AUM
AMERICANS BUYING RUSSIAN CHOPPERS FOR AFGHANS
By Brigadier Chitranjan Sawant,VSM
Truth is stranger than fiction. But it is gospel truth that the Pentagon of the United States has invested a large sum of money in buying both new and redone Russian helicopters for the fledgling Afghan Air Corps. What happened to the patriotic slogan “Be American Buy American.” The slogan is intact and well set in its place. However, Pragmatic philosophy has carried the day.
WHAT A U-TURN
Indeed it is a U-turn for the US Pentagon. In the 1980s when the Soviet armed forces were in occupation of Afghanistan, the Pentagon had financed and supplied Stinger missiles to the Afghan rebels to shoot down Soviet choppers and low flying fixed wing aircraft. The Stinger missiles were deadly and effective. Now in 2010, the Pentagon has gone in for a big buy of Russian Mi 17 transport helicopters to equip the Afghan Air Corps. The United States will be spending as much as 648 million US dollars to buy new choppers or refurbish their used ones As many as 31 Mi 17 Russian helicopters are being bought this year and ten more would be bought next year. Over a dozen plus choppers would be bought over aperiod of a decade or so. The American trainers are hopeful that by 2016, five years after the date set for beginning a planned withdrawal of the US forces from Afghanistan, the Afghan Air Corps would be ready on its own and run the show in the skies. Their strength and that of the choppers would go up many times.
The US Congress is not happy about the deal with Russians on the military choppers. The Congressmen feel that the Pentagon did not go in depth to analyse the issue and push for buying American helicopters. They also have opined that the Russians realised that there was no competition in the arms bazaar and so they charged exorbitant price even for the refurbished helicopters. The loss of face and loss of money could have been avoided with a little forethought and proper forward planning.
MI 17 SUIT AFGHANS
The Soviet designers had made Mi 17 helicopters for the Afghan skies. This sturdy war horse is best suited for the Afghan skies. It flies on the heights of the Hindu Kush and negotiates the high altitude desert too. Further the recruits for the Afghan Air Corps are by and large illiterate. They have to be taught both native language as well as English from the scratch. Since the language of the cockpit is English the pilots should be conversant with the language. Listening, understanding and speaking English is not an easy job for the Afghan trainees. India too has been contributing quite a lot in the field of education, especially English and Sciences, not forgetting Maths. The officers of the Army Educational Corps of the Indian Army have been doing the teaching job for quite some time. Two officers attained martyrdom in a dastardly attack by the L eT, egged on by the ISI of Pakistan. Nevertheless the job in hand has to be completed, come what may, so say the Indian Army officers. Commendable attitude they have displayed, indeed.
General Mohammad Dawran, Chief of the Afghan Air Corps has said that most of the trained helicopter pilots are in their forties now. It would be difficult for them to switch over from the Russian machine to the American machine at this stage. It is right from the days of the Soviet occupation that the Russian equipment was introduced and found quite effective in that climate and terrain. General Dawran threw his weight behind the No-changers andhis logic was accepted by the American advisors. Hence in 2010 the decision was made to go in for the Russian helicopters. Brigadier Michael Boera of the US Air Force who is in charge of training the Afghan Air Corps supported the view taken by the Afghan officers and their political masters. The US Pentagon went with them, much to the chagrin of the US Congress.
COMBAT ROLE FOR CHOPPERS
As of now the Russian helicopters of the Afghan Air Corps are being used in the support role. They carry supplies and ferry officers and troops to and fro. They do go to the combat zone but only to deliver supplies and carry armed forces personnel. The role of these transport helicopters and their pilots has been well appreciated. Top ranking politicians, including Afghan President Hamid Karzai and top ranking US Army General also are flown by the Afghan pilots. However, no combat role has been chalked out for them so far.
In not too distant future the pilots of the Afghan Air Corps may be given a combat role. It is envisaged that again a Russian built helicopter would foot the bill. The Mi 35 gunships have proved themselves in counter-insurgency warfare in Russia and elsewhere. Chechnya, Ingushetia, Dagestan and other Muslim dominated provinces of the Russian Federation created law and order problems. The central government in Moscow under the leadership of the ironman, Vladimir Putin dealt with Islamist insurgency very effectively. Reportedly the use of Mi 35 helicopter gunships was found to be very effective. In view of their past performance, Mi 35 helicopter gunships may be introduced in Afghanistan too. Of course, Afghan pilots, gunners, navigators and other personnel will have to be trained thoroughly before they are assigned combat roles. That explains why the American trainers have set 2016 as the deadline for the Afghan Air Corps to act independently without the aid and assistance of personnel of the US Air Force.
Many a time an element of doubt crops up about the competence of the Afghan combat pilots to act on their own. A parallel is drawn from the era of the Soviet withdrawal and collapse of the Afghan administrative and defence infra-structure. That was the time whem the Taliban came in and filled the vacuum. They took control of the country under the guidance of their mentor, Pakistan. Is the history likely to repeat itself? One sincerely hopes not. It is the moral duty of the US Administration to ensure that the control of a country like Afghanistan is not handed over to the Taliban and their mentor, Pakistan on a silver platter. It will be the Dharma of the democratic countries in the neighbourhood to come to the active aid of the new administration of Afghanistan to ensure that the Rule of Law prevails.
Email : upvanom@yahoo.com Mobile : 0091-9811173590.
Sunday, June 20, 2010
Saturday, June 19, 2010
THE THREE MARTYRS
Remembering the three martyrs: Bhagat Singh, Rajguru, Sukhdev
Bhagat Singh, Rajguru and Sukhdev became Martyrs for the cause of independence of Bharat. They did not submit to the diktats of the British Raj. They had moral courage to withstand the atrocities of the police and jailors. We salute them.
An Article by Brigadier Chitranjan Sawant,VSM
MAHATMA GANDHi arrived in Karachi in the month of March, 1931 to participate in the annual Congress session. There was a surprise in store for him. He was not a welcome guest to a large section of vocal people assembled there.
They waved black flags and shouted slogan “ Gandhi Go back”. Unbelievable but true. The vociferous youth were members of the Navajawan Sabha, a forum of the Congress party itself. Lo and behold! The restive youth were led by no less a person than Subhash Bose, a giant among men.
The sad cause they espoused was : non-intervention of Gandhi Ji in getting the death sentence of Bhagat Singh, Rajguru and Sukhdev commuted. The three brave young men who challenged the British Raj and fought for the Independence of their motherland, Bharat, were hanged by the neck by the British Indian government on 23rd March 1931 in the Lahore central jail. Against all rules, the hanging was done in the evening at 7.33 P.M .Their bodies were hurriedly disposed off to avoid peoples’ ire The Three young men became Martyrs for the cause of their motherland.
The Indian nation was in a state of shock on their premature hanging, a day before the appointed date, and after a slipshod funeral on the banks of the Sutluj river at Hussainiwala near Ferozepore. It was a sacrilege and added insult to injury. Instead of condoling their deaths and comforting their families Ghandhi Ji, in his own wisdom, had chosen to proceed to Bombay to see off Lord Irwin, the outgoing Viceroy who had declined to commute the death sentence of the three young freedom fighters. There was general indignation. The black flag demonstration against Gandhi Ji was a manifestation of the pent up anger of the people.
