State, the Christian majority accorded Hindus the special rights
that India accords the Christians?

83. Do you know that Mother Teresa projected a negative image
of India - of dying without dignity - to make money. Did she
ever attempt to counter-balance this image?

84. Do you think that Nehru family is the only family which fought
for freedom or there were other freedom fighters too? - like
Bhagat Singh, Chandrasekhar Azad, Madan Lal Dingra,
Vaanchinathan, Chapekar Brothers, Veer Savarkar, Raj Guru,
Subhash Chandra Bose, Udam Singh, etc.

85. There are some pockets in Godhra where Sales Tax/Income
Tax/Electricity Personnel cannot enter. Even policemen do not
tread, unless in huge numbers. This is not the case where
Hindus are in majority. Can you explain the reason?

86. In support of Ishrat Jahan, the lovely terrorist from Mumbra
shot dead by the Ahmedabad police, the whole locality
observed a Bandh and every one participated in her funeral. If
this is not supporting terrorism, what it is?

87. China is still showing Arunachal Pradesh as its territory. Will
you please ask a Communist to condemn this? He will not. For
Left outfits, Communist camaraderie comes before the interest
of the nation. Are Communists nationalists?

88. "The list of those I want to kill is very long, but I will shoot
Modi if
I am given a pistol" said Vijay Tendulkar. Do you consider him
a Human Rights Activist or a terrorist?

89. In Mallapuram (Kerala), a doctor found that 3 generations of
Muslim women - daughter-13, mother-26 and grandmother-
39 - all pregnant being admitted for delivery. Do you still think
that family planning is unnecessary for Muslims?

90. Lalu Prasad Yadav gave a resounding slap on the face of
judiciary by derisively and openly notifying his palatial house
as Jail. Do you still feel all are equal before law?

91. The author of Ramanayan, Rishi Valmiki, was a bandit. Same
way, the author of Mahabharat, Veda Vyas, was a fisherman.
Both the epics and the authors are revered by all Hindus. Do
you still think that Hinduism supports casteism?

92. In 2002, the Karnataka Govt.'s revenue from temples was
Rs.72 crores. Out of this, 50 crores were given to Madrassas,
10 crores to Churches and only 10 crores to Temples. Why
Hindus should pay for development of Madrassas (terrorist
factories) and Churches?

93. When Taliban demolished the Buddha statue in Afghanistan,
Times of India wrote that it was in reaction to the demolition of
Babri mosque. Do you agree to this justification by TOI? Is tit-
for-tat OK? Then why do you criticize Gujarat riots in reaction to
Godhra carnage?

94. "Genocide" "Holocaust" are the words used by the media for
the riots in Gujarat. But do you know that Jews and Parsis
were never persecuted and lived and prospered in total freedom
in India?

95. In Pondicherry a Muslim was denied burial because he
constructed a temple for Lord Muruga. Do you still think
"Religions do not teach to hate one another"?

96. Why Mother Teresa did not stay in her native country, Albenia,
and help poor there? Why Greham Staines did not stay in
Australia and help needy people there? Why Sonia Gandhi
selects India, and not Italy, for her service to the poor? Why do
you want imported leaders - like imported religion and imported
products? Is India a land for all and sundry?

97. Are you aware that illegal immigrants from Bangladesh are
settled in an area where Hindu candidates win by a narrow
margin, so as to change the trend in the next election?

98. In 1989 election manifesto of Congress, Rajiv Gandhi declared
that if the people of Mizoram voted the Congress to power, it
would run the govt. on the basis of teachings of Bible. If this is
not communalism, what it is?

99. Shaikh-al-Sayeed Yusuf Sayed Hashim al Rifai of Kuwait, the
chairman of the World Muslim Minority Community, was allowed
to land in Kerala without visa. He was not only not arrested but
was given royal treatment as a guest of the govt. of Kerala
and was provided with govt. cars to enable him to carry on
conversion. Is this promoting nationalism?

100. If a Muslim in Britain or USA (secular countries) cannot marry
more than one woman, why should he be allowed in India to
marry more?

101. The Pope was invited to visit India, but the King of Nepal,
Mahendra, was not allowed to participate in the Makar
Sankaranti function at Nagpur in 1965? Is this secularism?

102. In the Hindu Code Bill, a Hindu is defined as not being a Muslim,
Christian, or Parsi. It is an inclusive and unifying definition - to
include all others - Sikhs, Jains, Buddhists, etc. Then how come
our present-day politicians have fragmented the Hindu society,
can you ponder?

103. Tipu Sultan wanted to Islamise the entire south India. He was
prevented from doing so by the British, as British wanted to
rule them. So he had to fight the British first. Is he a Indian
freedom fighter? If yes, are Babar, Aurangazeb, Afzal Khan,
Gazhni, etc. too?

104. An English daily published Sonia Gandhi's speech on Hinduism
under the column of spiritualism! Is this not ridiculous, and
insulting Hinduism too? Have our presspersons become
intellectually bankrupt?

105. Ashoka and Kanishka ruled Afghanistan. Khandari, mother of
Duryodhana, came from Khandar, now in Afghanistan. Do you
believe that Afghanistan was once an integral part of India?

106. Our Sanatan Dharm was time immemorial. But still Bharatvarsh
was continually partitioned - Iran, Afghanistan, Burma, Nepal,
Sri Lanka, Pakistan, Bangladesh, etc. Today Kashmir is with
India not because of Sanatan Dharma but because of our
security forces. Do you agree that for dismembering Bharat,
one has to target our Sanatan Dharm.

107. The Baptist Church in Tripura was set up by missionaries from
New Zealand 60 years ago. Do you think the Church will
promote nationalism?

108. Students in Pakistan are taught from the very beginning that
Hindus are our enemies, that Hindus can never be our friends
and that Kafirs (Hindus) are to be killed. Do you still think that
friendship is possible with Pakistan?

109. The defence establishment of secular America observes
Church services for Good Friday, a pure religious ritual, and
deliberately asks evangelists to address security personnel.
Can you imagine the Indian Army or Navy or Air Force doing a
puja and inviting a Shankaracharya to address them?

110. Pakistan is an Islamic country. But for a by-pass surgery or
cancer operation, they come to India. How come a country,
which has developed nuclear weapon, did not develop good
hospitals and world class doctors? Does this mean that
Pakistanis are only trigger happy, at the cost of development
and health services?

111. Communist leader Stalin's daughter, Swetlana, wished to marry
Dinesh Singh's brother and settle in India. Our Communists
and Indira Gandhi opposed this. How do they now support an
Italian lady?

112. When Yoga has become a multimillion dollar industry in USA,
why our govt. is blind to this human-development technology?
Is it because it is a part of Hindu culture?

113. In a Pooja, the `sankalpa' begins with "Bharata varshe, Bharata
kande ...". What are they? Do you still think that spiritualism and
nationalism are different or are they the two eyes of the nation?

114. Spiritualism and nationalism are inseparable in Bharat. Don't
you think that without spiritualism Bharat will be like a body
without soul?

115. Why should practising my religion or wearing my religious
symbol hurt the feelings of other religionists, when their
practising their religion or wearing their religious symbol does
not hurt me at all? If this is not religious hatred, what else is?

116. Is it not true that from 1920, the Britishers, knowing that their
rule is going to end soon, started doling out large plots of land
to Christian organisations and Churches at throw away prices?

117. Kanchi Shankaracharya is not allowed to perform pooja and
eat the food he likes, but Pappu Yadav is allowed all facilities
inside Jail, including Mobile phone facility for contacting even
Bihar Jail Mantri. Is this equality before law?

118. Muslims convicts in jail are allowed time for Namaz and also
given all facilities for observing Ramzan fasting. Then why
Kanchi Shankaracharya, only an accused, is denied facilities
for performing Puja in jail?

119. Armstrong, the US astronaut, landed in moon in 1969. Since
then many astronauts have done so. Can you inform this to
your Muslim friend and see whether he admits this fact?

120. Temples are over-crowded in TN. Durga pooja is celebrated
on a grand scale in West Bengal. Still in both the states, the
God-fearing people vote for atheists. Why?

121. In Hinduism, you find a lot of `Reformers'. Why such reformers
are not found in other religions? Do they not need reform?

122. In the Radha Bhai Chawl (Mumbai) case, the people
responsible for the massacre of innocent Hindus were let off
by the High Court. How is it that, in the Baroda Best Bakery
case, the Supreme Court becomes overzealous in asking the
whole case to be transferred out of Gujarat? Are Muslims more
equal than Hindus before law?

123. When a Muslim files a PIL on Ayodhya Sri Rama Temple
construction, Supreme Court takes cognizance of his PIL. In
Kanchi Shankaracharya case, Shri B.P. Singhal's PIL is
dismissed with the remark that the petitioner does not have a
locus standi in this case. Is this not double-standard?

124. In the case of Teesta Setalvad, the Maharashtra HC directs
that three days notice be served before her arrest. Why is it
that the same facility has been denied to one of the most
revered Hindu religious heads – Kanchi Shankaracharya? Is
Teesta Setalvad more equal before law?

125. A Muslim can keep a battery of four wives at one time and it is
lawful. But, if a Hindu has more than one wife, he is guilty of
breaking the law. Is it not a contradiction against the very spirit
of natural justice?

126. Are you aware that an archbishop cannot be proceeded against
in any Court of Law in India? When some one is appointed an
archbishop he automatically becomes a citizen of Vatican and
gets a Vatican passport. Are all equal before law?

127. In Kolkatta, Sheikh Nazrul gave talaq to his wife Jahanara Bibi
because she had administered polio vaccine to their six-month-
old son. Is giving polio vaccine an offence in Islam?

128. You say all religions are the same. Then why do you need
temples? Instead of going to temples, would you and your family
members go to a Church or Masjid?

129. You say all religions are the same. How can you equate beef
eating with cow-worship? How can you equate Christian pork
eating with Muslims?

130. You say all religions are the same. Would you arrange for the
marriage of a girl in your family with a Muslim boy?

131. Are you aware that Muslim and Christian boys are paid and
rehabilitated for converting and marrying Hindu girls?

132. A 60-year old Arab married three girls - Afreen, Farheen and
Sultana - within 10 minutes in Hyderabad. If this is not rape,
what it is - animal farm?

133. Although Hindus form 82 per cent population of India, there is
still only one university which teaches Hinduism - whereas there
are five which teach Islam, five which teach Christianity. Is this
in order?

134. The Turkish Government's Dept. of Religious Affairs has issued
instructions to the country's fifty universities to help prepare a
new exposition of the Koran. Do you think this should be done
in India too?

135. The Patna Dist. Magistrate goes to the meeting addressed by
LK Advani, Dy. PM & Home Minister, and orders him to stop
the speech before 10.00 pm obviously at the behest of Laloo.
If this is not goonda Raj, what else is?

136. Many ministers in the UPA govt. spend more time in instigating
and provoking the opposition, rather than serving the nation,
while prices are sky-rocketing. Do you feel that this is a healthy trend?

137. Smt. Sonia Gandhi is still an Italian citizen, and can fight
election in
Italy. Do you still consider that she should be made PM of India?

138. A Pakistani, by marrying a girl from J&K becomes the citizen
of India. Would you agree to make him the PM too? - And if
that man is Pervez Musharraf?

139. The Kolkatta CM has compared VHP with Al Qaeda. Al Qaeda
has killed millions of innocent people all over the world, when
VHP has not even targetted its sworn enemy, leave alone
innocent human being. Is he not instigating Hindus?

140. Did one Muslim, just one, (not to mention Hindus) go from
India to Pakistan or Bangladesh after 1950. But why are
millions of Muslims coming into India from both countries even
now? Who is driving them out and why? So who is tolerant?

141. Are you aware of the latest gimmick of prohibition of religious
figures in Railway stations? Is it not directed totally against
Hindu shopkeepers, to demoralise and insult them?

142. The AP Christian CM allows Peoples War Group to say that
Dalit should destroy Hinduism. Is he not communal? Is he not
provoking Hindus? What does a Hindu do when such attacks
take place?

143. Police prohibited Bhajan in local trains in Mumbai, due to noise
pollution. Will they similarly prohibit Azaan through
loudspeakers and also Namaz on roads?

144. If sacrificing a goat before a village deity is cruelty and should
be banned, can slaughtering cows and buffalos in an abattoir
not also be banned?

145. Many Hindu Swamis preach that all religions lead to one and
the same God. How can this be true when a God becomes a
butcher of idol worshippers (Hindus)?

146. Christian Missionaries declare, through leaflets and TV
channels, that they want to free Hindus from the clutches of
Satan. Do you agree that Hindus are demon-worshippers? Is
this not spreading religious hatred?

147. Jesus Christ was tortured and ultimately crucified, and you
consider him as God. Will you in the same breadth accept
Kanchi Shankaracharya Jayendra Sarawati Swami, who was
tortured and jailed, as God? - He was jailed for our sins!

148. In Mecca, Haj pilgrims wear white dhothi; do parikrama; pelt
stones at Satan (temple); women are allowed to worship. All
these are not allowed in a Masjid. Don't you think that Mecca
was once a Shiv Temple and the old tradition is still maintained?

149. Does your Guru or Bapu calls himself a Hindu? If not, is he not
alienating you from the national mainstream - Hinduism - to
perpetuate his personal fiefdom?

150. You admire Gandhi cap. Can you show a few pictures where
Gandhi is wearing this "Gandhi cap"? He rarely wore this cap.

151. Bhagavat Geeta was preached by Lord Sri Krishna exhorting
Arjun to fight against Adharma. Then why do some Gurus
misguide their followers, so as to make Hindus despondent?

152. Every Hindu God and Goddess possesses a weapon. Still,
how come that Hindus today have become so coward?

153. Why "Traditional Day" in colleges? Have we forgotten our
traditional dresses like dothi, sari, kurta, etc. that we have to
remember it only for one day in 365 days?

154. Same way, why celebrate Mothers' Day, Fathers' Day,
Children's day, etc. Are fathers and mothers to be remembered
only once in a year, a western trend?

155. Why schools ask for signature of either parents or "Guardian".
Guardian is for westerners where mother and father separate
after living for sometime, and the children become orphan and
are guarded by `fathers' or `nuns'. Why this culture should be
discreetly reminded in Bharat?

156. A Model complained, when things went wrong, that a film director
had "raped" her 58 times in 3 years! Many such characters appear
in special TV shows lecturing on virtuousness and chastity. Don't
you think that this is a big fraud, in a country of Sati Savitris.

157. King Dasrath was having three wives, but Sri Ram only one -
Sita. Hindus worship Sri Ram - the Ek Patni Vrata - and not
Dasrath. What do you learn from this?

158. The word "Secular" was incorporated in our Constitution in
1976, during emergency. Do you think that India was un-secular
before that? What was the need for this amendment. Whom did
Indira Gandhi fool?

159. In 1976 during emergency, a separate section on "Fundamental
Duties" was inserted. Can you punish a citizen for violating these
duties? (The violation is punishable under different laws and
not under the constitution). Then why this mutilation of the
constitution?

160. USA has 84% Christian population as compared to India having
82% Hindus. But in USA, all are treated equally and there is
no minority-appeasement. Why is this malaise in India alone?

161. France has 24% Muslim population and they are clamouring
for separate civil laws based on Shariat (as they do in all other
countries, including India). How do you explain this world
phenomena?

162. All Muslims are not terrorists. But all terrorists are Muslims,
including the "lovely" terrorist from Mumbra (near Mumbai),
Ishrat Jahan. Why?

163. Communists and Fake Historians depict Islamic rulers as well-
intentioned, progressive, broad-minded and tolerant. Do you
buy this theory vis-a-vis Ayodhya, Mathura, Kashi? Don't you
think that they are taking you for a ride?

164. Times of India wrote an editorial justifying the infiltration of
Bangladeshis into India (TOI 29th July 2004). Can you imagine
New York Times or Washington Post justifying infiltration into
USA/UK. Please think - what could be TOI's compulsions.

165. When a Hindu is arrested for a crime, English newspapers
headline "Hindu arrested". But when a Muslim commits a
murder, they try to hide his religion and call him `Asian'. Why?
Are they afraid of only Muslim criminals?

166. Human rights is for all. Then why do you need a Minority
Commission? Are the Hindus, the majority, not entitled to
Human Rights?

167. In J&K, MLAs, MLCs, Ministers and Judges take the oath to
bear true faith and allegiance to the constitution of the State
and not to the Constitution of India. Still you do not want to
repeal Article 370, why?

168. Arjun Singh once said "we should not have allowed these
people (BJP) to come to power", as though power is doled out
by Congressmen. Is he a democrat or a dictator?

169. Arjun Singh dared the RSS to do its "worst", and RSS replied
that "the worst civilised people can do is file cases" (and RSS
has filed a case against him). Here, who is talking like a thug?

170. In USA, UK and Europe, Churches are for sale. They are bought
and converted into temples. Do you think that the educated
westerners are being brainwashed in the name of religion?

171. In Western countries, scientists, doctors, professors, engineers
and industrialists are turning to Hinduism and Hindu
Dharmacharyas. But in India, Missionaries are brainwashing
illiterates and converting them. Can you say who is fooling whom?

172. Shri S. Gurumurthy was questioned by the Kancheepuram
police for writing articles protesting the arrest of Kanchi Seer.
None of the English press raised their voice in his favour, a co-
journalist. Have they pawned their freedom?

173. Have you ever seen citizens disparaging their own country
and culture, as the pseudo-secularists and communists do in
Bharat? Is it not like disparaging their own mother. Can a sane
mind do it?

174. Can you show one building belonging to a Muslim named
"Mahal". Muslims always call "Manzil". Then how come
Shahjahaan named it "Taj Mahal"? Does this not prove that it
was actually Teajomahal, a Shiv Temple?

175. Have you ever seen a Dargha with parikrama, Hindu motifs on
the wall, etc. No, is itn't? If you see Om, Lotus, Sun, etc. in Taj
Mahal walls, how do you believe it to be a Muslim monument?

175. Apart from that of Mumtaj, many dead bodies have been buried
inside Taj Mahal. Are you aware of that? This was just to
desecrate the temple, Tejomahal, so that the Hindu King gives
up his fight for taking back the temple.

176. A Muslim prefers to settle down in USA, UK or Singapore and
not in Saudi Arabia, Iran or Iraq. Why, when he so much loves
Darul Islam?

177. Crores of Muslims have crossed over to India from Bangladesh
and Pakistan. Have you ever heard any Muslim from India
migrating to Pakistan or Bangladesh - the Dar Ul Islam?

178. Are you aware that Muslims from UP and Bihar who went and
settled in Pakistan during partition are not recognised as
Muslims there? Is this their brotherhood?

179. To control a population of about 3 crores, Christians have about
1,22,000 Fathers and Nuns. To control a population of about
15 crores, Muslims have nearly 70,000 Mullahs. There are
nearly 70 lakhs Sadhus and Sants too who do control
themselves, and not the 85 crore Hindus. How do you equate
Hinduism with these one-book-based and controlled religions?

180. Are you aware that for Saudi Arabia, Islam makes great
business sense? It invests in the growth of Islam through out
the world and reaps good dividends from Muslim pilgrims
visiting Mecca.

181. Are you aware that the Mullahs have a vested interest in
keeping the common Muslims poor and uneducated, so that
they are under their control? Once enlightened, they will start
questioning them (Mullahs).

182. Islam prohibits Muslims being photographed. Does this fit into
modern civilisation where you need photographs for passport,
election ID card, work ID card, etc. Do you at least agree Islam
needs change?

183. If Islam prohibits photography, how come Islamic states are
running TV channels. In some places in India, Mullahs have
issued fatwa against watching TVs. Do you realise the self-
contradiction?

184. Jesus is saying that those who don't believe in his Name as
the ONLY son of God are already doomed to hell. How does
that fit in your (a)dharma?

185. Bangalore Jakkur Airfield, belonging to Defence Dept. was not
allowed for a Dutta Jayanti celebrations. But the same land
was made available to Benny Hinn, a evengalist fraudster, from
USA. Is this secularism?

186. Have you ever gone into the family background of those
shouting of secularism? Most of them are non-Hindus or those
who have gone astray from Hindu culture. In order to hide their
aadharmic act, they take refuge into secularism. Having them-
selves spoilt, they want to spoil others too - Indira, Sonia, Mani
Shankar Iyer, Anand Sharma, Teesta, Sunil Dutt, Natvar Singh, etc.

187. Sonia Gandhi, in May 2004, wrote to the President staking a
claim to be sworn in as PM, submitted a list of 340 MPs,
demanded that 3,000 persons be invited to witness the oath-
taking ceremony and that it be held on the lawns of the Rashtrapati
Bhavan. Do you still consider she "sacrificed" PM post?