Vedic Influence On Martyrs
An analytical study of the events in the Punjab in the first few decades of the twentieth century points to the influence of the Arya Samaj, founded by Swami Dayanand Saraswati in Bombay in 1875 and in Lahore in 1877. No section of the populace remained untouched by this great historical event, irrespective of the religious faith they subscribed to.
I need not emphasize the obvious historical fact that the foundation of the Arya Samaj in Lahore was laid in the garden of a Muslim gentleman, Doctor Rahim Khan. The Vedic discourses were attended by a cross section of the population comprising Hindus, Muslims and Sikhs. Reverting to our subject of the martyrs, it would be appropriate to mention that Bhagat Singh, a born Sikh, had his sacred thread ceremony, Yajnopavit, done as a child, notwithstanding his caste being a Sandhu Jat, who were not entitled to hold the ceremony.
The Arya Samaj, a reformist movement, had opened the portals of Vedic knowledge and sixteen sanskars to one and all. Bhagat Singh was a beneficiary of the Arya liberalisation, courtesy his grandfather, Arjan Singh and father, Kishen Singh. His one uncle was also hanged as a freedom fighter and another had to leave India for Iran to avoid persecution at the hands of the British overlords.
Sukhdeo, the second martyr, too was from Lyallpur like Bhagat Singh and the family did not remain untouched by the waves of reform powered by the Arya Samaj. Both Sukhdeo and Bhagat Singh had enrolled themselves for studies in the National College, Lahore that had a preponderance of professors, who had received their education and baptism in Nationalism at the Gurukul Kangri, Haridwar, founded by Swami Shraddhanand.
Bhagat Singh was a student of the DAV School, Lahore too for a period of time and the spirit of freedom was indeed instilled in him there too. Vedalankar, Vidyalankar – the two degrees of Gurukul Kangri were in evidence in surfeit among the teaching faculty of both the educational institutions that shaped the personality and instilled patriotism and moral courage among many a greedom fighter, including our national Martyrs, Bhagat Singh and Sukhdeo.
Rajguru’s was a different story. Born in a village near Pune in Maharashtra in a family that comprised Purohits and students of the Vedas, they were appropriately addressed as Rajguru. It was the pursuit of Vedic studies that brought Shivram Rajguru to Varanasi and later to Kanpur to meet revolutionaries of the eminence of Chandra Shekhar Azad.
Bhagat Singh too had made more than one visit to Kanpur with the common intent of freeing the motherland through other ways and means than the one espoused by Gandhi Ji. These young men had no faith and, of course, no patience to follow the path of Ahimsa for achieving independence. Of course, the three had become inseparable comrades-in-arms in the noble cause where bomb – making and killing of foreigners or their lackeys was not a taboo. The revolutionaries from Bengal were a great help and they always came forward unhesitatingly. Many a time Bhagat Singh, Sukhdev and Rajguru had to miss a meal, forego new clothes to save money for the revolutionary cause.
FIGHT TO FINISH
AIM – that indeed is the first principle of war. Our revolutionaries knew this and indeed practised this. They had Independence of India as their sole aim. They did not allow any other thing to come in between that could make them deviate from the AIM. Not even the girls. Delving deep into their contemporary history, a researcher will have no option but to pronounce that celibacy was their creed. They could not but cling to creed unflinchingly. They had great disdain for the institution of marriage until independence was achieved. A mere mention of marriage was to them like a red rag to a bull.
Bhagat Singh, Sukhdev and Rajguru had left their homes and near and dear ones for the cause celebre and would not le marriage derail their noble mission. Notwithstanding their young age, the period when the urge for sex is at its zenith, they never thought of women, leave aside craving for company. This character quality is indeed laudable. It is a beacon light for the youth of the twenty first century where sex is taken as a dynamo to energise all activities. The three Martyrs show us light at the end of the tunnel. Even a blind person will not miss it.
Bhagat Singh and Rajguru came from different ethnic backgrounds but their aim was the same. Bharat Mata Ki Jai – that was their creed and that was their slogan. They had unflinching faith in their mission and knew that they would achieve the AIM – living or dead. In any case, the Vedic philosophy of life had it ingrained in them that the soul never dies, it only changes the bodies. Believers in the Vedic Trinity know it well that Parmatma, jeevatma and Prakriti have separate existences, never born and never die. Why grieve for a change in outer appearance.
This Vedic belief buttressed their determination to fight to finish; fight to win. Bhagat Singh, Sukhdeo and Rajguru had seen the barbarity of the British police officers when they cane charged the Indian procession at the Lahore railway station where they had assembled to show black flag to the Simon Commission as it was anti-Indian.
An old and venerable leader like Lala Lajpat Rai, a doyen among Aryas and Congressmen alike, was not spared the baton. Saunders, a police officer, himself beat Lala Ji resulting in his premature demise within a month. It was then and there that Bhagat Singh, Sukhdeo and Rajguru had vowed to avenge the insult and injury to venerable Lala Lajpat Rai, a great disciple of Swami Dayanand Saraswati. Our revlutionaries fought to finish and achieved their aim.
Chandra Shekhar Azad too had joined them when they made a plan to kill the Superintendent of Police, Scott, who had ordered the lathi charge. He was present at the time of execution of the plan too. Well, under a mistaken identity, Saunders, who was equally guilty of humiliating Indians, was killed by their bullets near the police station in Lahore. It shook the British administration not only in Punjab but in the rest of India too.
Bhagat Singh and Batukeshwar Dutt had the moral and physical courage to bomb the Central Assembly in New Delhi on 8th April 1029 and fire a few shots from the visitors’ gallery when the Public Safety Act was being passed as an ordinance after it was voted out by the Indian members. Our Duo had not intended to kill or injure anyone. By a loud explosion and smoke they wished the deaf government in Delhi to heed to the voice of the Indian masses. Their mission was a success, notwithstanding the sentence of life imprisonment awarded to them. Of course, the case of shooting the police officer in Lahore and trial of the three freedom fighters in Lahore gave a new turn to events as mentioned heretofore.
MEMORIES OF MARTYRS
Bhagat Singh was in the hot seat after Sunders, the British police officer, who was shot dead by the revolutionaries to avenge the death of Punjab Kesari, Lala Lajpat Rai. Lahore was not a safe place for him and his comrades-in-arms. To avoid detection by the British government sleuths, Bhagat Singh had shorn off his long hair and beard. He dressed like a European, was accompanied by a lady, Durga bhabhi (wife of another revolutionary) with a babe in her arms to give the impression of a family leaving Lahore and travelled first class in the train.
They left Lahore undetected. A great escape indeed like that of Neta Ji subhash Chandra Bose later from Calcutta. Rajguru left Lahore like a labourer and Sukhdeo like a daily wage earner. Chandra Shekhar Azad was clever by half and even his friends were amazed how he got away from the prying eyes of the alert spies and police personnel. He too died a Martyr’s death later in Allahabad Alfred park fighting the police like a possessed man.
The three Martyrs were almost of the same age group.Great bonhomie prevailed among them. Notwithstanding heated discussions on political and economic matters they remained bosom friends till they breathed their last at the gallows with a broad grin and smile on their faces. Bhagat Singh was merely 23 years old and so was Sukhdev Thapar; Shivaram Rajguru was only 22 years old when they kissed the noose at the gallows and attained martyrdom.
Every year on 23rd March we remember them for their patriotism and courage. Many men and women go to their Samadhi – the place where they were cremated on the banks of the Sutluj river in Ferozepore to offer flowers. Their lives thrill our youth till today. No wonder more than half a dozen movies have been made and screened by Bollywood handing down their sacred memory to posterity so that the boys and girls of today are prepared to defend the hard won freedom and keep our Bharat mata free from shackles of all kinds.
Let us take a leaf out of the prison diary of Shaheed Bhagat Singh and share his thoughts. He wrote :
“ Social progress depends not upon the ennoblement of the few but on the enrichment of democracy ; universal brotherhood can be achieved only when there is an equality of opportunity – of opportunity in the social, political and individual life.”
Bhagat Singh, Rajguru and Sukhdev became Martyrs for the cause of independence of Bharat. They did not submit to the diktats of the British Raj. They had moral courage to withstand the atrocities of the police and jailors. We salute them.
An Article by Brigadier Chitranjan Sawant,VSM
MAHATMA GANDHi arrived in Karachi in the month of March, 1931 to participate in the annual Congress session. There was a surprise in store for him. He was not a welcome guest to a large section of vocal people assembled there.
They waved black flags and shouted slogan “ Gandhi Go back”. Unbelievable but true. The vociferous youth were members of the Navajawan Sabha, a forum of the Congress party itself. Lo and behold! The restive youth were led by no less a person than Subhash Bose, a giant among men.
The sad cause they espoused was : non-intervention of Gandhi Ji in getting the death sentence of Bhagat Singh, Rajguru and Sukhdev commuted. The three brave young men who challenged the British Raj and fought for the Independence of their motherland, Bharat, were hanged by the neck by the British Indian government on 23rd March 1931 in the Lahore central jail. Against all rules, the hanging was done in the evening at 7.33 P.M .Their bodies were hurriedly disposed off to avoid peoples’ ire The Three young men became Martyrs for the cause of their motherland.
The Indian nation was in a state of shock on their premature hanging, a day before the appointed date, and after a slipshod funeral on the banks of the Sutluj river at Hussainiwala near Ferozepore. It was a sacrilege and added insult to injury. Instead of condoling their deaths and comforting their families Ghandhi Ji, in his own wisdom, had chosen to proceed to Bombay to see off Lord Irwin, the outgoing Viceroy who had declined to commute the death sentence of the three young freedom fighters. There was general indignation. The black flag demonstration against Gandhi Ji was a manifestation of the pent up anger of the people.
Vedic Influence On Martyrs
An analytical study of the events in the Punjab in the first few decades of the twentieth century points to the influence of the Arya Samaj, founded by Swami Dayanand Saraswati in Bombay in 1875 and in Lahore in 1877. No section of the populace remained untouched by this great historical event, irrespective of the religious faith they subscribed to.
I need not emphasize the obvious historical fact that the foundation of the Arya Samaj in Lahore was laid in the garden of a Muslim gentleman, Doctor Rahim Khan. The Vedic discourses were attended by a cross section of the population comprising Hindus, Muslims and Sikhs. Reverting to our subject of the martyrs, it would be appropriate to mention that Bhagat Singh, a born Sikh, had his sacred thread ceremony, Yajnopavit, done as a child, notwithstanding his caste being a Sandhu Jat, who were not entitled to hold the ceremony.
The Arya Samaj, a reformist movement, had opened the portals of Vedic knowledge and sixteen sanskars to one and all. Bhagat Singh was a beneficiary of the Arya liberalisation, courtesy his grandfather, Arjan Singh and father, Kishen Singh. His one uncle was also hanged as a freedom fighter and another had to leave India for Iran to avoid persecution at the hands of the British overlords.
Sukhdeo, the second martyr, too was from Lyallpur like Bhagat Singh and the family did not remain untouched by the waves of reform powered by the Arya Samaj. Both Sukhdeo and Bhagat Singh had enrolled themselves for studies in the National College, Lahore that had a preponderance of professors, who had received their education and baptism in Nationalism at the Gurukul Kangri, Haridwar, founded by Swami Shraddhanand.
Bhagat Singh was a student of the DAV School, Lahore too for a period of time and the spirit of freedom was indeed instilled in him there too. Vedalankar, Vidyalankar – the two degrees of Gurukul Kangri were in evidence in surfeit among the teaching faculty of both the educational institutions that shaped the personality and instilled patriotism and moral courage among many a greedom fighter, including our national Martyrs, Bhagat Singh and Sukhdeo.
Rajguru’s was a different story. Born in a village near Pune in Maharashtra in a family that comprised Purohits and students of the Vedas, they were appropriately addressed as Rajguru. It was the pursuit of Vedic studies that brought Shivram Rajguru to Varanasi and later to Kanpur to meet revolutionaries of the eminence of Chandra Shekhar Azad.
Bhagat Singh too had made more than one visit to Kanpur with the common intent of freeing the motherland through other ways and means than the one espoused by Gandhi Ji. These young men had no faith and, of course, no patience to follow the path of Ahimsa for achieving independence. Of course, the three had become inseparable comrades-in-arms in the noble cause where bomb – making and killing of foreigners or their lackeys was not a taboo. The revolutionaries from Bengal were a great help and they always came forward unhesitatingly. Many a time Bhagat Singh, Sukhdev and Rajguru had to miss a meal, forego new clothes to save money for the revolutionary cause.
FIGHT TO FINISH
AIM – that indeed is the first principle of war. Our revolutionaries knew this and indeed practised this. They had Independence of India as their sole aim. They did not allow any other thing to come in between that could make them deviate from the AIM. Not even the girls. Delving deep into their contemporary history, a researcher will have no option but to pronounce that celibacy was their creed. They could not but cling to creed unflinchingly. They had great disdain for the institution of marriage until independence was achieved. A mere mention of marriage was to them like a red rag to a bull.
Bhagat Singh, Sukhdev and Rajguru had left their homes and near and dear ones for the cause celebre and would not le marriage derail their noble mission. Notwithstanding their young age, the period when the urge for sex is at its zenith, they never thought of women, leave aside craving for company. This character quality is indeed laudable. It is a beacon light for the youth of the twenty first century where sex is taken as a dynamo to energise all activities. The three Martyrs show us light at the end of the tunnel. Even a blind person will not miss it.
Bhagat Singh and Rajguru came from different ethnic backgrounds but their aim was the same. Bharat Mata Ki Jai – that was their creed and that was their slogan. They had unflinching faith in their mission and knew that they would achieve the AIM – living or dead. In any case, the Vedic philosophy of life had it ingrained in them that the soul never dies, it only changes the bodies. Believers in the Vedic Trinity know it well that Parmatma, jeevatma and Prakriti have separate existences, never born and never die. Why grieve for a change in outer appearance.
This Vedic belief buttressed their determination to fight to finish; fight to win. Bhagat Singh, Sukhdeo and Rajguru had seen the barbarity of the British police officers when they cane charged the Indian procession at the Lahore railway station where they had assembled to show black flag to the Simon Commission as it was anti-Indian.
An old and venerable leader like Lala Lajpat Rai, a doyen among Aryas and Congressmen alike, was not spared the baton. Saunders, a police officer, himself beat Lala Ji resulting in his premature demise within a month. It was then and there that Bhagat Singh, Sukhdeo and Rajguru had vowed to avenge the insult and injury to venerable Lala Lajpat Rai, a great disciple of Swami Dayanand Saraswati. Our revlutionaries fought to finish and achieved their aim.