188. Sonia Gandhi's year of birth is given as 1944. But it is reported
that her father, Signor Stefano Maino, was a prisoner-of-war
in Russia allegedly from 1942 till 1945. What is the fact? Don't
you think that Sonia should come out with her past?

188. In 1991-1998 in UP, when the BJP had a clear Hindutva stance,
it won 60 seats. But now having given up Hindutva, it has won
just 10 seats. Don't you think that the alternative to Hindutva is
casteism and communism?

189. While BJP called for a Bandh against Benny Hinn show in
Bangalore, BJP's Christian MP from Bangalore, Sangliana,
was one of the main guests at the show. Do you agree that
there are many such secular "time-bombs" in BJP?

190. Do our Swamis who go to other nations call the locals devil
worshippers? Why Benny Hinn, a evengalist fraudster, from
USA, is allowed to do so in India?

191. Are you aware that Acharya Rajnish was put behind bars and
poisoned with false allegations, in USA? How Benny Hinn,
whose only aim is to convert Indians, is patronised by our
Governors, Congress CMs and Ministers?

192. Why Congress CMs and Ministers take advantage of such
congregation to defame RSS and VHP. Is it in keeping with
the secular traditions of our country?

193. Why a God should need so much publicity? Is it because,
without publicity, He will be forgotten by his followers?

194. Nehru is the only Father in the world who wrote letters to his
daughter, Indira, in a foreign language, English, and not in our
national language. Is this called national pride or love for
Rashtrabhasha?

195. After Nehru, no one in the Nehru family has become a
Graduate, i.e. in nearly 90 years. Is this the family destined to
rule our country?

196. The Rashtrapathi Bhavan has a Masjid. But it does not have a
temple. Do you still say ours is a secular country? Doesn't it
look like a Muslim country - secular in de jure and Islamic in de
facto?

197. Are you aware that you cannot garland our National flag, nor
can you break coconut in front of it? It is an offence. This is
Nehruvian secularism!

198. About 4000 Communists in AP, who fought against granting
freedom to India during 1940s, have now been declared
Freedom Fighters, with all incumbent facilities. Is it not
rewarding anti-nationals?

199. You say our country is secular. How come a secular country
has in its flag "Ashoka Chakra"? Was Ashoka not propagating
Bhuddhism?

200. How is that the Karnataka Chief Minister and other seculars
proudly participate in the mass proselytising event of Benny
Hinn, who abused Hindus and Hindu Gods?

201. The Kanchi Matham is being hounded, while the raid on the
Islamic religious school at Nadwa to catch ISI insurgents was
called off and Central ministers were sent to apologise to Ali
Mian for the raid? Is this called equality?

202. How is it that `secular' intellectuals are asking for the release
of the Godhra accused and none of them is bothered about
Vijayendra Saraswathi in jail?

203. In cities, there is no separate crematorium for Hindus, Jains,
Sikhs and Bhuddists. But Shia, Sunni and Brelvi Muslims have
separate graveyards. RC and Protestant Christians have
separate burial grounds. Whose tradition is uniting and whose
is dividing?

204. Are you aware that according to Quranic aayats, it is the
religious duty of a Muslim to side with a Dar-ul-Islam country
like Pakistan when it invades a Dar-ul-Harb country like India?
Can you understand the dilemma of a Indian Muslim soldier?

205. In FIR No. 98/93 dated 14.05.93, the Delhi police had
successfully thwarted repeated Court orders to ensure the
presence of Ahmed Bukhari in the court for three years.
Ultimately, the Govt. withdrew the case. Is it equality before law?

206. A Christian prayer is sung by the Nationalist Socialist Council
of Nagalim, Issac-Muivah group, before they begin talks with
the Prime Minister in the South Block. Would they allow the
same gesture to a Hindu outfit?

207. An article Saffron Demography (Hindu Communalists...) by a JNU
man Mohan Rao in Times of India dtd. 20th April 2006 teases
Hindus of their vegetarianism whose women, according to the
author, are going to non-vegetarian Muslims for sexual
satisfaction. He further writes `Ultra-virile Muslim male bodies
attract Hindu women'... etc. Is he and ToI not insulting Hindus?

208. A Ghazi is one who has killed many Kafirs. So, what are places
like Ghaziabad, Ghazipur, etc.? Are they not reminders that in
these places Hindus were massacred? Are they not places of
Hindu genocide?

209. A Hyderabad municipal corporator Ms Syeda Mumtaz Fatima
wants Road No 7, Banjara Hills, to be named after the late
Ayatollah Khomeini, founder of the Islamic Republic of Iran. Is
Khomeini a secularist/democrat?

210. The Kerala Assembly passed a resolution for the release of
Abdul Nasser Madhani, the Coimbatore blast case accused.
Did any one talk either in Parliament or Assemblies about the
arrest of Kanchi Shankaracharya?

211. The Congress and Nationalist Congress Party have divided
the Shirdi Sai Baba and Siddhivinayak Temples amongst
themselves, and their funds are given to NGOs supporting
Christian and Madrassas. Why can't they take over Churches
and Masjids and spend that income for upliftment of Christians
and Muslims?

212. When Nargis (a Muslim who lived like a Hindu) died, Sunil
Dutt prepared to take the body for cremation but her brothers/
cousins, insisted and took the body to the Muslim burial ground
and buried with Islamic rituals and customs. Why this insistence?

213. A Muslim in Afghanistan, Abdul Rahman, is facing death
sentence for converting to Christianity. Why are the international
Christian community silent?

214. A Muslim in Afghanistan, Abdul Rahman, has converted to
Christianity. Muslim clerics clamour for his death. Is this the
way clerics of a religion touted as compassionate, kind and
tolerant behave?

215. The world famous towering Buddha statues at Bamiyan was
blasted by Taliban, in the name of Islam, and Allah. What was
the provocation?

216. In Orissa, a couple - Nazama Bibi and Ser Mohammad - was
forced to live separately by Mullahs. The police, NHRC and
even the Orissa High Court refused to come to their help.
Ultimately the Supreme Court intervened. Are they - police,
NHRC, HC (the protectors of human rights) - afraid of Muslims?
Where does our secularism stand?

217. The UPA Government amended the Foreigners Act 1946 (after
the IMDT Act was struck down by SC) for selective applicability
in Assam to facilitate Bangladeshi infiltrators. Does this not
amount to importing voters?

218. Manu Smruti was conveniently used for Hindu bashing. Now
VHP and Dharmacharyas have rejected Manu Smruti for some
outdated notion. Will `Fathers' and `Mullahs' disown some of
the outdated verses in Bible and Quran respectively?

219. Don't you think that it is the anti-Hindu articles, writings and
attitude of the so-called historians and secularists that gives
solace to Nazism, racism, Marxism, fundamentalism and,
indeed, terrorism?

220. Shahi Imam Syed Ahmed Bukhari of Jama Masjid, Delhi,
entered into a scuffle with reporters outside PM's house. He
could not tolerate a question from Yusuf Ansari from Zee TV.
Is he qualified to preach peace and tolerance to Muslims?

221. In Singapore, a Muslim father raped his five teenage daughters
several times. He quoted excerpts from the Koran to justify his
incest. Will the Mullahs explain the stand of the Quran?

222. Sonia Gandhi does not own a home in India, but has an
ancestral home in Italy, and is therefore emotionally connected
to Italy. She became Indian citizen after 18 years, that too under
duress. Do you still believe that she loves India?

223. Since Sonia Gandhi is domiciled in Italy but has Indian
citizenship papers in her name. Are you aware that under private
international law, domicile decides the personal law applicable
to a person? So Sonia Gandhi, the Congress President, will
be governed in personal matters by Italian, not Indian, law!

224. Sonia Gandhi does not own a house in India, but she lives in
one of the largest and luxurious bungalows in Delhi at No.10
Janpath, valued at about Rs 100 crores! which is owned by
the government, but exclusively for her use. What are her special
qualities, to get this special treatment at tax payers' money?

225 Our Prime Minister asks the Hindu King of Nepal to establish
democracy there. In the same vein, will he ask dictator
Musharraf to establish democracy in Pakistan, as he usurped
power from a democratically elected PM?

226. Mani Shankar Iyer says that he is a Secular Fundamentalist.
Can a secular be a fundamentalist? He can either be secular or
fundamentalist, and not both.

227. The Govt. does not interfere in the so-called personal laws of
the minority communities, but interferes without any impunity
with similar personal laws of Hindus. Is this not a flagrant
violation of the very basic principles of secularism?

228. In AP, the government is selling temple lands. Why can't it sell
Church properties also? Between 1940-47, the British Govt.,
knowing that their government is folding up, doled out
thousands of acres of lands to Church organisations.

229. Almost every coin in USA is inscribed with the words "In God
we trust". The National song of UK starts with the words "God
save the King". They could have used "Christ" instead of "God",
but did not. But we, with a billion God-fearing citizen, say:
"We, The People of India ...". And we are calling the west as
`materialist'.

230. Alok Tomar, editor of a Hindi magazine, has been arrested for
publishing a cartoon of Prophet Muhammad and charged for
hurting the religious sentiments of Muslims. Will the Govt. arrest
MF Hussain for drawing nude picture of Hindu Gods,
Goddesses and Bharat Mata. Is he not hurting the religious
sentiments of Hindus and Indians?

231. If Uma Bharti can be sent to jail for hoisting the flag at Hubli
and Advani could face trial in Babri Masjid case, why should the
UP minister Haji Yaqoob Qureshi (who announced a reward of
51 crores to behead the cartoonist) not be booked for inciting violence?

232. The Government was very serious on the cartoons issue, but
did not show the same kind of seriousness in the case of MF
Hussain. Is it not a clear case of Muslim appeasement?

233. The Government approached the Israel Govt. to stop
conversion of Roman Catholics in the North East, but it does
not show any concern about the conversion of Hindus all over
the country. Is it not a clear case of Christian appeasement?

234. As reported by the Peace Council of Pakistan, a women is raped
every two hours and up to three women a day died from "stove
deaths" in Pakistan. Where are our Women's Right Activists,
who cry foul at imagined bride-burning and dowry death in India?

235. Why should anti-Bush protest in Lucknow turn in to a large-
scale communal violence, killing two Hindu minors and injuring
many? Why are Hindus targetted unnecessarily?

236. A innocent Hindu sailor was killed by his Muslim colleagues on
board a Norwegian oil tanker, following an argument over the
cartoons issue. But you say Islam does not preach violence!

237. In Pakistan, Ahmadis are not accepted as Muslims. In fact
many Mullahs prompt their followers to eliminate Ahmadis from
Pakistan. Is this the brotherhood of Islam?

238. Pak Jamaat-e-Islami Ameer and MMA president Qazi Hussain
Ahmad has termed Basant (Kite Flying) a bloody game
demanding immediate ban on it because it is a part of Hindu
culture. With this hate-culture, is peace possible?

239. According to KPS Gill, all political parties believe that supporting
the extremist - rather than the moderate - Muslim stance is
more productive in delivering the 'Muslim vote'. Is this not
dangerous to democracy and secularism?

240. Christians sent 60,000 Bibles to famine-stricken nation of Niger.
"Come rejoice, and feast upon the word of Our Lord, Jesus
Christ," said Christians. The right way to serve the starved!

241. Kamala Surayya, a noted poet and writer in Kerala who had
converted to Islam a few years ago, now regrets her decision
and is disillusioned with the treacherous behavior of her Muslim
friends. What more proof do you need for treatment of women
in Islam?

242. Out of 6236 Ayats of the Quran, about 3900 are directly or
indirectly related to 'Kafirs', and refers to other subjects like,
Jihad, Kiyamat, Hell and Heaven. Does this mean peace and
tolerance?

243. In the Baroda Best Bakery case, the poor, illiterate girl Zaheera
is punished for perjury, whereas the wealthy, educated,
politician, Teesta Setalvad is left scot free, although, according
to SC order, both were to be interrogated for telling lies. Is this
not doublestandard?

244. Many times Muslims are acquitted by courts for want of
sufficient evidence. The secularists like, Teesta or her CJP
have no time to think of justice. But when Hindus are acquitted,
they make a hue and cry. Can they be called only a Muslim
rights activist?

245. Our PM and President had expressed their great indignation
at the offending cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad published
in Denmark. But about the paintings by MF Hussain in our
own country, they expressed no opinion at all. Do they respect
Hindu sentiments?

246. The Hyderabad City Police and Andhra Pradesh State Wakf
Board chose to dismantle (for renovation) a platform in the
courtyard of the Mecca Masjid. Within hours, Chief Minister
Samuel Reddy shifted a top Wakf Board official Syed Anwarul
Huda. But the same Christistian CM mercilessly destroyed the
1000 pillar structure at Tirumala and presently planning to
demolish part of Tirumala Temple. Who cares about Hindu
sentiments?

247. Sunni Muslims have filed a petition in Mumbai High Court asking
for a ban on Shia's Mohurrum processions on fortieth day, saying
Quran does not allow such a ritual (March 21, 2006). HC tells
the police to settle the issue after discussion. Is this tolerance?

248. Of the top 20 countries ranked in order of defence expenditures
as a % of GDP, 14 are Islamic. Whom are they afraid of?
(India is at 47). Tells you something, doesn't it?

249. According to CIA report, many Islamic countries spend between
10 and 15 % of their DGP on defence purchases. Is this how the
US defence industry survives?

250. Smt. Jaya Bachchan was holding an Office of Profit in UP
which was created long back during the Congress rule. But
Sonia Gandhi's Office - Chairperson of UPA - was created only
recently. So, who is more guilty?

251. The chief guest at our 2006 Republic Day celebrations was
the Saudi King. Is it not a farce that a Monarch is the Chief
Guest of a Republic Day function? Will the Monarch allow
Hindus in Saudi Arabia the same freedom Muslims enjoy in India?

252. The Saudi king wanted to give money to run madarassas in
India and rebuild the Delhi Jama Masjid. Will he, in the same
vein, allow at least one temple to be built in Saudi Arabia?
(Today Hindus are not allowed to perform pooja even inside
their home).

253. Michael Witzel, professor of Sanskrit, Harvard University,
permits several passages in the California Text Book trivialising
and ridiculing Hindus. For example, one passage said: 'The
monkey king Hanuman loved Rama so much that it is said that
he is present every time the Ramayana is told. So look around,
see any monkeys?' Is it not making a mockery of beliefs?

254. Rahul Gandhi had to avoid going to the U.S. forever. Because
of the pending police case, he could be arrested again by FBI
if he ever steps in to US. (He was caught with his girlfriend
with US$2 lakh in cash at Boston airport in 2001, but was
released at the behest of Brijesh Mishra). Is he Mr. Clean?

255. "Professor dies in Indian gun raid" reports a BBC headline
about the terrorist attack at IISc, Bangalore. What is "gun raid"?
Is it not a terrorist attack? `Professor dies' - Was he not killed?
Has BBC become intellectually bankrupt? Or are they afraid of
terrorists?

256. On the terrorist attack at IISc Bangalore, the NDTV hurries to
report that there were some previous enmity between the
gunmen and the professors! Can you imagine personal scores
being settled by the use of automatic guns! Whom are they,
NDTV, fooling?

257. Suspected LeT militant Abdul Rehman, who is in police custody
in connection with the IISc attack, has revealed the involvement
of 12 moulvis in spreading terror in various parts of the country;
11 are from Karnataka (Belgaum, Bellary, Mangalore, Hubli etc).
How many more are there in India?

258. A number of Catholic cardinals have warned Italian women
against marrying Muslims. What our secularists and preachers
of "Sarva Panth Samabhav" have to say on this?

259. In Pakistan, Muslims girls are married to Quran, similar to our
Devadasis? Pakistan has decided to introduce a bill in Parliament
to impose a ban on this custom. Does this mean that Pak's
culture is Hindu culture, although the practice is condemnable?

260. Killing of peaceful Hindus in Pakistan, Bangladesh or even in
India is not taken seriously by media, by government or by
various political parties or by Human Rights industry in India.
Why? Do they fear only violence?

261. Communist actions and ideologies call for the destruction of
Hindu temples, spiritual movements, yoga, meditation, Ayurveda
and Hindu cultural practices. Do you think they fit in a democracy?

262. In Imphal, Manipur, the outlawed Kanglei Yawol Kanna Lup
threatened to target BJP party workers, and therefore BJP leaders
kept away from electioneering in the civic body elections. Whither
democracy?

263. Communists never support for the inclusion of women as
members of the clergy of the Roman Catholic Church. They
have never talked about women in Islam who have fewer rights
than men. Are they real protectors of proletariats?

264. Saudi Arabia restricts entry of non-Muslims to Mecca. Catholics
never allow a third world Bishop to become a Pope. Will our
communists and secularists take up these matter as Human
Rights violations?

265. Communists, Christians, Muslims and some Congress leaders
- all of whom have nothing in common and often hate each
other - are united against Hinduism and Hindu leaders. Is it
because unity among Hindus will thwart their nefarious designs?

266. The famous French journalist, Francois Gautier, writes: "The
British did not conquer India, it was given to them by its warring
Hindu princes, jealous of each other." Don't you think that
history is being repeated today, by the likes of Arjun Singh, Mani
Shankar Iyer, etc.?

267. Prince of Arcot Nawab Mohammed Abdul Ali has questioned
the Haj subsidy, which is against Islam. Haj is an obligatory duty
and not a luxury trip or picnic, he said. How does the Muslim
community sacrifice values, principles and rules of Islam for petty
financial
benefits, he questioned. Any comments from Mullahs?

268. What is Murti Pooja? You visualise a figure and give a shape
to it. Muslims visualise Prophet Mohammed and give a shape
to him by imitating him, by growing beard and wearing skull
cap. In what way it is different from Murti Puja? How can they
talk against Murti Pooja?

269. Many NGOs under the leadership of Mahesh Bhat made a
representation to the Dy.CM of Maharashtra objecting to the
word "Imam" being used in connection with the arrest of a
terrorist (who was a Imam) from the Haj House in Mumbai.
Did these NGOs express any concern when Kanchi
Shankaracharya was arrested on fake charges? Doesn't this
prove that all these NGOs are at the behest of anti-Hindus?

270. According to reports, every year, 98,000 patients die in US
hospitals due to medical negligence and three to four times
that number are left permanently-disabled. Greed,
malfeasance, misfeasance, grand corruption, murderous intent,
and a self-centeredness has led the system to such a pass. Is
humanity dying in USA?

271. According to reports, 150,000 people, mostly from the United
States, came to India last year for Medical care. Called "medical
tourism", the number is expected to grow at 15% per year.
Has it something to do with Yoga? Brinda Karat would be the
best person to answer.

272. A lot of hue and cry was made about the `manufactured' Sanjay
Joshi CD issue - a purely personal affair. Would secularists
dare to condemn the Roman Catholic Christianity for breaking
the solemn vows of celibacy by their priests?

273. How do the secularists accuse RSS and VHP of dividing the
country on communal lines when it is the `secular' ideology
that has done the damage and continues to do so! How can an
effort to unite the 82% population of a country be called divisive?

274. A British airline has banned its staff from taking Bibles and
wearing crucifixes on flights to Saudi Arabia to avoid offending
the country's Muslims. When you respect their belief, don't you
expect that they too respect your belief? Why do they succumb
to Islamic pressure, instead of fighting for human rights?

275. The Hindu's headline says: "Concern over personalised attack
against Brinda Karat - Over 150 scholars, academicians and
social activists sign statement supporting her". Can you
understand the concern of The Hindu? Can you also imagine
the reach of the perverted secularists?

276. Hindus and Christians in Pakistan are looked down upon. They
have to take up inferior jobs and their chances of rising in any
field is low. Is this the reason for Pakistani cricketer Yousaf
Youhana, a Christian, to embrace Islam?

277. India is blamed for casteism. Then how come a Dalit, the late
KR Narayanan, elected President of India. How come a Dalit
becomes CM of Maharashtra. Has a black man ever been
President of the United States?

278. Mohammed Ahmed Al-Marfai, a 80+ years old Arab has bought
a 27-year-old Indian bride from Hyderabad for Rs10,000. A Muslim
cleric Qazi Mehmood Qureshi performed the marriage. Why
this animal instinct in a 80+ years old Muslim? What could be
the motive of the Qazi?

279. `We hate Hindus because they are Hindustanis and the number
one enemies of both Islam and Pakistan. We know it all through
our history text books on Pakistan Studies' said a 14-year old
boy in Pak. How do you expect peace and friendship between
the two countries?