Chandra Shekhar Azad too had joined them when they made a plan to kill the Superintendent of Police, Scott, who had ordered the lathi charge. He was present at the time of execution of the plan too. Well, under a mistaken identity, Saunders, who was equally guilty of humiliating Indians, was killed by their bullets near the police station in Lahore. It shook the British administration not only in Punjab but in the rest of India too.
Bhagat Singh and Batukeshwar Dutt had the moral and physical courage to bomb the Central Assembly in New Delhi on 8th April 1029 and fire a few shots from the visitors’ gallery when the Public Safety Act was being passed as an ordinance after it was voted out by the Indian members. Our Duo had not intended to kill or injure anyone. By a loud explosion and smoke they wished the deaf government in Delhi to heed to the voice of the Indian masses. Their mission was a success, notwithstanding the sentence of life imprisonment awarded to them. Of course, the case of shooting the police officer in Lahore and trial of the three freedom fighters in Lahore gave a new turn to events as mentioned heretofore.
MEMORIES OF MARTYRS
Bhagat Singh was in the hot seat after Sunders, the British police officer, who was shot dead by the revolutionaries to avenge the death of Punjab Kesari, Lala Lajpat Rai. Lahore was not a safe place for him and his comrades-in-arms. To avoid detection by the British government sleuths, Bhagat Singh had shorn off his long hair and beard. He dressed like a European, was accompanied by a lady, Durga bhabhi (wife of another revolutionary) with a babe in her arms to give the impression of a family leaving Lahore and travelled first class in the train.
They left Lahore undetected. A great escape indeed like that of Neta Ji subhash Chandra Bose later from Calcutta. Rajguru left Lahore like a labourer and Sukhdeo like a daily wage earner. Chandra Shekhar Azad was clever by half and even his friends were amazed how he got away from the prying eyes of the alert spies and police personnel. He too died a Martyr’s death later in Allahabad Alfred park fighting the police like a possessed man.
The three Martyrs were almost of the same age group.Great bonhomie prevailed among them. Notwithstanding heated discussions on political and economic matters they remained bosom friends till they breathed their last at the gallows with a broad grin and smile on their faces. Bhagat Singh was merely 23 years old and so was Sukhdev Thapar; Shivaram Rajguru was only 22 years old when they kissed the noose at the gallows and attained martyrdom.
Every year on 23rd March we remember them for their patriotism and courage. Many men and women go to their Samadhi – the place where they were cremated on the banks of the Sutluj river in Ferozepore to offer flowers. Their lives thrill our youth till today. No wonder more than half a dozen movies have been made and screened by Bollywood handing down their sacred memory to posterity so that the boys and girls of today are prepared to defend the hard won freedom and keep our Bharat mata free from shackles of all kinds.
Let us take a leaf out of the prison diary of Shaheed Bhagat Singh and share his thoughts. He wrote :
“ Social progress depends not upon the ennoblement of the few but on the enrichment of democracy ; universal brotherhood can be achieved only when there is an equality of opportunity – of opportunity in the social, political and individual life.”
Friday, May 21, 2010
CHINESE TEACHERS IN AMERICA
AUM
CHINESE TEACHERS GET CULTURAL SHOCKS IN AMERICA
By Brigadier Chitranjan Sawant,VSM
Zhong Yue, a 27 year old Chinese teacher enters her classroom in a school in Lawton, Oklahoma, USA to teach the American students Chinese language. Some students are chewing gum, others are just in a relaxing mode; half sitting and half lying in their seats. No one gets up to honour the teacher. Zhong Yue is shocked at this behaviour of her students.
The student advisor explained to her later that it is considered normal behaviour in that part of the world. The Chinese teacher found it in contrast to the student behaviour back home in China. There the moment students see a teacher enter a classroom, they jump to attention. Not doing so in America did not mean showing any disrespect to a teacher by the students, the headmaster explained later.
TEACHING – LEARNING PROCESS
Zhong Yue found her American students intelligent and quick on the uptake. They were keen on learning the new language, especially the script comprising characters that represented ideas. There are no alphabets in Chinese script unlike English. The American students found the script and the tonal spoken language rather difficult to learn. But the patience and perseverance of the Chinese teacher and the desire of students to learn a new language worked like a spoonful of sugar that makes the bitter medicine go down in a delightful way. Their combined efforts produced results and in the periodical tests no one submitted a blank answer sheet. Three cheers to the teacher and the taught, so said the academic head of the secondary wing of languages.
The class was going on smoothly day after day and week after week. There was a storm in the tea cup of the oriental teacher. As she was writing the Chinese characters on the black board, there was a minor commotion in the class. A teenage student entered with a new born baby in her lap and showed her to the class with a sense of pride. Students welcomed the new arrival in the lap of an unwed teenage mother and celebrated with a loud clapping. Our Zhong Yue was in for a bigger cultural shock. How could this happen, she mused. In China it is just unthinkable. The social set up would never allow it, she surmised. America is America and China is China, so she figured. Rudyard Kipling the imperialistic English poet had written more than a century ago “East is East, West is West; the Twain shall never meet.”The young Chinese teacher, still a spinster, consoled herself that her job is teaching the Chinese language to Americans and not to meddle with their social system.
Zhong Yue was not alone in receiving cultural shocks in America. Other Chinese teachers spread out over the length and breadth of the United States were in for similar cultural shocks. Wiser counsels prevailed and they continued with their assignments taking new life in a philosophical way. Confucius, Buddha and Tao came to their help and rescued them.
Both the Chinese and American governments are keen that the Chinese language, now called the Pútung Hua or the common man’s language, be taught to the American students all over the country. This will be helpful in the ever growing volume of trade and commerce between the two countries. To achieve the aim, as many as 325 native Chinese teachers from mainland China have been seconded to various secondary schools in America. The Chinese government pays its teachers US dollars 13,000 each whereas the US government pays US dollars 500 each plus free furnished accommodation and transport facility where required. On an exchange programme the United States has deployed as many as 2000 educational administrators in China to advise the local administration on nuances of modern management.
CHINESE RELISH AMERICAN BURGER
By and by the Chinese teachers are taking to American burger like fish takes to water. It does not mean that they have forgotten the taste of noodles. No, not at all. The Chinese food in America called Chop Suey has noodles as the base on which a garnishing of pork is relished. By the way, both the American people and the Chinese people love to eat pork. This may be one of the reasons why the Islamic world is not comfortable in their company except when their cash comes handy. Pork takes a back seat in the Middle-East psyche then.
The Chinese teachers enjoy working five days a week and join the faculty for fun in the weekends. This gives them an opportunity to sharpen their knowledge of English and master the American accent too. In an informal exchange of ideas with their counterparts, the Chinese teachers informally register their abhorrence of the American student lifestyle. Drinking and dating and a freedom to have sex is beyond the imagination of the guest Chinese teachers.
The Chinese educationists are of the opinion that the student community should have only one thing uppermost in their minds and it is STUDY. Nothing in life should be permitted to detract a student from achieving his or her primary aim. Smoking, drinking, dating and indulging in teenage pre-marital sex make students deviate from their chosen path. So, it would be advisable to shun such mundane pleasures that pave the way to hell. When confronted with the age-old saying “all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy”, the retort was that all play and no work makes Jack a worthless boy. After a free and frank exchange of views a middle road was found. A little of fun thrown into a busy academic schedule will not lead the students astray. Of course, sports will provide a healthy outlet and that must be encouraged at all levels.”A healthy mind in a healthy body” is the panacea of all ills at this impressionable age.