280. A Muslim girl in Thiruvananthapuram, Rubiya, and her entire family
has been ostracised by Muslims, because she learnt Bharathanatyam.
Who will educate the Muslims on national integration?

281. According to AIMPLB, Muslims women should not work with
men or go to shopping malls, and should not mix with men.
Are they any different from Taliban? Why our Human Rights
activists silent on this?

282. Secularism means separation of religion from state. But in India,
the Govt. usurps temple funds and spend them on giving salary
to Muslim Clerics, whereas temple pojaris do not get salary. What
type of secularism is this?

283. The West Bengal population is 8,02,21,171. But there are
8,75,13,280 ration cards issued. That is 72,92,109 more eaters
than people. Will the communists of `progressive' WB explain?

284. In Kolkatta, hand carts are in vogue, i.e. man pulling a cart
occupied by a man, whereas in Ahmedabad, even cycle
rickshaws are absent - only autorickshaws. Can you compare
the development of communists' Kolkatta with that of
`communalist' Modi's Ahmedabad?

285. Even with the non-cooperation of the Marxist government's staff,
in WB 10 lakh bogus voters have been identified, which is only
a scratch on the surface. Do you agree that the Marxists are coming
to power in WB again and again by using undemocratic means?

286. 19 observers sent to WB have confessed to Chief Election
Commissioner BB Tandon that democracy and Bengal are two
mutually exclusive concepts. The EC has accused the Marxist
Govt. of deliberately creating conditions hostile to the holding
of free and fair elections. Do you think that democracy is safe
in the hands of Communists?

287. The J&K Police arrested a Christian missionary group for using
earthquake relief as a means to convert Muslims. Have you
ever heard of such action any where in India when Hindus are
being converted? Under UPA Govt. Muslims' conversion is illegal,
but Hindus' conversion is OK!

288. In Lahore (Pak), Quran was found lying in a drain and an
enraged crowd torched many vehicles and properties. They
also clashed with the police. Is violence the only way shown
by Islam to protest?

289. Do you agree that USA and Europe have the power to destroy
the entire Muslim population if they were to emulate the
example of unfairness and absolute perpetration of hate towards
non-Muslims, as is existing today in countries like Saudi Arabia?

290. S.Karunakaran has said that All India Congress Committee
(AICC) has become All India Catholic Congress. He cites the
importance given to Catholics like Secretary Vincent George,
Margeret Alva, Oscar Fernandes, Ajith Jogi, Rajasekara Reddy,
Oomen Chandy and A K Antony. What is your opinion?

291. No Indian newspaper has published the cartoons on
Mohammed. Even then why have the Hindus been at the end
of Islamic ire? - Hindu sailor killed - riot in Hyderabad - Hindu
killed in Lucknow - BJP office stoned, etc. Is it because to
Islam one kafir is as good as another?

292. In Parliament, the Parliamentary Affairs Minister Suresh
Pachouri of the Congress, while explicitly condemning the
Prophet's cartoons published in Denmark, did not mention
Husain's cartoons published in India against Hindus. What was
his compulsions?

293. In 2002, a critical comment on Prophet Mohammed by
American evangelist Jerry Falwell led Muslims of Solapur
(Maharashtra) to vent their ire upon Hindus. Is it because to
Islam one kafir is as good as another?

294. UP Minister Hajji Yakoob Qureshi declares a price of Rs 51
crore on the heads of Danish cartoonists. UP Chief Secretary
said that those cartoonists are not citizens/residents of India.
What will the Govt. do if US President George Bush, who is
not a citizen/resident of India, receives a prize on his head
from Indian Muslim organisations?

295. Sadhu Vaswani Mission was first established in Hyderabad in
Pakistan in 1933. During partition, Pakistanis chased them
away to Pune. Now the same Pakistanis are taking grants from
SVM for their treatment in India. Do they have any remorse?

296. Thousands of churches have come up in AP in the last five
years. Their population has gone up from 1.6% in 1991 to 10%
today. 25.1% of the B.Ed. colleges are of Christian
managements. Do you buy the theory that Christians are
persecuted in India, as alleged by vested interests?

297. Muslim countries like Saudi Arabia don't allot any land for
cremation grounds for Hindus. Nor does Vatican allow the
cremation of Hindus in the City. But in the holy city of Tirupati,
leave alone Burial Grounds, even Church is allowed. Still Hindus
are accused of intolerance. Why?

298. When Saudi Arabia destroyed holy shrines associated with the
Prophet Mohammad and replaced them with commercial
complexes, Muslims leaders in Kanpur, Uttar Pradesh,
protested. Why? Are Muslims in Kanpur more Islamic than
Muslims in Saudi Arabia?

299. In USA, alarming cases of Churches and their properties being
sold to settle millions of dollars worth cases involving sex
scandal by priests have come to light. Do you think our `fathers'
and priests lag behind?

300. One Dr. Zakir Naik says "If any non-Muslim considers the word
`Kafir' as an abuse, he may choose to accept Islam and then we
will stop referring to him a kafir. Do you consider him to be an
intellectual or a thug?

301. Intellectual Muslim is a misnomer; and it is also insulting Quran.
Only a free thinker can be an intellectual. Thinking is prohibited
in Islam, since every thing has been thought of by Mohammed
and written in Quran and Hadith. How can a Muslim think; he
has to only look in to Quran for guidance.

302. "Hindustan Times" had termed "Ganesh Chaturthi" as
"immersion frenzy in Mumbai". Will the same HT call Mohurrum
processions or Good Friday processions as "frenzy". Their pen
will fly into frenzy only at Hindus!

303. Just as Hindus are fast giving up the caste system, sati and
other less humane practices mentioned in their scriptures, why
can't the Muslims give up the inhuman practice of child marriage
and triple talaq?

304. The Muslim clerics are quick in issuing fatwas against some
Sania, Gudia and Imrana, encroaching on their personal lives
and human rights. But no Muslim cleric has dared to issue
fatwa against the terrorists. Is it lack of courage or willingness
or both?"

305. In the last civic elections in Gujarat, BJP got a sweeping victory
in all bodies. But most of the English media blacked out this
news. Why are they biased in reporting news?

306. Benny Hinn and Ron Watts, the Christian preachers, had been
allowed and treated as state guests even though in their own
country in USA they were under criminal investigation. Why
this sycophancy?

307. Many fathers-in-law who raped their daughters-in-law are
declared as their husbands and the husbands as their sons,
by the Mullahs. Do you think that such a situation will lead to a
civilised society?

308. The construction of Kottayam-Erumeli railway line, leading to
Sabarimalai, has been abandoned as it would go through
Christian-majority area. Christian CM Oommen Chandy has
recommended this step. Should Christian-majority areas be
treated as alien territory?

309. Azhar Khan (Bangladesh), 80, has married for the 44th time.
His 44th wife is half his age. He has no count of his children,
nor can he remember the name of his wives. Is this not animal farm?

310. 50,000 quake-survivors on hill tops were suffering in freezing
cold because a cleric issued a fatwa that "fleeing from a disaster
zone is un-Islamic". Please ponder who is for what - Scriptures
for the welfare of people or people for the `welfare' of scriptures?

311. A fatwa says that Yoga violates Islamic law because it is an
ascetic Hindu practice. Will the Muslims who have benefited
by Yoga question this fatwa? Why a religion should prohibit
practices of good health?

312. In Kolachal area of Kanyakumari Dist. TN, Muslim leaders
opposed the services of RSS volunteers to Tsunami victims,
although common Muslims were happy with their services.
Why are the Muslim leaders afraid of RSS service? Here, who
is alienating whom?

313. The Deoband Mullahs have issued a fatwa barring Muslim
women from contesting the civic polls in UP because it is un-
Islamic. Then why do they vote?

314. Do you agree that Islam and scientific development are
contradictory to each other? Show one Islamic country which
has produced good scientists, doctors, engineers or experts
in any field.

315. The Hindu, Chennai, with 3.5 million readers, has virtually
become a mouthpiece of the Chinese Communist Party. A card-
holding member of the Communist Party, its editor, N. Ram,
has been to China and occupied-Tibet at least fifteen times
mostly arranged by the Chinese Embassy in New Delhi. He is
also the mastermind behind `India-China Association of Journalists'.
Journalists as Foreign agents? What could be the motive?

316. When Maharashtra Govt. banned dance bars, the bar dancers
represented to Sonia Gandhi. Is it because a barmaid can better
understand the problems of bar dancers?

317. In Baroda nearly 20 temples were demolished for road
widening. Hindus protested peacefully, some even co-operated.
But when a Dargah was demolished, Muslims went on a
rampage. And the SC stayed the demolition. When thousands
of shops were demolished in Delhi, the Shopkeepers protested
peacefully. But the SC refused stay. Is the SC surrendering
before or abetting violence?

318. Hundreds of road side temples were demolished in Mumbai,
Chennai, Madurai, etc. under High Court orders. But when a
Dargah is demolished in Baroda, the UPA govt. goes to SC for
a stay against Gujarat HC order. Is the UPA govt. only for Muslims?

319. Communism is dying every where in the world. But it is thriving
in Hindu Nepal and India. Is it because Hindus are gullible?
No doubt communists are mocking at Hindus!

320. According to R. Sachar committee report, only 3.1% of Muslims
are graduates and just 1.2% are post-graduates. Who is
responsible for this? - Mullahs who forces them to go to
Madrassa or the Congress govt. which had been ruling the
country. Don't you think that both have a vested interest in
keeping Muslim masses ignorant.

321. Meer Waiz Umar Farooq, Former Chairman of APHC, on May
15, 1999 in Srinagar, said. "Kashmir is Paradise on Earth and
Paradise can not be owned by non-believers worshippers of
thousands of idols and cow. It must be made free from them at
every cost." Do you understand the meaning of this?

322. Muslims refuse to accept even Supreme Court verdicts in the
matter of divorce, etc. They do not follow family planning. Then
why do they demand reservation? How can they have the cake
and eat it too?

323. France does not ask for the religion of a person. Taking
advantage of this, Muslims have produced more children and
have now become stronger with 24%. Last year, Paris was
burning for many days and thousands of cars were burnt by
Muslims. Is this sufficient number for jihad?

324. Hardly any Muslim in the world blames Osama bin Laden for
provoking the US, and all the lives lost as a result - whether in
Afghanistan, Iraq or elsewhere. The reason given is that the
casualties are all a part of jihad. In Malegaon, Maharashtra,
Osama is worshipped. Is Osama the true Muslim?

325. The contention over Kashmir has often been cited as the cause
of Islamic terrorism in India. But in its pamphlet "Why We are
Waging Jihad" the LeT calls for the restoration of Islamic rule
in all parts of India. Any doubt about their motive?

326. You say Kashmir problem is due to Muslim alienation. What is
this alienation all about? Who caused it? Don't the Muslims
have a duty to integrate with the majority? Or is it the
responsibility of only the Hindus? Anywhere in the world, have
they integrated with the majority?

327. The Bomb Blast in Delhi on 29th October 2005 was referred to
as `fire works' by The Guardian, London. Why is it afraid of
calling it a terrorist attack?

328. Smt. Indira Gandhi termed corruption as a global phenomenon.
True to her word, the Congress under Sonia Gandhi has gone
international on corruption - Volcker, Quatorochi, etc. Treading
on the right path?

329. When Pope John Paul died, only Italy and Canada had declared
state mourning. The third was India. Don't you think that secular
India followed communal Italy?

330. The Government has to terrorise the terrorist. Instead, it is
treating them with kind gloves, by repealing POTA, and by
submitting to violence? This is a repetition of what Congress
did during 1940s, resulting in partition of our country. Don't you
think that it is time for you to wake up from your deep slumber?

331. Bhagwan Sri Krishna said: `Dharm can be established by (1)
protecting the virtuous, and (2) annihilating the wicked'. Every
one talks of protecting the virtuous. Have you ever heard anyone
talking about the annihilation of wicked (without which
establishment of Dharm is not possible)?

332. While the existence of Ram and Ramayana is denied by
M.Karunanidhi, CM of TN, TN govt.'s tourism posters are
inviting tourists by saying "The floating stone `Sethu Bandanam'
used to build the sethu Bridge is worth seeing here". His own
government seems to disagree with his views.

333. MK has confirmed the existence of Rama Setu in a foreword
he wrote in 1972 when he was CM, on Ramanathapuram
Gazetteer. What are his compulsions now? Is it not true that
the DMK government in TN is bent upon demolishing the Ram
Sethu as a revenge for the demolition of Babri structure in
Ayodhya, so as to appease Jihadis?

334. While Taslima Nasreen is chased away from one state to
another, and ultimately driven away from our country for writing
a book allegedly insulting Islam, MF Hussain is awarded prizes
for drawing naked pictures of Hindu Gods and Goddesses.
While Hussain is facing legal cases filed by hurt Hindus,
Nasreen is physically attacked by the peaceful religionists!

335. India is backward, right? Then why all developed countries
such as USA, UK, Germany, Canada, etc. import Doctors,
Engineers, Scientists, Professors, IT Professionals, etc. from
India? It should be the other way round. Isn't it??

336. Dr. Farooq Abdullah, former CM of J&K, recently claimed that
the accession of Kashmir with India achieved under the
leadership of his father, Shiekh Abdullah, was a mistake. In
fact, J&K acceded to India because of Maharaja Hari Singh.
Does not Dr. Farooq Abdullah take false credit? Or is he trying
to please terrorists?

337. In the recent elections in Gujarat (2007), a few Muslim villages
were just left out of campaigning. Congress thought that they
have no other go but to vote for Congress. And the BJP felt
that they will not vote for them; so why waste energy. Who is
responsible for their political wilderness? Definitely not Modi,
who talks of 5.5 crore Gujaratis.

338. Some Hindus in the Congress Party have floated a new front
"Congress Hindu Front". Have they come to the conclusion
that Hindus are being sidelined in Congress under Italian
Christian Sonia Gandhi? This is what Hindu leaders have been
saying all along.

339. SIMI (Student Islamic Movement of India), a terrorist organisation,
was banned by NDA Govt. Sonia opposed the ban. Her UP
Congress Party president, Salman Kurshid, was SIMI's advocate
in courts pleading for lifting its ban. How will they contain
terrorism?

340. Anwar Ali, a lecturer in National Defence Academy at
Khadakvasala in Maharashtra - yes, in the defence academy
to train soldiers to provide security to the people of India - was
found to be a SIMI activist! Found involved in Mulund bomb
blasts in April 2003, he was arrested!

341. Porn artist MF Hussain has drawn pictures depicting women
copulating with animals. Is he not lecherous? Why are our
women's rights organisations not raising their voice?

342. Jamia Milia Islamia University, Delhi, has honoured the porn
artist, M.F. Hussain with a doctorate! An art gallery nearing
completion will be dedicated to him. Is it not a reward for
continuously insulting Hindus?

343. Sonia Gandhi's daughter Priyanka Vadra has purchased 4.5
bighas of land in rural Himachal, near the President's Summer
Retreat. This is in violation of the existing law of Himachal
Pradesh that only those who are residing there can purchase
land. Compare this with Amitabh Bachhan being harassed for
buying farm-land.

344. The Election Commission had not taken any action against
Aaj-tak for displaying (in Oct. 2007) file photos of riots in Gujarat
in 2002. But the same EC had objected to posters showing the
burning of Sabarmati Express in Godhra in the past. Are there
two laws in India - one for Congress and another for BJP?

345. The Sonia-controlled UPA Govt. has removed the Bharat Mata
from the Two-Rupee coins, and has substituted it with a Cross.
Do you understand the import of this act - replacing Bharat
Mata with a Cross?

346. Gujarat riots in 2002 were described by perverted secularists
and the media as pogrom, holocaust, genocide, etc. although
40,000 Hindus too had taken shelter in Relief Camps and 254
Hindus killed in police firing. But what the West Bengal Govt.
did in Nandigram was pogrom. But our secularists are
deafeningly silent on this

347. Like pseudo-secularists, now comes a pseudo-Shankaracharya
set up by the Congress Party. He even went to the extent of
declaring that Rama Setu was a political agenda of the BJP,
although it is the Congress-led UPA which is going to destroy
the Ram Setu.

348. "Dr. Naik, you know next to nothing about the Western society
and are talking through your skull cap. People like you are
making the Muslims lag behind other communities." Kushwant
Singh to the self-proclaimed intellectual Dr. Zakir Naik. Does
Naik need any more certificate?

349. Bangladeshi writer, Tasleema Nasreen, under an Islamic
`fatwa', has been living in India, but porno painter MF Husain, is
in self imposed exile in foreign countries, just to avoid court cases
against him in India. How can one compare these two cases?

350. Our soldiers have been described as "cannon fodder" in the
past. In the present Indian context they can only be described
as "lambs for slaughter". Fake human rights activists pounce
on our Soldiers and govt. talks of human rights violation by
them for performing their duty. Does any country treat its
soldiers so badly?

351. "Arab Pardha - All pious women should wear it" declares one
Advt. board in Trivandrum. In fact, it should have read, "All
pious women should disappear behind it." Do you understand
that Islam is Arab National Movement based on Arabian tribal
culture, and Faith in India is being transplanted by belief in Arabia?

352. Are you aware that 70 per cent of the polio victims in India in
recent years are Muslim children, although Muslims constitute
just 13.4 per cent of the population. This is because Mullahs
and Maulvis advise Muslims not to administer the polio drops
to their children, although our Govt. spends crores on this health
care project.

353. Do you know that the President & the Prime minister of India
did not greet the people of India on Deepavali in 2007. They
never fail to send Christmas and Id greetings. Is this not
outrageous and atrocious, in a country where about 90% people
celebrate the festival?

354. Muslims scholars do not recognize the word "God". It is always
"Allah" for them. Then how come our Supreme Court declares
that both God and Allah are the same while giving its judgement
in the case of 12 Kerala Muslim MLAs who took Oath in the
name of Allah?

355. In Jalpaiguri (WB), A 38-year old Muslim (Afazuddin Ali)
`married' his 15-year old daughter and made her pregnant (in
Nov. 2007). He claimed Allah's sanction for his incestuous lust.
Mullahs and Maulvis are silent on this. Is this because in Islam
women are men's properties?

356. A big hue and cry is made by the secular gang about the
encounter killing of Shorabuddin Sheikh, a terrorist, by the
Gujarat police. But when it comes to the encounter killing of
Mohamed Yunus by the Maharashtra police, they tone down their
rhetoric. Is it because they do not want to disturb a Congress govt?

357. Notorious historian Romila Thapar says that Ram is a myth,
but Jesus and Mohammed are realities as their biographies
have been well accepted. Does she say that Ramayan is not
well accepted by Hindus? Whom is she fooling?

358. During the Babri demolition in December 1992, when a few
journalists were manhandled by the agitators, the secular gang
demanded the public hanging of the BJP leaders. But when
many journalists were attacked in Nandigram (WB), the secular
gang is silent. The media too plays down the incident. Have
they suddenly lost courage?

359. Vice President, Mr.Hamid Ansari speaking at a conference in
New Delhi on 'Emerging Security Concerns in West Asia'
berated the US Government for providing 'impetus to terrorism'.
Don't you think that Mr.Ansari is providing an excuse for acts
of terror by Islamic fanatics?

360. While the Central BJP has rejected the Sachar Committee
Report, its General Secretary, Gopinth Munde is supporting it. He
attended the "Insaf Do" rally organised by its MLC, Pasha Patel, held
in Nagpur on 22nd Nov. 2007, demanding
implementation of the Report. Is he not flouting the stand taken
by the Central leadership?

361. It is reported that Romilla Thapar and a couple of others have
been rewarded with Fellowships amounting to Rs.25,000 per
month by the Indian Council for Historical Research. Are they
being paid for saying that Ram and Ramayan are myths? They
have all along been distorting Indian history and belittling Hinduism.

362. At a Press Conference by Narendra Mody, a lady reporter (wife
of Salman Khurshid, UP Congress Chief) asked `Is it not true
that the number of people who voted for the BJP in the last
election is less than 50% of the population?'. How is UPA Govt.
formed? Can you imagine the level to which `intellectuals' in
India have dipped to?

363. After 36 years US has discovered that minorities are in trouble
in Bangladesh. Of course 60 years is still not sufficient for them
to notice that minorities are in trouble in Pakistan. Can there
be any other country more dishonest than US?

364. In UK, Some Muslim medical students have refused to attend
lectures or answer exam questions on alcohol-related or
sexually transmitted diseases because they claim it offends
their religious beliefs. What will they do if such a patient comes
to them for treatment?

365. In Malda (WB), a 14-year-old Muslim girl was forcibly married
to a 75-year old Muslim man. On refusing to say with the old
man, she has become an outcaste. Local CPM men and NGOs
have washed off their hands saying that it is a "social problem".
What will be their stand if they were Hindus?

366. On 2nd October 2007 (which has been declared as International
Non-Violence Day by United Nations), Sonia Gandhi addressed
the United Nations. Is there any relations or comparison between
Mahatma Gandhi and Antonio Maino, renamed as Sonia Gandhi?

367. Notorious Advocates Ram Jethmalani, Shanti Bhushan, etc.
have succeeded in making Prof. Geelani (Parliament attack
accused) free. Salman Khursheed pleased the case of banned
SIMI in SC. They think this is their holy work. Why do they
consider defending the encounter specialist Vanzara (who
finished Sohrabuddin Sheikh) a sin?

368. According to a Senior IPS Officer, over 90% crime in India, is
committed by 15% Muslim population. Yet the UPA government
does not want to punish those criminals, for fear of losing
Muslim votes. Has this not ruined the peace of majority of Indian
people?

369. Article 25-30 give special status to Minorities. After partitioning
the country and giving one third of Bharat to Muslims, how do
you justify giving special privileges to those who preferred to
stay back in Bharat? Is it not eating the cake and having it too?

370. Hindus in Malaysia are discriminated against, whereas Muslims
in India are pampered. How many Indian Muslim have raised
their voice against discrimination of Hindus in Malaysia, if at
all they believe in Human Rights? They did protest against a
cartoonist in Denmark.

371. 14 lakh people have been displaced in Chhatisgarh and Orissa
due to industrialization projects. The PM has directed these
non-Congress Govts. to treat their demand for rehabilitation
as a Naxalite threat and put it down with an iron hand. But the
same PM advocates a velvet handshake to the Islamic terrorists.

372. In the Communal Budget of the UPA, 15% of the 11th 5-year
plan has been allotted to minorities. That means allotting funds
according to population. Don't you think that this is an incentive
to Muslim population growth. The more children they produce,
the more allocation they will get.

373. Madrassas in Ujjain have boycotted the Madhya Pradesh
government's mid-day meal scheme for students on the ground
that the food is being prepared by ISKON. Then how do they
accept Haj subsidy given by Indian govt., a part of which comes
from temple donations?

374. "Workers in Catholic charitable organizations must reflect
evangelical love, not mere philanthropy, says Benedict XVI."
So, charity is not a goal by itself, but a tool to be used to make
people know Christ well - in other words to convert Hindus.

375. An Assamese newspaper - Asomiya Pratidin - has been
banned, following a report it had carried about the extravagant
wedding of Hagrama Mohilary, the chief executive member of
Bodoland Territorial Council (BTC). Will the media in India come
out in support of the Assamese newspaper? No, because it
would be against their secularism dharm!

376. In India a terrorist Afzal Guru who was sentenced to death is
being protected and in Pakistan an Indian, Sarabjit Singh, who
was considered innocent is being given death penalty. What a
contrast! No doubt, India appears to be a smooth place for all
types of criminals and anti-nationals.

377. Our great humanitarian PM, Dr. Manmohan Singh could not
sleep when Haneef was being interrogated in Australia, for his
terrorist links. But when our innocent Sarabjit Singh is sent to
the gallows by Pakistan, how does the same PM have a deep
slumber? What about the other Human Rights group who were
so boisterous in the case of Afzal.

378. China is cracking down and crushing Muslim Uighurs in the
name of counter terrorism. How come our comrades and
secularists in India are not opposing this crushing of the mujahideen
in China, when they are so friendly to Muslims in India.

379. Yasin Malik, the supreme commander of the terror outfit JKLF
was invited to address `India Today Conclave 2008'. The theme
was "Leadership For The 21st Century". Should India learn the art
of Leadership from a known terrorist? Is it not promoting terrorism?
Is not the role played by India Today management reprehensible?

380. When Holi comes, NGOs and Human Rights Activists start
crying "save water". Have they every cried "Save Blood", "Save
Life", "Save Animals" on Bakri ID?

381. When Deepavali comes, NGOs and Human Rights Activists
comes to you and advise "save money for the poor". When
Christmas comes and the whole world spends lavishly on wining
and dining, they are silent. Why can't they make the same
request to Christians too?

382. Have you every heard of Humanists saying `Save youth' on
31st Dec. and 1st January when youths, mostly Hindus, are
lost in wines and girls? They are indeed happy when Hindu
youths become vagabonds. And they talk about Humanism!

383. When the RSS-BJP Protest in front of CPM Office in Delhi
(against the murder of BJP-RSS workers in Kannur, Kerala, by
CMP goons) was forced to turn violent, the DMK and other UPA
allies cried hoarse. The same DMK cadre attacked the BJP/
RSS/VHP/Hindu Munnani offices in Tamil Nadu a few months
back? Do DMK have the moral authority to condemn RSS-BJP?

384. Porn artist MF Hussain's nude paintings of Hindu Gods and
Goddesses are being defended by our secularists and the
media. But Francois Gautier's paintings of Aurangzeb as per
his (Aurangzeb's) own record, are opposed by them. What
type of Freedom of ex-pression they clamour for?

385. When an Exhibition in Baroda University, depicting Hindu Gods
and Goddesses in the nude was objected to by Hindus, the
whole media went crazy and accused them of moral policing.
But when Francois Gaugier's paintings of Aurangzeb exhibited
in Chennai was opposed and subsequently closed by Muslim
fanatics, the media did not even report the incident. Are they
(the media) in the pay roll of Muslims?

386. If attack on inanimate office is bad (RSS-BJP workers attacking
CPM's Office in Delhi), then what is cold-blooded murder of
men - brutal murder of a dozen RSS-BJP men in Kannur,
Kerala? While our secularists condemn the former, they
acquiesce to the latter! And they talk about democracy and
freedom of ex-pression!

387. The communists cannot even dream of starting their party leave
alone contest in elections in countries where the Muslims are
in a majority. But look at the hullabaloo they make in Bharat,
the haven of Liberty, riding rough-shod over the amiable Hindus,
deriding Hinduism!

388. Dalits, especially their leaders, have a hatred towards Hinduism
although Hinduism embraces Bhuddism. According to them
Hinduism has dominated over Buddhism in India. Do they ever
hate Communists and Communism? China was once a
predominant Buddhist country, till atheist Communists took over it.

389. When people eulogise Afzal Khan (who plotted to kill
Chatrapathi Shivaji) and build memorial for him, don't you think
that they are insulting Shivaji? Do you think that in India, the
name of Chatrapathi Shivaji should be vanished and Afzal Khan
should be promoted?

390. In politics, 49% is minority and 51% is majority. In population,
what is `minority' and up to what percentage? Will they be
considered minority till they are 49% and avail all special
privileges, so that when they become 51%, they become
majority and enforce Sharia law on Hindus?

391. What do you think of our Constitution which in its Preamble
talks of Equality but allows special privileges to minorities in its
Articles, without defining who minorities are, leaving its interpretation
to politicians and courts? Is it a work of intellectuals?

392. Mumbai Police had asked porno artist MF Hussain (in Feb.
2007) to paint for the `Let us Make Mumbai Unbreakable'
campaign and displayed it through hundreds of hoardings.
Hundreds of cases are registered against him for drawing
obscene pictures of Hindu Gods and Goddesses. Instead of
taking action against him, the Mumbai Police is befriending
him. Is it not a proof that they do not want to act against him?

393. The UPA Govt. has banned movies like `Da Vinci Code" and
"Escape from Taliban" to please Christians and Muslims. But
pictures like "Water" and "Parzania", which hurt Hindu sentiments,
are allowed free display. Is this not double-standard?

394. In Jan. 2007, Allahabad police arrested six Gospel for Asia
missionaries for trespassing at Ardh Kumbh festival. Scores
of GFA leaders and missionaries camped at the Ardh Kumbh
location. Does any Hindu Sadhu go and distribute leaflets in
their "Prayer Convention"? How dare they go to Hindu Meets?
Still they complain of Hindu oppression!

395. All India Muslim Tyohar Committee has declared that Mansur
Ali Khan Pataudi, the well known cricketer, is no longer a Muslim
because he consumes liquor and has acted in films. Is this
applicable to Salman Khan, Shah Rukh Khan, Amir Khan, et al?
Pataudi has approached a clergy to get a `fatwa' issued against
this declaration. Has `fatwa' become a blackmailing tactics?

396. A Muslim in Lahore (Pakistan) shot and killed Punjab Social
Welfare Minister Zile Huma Usman in an open court (Feb. 21,
2007) in her hometown, because woman holding ministership
is against Islam and is contrary to the teachings of Allah. Any
comments? Maulvis are mum.

397. In Kerala, the Customs and Police officials seized 35 pistols
and 47 air-guns from a container consignment of 817 boxes
on Jan. 08, 2007. The surprise was that a copy of the Koran
was found in every packing box of each gun! What is the
relevance of Koran with Gun?

398. In the Kumbh Mela once in 12 years and also in the Ardh Kumbh
Mela, about 13 to 15 crore people assemble at Prayagraj for
the sacred dip. They are from different castes, languages, social
backgrounds, sampradayas, etc. Just imagine - Were they
invited by any Central organisation? Was there any publicity
inviting them? Was there any quarrel or skirmishes for food
and stay? Peace, harmony, tolerance and brotherhood is in
abundance every where. Is it not a `Hindu Marvel'?

399. On 31st Dec. 2006, a Hindu girl was molested by a few Muslim
youths at the Gateway of India. What were the Muslim boys
doing on 31st Dec., when 31st December night has no meaning
for Muslims and Islam. Is there an organised plot to `trap' Hindu
girls by Muslim boys on such occasions, dressing and acting
like modern youth?

400. Legendary freedom fighter Savarkar's grandson, Praful
Madhav Chiplunkar, an IIT graduate, was found begging in
Pune streets (in Jan. 2007

Salman Khan family celebrate Ganeshotsav - Fatwa follows

2008-09-13T15:51:00.000-07:00

'Fatwa' against Salman Khan, family for celebrating Ganeshotsav

Submitted by Tarique Anwar on 12 September 2008 - 10:16pm.

By IANS,

Mumbai : Veteran Bollywood scriptwriter Salim Khan, the father of actor Salman Khan, Friday questioned a fatwa, religious edict, against him by some Muslim organizations for celebrating Ganeshotsav at their home here.

“What is the locus standi of these people? Who are they to question people's religious beliefs? Why don't they issue such a 'fatwa' against terrorists and terrorism, which is un-Islamic? The clerics are talking nonsense,” he thundered before a television channel Friday evening.

Mufti Manjar Hassan Khan Ashrafi Misbahi, the chief of Darul-Uloom Hijaziya Chishti, Mumbai, issued the 'fatwa' urging a religious boycott of the entire Khan family on Wednesday.

Last week, the Khan family was in the limelight when all members along with friends and relations celebrated the Ganeshotsav festival at their home in Bandra, northwest Mumbai.

The Khans celebrate Ganeshotsav every year, but this time, the live telecast of the family performing 'aarti' (invocation) of Lord Ganesh has irked some community leaders. Later, the family took part in a ceremonial immersion of the idol of Lord Ganesh.

The social boycott call was issued in response to a demand by Abdul Rehman Anjaria, member of the Advisory Council, Jama Masjid, New Delhi.

Anjaria, who is also member All India Muslim Personal Law Board (AIMPLB), told IANS Friday evening that the 'fatwa' would be in force until Khan and his family atone for their actions of worshipping an idol of Lord Ganesh, which is not permitted in Islam. ...more

After Muslims RSS now brands Christians as Terrorists

2008-09-11T19:42:00.000-07:00

RSS booklet blames 'Christian terrorists' for Saraswati murder

Fri, Sep 12 02:32 AM

The Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) has published a booklet blaming "Christian terrorists" for the killing of senior VHP leader Swami Laxmanananda Saraswati and four of his associates on August 23.

The 40-page booklet, titled The Truth Behind Swami Lakshmanananda Saraswati's Murder, has been published by the Viswa Sambad Kendra, a publicity unit of the RSS. It will be distributed to bureaucrats, police officials, journalists and intellectuals to "give them the true picture of the reasons behind the murder". Read

Violent religiosity - How Rajesh was killed

2008-09-11T17:31:00.000-07:00

Rajesh, 27, and a Hindu friend, Tunguru Mallick, worked in Chennai, a southern Indian city. The two came back to Orissa for holidays and arrived at G. Udayagiri, a small town, on Aug. 24, not realizing Hindu groups had called for a statewide strike that day to protest Swami Saraswati's murder.
The town 220 kilometers west of Bhubaneswar, the state capital, is in Kandhamal. Bhubaneswar lies 1,745 kilometers southeast of New Delhi.
As no transport was available, Rajesh and Tunguru decided to walk to Bataguda, their native village, about 60 kilometers further west from G. Udayagiri. However, a mob accosted the duo when they reached Paburia, about 12 kilometers into their journey, and demanded they identify themselves. As the two tried to talk, someone pulled a bible from Rajesh's bag.
The mob then began beating Rajesh, who fell down to the ground. While some continued to beat him, others dug a pit in a nearby field. As they dragged Rajesh toward it, he asked the attackers why they were burying him when he was still alive. They retorted, "Call your Jesus. He will save you." They then tied Rajesh, dumped him into the pit and covered it with mud.
Kamal said Tunguru, who watched the entire incident, recounted it all to him.
The extremists then turned to Tunguru, who kept insisting he was a Hindu. Nonetheless, they condemned him for befriending Christians, then poured kerosene on him and set him on fire. Tunguru fled to a nearby village where people helped douse the fire. According to Kamal, Tunguru suffered severe burns on his body.
Kamal said Rajesh's two younger sisters and an aged mother now live in a relief camp. Nobody has filed a police case over Rajesh's death, he added. Read

INDIA Priest Recounts Close Brush With Death In Orissa

By Dibakar Parichha

September 10, 2008 | IE05724.1514 | 667 words Text size

Suresh Nayak's Story

"We lost everything, but the humiliating ceremony to disown our Christian faith still haunts me," Nayak told Catholic News Service at a refugee camp in Cuttack, about 20 miles from Bhubaneswar, Orissa's capital.

"They tonsured my head and made me drink cow dung water to purify me. We were also forced to write a declaration that we are becoming Hindus of our own (will) and giving up the Christian faith," he said.

Nayak said he and his family, as well as 20 more Christian families from Pirigurg village in Kandhamal district, fled to nearby jungles Aug. 24 after they were alerted that Hindu extremists were planning to target their village.

"They looted our houses and burned everything down," he said.

Nayak and several others returned to his village after local Hindu leaders, assuring them of their safety, invited them back for a peace meeting. But Hindu extremists had a different agenda and forced 13 Christian couples to attend the conversion ceremony.

While the men had their heads ceremonially tonsured as a mark of embracing Hinduism, the women were forced to eat sacred offerings to mark their conversion. Read

ABC News: Beware Do-It-Yourself Alzheimer's Cures

2008-07-31T14:52:00.000-07:00

ABC News: Beware Do-It-Yourself Alzheimer's Cures

Alzheimer 'Breakthrough' Tempts Families to Improvise
Latest Hope for the Disease Is a Drug With a Commonly Available Ingredient
By LAUREN COX
ABC News Medical Unit
July 31, 2008

What would you do if had an incurable disease and heard that something simple and common may help -- a chemical found at a pet store, or in an allergy drug, or a breakthrough injection a man in California developed?
methylene blue Alzheimer's
The similarities between an active ingredient in a potential Alzheimer treatment and the chemical methylene blue, commonly used as a blue dye, may lead some people to improvise, researchers fear.

It's the sort of dilemma Alan Romantowski, a former airline pilot, faces with each news story about Alzheimer's disease treatments.

"It is tempting; I'm taking ginseng, fish oil, ginkgo and all the over-the-counter things that the doctors say don't have any proof that it helps, but it doesn't hurt," said Romantowski, 55, who is suffering from the early stages of the disease.

And not all of the solutions Romantowski has sought have been from a pharmacy. Earlier this week, he says, he "was just about packing my bags to California" to try an unproven treatment that involved injections into his head -- that is, until his doctor let him know that the so-called breakthrough treatment he heard about in California was "wacky" and unproven.

But whether scientifically sound or wacky, any news about potential Alzheimer's treatments can fill a doctor's voicemail with calls from desperate families.

And a new potential treatment announced Tuesday may be no exception. Discussed at the annual Alzheimer's Association Meeting in Chicago, a drug called Rember sparked hope among researchers and within the Alzheimer community.

Rember has completed a phase II trial, which means it's a long way off from meeting FDA approval as a legal therapy. But, thus far the data has shown promise -- double the improvement in cognition than a placebo gives for patients with moderate Alzheimer's disease.

And the drug happens to have an active compound called methylene blue, which is found in medical and industrial dyes and in some pet shop fish medicine.

"I think there was an article about that in our paper this morning," said Josie Romantowski. "I actually even called my husband about it... as far as trying [a drug], what is there to lose really, at this point?"

Not, however, if it's in the form of blue jean dye or fish medicine, her husband said.

"You try to want to balance between being optimistic and aggressive, and not going into things that are just quackery," he said. "I would certainly discuss it with the neurologists, and if they thought it would be safe and wouldn't be a problem, I'd try anything."

Trials at Home, and the Lab

Researchers found the effect of Rember by accident in 1986, when the active chemical in a test tube dissolved substances found in the brain which are thought to be involved in the development of Alzheimer's called "tangle filaments," said Claude M. Wischik, professor in mental health at the University of Aberdeen, U.K. and lead investigator of the Rember trial.

Over the years, there have been many uses found for this compound in medicine, from biological dyes to a treatment for cyanide poisoning.

"From a surgeon's standpoint, the main thing we use methylene blue for is we inject it into the patient's veins and it turns their urine blue -- that's so we can find leaks," said Dr. Chris Gonzalez, an associate professor of urology at Northwestern University in Evanston, Ill.
Gonzalez says an injection of methylene blue might also be used to treat the potentially lethal condition of methemoglobin, where a person cannot get enough oxygen from their blood and turns a slate-blue color. Or, it can also be injected to treat priapism -- "when you get an erection that won't go away," said Gonzalez.

But at the first news of methylene blue's ability to dissolve tangle filaments, "the world responded, 'yeah, so what?'" Wischik told ABCnews.com. The tangle filaments methylene blue dissolved in the test tube were known to be a hallmark of Alzheimer's in the brain. But at the time, Wischik says, the latest theories about Alzheimer's thought of tangles as a consequence of the Alzheimer's, not as a cause of dementia.

"In the end I decided the only way to win was to win -- to have a clinical trial that proves the point," said Wischik. "I had to form a company to do that."

So now that Rember is in clinical trials, all that Wischik and families like the Romantowski family can do is wait and hope for the scientific research to prove it's a useful drug. This wait is nothing new to the Alzheimer community.

Watching and Waiting

Dr. Ronald Petersen, chair of the medical scientific advisory council of the Alzheimer's Association said Tuesday's glowing coverage of Rember already reached his patients and their families.

"As a result I've already had several calls from my office saying 'Is this available, can I get this for my mom and dad?'" said Petersen. "Some people are desperate out there.

"It's a fine line -- trying to give people the idea that there's hope out there in the field, because there really is, but also tempering the news based on the information."

"We've read so many reports of things that were so promising, and then we go and talk to the neurologist," said Romantowski. "In the final analysis, so far always they don't hold up to the original hype that comes out."

"But there are so many of these studies, that somebody has got to hit on one of these," he said.

ABC News: Can U.S. Catch Up on Plug-In Hybrids?

2008-07-20T16:43:00.000-07:00

ABC News: Can U.S. Catch Up on Plug-In Hybrids?

Can Plug-In Hybrids Ride to America's Rescue?

Engineer Behind Many Electric-Car Advances Says Oil's Days May Be Numbered

By MARK CLAYTON
DAVIS, Calif., July 19, 2008

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If the United States breaks its oil addiction, a measure of thanks will no doubt be due to Andy Frank, who some have dubbed the "father of the plug-in hybrid" car.

Andrew Frank, a professor at the University of California, Davis, is considered the godfather of the plug-in hybrid car, which runs 60 miles on electricity from a standard 110-volt wall socket and then switches to liquid fuel.

(Paul Kitagaki Jr./Sacramento Bee/ZUMA Press)

Laboring in near anonymity in his garage-style laboratory on a leafy byway of the University of California at Davis campus, Frank has for three decades focused on developing plug-in-hybrid technology. With his students, he has built nine plug-in vehicles since the 1990s, winning several vehicle contests sponsored by the Department of Energy and automotive companies.