The teaching of the Pútung Hua is going on at its normal pace and a promise of positive results is on the academic horizon.
CHINESE TEACHERS GET CULTURAL SHOCKS IN AMERICA
By Brigadier Chitranjan Sawant,VSM
Zhong Yue, a 27 year old Chinese teacher enters her classroom in a school in Lawton, Oklahoma, USA to teach the American students Chinese language. Some students are chewing gum, others are just in a relaxing mode; half sitting and half lying in their seats. No one gets up to honour the teacher. Zhong Yue is shocked at this behaviour of her students.
The student advisor explained to her later that it is considered normal behaviour in that part of the world. The Chinese teacher found it in contrast to the student behaviour back home in China. There the moment students see a teacher enter a classroom, they jump to attention. Not doing so in America did not mean showing any disrespect to a teacher by the students, the headmaster explained later.
TEACHING – LEARNING PROCESS
Zhong Yue found her American students intelligent and quick on the uptake. They were keen on learning the new language, especially the script comprising characters that represented ideas. There are no alphabets in Chinese script unlike English. The American students found the script and the tonal spoken language rather difficult to learn. But the patience and perseverance of the Chinese teacher and the desire of students to learn a new language worked like a spoonful of sugar that makes the bitter medicine go down in a delightful way. Their combined efforts produced results and in the periodical tests no one submitted a blank answer sheet. Three cheers to the teacher and the taught, so said the academic head of the secondary wing of languages.
The class was going on smoothly day after day and week after week. There was a storm in the tea cup of the oriental teacher. As she was writing the Chinese characters on the black board, there was a minor commotion in the class. A teenage student entered with a new born baby in her lap and showed her to the class with a sense of pride. Students welcomed the new arrival in the lap of an unwed teenage mother and celebrated with a loud clapping. Our Zhong Yue was in for a bigger cultural shock. How could this happen, she mused. In China it is just unthinkable. The social set up would never allow it, she surmised. America is America and China is China, so she figured. Rudyard Kipling the imperialistic English poet had written more than a century ago “East is East, West is West; the Twain shall never meet.”The young Chinese teacher, still a spinster, consoled herself that her job is teaching the Chinese language to Americans and not to meddle with their social system.
Zhong Yue was not alone in receiving cultural shocks in America. Other Chinese teachers spread out over the length and breadth of the United States were in for similar cultural shocks. Wiser counsels prevailed and they continued with their assignments taking new life in a philosophical way. Confucius, Buddha and Tao came to their help and rescued them.
Both the Chinese and American governments are keen that the Chinese language, now called the Pútung Hua or the common man’s language, be taught to the American students all over the country. This will be helpful in the ever growing volume of trade and commerce between the two countries. To achieve the aim, as many as 325 native Chinese teachers from mainland China have been seconded to various secondary schools in America. The Chinese government pays its teachers US dollars 13,000 each whereas the US government pays US dollars 500 each plus free furnished accommodation and transport facility where required. On an exchange programme the United States has deployed as many as 2000 educational administrators in China to advise the local administration on nuances of modern management.
CHINESE RELISH AMERICAN BURGER
By and by the Chinese teachers are taking to American burger like fish takes to water. It does not mean that they have forgotten the taste of noodles. No, not at all. The Chinese food in America called Chop Suey has noodles as the base on which a garnishing of pork is relished. By the way, both the American people and the Chinese people love to eat pork. This may be one of the reasons why the Islamic world is not comfortable in their company except when their cash comes handy. Pork takes a back seat in the Middle-East psyche then.
The Chinese teachers enjoy working five days a week and join the faculty for fun in the weekends. This gives them an opportunity to sharpen their knowledge of English and master the American accent too. In an informal exchange of ideas with their counterparts, the Chinese teachers informally register their abhorrence of the American student lifestyle. Drinking and dating and a freedom to have sex is beyond the imagination of the guest Chinese teachers.
The Chinese educationists are of the opinion that the student community should have only one thing uppermost in their minds and it is STUDY. Nothing in life should be permitted to detract a student from achieving his or her primary aim. Smoking, drinking, dating and indulging in teenage pre-marital sex make students deviate from their chosen path. So, it would be advisable to shun such mundane pleasures that pave the way to hell. When confronted with the age-old saying “all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy”, the retort was that all play and no work makes Jack a worthless boy. After a free and frank exchange of views a middle road was found. A little of fun thrown into a busy academic schedule will not lead the students astray. Of course, sports will provide a healthy outlet and that must be encouraged at all levels.”A healthy mind in a healthy body” is the panacea of all ills at this impressionable age.
The teaching of the Pútung Hua is going on at its normal pace and a promise of positive results is on the academic horizon.
Monday, May 10, 2010
HUSSAIN A RANK COMMUNALIST IN HIS PAINTINGS
AUM
HUSSAIN’S ART SMELLS OF RANK COMMUN
By Chitranjan Sawant
Meet the man who manoeuvres to remain in the news all the time for all the wrong reasons. He sports a white beard, white longish hair, wears a kurta-pyjama and walks around barefoot in all seasons. Many a club or a hotel slammed their doors on him because they found his appearance not presentable and obnoxious to hi-fi guests. He welcomed such episodes as these brought him into the limelight through the ever hungry media, both print and electronics.
His name is Maqbool Fida Hussain and he professes to be an artist. A brush and a canvass to be painted in oil or water colours are his tools with which he has pocketed millions of dollars from the rich but ignorant people who wish to keep up with the Joneses. His bizarre paintings fetch more money in outlandish exhibitions than at home. The Sheikhs of the Arabian countries loosen their purses to buy something that they do not understand but their foreign wives find fashionable.
COURTING CONTROVERSIES
MF Hussain thrives on controversies. The more, the merrier – that is his motto. The unsavoury controversies keep his name and mien in circulation and bring both notoriety and popularity; (it depends on which side of the fence you are). Such controversies indeed are money spinners. Our hero-cum-villain loves money. He worships Mammon, keeping Allah in the wraps for that period. This helps him wear his pseudo-secular credentials on the sleeves and enables him to keep the Islamist terrorism at bay ostensibly. He practises and promotes religious terror of sorts and is a past master of religious discrimination as we shall see for ourselves shortly.
Hussain was born in India and thus is a natural citizen of the great land called Bharat. But there is no love lost between the two. A billion strong citizens of India address their motherland as Bharat Mata – Mother India. However, Hussain’s head is where his heart should be. His head says “denigrate Bharat Mata, create a controversy, gain notoriety and earn more money.”His heart is in Dubai where he lives at present and has acquired its citizenship too. M.F.Hussain courted controversy by painting a portrait of Bharat Mata in the nude with an outline sketch of the country around. He and his mindless friends hailed the said obnoxious painting of Bharat Mata in the nude as an Expression of Artistic Freedom. What a shame! In the name of artistic freedom, the perverted mind of Hussain brought Mother India into international disrepute. He deserved to be exiled but survived with the support of pseudo-secularists and cumbersome legal system. The public pressure, however, forced him to flee India and take refuge in Dubai and show off his numerous cars like Rolls Royce, Bentley and what have you.