Even so, Detroit showed little interest in the idea of plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs) -- until recently. With $4-a-gallon gasoline killing SUV sales, big automakers like General Motors, Ford and Toyota have begun to talk about a future with plug-in hybrids -- or even futuristic fuel-cell cars -- instead of SUVs.

McCain Backs Tax Credits for GM Volt, Others

Nissan Plans Electric Cars in Portugal

Gas Crunch Creates 'Green Gold Rush'

Plug-in hybrids go much farther on a single charge than an ordinary hybrid. Some converted Toyota Prius plug-ins get the energy equivalent of 100 miles (or more) per gallon and travel nearly 40 miles on electricity alone before a gasoline engine kicks in for longer trips. With their hefty battery packs, such hybrids can be plugged into a socket in the evening for a charge.

Since 78 percent of American commuters drive 40 miles or less each day, a plug-in driver might need only to fill up his tank with gasoline a half-dozen times a year. It's a game-changing concept that's won over many energy-security hawks and even environmentalists who had been married to futuristic fuel-cell vehicles, but now see plug-ins as a here-and-now way to fight global warming as well as freeing the U.S. from imported oil.

One of the main complaints about plug-in technology is that you're just trading one form of pollution for another -- tailpipe emissions for power-plant smokestack emissions. But a recent "well to wheels" life-cycle analysis by the Electric Power Research Institute and the Natural Resources Defense Council shows that a shift by the U.S. to plug-in vehicles would cut carbon emissions by as much as 500 million tons annually and 10 billion tons cumulatively by 2050. At the same time, other exhaust pollutants would decline.

Lawsuits Against Bloggers Seen Rising

2008-07-20T16:35:00.000-07:00

ABC News: Blog at Your Own Risk: Lawsuits Fly
http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/Story?id=5406538&page=3

Lawsuits Against Bloggers Seen Rising

Since 2004, 159 Court Actions Have Targeted Citizen Journalists for Libel and Other Charges

By HUMA YUSUF
July 20, 2008

When Christopher Grotke answered a late-night knock on the door, he did not expect to find the deputy sheriff on his doorstep serving notice that he was being sued. Nor was he prepared for the charge: libel.

Someone had posted a comment on his citizen-journalism Web site, iBrattleboro.com, stating that a woman in Brattleboro, Vt., was having an extramarital affair. The accused woman then sued Grotke and his Web site co-founder for failing to edit or delete the comment.

The blogging community increasingly is subject to lawsuits and threats of legal action running the gamut from subpoenas to cease-and-desist notices.

Since blogging became popular in about 2004, there have been 159 civil and criminal court actions involving bloggers, according to the nonprofit Media Law Resource Center (MLRC) in New York. Seven cases have resulted in verdicts against bloggers, with cumulative penalties totaling $18.5 million. Many more legal actions never result in trial.

The result? A stifling of free speech in a medium providing more comprehensive and diverse opportunities for commentary than ever before, digital-rights activists, media lawyers, and bloggers say.

"There is a chilling effect of a cease-and-desist letter or a legal threat that claims an aspect of a blogger's work could lead to liability, even when those claims are not well grounded," says Kurt Opsahl, a senior staff attorney at the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), a nonprofit in San Francisco that defends digital rights.

Bloggers faced with legal threats often deem it easier to remove potentially offensive content rather than undertake the difficulty and expense of defending themselves, he adds.

Abroad, More Than 60 Bloggers Arrested

Bloggers face much bigger threats overseas, particularly if they criticize governments or point to human rights abuses.

Since 2003, 64 bloggers have been arrested around the world -- with Egypt, China, and Iran initiating more than half of those arrests, according to the World Information Access Report, published last month by the University of Washington. By contrast, the United States has arrested two in that period.

Still, online commentators face risks in the United States.

"In the developed world, bloggers can be punished through lawsuits," writes Philip Howard, a communications professor at the University of Washington, in an e-mail.

The number of lawsuits is growing, says Robert Cox, president of the Media Bloggers Association (MBA), a U.S.-based group devoted to protecting citizen journalists.

"As blogging expands and more people are aware of it," he says, "the lawyers are not far behind."

No one is suggesting that bloggers should have free rein to publish whatever they want.

"If you're slandering, you can be sued whether you have a blog or not," says Cox, a blogger himself. "You're not immune to defamation charges ... just because you're a citizen speaking your mind."

Who Should Educate the Bloggers?

There is no consensus, however, on how best to make bloggers aware of their legal responsibilities.

Many lawyers expect bloggers to figure it out themselves.

"If you're going to be responsible enough to manage a site where people post such things, you should be able to detect when things are defamatory and take them down," says Margot Stone, the lawyer for the woman who sued Grotke. "The problem is that technology is outpacing the ethical responsibilities. People haven't thought through the ethics of all this."

Online communities as well as media activists and lawyers are pushing to ensure that bloggers are aware of their legal rights and responsibilities.

The EFF and the Citizen Media Law Project (CMLP) -- an affiliate of the Berkman Center for Internet and Society at Harvard Law School -- offer detailed legal guides for bloggers. Both organizations also help bloggers find legal counsel.

In addition, the CMLP maintains a database of all legal action directed against bloggers.

"That way bloggers know they're not alone," explains David Ardia, director of the CMLP.

Other citizen-media groups say more proactive support is needed.

Since 2006, the MBA has been working with Media Pro Insurance to create the MBA Media Liability Insurance program.

ing up with a product that covers defamation, copyright, privacy violations -- the same protections as newspapers -- for bloggers," says the group's Cox.

MBA members will receive a hefty discount on the insurance package, due to be launched at the end of this month. The cheapest coverage for a solo blogger will be $540 a year.

But some bloggers resist the idea.

"I don't have the money for that kind of thing," says Kathleen Seidel, a New Hampshire-based blogger who was subpoenaed this spring in connection with another lawsuit against vaccine manufacturers that she had written about on her blog.

Having written several posts about litigation and completed two legal courses at the local community college, Seidel was able to deflect legal threats against her blog and successfully composed a motion to quash the subpoena.

Grotke, too, was able to convince a Vermont court to dismiss libel charges.

Many bloggers, however, aren't so fortunate, which is why the online community is searching for ways to protect them.

"The effect of intimidation is a real one," Seidel says.

Challenge of Nonfoundationalism to Indian Christian Theology

2008-07-06T22:00:00.000-07:00

Challenge of Nonfoundationalism to Indian Christian Theology
T. Jacob Thomas

Introduction
The basic nonfoundationalist position is that there are no fixed or absolute universal foundations for knowledge. Knowledge exists in particular cultural and linguistic communities and such knowledge does not need any validation from out side its community. The nonfoundationalist approach would help us to think about reality in a different way, not in fixed categories but in an interconnected, independent web of existence. With regard to theology of religions nonfoundationalism can justify the truth claims of different religions and make religions coexist in a galactic world, rejecting a monistic and centred world. It can also provide sufficient strategical validity to contextual theologies in India like Dalit or tribal theology in their struggle to find a place in the vast spectrum of knowledge formations. Major Western epistemological schools like rationalism, empiricism and idealism as well as the Indian advaitic school have been basically concerned with universal validation of knowledge. The nonfoundational or antifoundational rejection of any absolute or universal claims of truth, would help the emergence and justification of contextual contested knowledge theories. Postfoundationalism attempts to combine both foundationalist and nonfoundationalist approaches to knowledge. It affirms the foundationalist vision of truth as necessary but holds that our current knowledge is not final; hence ambition for any metanarrative is out of place. However, several people see nonfoundationalism nihilistic. In order to understand the role of nonfoundationalism constructively we will first examine the major traditions in philosophy and theology which were foundationalistic and then the tenets of nonfoundationalism will be looked into. Finally some modern nonfoundationalist heologies will be evaluated for their usefulness in the Indian context.
The Epistemological Dilemma in Philosophy and Theology
Epistemological debates since the time of the Greek Sophists in the 5th century BCE dealt with questions such as what is truth and how can we know anything, that is, the possibility of reliable and objective knowledge. The Sophist Gorgias argued that nothing really exists and that if anything did exist it could not be known; if knowledge were possible, it could not be communicated. Protagoras, another major sophist, held that no person’s opinions can be said to be more correct than another’s. However, the Sophists were put to oblivion by the opposing school of Socrates, Plato and Aristotle, who held that it is possible to have exact and certain knowledge of world and its “unchanging and invisible forms,” or ideas. They held that what we see and touch are imperfect copies of pure forms; abstract reasoning can provide genuine knowledge of these forms. The real problem Plato confronted was how to distinguish episteme (knowledge) from doxa (opinion) and authenticate one’s knowledge. For this he appealed to intuition. This was met with the problem that when we rely on intuition with out giving any reasons for it we do not have any basis to judge between alternative intuitions. If we give reasons for our choice of correct intuition, then we are no longer relying on intuition , but on reasons; again we are left with out any reason to justify our reasons. That means, there was no sound basis or foundation for thought.
Aristotle called the basic forms of knowledge which are grasped by the mind, scientia, first principles. The knowledge we get from experience is actually processed by the mind abstracting or deducing new facts from those already known, in accordance with the rules of logic, which was set down for the first time in systematic form by Aristotle. St. Thomas Aquinas followed Aristotle in regarding perception as the starting point and logic as the intellectual procedure for arriving at reliable knowledge of nature. The challenge taken up by Aquinas was to make theology a science in accordance with Aristotelian logic. For this he posited the articles of faith as the first principles, on the basis of the authority of the church. However, the Enlightenment philosophers, armed with the spirit of reformation, attacked such authority and challenged the Thomistic way of understanding. Schleiermacher, the enlightenment theologian built his theology not on the authority of the Church but on the self-consciousness of every human being, the “feeling of absolute dependence,” as the foundation for sure knowledge of God.
Classical Foundationalism
The traditional foundationalist philosophy has as its core tenets: idea of a basic dichotomy between the subjective and the objective; the conception of knowledge as being a correct representation of what is objective; the conviction that human reason can completely free itself of bias, prejudice, and tradition; the ideal of a universal method by which we can first secure firm foundations of knowledge and then build the edifice of a universal science; the belief that by the power of self-reflection we can transcend our historical context and horizon and know things as they are in themselves.
Cartesian paradigm of the solitary thinker served as the background for the modern search for secure foundations. In his Meditations (1641) Descartes identified “clear and distinct ideas” as the foundation for knowledge. He made the foundation of all knowledge the certainty of the self and as a corollary the existence of God. He was following the mathematical ideal of certainty to know that “something is so and can’t be otherwise” and asserted, cogito ergo sum, I cannot doubt that I who doubts exist. The result was dualism between mind and matter, thinking thing (res cogitans) and extended thing (res extensa), which made mind as the source of knowledge and not empirical evidence as empiricists argued.
For John Locke, the father of empiricism, all human knowledge comes to us through our senses. Faith helps us, when reason fails, to make the leap towards revelation, not a certainty but a probability. According to the skeptical epistemology of David Hume ( 1711-1776) we can trust only the knowledge that we acquire from our perceptions. Our perceptions,can be divided into two categories: ideas and impressions. Ideas are nothing but copies of our impressions, or, in other words, that it is impossible for us to think of anything, which we have not antecedently felt, either by our external or internal senses. We cannot believe that a certain thing, such as God, soul, or self exists unless we can point to the impression from which the idea of the thing is derived.In his Enquiry concerning Human Understanding he defines the term impression as our lively perceptions, when we hear, or see, or feel, or love, or hate, or desire, or will. Ever since the time of Hume knowledge found it difficult to establish itself on any sure foundations. George Berkeley, another, empiricist held that human knowledge of external physical objects is always subject to the errors of the senses, and concluded that one cannot have absolutely certain knowledge of the physical world a position which was contrary to that of the rationalists. The classical philosophical schools such as the Cartesian rationalism, Lockean empiricism and German idealism accepted the criteria that a knowledge is valid if it is universally true and accepted beliefs that are self evident, incorrigible and “evident to the senses” as foundations of sure knowledge. Immanuel Kant agreed with the rationalists on the possibility of getting exact and certain knowledge, but along with the empiricists he held that such knowledge is more informative about the structure of thought than about the world outside of thought. He has made room for faith by setting limits to reason, the boundary of knowing. Pure practical reason helps us to postulate freedom, God and immortality.
The Linguistic Turn and the Death of Foundationalism
The linguistic turn refers to the demise of the long reign of the philosophy of Cartesian monological subject and the recognition of the centrality of language in the constitution of knowledge To understand something is no more to form mental “representations” of it as modernism insisted, rather, understanding has become a matter of actively interpreting our world experience—by means of language. The enlightenment belief that reason is neutral and would lead to truth irrespective of context, tradition, or language was found shaky. Several people have contributed to this turn beginning from John Locke to Gadamer. It was Schleiermacher who liberated the hermeneutical theory from the Enlightenment “objectivity” to the consciousness of the feeling subject, paving the way for liberal humanism with its universal concept of human nature. Edmund Husserl and Martin Heidegger rejected the concept of knowing subject by the “lived experience” of the involved subject which would discover itself. Ludwig Josef Johann Wittgenstein’s (1889-1951) Philosophical Investigations marked the shift in linguistic analysis. His linguistic analysis perceived reality in terms of language games. No truth is possible outside the language. Languages are shaped by cultural systems and traditions into which we are born. Language is inextricably woven into the fabric of life. Language determines our knowledge. Hans-Georg Gadamer ( 1900-2002) was critical of modern approaches to humanities that modeled themselves on the natural sciences and scientific methods and argued that a “historically effected consciousness” is embedded in the text which itself was the product of particular history and culture. Interpreting a text involves a “fusion of horizons” where the meaning emerges in dialogue with the text's history with the interpreter’s own background. The final outcome of all these developments was coming to the realization that no absolute knowledge is possible as the enlightenment conceived.

Poststructuralism

Ferdinand de Saussure’s structural linguistics contended that language is a system of relations and the meaning is processed within that structure. The text has no given meaning and the author disappears behind the structure. The problem with Saussure’s structuralism has been that it rejects not only the Cartesian knowing self but also the subjectivity and subverted the emerging identity consciousness among the socially oppressed women, Blacks, Dalits and tribals. The resurgence of identity politics among the submerged or subaltern groups challenged the unitary notions of human kind as false universalism that blocks substantive differences such as race, gender, or ethnicity , and contested all traditional knowledges. Poststructuralism and the strategy of deconstruction addressed this growing concern. Jacques Derrida’s notion of decentred universe challenged all fixed or absolute notions of centre and periphery and has conceived universe as a free play. There is no authoritative centre, which makes validation of knowledge necessary. Derrida has gone beyond Saussure’s notion that words derive their meaning in their difference with other words and pointed out that since the text has no foundational meaning any number of meaning can be formed by deferring the meaning of a word. This endless passive and active interplay of meaning is termed by Derrida as “differance.” Differance happens not in the difference of words as in structuralism but when something is known only from its absence. The poststructuralist strategy of deconstruction devised by Derrida categorically asserts the absolute impossibility of attributing to any text one single ultimate meaning. In deconstruction "objective truth is to be replaced by hermeneutic truth
It brings out the politics behind the construction of meaning. That means sacred texts, such as the Bible, do not have a single ultimate meaning nor are such texts necessarily authoritative. Deconstruction is a rebellion against absolute truth claims. It contest the given knowledge absolutised through hierarchical dualities which Derrida calls binary oppositions, creating superiority and inferiority structures of thought and social practices. Deconstruction disrupts and displaces the hierarchy and dismantles its authority and creates space for the “marginals” to present themselves as social agents.The web of relations outside the text may determine both the meaning of the text and the nature of its authority.
The linguistic turn led to the demise of the foundationalist tenet that for truth to exist there must be some sort of “extralinguistic” reality. Instead the legitimacy of a plurality of stand points and interpretations over an absolute or a contextual conception of knowledge or truth was affirmed. The linguistic turn has led to the postmodern argument that there are no truths, but only rival interpretations. This does not mean that language is everything, but that we know everything by means of language. There is no need of any foundation, either by way of intuition or by experience.

Postmodernism – Deconstruction of Knowledge

The perspective character of knowledge has been given ever-increasing importance since the age of Nietzsche. Human experience, insights and the perspective shape new ways of achieving and producing knowledge. The new view on knowledge does not assume reason to remain the same at all times and in all places. Rather it is now assumed that the subject of knowledge constitutes itself through a large number of social factors in its cultural context, like gender, wealth, class, and tradition.
Knowledge has now become a communicative function, an interplay between competence and performance, a “social construction of reality.” It is no longer result of any inherent human characteristic. Circumstances in society affect the subject’s knowing and knowledge. The question of the nature of knowledge is now replaced with the question of knowledge’s social connection and of rationality in communicative social course of events.
The philosophical core of postmodernism is a rejection of foundationalism, defended as the belief in given or fully attainable truths. LeRon Shults notes that postmodernism was born “out of the death throes of foundationalism.” The distinguishing features of the postmodernism can be identified as (1) rejection of an essentialist metaphysics; (2) a nonfoundationalist epistemology; (3) the historical contingency of all ides and a constructivist view of knowledge; (4) an aversion to metanarratives; and (5) the decentering of the self. Postmodernists differ from one another in important respects.
The nonfoundationalists defend an aesthetic relation to self; one should affirm “one’s liberty” by devising a personal style in opposition to all ruling norms. They attempt to immunize particular interpretations from critique by appealing only to the intra communal factors; they disengage themselves from any inter communal or extra communal factors. From a static and monist outlook on human kind, these newer attempts emphasized that the knowledge is produced in the interaction between subject and context. This means the earlier anthropological essentialism was discarded in favour of a relational view of the human person.
Postmodern theologies

The Liberation theology as well as the consequent third World theologies, though aimed at “a radical break” from the Euro-centric epistemologies could not escape the project of modernity, the dialectical progress of history and the Marxist “metanarrative” of class struggle. These contextual theologies could not accommodate epistemological and anthropological pluralism because of their basic foundationalistic world-view. Several contemporary scholars responded to the challenge raised by the nonfoundationalist theory of knowledge in a variety of ways. These nonfoundationalist theologies are postmodern as they reject the modern project of metanarratives but in that attempt find themselves in the awkward position of emitting ultraliberal as well as ultra conservative responses.

Among the liberal postmodern theologians Mark C. Taylor, Thomas J.J. Altizer, Robert P. Scharlemann, Charles Winquist, David Ray Griffin and Don Cupitt are important, though their works are not identical. Don Cupitt and Mark. C. Taylor endorse the line of thought of postmodern philosophers like Jacques Derrida, Michel Foucault, and Gilles Deleuze. Both of them are influenced by Nietzsche’s ideas on the death of God. To them the death of God meant “the death of a transcendental signifier stabilizing identity and truth” and their concern is not a theology in the traditional sense but an “a/theology.” As Taylor calls it.

Among the conservative Postmodern theologians Graham Ward includes the names of George Lindbeck who initiated the Postliberal school of theology and his Yale colleague, Hans Frei , whose Biblical interpretation became basic source for this school, and other Yale students like William Placher, Ronald Thiemann and Kathrynn Tanner. Archbishop Rowan Williams of Canterbry also is included among the postliberal theologians. John Milbank, a sociologist, whose theology of Radical Orthodoxy, though nonfoundationalist, is premodern as it rejects any traffic between theology and contemporary human or natural sciences.
Postliberalism

Postliberal theologians reject the nonfoundationalists claim “that knowledge is grounded in a set of non-inferential, self-evident beliefs.” For them experience comes to us always as interpreted . There is no way for us to check them against some primordial, uninterpreted experience.” The nonfoundational or antifoundational character of Postliberalism goes back to Karl Barth or even to Aquinas. Barth held that there could be no “foundation, support, or justification” for theology in any philosophy, theory or epistemology” Karl Barth affirmed the self-authenticating Word of God as the foundation of theology. The truth of this Word is self evident to the believer. It may not make any sense to those who do not share the faith. This Barthian approach to Bible has influenced the postliberalist thinking that other religions or schools of thought can have their own valid set of foundations with no need of authentication from any outside authority. Lindbeck also is open about his indebtedness to Aquinas who wrote that the Christian language about God is true, but we do not know how it is true. We know God loves us, but we do not know what love would be like for God. We cannot go beyond our experience; we can only work within the rules the community provided to talk about God. As the title of the postliberal theologian William Placher’s book suggests, Christians need not "apologize" for their theology not conforming to non-Christian standards of rationality.