Here is a contrast that exposes Hussain’s rank communalism. He let his brush move up and down the canvas cautiously. He made a painting of his mother and also that of an unidentified Muslim lady. In reverence, both are fully clad and no part of the body is visible. Just short of a Burqa or a hijab, the ladies are fully clothed and have been given an aura of social respectability. Hussain’s biological mother is all dressed up but the Mother of a Billion Indians, Bharat Mata, is shown in the nude. Why? It is just not an expression of freedom of the artist’s brush but an exhibition of mental perversion and laying bare his hatred for all things that the Hindus worship. The worse follows.
It was indeed mean of Hussain to have painted the Hindu goddess Durga in the nude and showing sexual nuances with her mount, the lion. By any standard, it was an act of sacrilege and certainly not an exhibition of artist’s freedom of expression. My abhorrence of that man masquerading as an artist precludes from citing such examples where reverence is shown to Islamic women but nudity is thrust upon Hindu goddesses. Hussain had once painted Hitler headless and another person in the nude to announce from housetops how he hated them. I wonder if Hussain too subscribes to the Pakistani’s Hate Hindu campaign. The artistic evidence has put Hussain in the dock. Let him have a chance to defend himself under the magnanimity of the Hindu ethos.
One wonders why Hussain has been ignoring the Muslim women of prominence from joining the gallery of nude portraits. The most venerable young bride of Prophet Muhammad(PBUH), Sallallah Wasale Wasallum, was intelligent and advised administrators on matters of State. Ayesha was her name. Hussain should have tried a portrait of Ayesha like that of Bharat Mata. He did not do so for reasons known to him. Does it not amount to discrimination? Perhaps the Muslim element in him took control of the artist element and he painted the Hindu goddesses in the nude to denigrate a vast majority of his compatriots. Shame on Hussain and on those who espouse his cause under the mistaken belief that they thus promote a plural society. It is nothing but rabid communalism to appease the Muslim vote-bank.
I shall concede the point that poor Hussain could not have painted the Prophet and exhibited his artistic freedom as it is forbidden in Islam. It is one of the rare occasions when the Muslim in Hussain gains ascendancy and locks him out of the realm of Islam. I would, however, like to remind the artist , now a nonagenarian, that painting another great lady, Fatima, is not forbidden. As a beloved daughter of the Prophet, she should have been taken note of by our morbid Hussain. But he failed to do so and the gallery of paintings of the eminent ladies in the nude was deprived of a great possession. Artist Hussain has to answer for this gross dereliction of duty towards the Muse. Let us borrow the eternally famous words of Jesus Christ spoken when the life was ebbing out after crucifixion :
“Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.”
Perhaps, Hussain the artist does not know what he has missed by being discriminatory in painting some and leaving out other eminent ladies in the nude. Let us wish him better luck next time when he feels inspired to paint women in the nude so that he spreads his net far and wide without any bias, fear or favour. Adieu our ex-compatriot! Now we sign off.
UPVAN 609, Sector 29, NOIDA – 201303, INDIA. Mobile : 0091-9811173590.
Email. upvanom@yahoo.com and sawantg.chitranjan@gmail.com
HUSSAIN’S ART SMELLS OF RANK COMMUN
By Chitranjan Sawant
Meet the man who manoeuvres to remain in the news all the time for all the wrong reasons. He sports a white beard, white longish hair, wears a kurta-pyjama and walks around barefoot in all seasons. Many a club or a hotel slammed their doors on him because they found his appearance not presentable and obnoxious to hi-fi guests. He welcomed such episodes as these brought him into the limelight through the ever hungry media, both print and electronics.
His name is Maqbool Fida Hussain and he professes to be an artist. A brush and a canvass to be painted in oil or water colours are his tools with which he has pocketed millions of dollars from the rich but ignorant people who wish to keep up with the Joneses. His bizarre paintings fetch more money in outlandish exhibitions than at home. The Sheikhs of the Arabian countries loosen their purses to buy something that they do not understand but their foreign wives find fashionable.
COURTING CONTROVERSIES
MF Hussain thrives on controversies. The more, the merrier – that is his motto. The unsavoury controversies keep his name and mien in circulation and bring both notoriety and popularity; (it depends on which side of the fence you are). Such controversies indeed are money spinners. Our hero-cum-villain loves money. He worships Mammon, keeping Allah in the wraps for that period. This helps him wear his pseudo-secular credentials on the sleeves and enables him to keep the Islamist terrorism at bay ostensibly. He practises and promotes religious terror of sorts and is a past master of religious discrimination as we shall see for ourselves shortly.
Hussain was born in India and thus is a natural citizen of the great land called Bharat. But there is no love lost between the two. A billion strong citizens of India address their motherland as Bharat Mata – Mother India. However, Hussain’s head is where his heart should be. His head says “denigrate Bharat Mata, create a controversy, gain notoriety and earn more money.”His heart is in Dubai where he lives at present and has acquired its citizenship too. M.F.Hussain courted controversy by painting a portrait of Bharat Mata in the nude with an outline sketch of the country around. He and his mindless friends hailed the said obnoxious painting of Bharat Mata in the nude as an Expression of Artistic Freedom. What a shame! In the name of artistic freedom, the perverted mind of Hussain brought Mother India into international disrepute. He deserved to be exiled but survived with the support of pseudo-secularists and cumbersome legal system. The public pressure, however, forced him to flee India and take refuge in Dubai and show off his numerous cars like Rolls Royce, Bentley and what have you.
Here is a contrast that exposes Hussain’s rank communalism. He let his brush move up and down the canvas cautiously. He made a painting of his mother and also that of an unidentified Muslim lady. In reverence, both are fully clad and no part of the body is visible. Just short of a Burqa or a hijab, the ladies are fully clothed and have been given an aura of social respectability. Hussain’s biological mother is all dressed up but the Mother of a Billion Indians, Bharat Mata, is shown in the nude. Why? It is just not an expression of freedom of the artist’s brush but an exhibition of mental perversion and laying bare his hatred for all things that the Hindus worship. The worse follows.
It was indeed mean of Hussain to have painted the Hindu goddess Durga in the nude and showing sexual nuances with her mount, the lion. By any standard, it was an act of sacrilege and certainly not an exhibition of artist’s freedom of expression. My abhorrence of that man masquerading as an artist precludes from citing such examples where reverence is shown to Islamic women but nudity is thrust upon Hindu goddesses. Hussain had once painted Hitler headless and another person in the nude to announce from housetops how he hated them. I wonder if Hussain too subscribes to the Pakistani’s Hate Hindu campaign. The artistic evidence has put Hussain in the dock. Let him have a chance to defend himself under the magnanimity of the Hindu ethos.
One wonders why Hussain has been ignoring the Muslim women of prominence from joining the gallery of nude portraits. The most venerable young bride of Prophet Muhammad(PBUH), Sallallah Wasale Wasallum, was intelligent and advised administrators on matters of State. Ayesha was her name. Hussain should have tried a portrait of Ayesha like that of Bharat Mata. He did not do so for reasons known to him. Does it not amount to discrimination? Perhaps the Muslim element in him took control of the artist element and he painted the Hindu goddesses in the nude to denigrate a vast majority of his compatriots. Shame on Hussain and on those who espouse his cause under the mistaken belief that they thus promote a plural society. It is nothing but rabid communalism to appease the Muslim vote-bank.