The postliberal approach finds important the differences among religions, rather than their commonalities. They don’t agree with the pluralists that all religions are saying the same thing. Postliberal theology “emphasizes the scriptural stories or narratives by which Christians identify God and the Christian community and come to understand their own lives.” Interpreting Hans Frei, the postliberalists argue that the Christian story for them can shape the Christian communal identity. It has the assimilative power to absorb the world. Postliberal theology emphasizes the importance of an intratextual use of scripture, relying on “the distinctive internal logic of Christian beliefs and practices. Kathryn Tanner “refuses to locate divine acts in some larger narrative of what is happening in creation, but insists on the primacy of God’s activity, but she sees such an account as ‘empowerment’ of quests for social justice rather than ‘tyranny.’ Postliberalists attempt for the “creative fusion of hermeneutics and epistemology.”

Postfoundationalism
If the problem with foundationalism was that it missed the communal factors by absolutizing the thinking subject, nonfoundationalism attempted to “immunize particular interpretations from critique by appealing only to those communal factors”. J. Wenzel van Huysteen, a Princeton theologian and proponent of a postfoundationalist theology fears that postliberal approach to community would develop ghetto mentality or “closet foundationalism.” For van Huysteen, the task of theology is “both to understand and explain.” He criticizes the postliberalists for rejecting the latter aspect of theology and making it simply “narrative” Our knowledge of reality is always mediated by our interpretation of experience. Our claims of truth are not absolute because our interpretation of reality is fallible. Our language is metaphorical and therefore cannot be absolutized, even if it is fully operational with in a given community. He says that interpreted experience is key to the relation between truth and knowledge. According to Mark Bevir, postfoundationalism implies that the individuals can have experiences and exercise their reason only against the background of a social practice or tradition. Individuals can exist only against the background of the community: “an individual is embedded within the community.” Postfoundationalism safeguards identity not by immunizing it against any critique but by emphasizing difference – otherness. It does not make a closed community, as is the tendency in postliberalism or radical orthodoxy, but rather stands for “an open community.
Van Huyssteen, suggests “critical realism” as a way of overcoming the dichotomy between the thinking individual and closed community. According to Tom Wright, a New Testament scholar and the Bishop of Durham,
...[critical realism] is a way of describing the process of "knowing" that acknowledges the reality of the thing known, as something other than the knower (hence "realism"), while fully acknowledging that the only access we have to this reality lies along the spiralling path of appropriate dialogue or conversation between the knower and the thing known (hence "critical").

Van Hyussteen has his own version of critical realism that “affirms the embedded nature of human knowledge and existence” Critical realism, believes that the conceptual categories that we use to identify and understand social events are not exogenously determined; rather these categories are socially and historically determined. Critical realism is mainly employed by scientist turned theologians like John Polkinghorne, Ian Barbour, and Arthur Peacocke who were influenced by the scientist turned philosopher, Michael Polanyi. Polanyi's ideas were taken up enthusiastically by T. F. Torrance a theologian who finds dialogue with science important. Following van Hyussteen LeRon Shults attempts to develop a postfoundationalist theology based on the theological method of Wolfhart Pannenberg, who promotes dialogue with science and the philosophy of Calvin Schrag. Schrag holds that though our knowledge is contextual and fallible that do not automatically entail relativism. Reason has a binding effect across the contexts. Based on this philosophical approach postfoundationslim “insists on developing transcommunal and intersubjective explanations,” a necessary correction to postliberalism. Now we will briefly look at how Indian Dalit theologians deal with the challenge of postmodern theories.

Dalit theology

Dalit theology emerged as an academic discipline in the 1980s. It emerged as a quest for a “contested epistemology; it offered a “methodological challenge to the grand narratives of ‘prefix-less’ theology and Indian Christian theology.” Arvind P. Nirmal(1936-1995) rejected the Brahminic tradition in Indian Christian theology He observed that even though a third world theology was emerged in the 1970s under the influence of the Latin American Liberation theology it “failed to see in the struggle of Indian dalits for liberation a subject matter appropriate for doing theology in India.” Liberation theology or the third world contextual theologies could not offer a proper method for analyzing and interpreting the story of the Dalits. Dalit theology needed “a methodological shift in this postmodern context.” In his search for a suitable critical and constructive method Nirmal digged out the neglected Indian protest tradition of Lokayata or Carvaka school of Indian philosophy which rejects the Brahminic notion of esoteric knowledge. Vinaya Raj introduces a nonfoundationalist poststructuralist method of deconstruction, suitable for Dalit theology. He writes: “Deconstruction-- the poststructural method, as it believes in the fluidity and nonfixity of the meaning/subjectivity helps us to produce new meanings through discursive readings.” The nonfoundationalist poststructuralist strategies offer alternate ways of looking at theories of self and social formations, and transform existing caste practices and institutions in order to construct a sense for Dalits as active social agents.

Conclusion

Colin Gunton is of the opinion that we should not give up our search for foundations. For him non-foundationalism is a reflex to foundationalism. He argues, “that the basis and criteria of rationality are intrinsic to particular human intellectual enterprises, which should not have imposed upon them in a procrustean way the methodologies which are appropriate for other forms of intellectual life.” Yet Gunton rejects non-foundationalism as it constructs a barrier to outside critique. The nonfoundationalists “run the risk of the rank subjectivism… they evade the intellectual challenge involved in the use of the word ‘God’.” Basing on the theology of Cappadocians Gunton writes that since God is a communion of persons and each person is distinct but inseparable from the others, God’s being consists in relationship with one another. He writes,

…[the] three persons are for and from each other in their otherness. They thus confer particularity upon and receive it from one another. That giving of particularity is very important: it is a matter of space to be. Father, Son and Spirit through the shape – the taxis – of their inseparable relatedness confer particularity and freedom on each other. That is their personal being.

For Barth the doctrine of the imago Dei means that God created human beings for fellowship. Humans are naturally fellowshiping beings, with other beings and with God. It also means only in relationship with God that we can be fully human. There is no objectively existing datum that can be called religion, no “true religion” as such. Neither are we able to discover truth. We only become real only in relation between objectivity and subjectivity. Hendrick Kraemer called this Barthian approach “Biblical realism.” Since we cannot understand ourselves or others wholly we must focus on what we are made for—relationship. So the encounter with other religions must focus on the relational aspects of the encounter. The relational character of being human existence, the network of existence need to be the common ground between people, defined by way of religions, ethnicity, race, language or gender. Postliberlaism failed to note this relational aspect of Barthian theology, instead they used him mainly to insulate themselves from any outside scrutiny. Postliberal suggestion that Christian community exists alongside other communities with each having its own rules of discourse and linguistic conventions, each becoming a system unto itself, without any cross-cultural, universal values, is not satisfactory. The problem the postliberalists want to solve is not solved as there still looms the danger of the most dominant group exerting its values upon others. Colin Gunton criticizes postmodernity as “an imperious for truth which abolishes all other truth by a form of homogenization. It is, despite appearances, a form of universalism” Postliberlaism deprives itself any theological warrant to establish mutual relationship as the rules of each community remain separate.
The challenge to Christian theology in India is to demonstrate that Christian faith, at its very heart, and not only in its moral preaching, promotes the dignity and honor of human personhood. Christians have to acknowledge the criticisms raised by contemporary discourses on casteism, racism and, sexism. In order to accept the other, to accept difference, theology should change its universal, fixed, absolute categories of knowledge and values and reorient its theoretical basis to accept the validity of multi-foundational faith, values and practices. If we redefine our worldviews it is possible to see that as stars in relation to galaxies, or galaxies in relation to the universe or universe in relation to multiverse are not necessarily centred on any particular point; the world organism, even the atoms and the subparticles exist only in relationship, one keep the other in its place with their simple presence, mutually influencing and shaping other’s identity. If that relationship is broken the entire universe will collapse. Hence our theologies need to be relational with respect to individuals, communities, genders, races, and all creation, resisting all efforts to subsume the difference or drift away from one another.
Select Bibliography
Ford, David F., ed. The Modern Theologians: An Introduction to Christian theology in the twentieth century. Second edition. Cambridge, Mass.: Blackwell Publishers Ltd., 1997. Gellner Ernest. Postmodernism, Reason and Religion. London: Routledge, 1992.Danish Yearbook of Philosophy vol 35, 2000. University of Copenhagen: Museum Tusculanum press, 2001. Healy, Paul. Rationality, Hermeneutics, and Dialogue: Toward a Viable Postfoundationalist Account of Rationality. Aldershot, UK: Ashgate, 2005. Healy, Paul. Rationality Judgment, and Critical Inquiry,” The Electronic Journal of Analytic Philosophy 1:3, 1993. Kamitsuka, David G. Theology and Contemporary Culture: Liberation, Postliberal and Revisionary Perspectives. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999. Lindbeck, Goeorge A. The Nature of Doctrine: Religion and theology in a postliberal age. Philadelphia: John Knox Press, 1984. Nirmal, Arvind P. Heuristic Explorations. Madras: CLS, 1990. Nirmal, Arvind P.ed. A Reader in Dalit Theology, Madras: Gurukul Lutheran Theological College and Research Institute, 1991. Raj, Vinaya, Y. T. “Poststructructuralist theory of language, discourse, power and resistance and its implications for the re-working of Dalit theological methodology,” M.Th. Thesis submitted to the Senate of Serampore College, 2006. Rorty, Richard. The Linguistic Turn: Essays in Philosophical Method .Chicago: University of Chicago press[1967], 1992. Schrag, Calvin. The Resources of Rationality: A Response to the Postmodern Challenge. Bloomington: Indian University Press, 1992. Schwarz, Hans,.Theology in A Global Context: The Last Two Hundred Years Grand Rapids, Michigan/Cambridge, UK: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2005. Shults, LeRon, F. The Postfoundationalist Task of Theology: Wolfhart Pannenberg and the New Theological Rationality. Grand Rapids, Michigan: William B. Eerdmaans, 1999. Toulmin, Stephen. The Return to Cosmology: Postmodern Science and the Theology of Nature. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1982.

Indian Bible Commentary Paul’s Letter to Galatians

2008-07-06T21:55:00.000-07:00

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Indian Bible Commentary

Paul’s Letter to Galatians

Introduction

Book of Galatians has profoundly influenced Christian history. It is considered the "the Magna Carta" of Christian freedom. The epistle to Galatians pictures the early church's struggles to free itself from the so called "Judaizers" who would have made the Christian Church a Jewish sect had they been successful. The Judaizing faction, based in Jerusalem, had their missionaries sent to Pauline congregations to teach them the necessity of observing the Mosaic law for their salvation. They had the support from the Jerusalem Church headed by James, brother of Jesus Christ. Even Peter and Barnabas were misguided by their arguments and stopped eating with Paul's gentile converts. Paul defended the freedom and equality of the gentiles and argued that no law is applicable to them for their salvation as they are justified by faith in the Christ of God. The Judaizers on their turn attacked the authenticity of Paul’s apostleship. In the letter to the Galatians Paul defends his credentials as a true apostle of Jesus Christ and upholds that the freedom the gentiles enjoy is on account of their faith in Christ and not based on any observance of rituals or the Law. In discussing his theological position with regard to the Gospel of God in Christ Paul touches upon the equality of races and genders well as the significance of religious traditions like Judaism. The major themes selected for study in this article are the meaning of Gospel, importance of faith for salvation, meaning of God's promise or covenant, place of non Christian traditions in relation to Christian faith, the question of circumcision and baptism, and human freedom.

Date and Purpose

Of the seven undisputed Pauline letters, Galatians is the most difficult to date. Scholars, are not in agreement whether the Galatians were written before or after the Council of Jerusalem which is referred to in Acts 15 which might have happened in CE 50. Some scholars hold that the Galatians may be the earliest epistle, written in CE 48 by Paul before the Council. They also differ in the purpose of both accounts. While Acts try to justify Peter, Galatians is written for Paul’s self defense. This epistle has considerably helped the church to establish itself as a separate entity different from the Jewish church. We take the view that it was written after the Jerusalem Council by Paul to win back people of Galatia from the “Judaizers” or the “agitators” (as some commentators would like to call them) and make them accept his apostolicity.

Context of the letter

This letter has in its background the ethnic conflict between Jews and proselytes to Judaism as well as gentile Christians. Also it deals with the questions related to the practice of Jewish Christians refusing to eat with the Gentile Christians, an issue similar to the question of untouchability and caste system existing in the Indian Church; this has made the letter particularly significant to India. The religious background of Galatia was also multi-religious as that of India. The local population worshipped Greek and Roman deities as Galatia was converted by Caesar Augustus to a Roman colony. Galatia also had a large number of Jews, who followed the Second Temple Judaism and there were also few proselytes to Judaism. The Christian church in Galatia was comprised of Jewish as well as gentile converts. The “Judaizers” who came from Jerusalem held that although ultimately there would be no difference between the Jews and gentiles before God, in the penultimate conditions, the gentiles had to undergo Jewish ceremonial laws of circumcision and commensuration (laws regarding eating with gentiles, i.e., abstaining from Table fellowship with the non-Jews) before becoming Christians. The question of circumcision was more a gender issue rather than a question of observance of the Jewish Law.

The way the apostles handled the issue of salvation of gentiles as well as the issue of circumcision at the Jerusalem Council, specifically the question of the equality of all human races before God, has some thing important to say to the pluralistic religious and social context of India especially with regard to the prevailing caste and gender inequalities. Paul upheld that gentiles are acceptable to God in the same way the Jews are and faith is the only condition for salvation; in Christ all human made barriers -- religious, cultural or gender -- are broken down and all are one in Christ.

Acts and Galatians

Galatians chapter 2 and Acts chapter 15 refer to some apostolic meeting in Jerusalem which Paul attended. But Paul’s version of the meeting is different from Luke’s account. Acts 15 tells us that James decided, on behalf of the church, that gentiles should have to undergo circumcision, and should abstain from “things polluted by idols and from fornication and from whatever has been strangled and from blood" (15.19-20). Paul’s version of the decision of the council was that "we [Paul and Barnabas] should go to the Gentiles and they [James, Cephas, and John] to the circumcised. The only one thing they asked was to “remember the poor, which was actually what I was eager to do" (2.9-10). As Paul has understood the Council did not demand gentile circumcision. It was only some agitators who had the blessings of certain apostles of Jerusalem under the leadership of James, who wanted to create seeds of dissention among the Galatians, which Paul vehemently opposed. He had to oppose even Peter who changed his position after the intervention of the missionaries from Jerusalem. Even Barnabas sided with them.

Both Acts and the Galatians agree that in Christ salvation is possible for all people. However, the methodology of arriving at the conclusion has become crucial for Paul, than the conclusion itself. Here Paul contrasts “faith in Christ’ with “works of the law." These phrases subsequently "became ciphers for the superiority of Christian faith and the inferiority of Jewish Torah-observance” (Tatha Wiley, p. 9). The other Apostles upheld the role of Torah in the history of salvation. In Galatians Paul admits James, Peter and John are reputed to be pillars in the church, but their reputations mean nothing to Paul and he is every bit equal to other apostles. However, the Acts clearly subordinates Paul to the Jerusalem authorities and all that they represented theologically went against the independent Pauline line. Proper attention to the ethnic conflict between the Jewish and the gentile Christians will shed much light into Paul's arguments in this letter in defense of the gentile Christians.

While the Galatians has no reference to Damascus in Acts the geographical centre of Paul’s conversion experience is Damascus. In Galatians Paul notes the significance of Arabia where he spent several years after his conversion which finds no reference in the Acts. Often we see the authority of Paul as expressed in Galatians countered by the Acts narrative. The author of Acts attempts to cut Paul down to a subordinate position to the Jerusalem apostles. Acts rejects Paul’s sniffing at Cephas, James and John. Galatians, on the other hand holds that James, Peter and John all have agreed with Paul in Jerusalem. The letter to Galatia has in its background not only the gentile Jewish conflict but also the hierarchical struggles among the apostles.

What happened in Antioch?

The Antioch incident' described in Galatians 2.11–21 “remains a crux interpretum in New Testament studies” (Stephen Anthony Cummins, 2001). This incident sheds considerable light on both Pauline theology and the development of the early church. As Tatha Wiley says, the letter draws us to the “controverted heart of Christian origins.” The Antioch confrontation has served as a source of consternation and controversy in the early church. For example, Marcion (d. c. AD 160) used it to promote anti-Judaism in the Church; the early third century Pseudo-Clementines used it to attack Paul; and Porphyry (c. 232–303) used it against Christianity itself. Irenaeus (c. 130–200), made use of it in his combat against certain gnostic advocates of Paul. He viewed Peter in a more positive light by subduing Paul to Jerusalem apostles' authority. Tertullian (c. 160–220), reacting against Marcion, maintained that the two apostles shared the same basic gospel.

According to Eusebius, Clement of Alexandria (c. 150–215) simply maintained that the Peter of Galatians was not the apostle Peter, but rather another of the seventy disciples bearing the same name (see Luke 10.1). Origen (c. 185–254) held that both Peter and Paul were only pretending to dispute with one another in order to condemn more effectively the Judaizers. Aquinas (1225-74) followed Augustine(354–430) in viewing Paul's public rebuke of Peter as a necessary response to an action which was an unacceptable renunciation of the truth. However, Aquinas held that it constituted only a venial rather than a mortal sin. It was exactly at this point Luther (1483–1546) differed with Aquinas. For Luther the conflict was no mere pretence ; it was a clear desertion of the truth of the gospel. On the basis this view Luther rejected all the veneration of the saints, the significance of papal decisions and the value of works of satisfaction. Luther held that the central tenet of the Gospel has to be justification by grace through faith, and not through any “works of the law' (Gal. 2.16). However, for F. C. Baur, the founder of the so-called Tübingen school, the churches in Jerusalem (led by James) and Antioch (led by Paul) represented the outworking of a division between two Christian “parties”: the conservative “Hebrews” and the more liberal “Hellenists” (see Acts 6.1- 8.4). Baur's view has been a dominant force in nineteenth and twentieth century interpretations of the Antioch incident. Still today debates on justification by faith and the role of exegetical method in relation to matters of theology, dogma and praxis are prevalent among the ecumenicals and evangelicals. In the context of India this background information will help us to gain some theological insights regarding how to address the socio-cultural problems existing in the Indian Church.

History of interpretation

Paul is weaving together several stories throughout Galatians. This is perhaps his most narrative epistle considering how much storytelling plays a part in his argument. Historically, the book of Galatians has misled Christian commentators largely due to the technical discussions of biblical topics ranging from circumcision, to the Torah, and to freedom in Christ. Jerome thinks that Paul is playing upon the name Galatians, claiming its derivation from the Hebrew word Galath, which means fallen or carried away, as though Paul wanted to say, "You are true Galatians, i.e., fallen away in name and in fact." For Luther it was Jewish legalism that Paul opposed. Since Luther it has been regarded justification by faith is central to Paul’s theology. Calvin also held justification by faith as a central doctrine in Paul. Bultmann understood justification by faith against the background of his existential understanding of anthropology. He considered the first century Judaism as legalistic in his work, Primitive Christianity. That means Judaism believed that salvation was depended on the observance of the law, or good works in accordance with the law. Bultmann held that Paul took his central ideas, motifs and theology from Hellenism and not from Judaism. He found an antithesis between Paul and Judaism . Bultmann’s ideas dominated the thinking of early twentieth century scholarship.

Albert Schweitzer on the other hand considered Paul as a Jewish thinker and not a Hellenistic. It has to be noted that for Schweitzer, the centre of Paul’s theology was not justification by faith but Christ-mysticism. Schweitzer regarded Christ-mysticism as the centre of Pauline theology within the context of apocalyptic Judaism; he rejected the influence of Hellenistic Judaism upon Paul (Schweitzer, Mysticism, pp. 225, 295) This understanding of Paul as a mystic would be helpful to interpret Galatians in the Indian context. Kristel Stendahl, in his famous article, “The apostle Paul and the introspective conscience of the West ”(1963) held that Paul did not see any fundamental problem in Judaism. For him the pre-Christian Paul did not find any problem in finding his salvation in Judaism. Stendahl blamed Augustine for making Paul a person who had an introspective conscience. He held that it was Luther who degraded Paul’s justification by faith as an answer to individual salvation. Stendahl identified Paul’ s Damascus encounter as a calling rather than a conversion. Like Schweitzer, Stendahl interpreted the justification by faith in relation to Paul’s Gentile mission. This way of looking at Paul’s relation to Judaism would enlighten us in India in our approach to different religious traditions existing in the Indian missionary context, which constitute the spiritual background of Indian Christians. We can more tolerantly and with genuine openness approach and understand our mother traditions. As Chakkariah has pointed out, Hinduism to him is the spiritual mother while Christianity is his wedded love.
A New Perspective

Contemporary Pauline scholars challenge the theological historical assumptions embedded in the dominant interpretation of Galatians. A major challenge came from the “new Perspective” advocated by scholars like Krister Stendahl, E. P. Sanders, James Dunn, and N. T. Wright in the 1960s. Galatians had too often been interpreted in the adversus Judaeos tradition which suggested a superior Christianity (faith) over against an inferior Judaism. The New Perspective rejected the idea that a theology of works-righteousness can be found at all in the Second Temple Judaism, popular during Paul’s time. They considered the view of works-righteousness as a polemical caricature of Judaism, not a historical reality. The theme of salvation by grace through faith occurs almost exclusively in Paul’s letters to Galatians and Romans. In these two letters Paul deals directly with the relationship of Gentile and Jewish followers of Jesus. Paul believed passionately in grace and faith, so did other Jews of his day.

Influenced by Augustine and Luther, scholars once assumed that the pre-Jesus Paul carried a heavy burden of sin. This argument was based on Romans 7 and 1 Timothy 1:15 where Paul calls himself the foremost of sinners. the “New Perspective” school began reading ancient Jewish texts on their own terms, rather than through the Christian lenses. They found that texts like Galatians 1 and Philippians 3 reveal that Paul did not struggle under a burden of sin; rather, he remained proud of his faithfulness to the law throughout his life. Does it not suggest that in India those who come from traditional local faith traditions can uphold what ever is not inimical to Christianity, once they embrace it? Perhaps it suggests more than that. Just as Paul argued that his revelation is equally valid and he himself is equal to any of the other apostles, Christians in India can validly claim a direct revelation from Christ. Perhaps, this is what Chenchiah meant when he spoke of the “raw fact of Christ” which is not supported by any traditions.

Paul indeed emphasized the equality of Jews and Gentiles in their faith to Christ (3:26). E. P. Sanders, in his Judaism held that the notion of justification by faith resulted from Paul’s Gentile mission was a polemic response against his opponents. What was distinctive of his mission was the inclusion of Gentiles without requiring them to observe Israel's Torah. In this new perspective, Paul’s conversion was not from Judaism to Christianity, as in leaving one religion for another. Instead, he received an "apocalypse" from God, that revealed the risen Jesus to him. Paul's gospel was not simply the announcement of salvation by grace through faith as held in the older perspective. Paul's gospel proclaimed God's decisive saving action in the death, resurrection, and return of Jesus. "Christ has died, Christ is risen, Christ will come again." Paul proclaims the righteousness and power of God, demonstrated through the faithfulness of Jesus Christ (not simply "faith in" Jesus) to save humankind and the cosmos.

The new perspective in Pauline studies considerably benefit Jewish-Christian relations as Christians seriously try to understand Judaism on its own terms. It prompts us to interpret Hinduism or any other religion on its own terms and find the link to Christian faith not as its fulfillment rather from an altogether different angle, in a “good neighbor” paradigm. In the older perspective, following Augustine and Luther, Christians sought to get people lost before they can be saved. The new perspective, while it takes sin seriously, instead announces God's lacerative acts on behalf of individuals, communities and all of creation. While the old perspective calls people to repent and find forgiveness, the new perspective invites people to participate in the ongoing work of God. Paul applies the same equality to Jews and Gentiles as well as to slave and free (which undermined the very basis of Rome’s economic system) and to male and female (which undermined the patriarchal basis of Roman society, grounded in the idea of Caesar as paterfamilias for the whole empire). This means that there must be no second-class citizens in the Church; that there should be provision in the Church structure for women to have equal authority as well as equal opportunity to leadership, teaching, and prophetic ministry; that gentiles and Jews as well as slaves and free people are to be treated on equal level in the Church of Christ.

What should be asserted in India is that one individual or religious community, is not more disadvantaged than the other, one is not more welcomed than the other, one is not more privileged than the other in relation to Christ. All have equal standing before God; no one is great or small before God.

Table fellowship: A Caste issue?

Exegetes and theologians once presumed that Paul’s theological concepts like justification could be discussed independently of their social setting. Today it is axiomatic that meanings are intimately bound up with social settings. The major question in Galatia was with regard to the nature of table fellowship of Jewish and Gentile Christians. Though the Roman masters would eat at the same table with slaves and other lower-class people, but they would maintain the status differentiation by offering differing kinds of food and thus reinforce the divisions in Roman society through the public table practices. Paul responds to this practice in 1 Corinthians 11. The question of table fellowship among Christians in Antioch was different. Here Judaistic Christians missionaries who came from Jerusalem taught that unless the gentiles become Jews first sharing a common table with them was not in order. Paul accuses that Peter and Barnabas sided with them. Such an act from the side of apostle like Peter would pave way for the practice of social inequality between Jews and Gentiles in Christ’s church. Paul found it contrary to the faith in Christ and also to the Abrahamic faith which Jewish Christians acknowledged. Paul’s argument for common table fellowship was based on the promise of God to Abraham that all nations will be blessed in Abraham. According to him fulfillment of the promise of God was ultimately fulfilled in Jesus who is the seed of Abraham. The Judaisers also accepted and strongly promoted the view that Jesus is the seed of Abraham. We may remember that both Matthew and Luke in their Gospels found it necessary to include the genealogies that would support the lineage of Jesus from Abraham, in the case of Luke, he would even trace it back to Adam.

Many western missionaries who came to India were critical of caste system though they were not as critical of racism in their own homelands. M.M. Thomas in his book, Salvation and Humanization, narrates an incident happened in South India. The high caste converts of an Anglican Church in Madurai sent a complaint to their bishop asking him to restrict the missionaries from giving Holy Communion to them along with the untouchable. Even such strong steps from missionaries did not completely eradicate castes system from the Indian Churches. Caste discrimination continued to be even strengthened under the native leadership after the independence of India. Now this is the major issue that threatens the good news of Christ in India. If churches do not take strong stand against casteism, the Indian churches would be missing the truth of the Gospel which Paul defended so strongly in his letter to Galatians.

The circumcision: A gender issue?

Through out the Christian tradition, the circumcision preaching had been interpreted as a threat not to the equality of members in the assemblies but to the legitimacy of the Christian gospel. But Tatha Wiley has introduced a different interpretive principle to understand the Galatian conflict. She raises the question about the feelings of women in the Galatian Assemblies with regard to circumcision. She argues that the dispute between evangelists over the necessity of circumcision was, in its immediate communal context as well as direct consequence, a dispute over whether the membership of Gentile believers in the Galatian assemblies would be differentiated by gender (Wiley,11). For her the question of circumcision was directly related to gender and it remained at the heart of the Galatian conflict. Paul as well as his Jewish friends were competing to win the hearts and minds of the Gentile men and women in the Galatian assemblies. The circumcision conflict not only raised the question of membership in the church, but also about women’s role in the churches. Equality of the all congregational members was part of the constructed social reality of the first Christian generation. For Tatha Wiley circumcision would not only enforce the Jew/Gentile dichotomy but also the male/female division of Judaism. Circumcision implies that women are lesser people who are unable to have real authority and leadership in religious life. Paul not only argues that Jesus abolishes the concept of the “Holy of Holies” accessible only to the high priest but Paul rejects the whole Jewish religious system with its divisions between Jews, Gentiles, men, women, priests, and people. For her, to some degree, Paul’s rejection of physical circumcision might mean a rejection also of male privilege (Wiley, 120). She asserts that the question of purity was not the deciding factor that excluded women, also fear of circumcision was not the only factor that entitled adult Gentile men with the status salvation.

Paul’s interference was precisely for the equality of Gentile women in the Galatian Assemblies. Paul’s rejection of physical circumcision might mean a rejection also of male privilege. She holds that Paul is of the opinion that without theTorah, differences between women and men are removed and that women, like men, are to be admitted to the assemblies as persons, turning to the God of Israel by way of their own decision.

Chapter Analysis: Argumentation

This letter is written after the model of a Greco-Roman apologetic letter: prescript (1:1-5), introduction (1:6-11), narrative (1:12-2:14), proposition (2:15-21), proof (3:1-4:31), exhortation (5:1-6:10), and conclusion (6:11-18).Paul begins by mentioning the Christ-narrative: “who gave himself for our sins, that he might deliver us from this present evil age” (1:4). After asserting his apostleship Paul pronounces curses upon any one, who should dare to preach any other gospel than Christ's own, first preached by Paul. Next he moves to a lengthy account of his personal conversion history (1:11-2:10), filling in the story with enough historical details to sketch a rough timeline of his conversion when compared with Acts. Chapter 2 is also narrative. The seemingly instructive section of chapter 2 (2:15-21) almost certainly belongs to Paul’s address to Peter at Antioch. In the second chapter Paul deals with the Antiochean controversy. In both Jewish and Greco-Roman circles, eating with someone was a sign of communion with them, and such communions enforced unity among the same group members and created division between different groups. “Good Jews” didn’t eat with “sinners.” Jesus got into trouble for “eating with sinners.” Paul’s chastisement of Peter was for his subservience to this Jewish practice by breaking the table fellowship with the Gentiles that Paul practiced in his churches. Table fellowship was a concept that had serious social implications at that time. Paul’s practice was to include all at the table, Jew and Gentile, slave and free, male and female, which is a practice that stands in stark contrast to the Jewish practice. It was contrary to the Roman practice of serving different foods for different categories of people. Elsewhere he emphasizes One body, One bread, One Spirit.

Discussion in the second chapter is particularly significant to the Indian church situation where caste conflicts destroys intercommunion of different castes. Most churches in India are infested with this kind of destructive practices. People find it difficult to cross the caste barriers and enjoy table fellowship or marital relationships across caste divisions. Many high caste Christians adhere to the Judaistic or Petrine position and refuse to eat with the lower castes. Paul’s courageous stand must encourage Indian Christian to overcome the caste mentality and accept all humans equally worth in Jesus Christ. As noted above this is the biggest task of the Indian churches.

Paul takes up Habakkuk’s text (Hab. 2:4) which says that the righteous will live, not by their own righteousness, but by faithfulness to their vision. Paul somewhat alters its perspective. He focuses not on the faithfulness of the vision but on the faith of the one who waits for the vision; so it is the “righteous by faith who will live.” If this is so then one cannot possibly be righteous by the law. Faith decides righteousness. Commitment to one’s vision also impute righteousness. Just as people with religious orientation are guided by their faith, people committed to their ideological persuasion could also be made righteous on account of their vision, by Pauline argument. Faith and vision both go beyond oneself, transcends the narrow selfish interests and rises to level of spirituality. Thus Paul offers consolation of acceptance by God, not only for the religious but also for secular person. In the next section, Paul reaches all the way back to Abraham and traces Abraham’s story as the paradigm for conversion, and in the rest of chapter 3 as well as chapter 4 Paul continues to give instruction through means of intertextual allusions. Paul begins his third chapter with the curse of the law in Deuteronomy (3:10), then moves next to the question of being justified by faith with reference again to Habakkuk (3:11). Then he centers on Christ’s crucifixion (3:13-14) which inaugurated the next stage of the gospel going to the Gentiles and finally the coming of the Spirit (3:14).

It has been usually held that chapter three, especially 3:10-12, stood at the heart of Paul’s message to the Galatian believers The key argument in this chapter is that it is impossible for a person to be justified by observing the law. The law nullifies any religious observance that negates the earlier promise given to Abraham, who was himself a gentile without circumcision. In a religiously fundamentalist country like India this argument brings liberation to people who want to maintain a free fellowship with God without any interference from the religious hierarchies of different sorts. Salvation is unattainable by obedience to the law’s commands, because no one is able to continually remain in steadfast obedience to them. The issue in Galatia was that the law-observant Judaizers seek to turn Christian Gentiles to law-observers as well. Paul opposes this trend with all his might.

Paul says that Christ has been portrayed as crucified before their eyes (3:1). He makes mention of their having received the Spirit (3:2-3), and point out that they have suffered many things (3:4). Now someone has bewitched them (3:1). Later in 6:12-13 Paul writes that the Judaizers are greedy for the flesh of the Galatians, for their own gain not for the gain of the circumcised.The law does not operate on the principle of believing, but on the principle of doing (Gal. 3:12).The law does not confer righteousness since nobody is able to keep it, but it participates in the prophetic witness to righteousness. The law upholds the principle that obedience confers blessing. Paul argues that the law did not annul or add to the principle of justification by faith. This is clearly seen in the way God ratified his covenant with Abraham in Genesis 15. Following the customs of the day, animals were cut apart and the halves arranged opposite to each other. The parties were to pass through the pieces, and so the covenant would be ratified in blood. However, in making his covenant with Abraham, God passed between the pieces alone. Again, this suggests that this covenant is not so much an agreement as it is a declaration of what God promises to perform. The fulfillment of the promises does not depend on both parties playing their parts, since Abraham had no part - the covenant does not depend on him, but only on God's ability and faithfulness to perform what he has promised. But what Paul is really saying (v. 17: "what I mean is this"), is that since no one can set aside or add to even a human covenant that has been duly established (v. 15), then, "The law, introduced 430 years later, does not set aside the covenant previously established by God and thus do away with the promise" (v. 17). The inheritance was given to Abraham by promise - by God's sovereign declaration of what he would perform - and ratified in blood. And as we have seen, the promised blessing is applied through faith to those whom God has chosen to believe. The law, which came after, does not affect this, whether we are referring to the promised inheritance or the means by which it is applied (v. 18). Therefore, the principle of justification by faith is preserved despite the formal institution of the law.

Chapter three has been used by Prosperity Gospel preachers to reinforce their own gospel. The prosperity Gospel preached by many fast track gospel preachers severely damage the message of the Gospel. Blessings from God has been equated with materialistic growth. The bedrock of the prosperity gospel is Galatians 3:29: “ And if you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s offspring, heirs according to the promise.” Some others appeal to Gal. 3:14, which says “that in Christ Jesus the blessing of Abraham might come to the Gentiles . . . .” Certainly Gospel is related to human well being. But the contention of the prosperity Gospel that God bestows material blessings proportionate to the amount of prayers of believers is mocking the image of God portrayed by Jesus, God as the parent of all who bestows blessing according to the needs of every one, not by the acts or merits of any one. Acquiring more than what one needs is against the gospel as it is evident in the sermon on the mount as well as from the parable of the labourers in the vineyard. Paul also speaks of materialistic equality as the will of God in II Corinthians 7. In the New Perspective approach the debate in Galatians 3 is not over how an individual becomes saved, but what the children of Abraham look like. Paul asserts that they look like people with faith, without respect to the works of the law, all to be one in Christ, irrespective of the one’s birth, gender, caste, colour, nationality, culture or religion.

Paul continues his discussion in Chapter Four on how we inherit the promises of Abraham in faith by the grace of God. The Hebrew word, hen, speaks of undeserved favor. It is usually translated to Greek as charis, grace, graciousness, grace in a person, favor, gracious care, undeserved gift that which one grants to another, or the action of one who volunteers to do something on behalf of another. Grace can be never earned or deserved, but can only be received as a gift. Grace is all that God is free to do and it functions apart from all human works, cooperation or merit. Grace is universally free and is designed to impart happiness and joy on all. In the Greek and Roman cultures, sons were not automatically heirs to their father's estate. When they reached a point of maturity where they could understand what it meant, usually between 14 and 18, they went through a formal adoption process where they received “the full rights of sons”, qualifying them to inherit their father's estate. Until then even though they were biologically related to their fathers, they had no more legal standing than the household slaves. Through the Lord's atoning sacrifice, we've been given “the full rights of sons” in our Father's family. No longer slaves to sin, and not just forgiven, we've been made heirs with Christ of all eternity.

Galatians 5 is considered as a pivotal text for understanding Christian freedom and calling. It has been a dear text for the monastic movement. Monastic life has been an attempt to walk and live with Jesus. For this the Monastic Fathers and Mothers sought to create an environment which was acoustically perfect to hear God's voice. However, such an environment turned out to be artificial. To walk freely one must first recognize all those various artificial environments. When people forget the artificiality of their environment and take it as an immutable law of nature they get trapped within the 'game', within the confines of the environment. Freedom in Christ means that one need not limit oneself to a few of these 'games,' ritualistic, or monastic, pietistic or of such sort. Paul affirms this by saying that he is free to be all things to all people; that he has authority over all things, though he in his freedom has refrained himself from many things for the sake of the weak members of the community. Jesus in his ministry illustrated this freedom by throwing out social conventions that restricted the exercise of one's freedom as human being - he touched the outcasts, ate with them, broke Mosaic law of purity and pollution, allowed women disciple to accompany him even in long journeys such as to Jerusalem , enlarged the concept of family, called God “Daddy,” discarded all the usual pietistic life style of the Pharisees, acknowledged the faith of the non Israelites, crossed the boundaries of Israel to live with the gentiles, ate and drank with them, never insisted on any religious strictures upon his followers.

What Paul is suggests is to drop all hypocrisy! To be free in Christ is to shun away all hypocrisy since Christ considered hypocrisy as the greatest of sins that distorts one's relation to God and others in community. One does not have to pretend to be something else in Jesus community. All are accepted as they are by Jesus. One does not have to worry about one's religion, sexual orientation, intellectual abilities while coming to Jesus. All his friends in Galilee were marginalized people, thrown out of the elite society. For him all social rules were artificial.

Paul has been dealing with two ethnic groups of people in the entire context of the letter to Galatians – Jews and Gentiles. What Paul spoke of the “uncircumcised,” -- the “Gentiles,” --and the “circumcised” in Gal. 2:7-9 is repeated in Gal. 6:15. The term “Israel” has always been used as an ethnic reference to the people who have descended from the patriarch Jacob. Some scholars, called the covenant theologians, argue that Paul equated Church with Israel. However, it should be noted that any Church literature that equates the Church to Israel was not found until 160 A.D. Paul has been emphatic in rejecting any attempt to bind Christians to the Jewish community or the observance of the Law. Any attempt to achieve salvation throught he observance of the Jewish Law has been considered by Paul as a denial of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Therefore it is unfair to Paul to say that he equated Gentile Christians to the new spiritual Israel, or made the Church the new spiritual Israel, as claimed by some theologians.

Theological Themes:

Gospel of God

It is important to examine what Paul understands by the term “gospel” in the letter to the Galatians. Paul’s usage of the term must be searched in two possible background sources: the Hebrew scriptures on the one hand and pagan usage
on the other. In other words, the Pauline meaning of the Gospel has to be searched in the message of Isaiah or in the Greco-Roman imperial proclamations. In Isaiah 40.9 we read of the herald of good tidings who proclaims “Here is your God!” and in 52.7 we read of the messenger who announces peace, who brings good news, who announces salvation, and says to Zion, “Your God reigns.” These passages, deal with the great double theme of Servant Songs (Isaiah 40-55): Yahweh's return to Zion and enthronement, and the return of Israel herself from her exile in Babylon. For some, this is the background against which the New Testament term, “gospel” need to be understood. The Isaianic tradition of “good news” was prevalent in the Second Temple period, which sets the background of the New Testament.

Others insist upon the pagan background of the gospel. In the Greek world good news is a technical term for "news of victory." It would refer to the announcement of the birth or accession of an emperor. The coming of a new ruler meant the promise of peace, a new start for the world. Then the question that has been raised is whether “the gospel,” for Paul, an Isaianic message or a pagan Imperial proclamation? The New Testament scholar, N.T. Wright suggests that such an anti-thesis between Jewish and pagan is a false and misleading one. Wright argues that for Paul, gospel, primarily, is a message about the true God as opposed to the false gods; secondly, it is a message about the Messiah, the true king of Israel, and hence of the world; the “gospel” confronts directly the claims of other gods and lords. The message of good news decisively confronts the power of the spurious gods. Here the question is, whether the regular Pauline phrase “the gospel of God”, should be read as “the gospel concerning God” or as “the gospel from God”. Though it is difficult to divide them up completely, the Galatians suggests that the content of the gospel is primarily, God. Hence, Gospel is Gospel of God in Christ.

The gospel certainly concerns the Christ, the Jewish notion of Messiah; it is through the Messiah that the true God has revealed the gospel which involved the portrayal of Jesus Christ as the crucified one (3.1). “The gospel” is not a message about “how one gets saved,” in an individualistic and ahistorical sense but the announcement of God’s rule, a summons to share in the blessings of the “age to come,” proclaimed by Isaiah.
For Paul there is no other gospel besides the one he had preached to the Galatians. He preached, not a gospel of his own invention, but the very same Gospel God had long ago prescribed in the Sacred Scriptures.

Abraham’s Children: Children of Promise or People of Faith

Another significant usage of Paul in Galatians is his interpretation of Abraham’s role in human salvation -- the meaning of the “children of Abraham” and “Abraham’s faith.” For the Jews the children of God meant the descendants of Abraham (John 8:31-47). It is likely that the Judaizers has asserted that it was necessary for the Gentiles to become children of Abraham first in order to be saved, that is in order to become the children of God. They insisted that in order to become the children of Abraham, it was necessary for them to receive circumcision, the physical seal of the covenant that God made with Abraham (Genesis 17:9-14). Paul refers to the case of Abraham not only to counter the Judaizer's misuse of covenant history and their misinterpretation of the ters “children of Abraham.”