I shall concede the point that poor Hussain could not have painted the Prophet and exhibited his artistic freedom as it is forbidden in Islam. It is one of the rare occasions when the Muslim in Hussain gains ascendancy and locks him out of the realm of Islam. I would, however, like to remind the artist , now a nonagenarian, that painting another great lady, Fatima, is not forbidden. As a beloved daughter of the Prophet, she should have been taken note of by our morbid Hussain. But he failed to do so and the gallery of paintings of the eminent ladies in the nude was deprived of a great possession. Artist Hussain has to answer for this gross dereliction of duty towards the Muse. Let us borrow the eternally famous words of Jesus Christ spoken when the life was ebbing out after crucifixion :
“Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.”
Perhaps, Hussain the artist does not know what he has missed by being discriminatory in painting some and leaving out other eminent ladies in the nude. Let us wish him better luck next time when he feels inspired to paint women in the nude so that he spreads his net far and wide without any bias, fear or favour. Adieu our ex-compatriot! Now we sign off.
UPVAN 609, Sector 29, NOIDA – 201303, INDIA. Mobile : 0091-9811173590.
Email. upvanom@yahoo.com and sawantg.chitranjan@gmail.com
Sunday, April 25, 2010
Check out Dramatic development of Chinese Navy
Check out Dramatic development of Chinese Navy,
an article by Brigadier Chitranjan Sawant,VSM
Thursday, April 15, 2010
Monday, April 5, 2010
ENEMY OF HUMANITY
ENEMY OF HUMANITY
By Chitranjan Sawant
When we heard of two suicidal bomb blasts on the Moscow metro, our hearts went out to the families that had lost their loved ones. Some Indians who had lost their bread winners in the Islamist terror attacks in Mumbai, India on 26/11 knew how lives of the bereaved would stall for now..Hillary Rodham Clinton, Secretary of State, USA said that the terrorist was our common enemy. She says that no alibi will be able to justify committing such heinous crimes against the humanity as was done by the Chechen Islamist terrorists. The Caucasus Black Widow organisation took part in perpetrating these acts of terror. The Black Widows comprise wives of those men who were killed by the Russian security agencies sometime or the other in an effort to root out Islamist terrorism from the soil of Russia. On the death of their husbands at the hands of the security forces, the widows vowed to continue the acts of terror against the State and its agencies, including innocent civilians. A few members of the Black Widow terrorist outfit are just teenagers and have yet to taste the rosier side of life. They are, however, possessed by a sinister desire for revenge.
PECULIAR PROBLEM
SOME ANALYSTS SAID THAT THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION FACED PECULIAR PROBLEMS OF THE ISLAMIST TERRORISM. THE MUSLIM STATES OF CAUCASUS LIKE INGUSHETIA, DAGESTAN AND CHECHENIA were and are very much a part of the Russian Federation and have also been centrally funded from Moscow. The analysts found it rather strange that the State was funding some Muslim educational institutions and the latter were indirectly funding the Muslim terrorists. Since a situation like this does not exist in the UK or the USA, the Russian rule known as the toughest and most discipline promoting could not put the Islamist terrorist on leash - it sounded so strange. Of course, since the time President Putin and later Prime Minister Putin assumed power, acts of terrorism had shown a marked decline. But 2010 has seen a resurgence of Islamist terrorism and the scene is rather disquieting. When the apartment buildings in Moscow and two other Metropolitan cities were under terrorist attack and the siege of the Beslan School had shaken the young and old alike, strict handling of the situation and new strategy to let Muslim executives of the states in Caucasus handle terror, had indeed shown remarkable results.
However, a passing phase of a relaxation in security handling saw the twin blasts on the Moscow metro, one in Dagestan and now a blowing of rail track in a remote region. No wonder, Prime Minister Putin has vowed to scrap the terrorists from the deep sewage and punish them. His strong arm method may show immediate results but for a long-time peace, economic and administrative measures will have to be taken as spelt out by the President of Russia, himself a protege of Putin.
INDIA SUFFERING TOO
Russia is not alone in facing a difficult situation of Islamist terror that some claim is funded by the Russian government indirectly. The central government of Russia is responsible for running the government schools in the Muslim minority areas wherein secular education is imparted. It is, however, feared that a part of the money meant for education is quietly siphoned off to the Islamist terrorists by the lower level officials in the Muslim states because the officials are deeply sympathetic to the Islamist movement for independence of Muslim areas and terror is just an extension of the policy of liberation from the Russian domination. An analyst will safely surmise that in this respect India and Russia are sailing in the same boat.
The state of Jammu and Kashmir is a Muslim dominated area. It was ruled by a Hindu Maharajah before independence of India. All rulers were given the prerogative by the British paramount power to either join India or Pakistan or remain independent. Shree Maharajah Sir Hari Singh Ji willy-nilly chose to accede to India and signed the instrument of accession. Legally speaking, it was final and irrevocable. Nonetheless, pt Jawaharlal Nehru, under the advice of the then Governor General, Lord Luis Mountbatten said that in due course of time there would be a referendum to ascertain the will of the people on the issue of joining India or Pakistan. This was a Himalayan blunder committed by the most impractical politician divorced from pragmatism. India suffered as Mullahs preached Hate Hindu theory in mosques every Friday and in madarsas daily. The money of Indian tax payers, predominantly Hindus, was sent to J&K for development ostensibly but was pocketed by a few families, not excluding pro-Pakistanis. The terrorists had their share of the Indian money through extortion. Thus like in Russia, in India too the government funded terrorism through an indirect route. How unfortunate!
NEW LORDS NEW LAWS
Plebiscite was a dead word in due course of time. There were free and fair elections in J&K many times. However, no government was serious in checking, what to say of rooting out, Islamist terrorism from the state. The Hindu minority was unceremoniously bundled out of the valley of Kashmir. Hindus of Kashmir became refugees in their own land. Successive governments in New Delhi played the Muslim appeasement card to get their votes en block. Some right wing Hindu nationalists also formed the government at the centre but there was no qualitative change in the state of Islamist terror in J&K. Muslim pilgrims proceeding on Hajj continued receiving the Hindu tax payers money as subsidy, never mind who was in power in New Delhi. Appeasing the minorities, irrespective of their loyalty to friend or foe, was the order of the day. Flying the flag of Muslim minorities became quite fashionable among journalists of the English press in India. With the result, the Islamist terrorists in various shapes and sizes got an unexpected boost. Our country, India that is Bharat suffered most. The political, economic and military situation remains unchanged in the second decade of the 21st century.
Terrorism in India has many forms. The one prospering now in the rural Bihar, Bengal, Orissa, Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh, Andhra, Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh is called Naxalism. It is an offshoot of Maoism. The Nepal Maoists, who have tasted blood and power, encourage armed conflicts all over India, especially in the corridor just mentioned above. The central government of India acknowledges the potential danger of Naxalism to the unity of India and yet the centre and states play ping-pong on the issue of fighting against the Naxals. The central police jawans are dying in surprise sweeps of Naxals day in and day out. I do know that efforts are being made to tackle the serious problem. But it is too little and too late. Every Home Minister wants to raise a new police force or put his new strategy into experimental use. Never mind if the poor police jawan becomes the cannon fodder.
WIN OVER THE ENEMY
I do not and shall not subscribe to the view that if you cannot fight against the enemy, join the enemy. No Never. Nevertheless, we can win over the enemy to our side, to our philosophy of life. Remember the great wizard of Statecraft, Acharya Chanakya, also known as Kautilya because of his policies that were Kutil or wily and hence he was called KAUTILYA. He even employed VISH KANYAS TO ELIMINATE ENEMIES OF THE State. The terrorists, howsoever indoctrinated they may be, can be bought by the State. It is said that every individual has his price, Just Pay and win him or her over to your side.