Paul affirms that according to the Scripture Abraham was righteous because of faith and not works. When he appeals to the verse again in his letter to the Romans, (See Romans 4) Paul does expand on this point and reveals some of the reasoning behind his use of it. Christian faith does not enforce worship and declares that God accepts us just as we are, and our worship and service in God's name is a grateful response for that unmerited love and acceptance. God accepted the faith of Abraham while he was still an uncircumcised person; therefore religious rituals have nothing to do with the salvation of God in Jesus Christ. Paul is saying that when it comes to justification, and when it comes to being the children of Abraham and the children of God, it does not matter whether one is Jew or non-Jew, slave or free, male or female. Before God one is not more disadvantaged than the other for all are under condemnation by the righteous judgment of God; one is not more welcomed than the other, for all must come through the faith that God gives; one is not more privileged than the other, for all are children of Abraham by their faith in God. John the Baptist in (Luke.3:8) declares that God can make children of Abraham out of stones. Jesus is said to have declared that salvation of Zachaeus, the socially outcaste tax collector, and that of Lazarus in the parable, are on account of their filial relation to Father Abraham.

Believers are "all one in Christ Jesus" (v. 28) and are the children of God (v. 26). In our context, this supersedes all natural distinctions between individuals, so that in Christ "there is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female." In the caste context of India the concept of being the children of God is important. Seeing the power of the concept Gandhiji called the outcastes, “Harijan,” people of God. However, he could not substantiate this in terms of Hindu theology and ideology which legitimizes varnasramas, the fourfold divisions of society and dharma which requires caste practices as one’s duty, that maintains people outside the caste as “mlechhas” or untouchables.

Paul by employing the term “Abraham’s children” does not mean that Christ has abolished all racial differences, all class disparities, and all gender distinctions. That is, Paul’s logic of promise to Abraham cannot be used to refute plurality of races, classes, and genders. The meaning of the name Abraham itself is “father of many nations.” In Paul’s argument there is a spiritual basis that nullify all racism and sexism, while affirming the plurality of the identity of races and gender. That is, if in Christ there is neither male nor female, Jew or Gentile, that means no racial or gender discrimination should remain, while distinctiveness are legitimately maintained. However, no legitimate distinctions can be maintained in terms of “slave-free” categories, as they are based on economical and not anthropological factors. Paul’s point for the Galatians is that the blessings of Abraham for Gentiles (i.e., Galatians) comes only through Christ and not by observing Mosaic law, as the Judaizers insisted. Furthermore, with Christ’s redemption comes the promise of the Spirit, which, once again, is only available through faith.

Before and Beyond Circumcision

In Galatians Paul argues that the Abrahamic tradition gathers all the gentile faith traditions in Christ. Abraham was justified through faith even before he was circumcised, or before he adopted any particular religious ritualistic tradition. In Galatians 4:8-11, the ex-pagan Galatian Christians are warned that if they become circumcised, that is, aspire to become Jewish, they will in effect be reverting to paganism, forsaking the freedom of faith made available through Jesus Christ. The gospel stands over against any such attempt to circumscribe people to any legal or ritualistic systems of religion. The gospel is a message about the true God. If the “false brethren”, or the Galatian “agitators”, -- the so called Judaizers-- had had their way, the gospel would have become simply an inner-Jewish message, inviting people to get circumcised and to join Judaism. Paul’s reconstruction of the Jewish worldview necessarily broke the bounds of previous Jewish ways. Similarly, the pagans also reconstructs their world view and religious boundaries to go beyond to accept those who hailed the crucified king, Messiah Jesus, as their Lord and formed together a single family of Jews and gentiles. The common table functioned as a vital symbol of this new family of God in Jesus Christ. Paul would speak of scripture “preaching the gospel in advance” to Abraham (3.8). “The gospel” which is thus preached is not the summons to a new dimension of religious experience nor an invitation to a private experience of salvation but the message that all the nations would be blessed in Abraham (3.8b) The story of Jesus the Messiah, narrates how that promise has come true, how the single “seed,” the one family promised to Abraham, has been created, which would have been impossible if Torah was absolutized (3.15-22, 28 29). “Justification by faith” was not,
for Paul, a doctrine about how people could find a gracious God without moralism but the announcement that people are accepted by faith into the united family of Abraham. “Apocalyptic” is not about the destruction of everything that
happened before Jesus and the ushering in of a totally new world but it is about the new creation breaking into the old, true God “rescuing us from the present evil age”(Gal. 1:4). The real “apocalypse” has taken place in the resurrection of the Messiah Jesus (Gal. 1:13), the significance of which is explained through the Abrahamic covenant (Gal. 3-4). Paul's gospel, like Isaiah's, confronts the tyrants and summons their victims to freedom.

Covenant and the Logic of Promise

Covenant is a major theological theme in the Old Testament. Covenant is a formal agreement, contract, testament, or treaty between two parties, with specific obligations on each side. Covenants (Hebrew berith, Greek diatheke, Latin testamentum) often promise specific benefits, rewards, or blessings for people who keep the terms of the covenant but they also threaten with sanctions, punishments, or curses for people who break the terms of the covenant. Covenants also need to be ratified formally, usually sealed with blood. God’s covenant with people in the Bible is in the form of God's promises to people. People are really not a party to the covenant. God makes promises and demands. God makes up for that which is not obeyed by the people in his own person and makes new covenants.
God’s covenant with Noah promises not to destroy the whole human race again through a flood (9:8-11); covenant with Abraham promises that in him all the families of the earth shall be blessed. (12:3; 18:18). The covenant with Moses was interpreted as obeying the laws in return to God’s protection in the promised land. Mosaic Law remained the supreme covenant in Judaism. The law says that the ones who do the law will live by their doing (Lev 18:5). Paul in Galatians attempts to solve the questions surrounding the Torah. Paul argues that the law cannot save for two reasons: 1) no one can keep it; and 2) the law is not of faith. Paul turns to blame the reason for the curse not only on the doer’s inability, but also on the law because it is not of faith. The law has never been meant to save in the first place (3:21-22).

The theology of covenant has very much shaped the interpretation of God’s relation with people in the history of the church. The reformers assumed that Judaism was a religion based on “works” (laws) and Christianity was based on “grace” (faith and trust in God’s promises). Today it is generally acknowledged that the ancient Jews were as much dependent on grace as any Christian. They also viewed the law as a response to what God has done and not as a way of earning God’s favor as previously held. Therefore, it is unlikely that Paul put the law aside in favor of grace. However it must be said that Paul has shifted the locus of our response to grace from Torah observance and to following Jesus and replaced circumcision with baptism as the sign of the covenant.

Christ has come to free humankind, and it is a new age. People are no more imprisoned to the law. They do not need to seek the law for the status of any kind. To reach back to obey the law is to stand still in salvation history. In seeking to observe the law one is seeking to remain under the curse from which Christ has redeemed the world. Those who observe the law are under a curse. They are cursed because by turning back to obey the law, they are rejecting the redemption from the law.

Paul’s statements especially Galatians 3:28, subvert both the hierarchies of ancient Jewish practices and the foundations of Roman society. It also demands equality for women with men which must include all areas of Christian social practice in this age. Women, like men, must enter into the solemn assemblies as persons, turning to the God of Israel by way of their own decision.

The in breaking of God’s reign of peace and justice into this world requires that we radically alter our perception of social relations. According to Paul, Christ’s work on the cross not only brought redemption but was the catalyst for several other steps in the story-line of salvation history.

Freedom in Christ

What is freedom in Christ ? Jesus in his ministry illustrated his freedom by throwing out social conventions that restricted the exercise of his responsibility to the other as a human being -- he touched the outcasts, broke Levitical law, had close women followers, called God 'Daddy', enlarged the concept of family, discarded all the usual pietistic life style of the Pharisees, accepted the faith of the non Israelites, crossed the boundaries of Israel to live with the gentiles, never insisted of any religious rules on his followers. Paul in his letter to Galatians affirms that the freedom Christ brought to them demands continuous exercise of it and they are not to be threatened by any one to the earlier ritualistic bondages of the law. Paul himself understood this freedom to be an exercise that he can be free to be all things to all people; that he has authority over all things, though he in his freedom has refrained himself from many things for the sake of the weak members of the community.

Freedom is something which is difficult to keep up. Unless the individual and the community are not cautious enough freedom will fall back to bondage. The story of sin in the Bible is the story of human inability to maintain freedom and integrity. Humans lost their freedom to their own passions as well as to that of the forces surrounding them. The story of sin that started from Adam and Eve corrupted human culture and civilization. Cain the originator of human culture and civilization became the symbol of violence and cruelty. Social, economic and religious innovations and institutions became part of the vicious circle of sin and violence developing into slavery, casteism, untouchability, gender discrimination, ethnic rivalry, war, imperialism, feudalism, capitalism, consumerism, globalization, the marginalization of the weak and the poor. The Church responded to this crisis of freedom and faith by insulating the lives of the communities and individuals from evil influences through the creation of artificial environment of the monastic system.

The beginning of the monastic movement was from the “desert fathers” who fled the sinfulness of the city life to the loneliness of deserts so that they may not be contaminated. Through the introduction of the monastic system the Church wanted to create an environment which was acoustically perfect to hear God's voice. Monks were trained to live and walk with Jesus within the four walls of monasteries. However, such an environment turned out to be artificial. Outside monastery, the monks found themselves more vulnerable to worldly passions than their counterparts who lived and struggled in the real life world. Church reformers like Martin Luther attacked such artificial spirituality. To walk freely one must get rid of all these various artificial environments. Monastic movement has become the model of the contemporary corporate companies who design their environment, in order to produce more profit. New game rules have been introduced to maximize their profit and to channelize every bit of human energy for the sole purpose of making money, disregarding the values of family, community, leisure, and natural environment that sustain human creativity and freedom. However, when people forget the artificiality of their environment and take it as an immutable law of nature they get trapped within the “game,” within the confines of the environment.

What Paul suggests is to drop all hypocrisy! To be free in Christ is to shun away all hypocrisy since Christ considered hypocrisy as the greatest of sins that distorted one's relation to God and others in community. One does not have to pretend to be something els in Jesus community. The law entices people to pretend that they observe it even though no one is able to be righteous as the law demands. For Paul law is not salvatory, it only highlights human inability to satisfy the righteous demands of the law. As Tatha Wiley argues, it is the Torah that discriminates between women and men. Transcending it means freedom. This is what Paul asks us in the letter to Galatians – go beyond the limitations of the law to the open world of humanity, to cross the boundaries of Jerusalem to Samaria and to the end of the world.

In their attempts to be righteous humans are tempted to pretend before others that they are righteous, which is the most despicable human behavior in the eyes of Jesus. All are accepted as they are by Jesus. One does not have to worry about one's religious or sexual orientation, intellectual abilities or ethnic qualities while coming to Jesus. All of Jesus’ friends in Galilee were marginalized people, thrown out of the elite society. For him all social rules were artificial and hypocritical. Church needs to be an alternative community, where all hypocrisy, hierarchical impositions, spiritual gradations, ritualistic pretension have no place.

Role of religions

The Hebraic way of thinking was different from the Hellenistic way of thinking. Paul spoke to the Jews according to the Hebrew way of thinking, and preached to the Greeks as we see in the Athens incident, in Greek categories (Acts 17:22-31). In his letter to the Corinthians Paul has written that the Jews seek signs while the Greeks seek wisdom. Paul found it necessary to use both ways in order to communicate the truth of the Gospel. Pauline methodology requires one in India to be open to the pluralistic sensibilities, in its various ramifications of Advaitic as well as non advaitic, theistic as well as the non theistic, brahminic as well as the carvaka traditions. It must be noted that even the atheistic traditions like Jainism and Buddhism have contributed to the spirituality of India. Christian theological schools like death of God theology similar to the non theistic Indian religious traditions are more concerned with human suffering and death than some theistic religiosity . It is worth to note that Indian Dalit theologians owe much of their “pain-pathos” methodology to Buddhism rather than to traditional Christian theologies that reject patripassianism, death of God, as heresy. Not only the acclaimed death of God theologians, but theologians like Jurgen Moltmann, and Dorothy Solle, Edward Schillebeekx, and James Cone reject the view that patripassianism, the suffering nature of God, is heretical; they affirm the inevitable suffering and death in God as necessary to explain the love of God.

The missionaries who came to India employed the advaitic brahminic traditions to communicate the Gospel truth to the Indians, but ignored the Jain and Buddhist traditions. Ahimsa, which has been much popularized by Gandhi, owes its origin not to classical Hinduism but to the Jain and Buddhist traditions. In India, advaitic strand of thought has been popular only among a minority brahminic tradition, though that minority is very influential. India has a large number of Dalits and tribals whose thought world has been different from the Brahmin dominated classical Hinduism and its advaitic thought world, but suppressed all through out history. It is now almost acknowledged by scholars that in India Christianity can communicate the Gospel only when it is willing to acknowledge and appropriate these living forms of Indian life world and thought existing among the dalits and adivasi tribals. Here the same spirit of Paul who made himself a Jew to the Jews and Greek to the Greeks need to be remembered and adopted. In Pauline methodology religions are not hindrance to Gospel, but necessary signifiers to the Gospel; religions play a role similar to the Jewish Law. They are valid in themselves and salvifically significant like the Jewish Law, but finds their relevance in relation to Christ. Christianity itself is salvifically significant but has to find its relevance only in relation to the Jewish Law and different religions in context. No religion in isolation , just as no individual in herself /himself, is complete or self-sufficient, but needs one another to find meaning and relevance of its own existence and role in the world.

Conclusion: God's purpose in calling peoples

Paul acknowledges that even before his birth, God had a plan for his life. In India many people believe in destiny. It may have its negative impact on life as it can promote fatalism. But theologians like Calvin believed in predestination which also have some determined course of action in life countermanding freedom of the will. But if we look at Paul's view of it, destiny need not be fatalistic or predetermined. It refers to the plan of God for creation. It is quite understandable that an “intelligent designer “has planned the world in such a way that every part of creation has a specific role to play in the world. Discovering that role relieves us from unnecessary tension regarding the ebbs and flows during the course of life. According to Calvin we need not worry about even our salvation. It is taken care for us by the creator and redeemer. We are free to choose a life that is pleasing to God which is free of any unnecessary worry with regard to salvation. Salvation is already available in Jesus . We are here to praise God for that. Paul is convinced of his life in terms of God's plan to save gentiles. This is asserted not only in Galatians but also in letters to Romans, Ephesians and Colossians. What ever happens in his life, Paul conceives it to be for the promotion of the gospel, God's plan for the creation. This gnana, sapientia, saving knowledge makes one a free person. This relieves us also from worry and care of the vicissitudes of our life. God calls us for fulfilling God’s purpose in creation regardless of ethnicity, culture, religion, language or gender.

The introductory remarks to the letter to the Galatians show Paul’s theological openness and imaginative mind. He claims a direct revelation from God. This he repeats several times. Perhaps he might be attempting to secure his position against the Judaizers who questioned his apostleship. For us in India it opens up some important theological vista. Paul is claiming the rightfulness of direct revelation from God, over and above the mediatory channels, in the form of apostles or theological or religious traditions, though not in defiance of them. It is important to maintain one's theological freedom in order to relate with God. Most often Church traditions limit the freedom of people to approach God directly to God and snub the individual initiatives as heresy. Paul asserts his freedom to preach the gospel as it was revealed to him, while at the same time ready to acknowledge a different way of understanding revelation. What he declares as “eternally condemned” is not the freedom of interpreting the meaning of the Gospel, but forcing people to a particular interpretation of it on the basis of some kind of self-declared authority. Schweitzer’s observation that Paul has been a mystic adds strength to us in India to work out a mystic path of salvation, not in monastic isolation, but in creative confrontations with a hypocritical spirituality. Paul is creating a new path towards God, a kind of active mysticism and experience-in-relation to Christ.

Paul addresses God as father, Father of Jesus Christ. It has been unusual in the Jewish circles. Today the fatherhood represents the patriarchy, hierarchical dominance of the male over the female, rather than the intimacy of filial relationship with God. Jesus and Paul use this term to show that a believer has the status of an offspring, sonship or daughtership, in relation to God. However, the “fatherhood of God,” consciously or unconsciously, is used in the Church today in order to deny women their rightful claim before God. They become secondary in their relation to God on account of their gender which has become explicit in denying them ministerial ordination in many major churches. Moreover, it symbolizes a wrong Trinitarian theology in which the “motherhood of God” is pushed to the background to uphold “manliness” of the Father. Today many Christians fail to acknowledge the motherhood of God, while many women refuse to acknowledge the domineering Patriarchal symbol of Fatherhood as irrelevant today. Patriarchy denies the equality of women before God. The retrieval of Motherhood of God is important in the post modern world and Paul has given us the right to address God in intimate categories because God is a person of relationship and not of some supernatural authority, or a symbol to validate the male supremacy in the world.

What is the relation of Christians to the world? There are passages used to show that world is inhospitable and must be rejected. Paul in all his letters has given adequate importance to ethics, human behavior in this world. Paul is aware of the good and bad aspects of life. One is not separated from the other though they are quite distinctive. Though not the dualism of classical Greek thinking where good and bad are two distinct realities Bible and Christians have acknowledged that the world made good by God has been corrupted and the free will of human beings has been distorted and perverted. Evil is the misuse of freedom of the will. God is always at the helm of affairs by controlling the evil and helping the humans to overcome the evil, by giving them the power of God’s spirit and vision about the world. God is creating strong human persons to lead the world in the newness of the spirit. Paul is invoking that spirit so that the disciples may not become susceptible to evil.

For further reading:

Betz, Hans Dieter. Galatians. Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1979.

Cummins, Stephen Anthony. Paul and the Crucified Christ in Antioch: Maccabean Martyrdom and Galatians. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001.

Dunn, James D. G. The Theology of Paul’s Letter to the Galatians. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993.

Matera, Frank,J. Galatians. Sacra Pagina Series vol.9. Collegeville, Minnesota: The Liturgical Press, 1992.

Schweitzer, Albert. The Mysticism of Paul the Apostle. London:A. & C. Black. 1931

Wiley, Tatha. Paul and the Gentile Women: Reframing Galatians. London: T&T Clark, 2005.

Gurukulam. Com: Race and Caste: Civil Rights Leader Rosa Parks Collection

2008-07-04T17:50:00.000-07:00

Gurukulam. Com: Race and Caste: Civil Rights Leader Rosa Parks Collection

BSP MLA arrested for ‘raping’ research scholar

2008-06-29T17:33:00.000-07:00

Expressindia » Story
BSP MLA arrested for ‘raping’ research scholar

Press Trust of India
Posted online: Sunday , June 29, 2008 at 08:50:08
Updated: Sunday , June 29, 2008 at 10:22:40

Lucknow, Jun 29: BSP MLA Bhagwan Sharma alias Guddu Pundit was arrested on Sunday from sector 24 of Gautam Buddha Nagar for allegedly raping a research scholar.

Sharma was arrested after a FIR was lodged against him by a woman research scholar of Agra University under various sections of the IPC including 376 (rape) and 120 B (criminal conspiracy) at Kasganj police station in Kashiram Nagar, Additional Director General of Police, Brijlal told media.

Besides, section 147 (rioting), 366 (illegal confinement), 363 (whoever kidnaps or abducts a women and compels her to marry or have a sexual relation), 497 (adultery) and 420 (cheating) were also slapped on the MLA, Brijlal said.

Sharma, an MLA from Debai seat who had defeated BJP leader Kalyan Singh's son Rajveer Singh Raju was given Z plus security on the recommendations of the state government.

In her complaint, the research scholar from Agra alleged that the MLA had married her two years ago by hiding the fact that he was already married and had two children, the ADG said.

"He (MLA) wanted me to be his kept and terrorized me physically besides mentally torturing me", the ADG said quoting the research scholar.

She also alleged that she was kept in different places and raped several times by the MLA's men.

Brijlal said, on the basis of the complaint of the woman, Station House Officer of Ramghat police station in Bulandshahr was suspended for trying to frame her and a colleague in fake cases of auto theft and fraud.

Asked whether the arrest was made on the direction of the Chief Minister, Secretary Home Mahesh Kumar Gupta said that GB Nagar police arrested him after being tipped off by the police chief of Kanshiram Nagar.

First Blog

2008-06-27T03:22:00.000-07:00

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