All said and done, all our men and women must be given lessons in patriotism. They should love Bharat much more than their own loved ones. The litmus test can be done in field alone in the face of the terrorist, our biggest enemy. If an Indian, whatever his vocation may be, passes the test of Patriotism, he need pass no other test in this life.
UPVAN 609, Sector 29 NOIDA – 201303 INDIA. Mobile 0091-9811173590.
Email – upvanom@yahoo.com or sawantg.chitranjan@gmail.com
By Chitranjan Sawant
When we heard of two suicidal bomb blasts on the Moscow metro, our hearts went out to the families that had lost their loved ones. Some Indians who had lost their bread winners in the Islamist terror attacks in Mumbai, India on 26/11 knew how lives of the bereaved would stall for now..Hillary Rodham Clinton, Secretary of State, USA said that the terrorist was our common enemy. She says that no alibi will be able to justify committing such heinous crimes against the humanity as was done by the Chechen Islamist terrorists. The Caucasus Black Widow organisation took part in perpetrating these acts of terror. The Black Widows comprise wives of those men who were killed by the Russian security agencies sometime or the other in an effort to root out Islamist terrorism from the soil of Russia. On the death of their husbands at the hands of the security forces, the widows vowed to continue the acts of terror against the State and its agencies, including innocent civilians. A few members of the Black Widow terrorist outfit are just teenagers and have yet to taste the rosier side of life. They are, however, possessed by a sinister desire for revenge.
PECULIAR PROBLEM
SOME ANALYSTS SAID THAT THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION FACED PECULIAR PROBLEMS OF THE ISLAMIST TERRORISM. THE MUSLIM STATES OF CAUCASUS LIKE INGUSHETIA, DAGESTAN AND CHECHENIA were and are very much a part of the Russian Federation and have also been centrally funded from Moscow. The analysts found it rather strange that the State was funding some Muslim educational institutions and the latter were indirectly funding the Muslim terrorists. Since a situation like this does not exist in the UK or the USA, the Russian rule known as the toughest and most discipline promoting could not put the Islamist terrorist on leash - it sounded so strange. Of course, since the time President Putin and later Prime Minister Putin assumed power, acts of terrorism had shown a marked decline. But 2010 has seen a resurgence of Islamist terrorism and the scene is rather disquieting. When the apartment buildings in Moscow and two other Metropolitan cities were under terrorist attack and the siege of the Beslan School had shaken the young and old alike, strict handling of the situation and new strategy to let Muslim executives of the states in Caucasus handle terror, had indeed shown remarkable results.
However, a passing phase of a relaxation in security handling saw the twin blasts on the Moscow metro, one in Dagestan and now a blowing of rail track in a remote region. No wonder, Prime Minister Putin has vowed to scrap the terrorists from the deep sewage and punish them. His strong arm method may show immediate results but for a long-time peace, economic and administrative measures will have to be taken as spelt out by the President of Russia, himself a protege of Putin.
INDIA SUFFERING TOO
Russia is not alone in facing a difficult situation of Islamist terror that some claim is funded by the Russian government indirectly. The central government of Russia is responsible for running the government schools in the Muslim minority areas wherein secular education is imparted. It is, however, feared that a part of the money meant for education is quietly siphoned off to the Islamist terrorists by the lower level officials in the Muslim states because the officials are deeply sympathetic to the Islamist movement for independence of Muslim areas and terror is just an extension of the policy of liberation from the Russian domination. An analyst will safely surmise that in this respect India and Russia are sailing in the same boat.
The state of Jammu and Kashmir is a Muslim dominated area. It was ruled by a Hindu Maharajah before independence of India. All rulers were given the prerogative by the British paramount power to either join India or Pakistan or remain independent. Shree Maharajah Sir Hari Singh Ji willy-nilly chose to accede to India and signed the instrument of accession. Legally speaking, it was final and irrevocable. Nonetheless, pt Jawaharlal Nehru, under the advice of the then Governor General, Lord Luis Mountbatten said that in due course of time there would be a referendum to ascertain the will of the people on the issue of joining India or Pakistan. This was a Himalayan blunder committed by the most impractical politician divorced from pragmatism. India suffered as Mullahs preached Hate Hindu theory in mosques every Friday and in madarsas daily. The money of Indian tax payers, predominantly Hindus, was sent to J&K for development ostensibly but was pocketed by a few families, not excluding pro-Pakistanis. The terrorists had their share of the Indian money through extortion. Thus like in Russia, in India too the government funded terrorism through an indirect route. How unfortunate!
NEW LORDS NEW LAWS
Plebiscite was a dead word in due course of time. There were free and fair elections in J&K many times. However, no government was serious in checking, what to say of rooting out, Islamist terrorism from the state. The Hindu minority was unceremoniously bundled out of the valley of Kashmir. Hindus of Kashmir became refugees in their own land. Successive governments in New Delhi played the Muslim appeasement card to get their votes en block. Some right wing Hindu nationalists also formed the government at the centre but there was no qualitative change in the state of Islamist terror in J&K. Muslim pilgrims proceeding on Hajj continued receiving the Hindu tax payers money as subsidy, never mind who was in power in New Delhi. Appeasing the minorities, irrespective of their loyalty to friend or foe, was the order of the day. Flying the flag of Muslim minorities became quite fashionable among journalists of the English press in India. With the result, the Islamist terrorists in various shapes and sizes got an unexpected boost. Our country, India that is Bharat suffered most. The political, economic and military situation remains unchanged in the second decade of the 21st century.
Terrorism in India has many forms. The one prospering now in the rural Bihar, Bengal, Orissa, Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh, Andhra, Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh is called Naxalism. It is an offshoot of Maoism. The Nepal Maoists, who have tasted blood and power, encourage armed conflicts all over India, especially in the corridor just mentioned above. The central government of India acknowledges the potential danger of Naxalism to the unity of India and yet the centre and states play ping-pong on the issue of fighting against the Naxals. The central police jawans are dying in surprise sweeps of Naxals day in and day out. I do know that efforts are being made to tackle the serious problem. But it is too little and too late. Every Home Minister wants to raise a new police force or put his new strategy into experimental use. Never mind if the poor police jawan becomes the cannon fodder.
WIN OVER THE ENEMY
I do not and shall not subscribe to the view that if you cannot fight against the enemy, join the enemy. No Never. Nevertheless, we can win over the enemy to our side, to our philosophy of life. Remember the great wizard of Statecraft, Acharya Chanakya, also known as Kautilya because of his policies that were Kutil or wily and hence he was called KAUTILYA. He even employed VISH KANYAS TO ELIMINATE ENEMIES OF THE State. The terrorists, howsoever indoctrinated they may be, can be bought by the State. It is said that every individual has his price, Just Pay and win him or her over to your side.
All said and done, all our men and women must be given lessons in patriotism. They should love Bharat much more than their own loved ones. The litmus test can be done in field alone in the face of the terrorist, our biggest enemy. If an Indian, whatever his vocation may be, passes the test of Patriotism, he need pass no other test in this life.
UPVAN 609, Sector 29 NOIDA – 201303 INDIA. Mobile 0091-9811173590.
Email – upvanom@yahoo.com or sawantg.chitranjan@gmail.com
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