Random Thoughts - Pattabhi Sitaraman

Santana Dharma as the word denotes is a form of faith that is ageless and dateless. No one has been able to definitely say when this form of faith originated and by whom.  Hence the name given to this faith is Santana Dharma and colloquially referred to as Hinduism thanks to the British who came to the country as traders and later took to ruling the country.   There has been a strong fundamentally flawed opinion among most of the literate people of the country.  They all feel that it is the people who follow the Santana Dharma only have to be secular accommodating people of all religions and not vice versa.  The main reason for this anomaly is found in the articles of the constitution that the country adopted which expressly prohibits the teaching of the scriptures of this faith in educational institutions.  However, there is no such bar on other religious scriptures being taught.  Moreover, with the misguided concept of secularism in our country since...

The book of Dan Brown on symbolism in Christianity with specific reference to Michael Angelo's paintings has induced lots of interest in people to study and find out any such symbolism in other relgions.  This piece is an attempt to give just a glimpse into the work of finding such symbolism in the age old Sanathana Dharma popularly called Hinduism.  This being a religion that was there much before, Christianity, Islam and even Judaism, it is pertinent to refer to this as Sanathana Dharma.  Let us look at a few of the symbolic references found in the puranas. The birth of Lord Karthikeya son of Lord Shiva.  In the puranas, it is mentioned that Sanathkumara, one of the four sons of Brahma gave a boon to Shiva that he would be born as a son to him, overlooking Shiva's consort Parvati alongside.  When questioned by Parvati, he reportedly said that only Shiva sought a boon and that he had given and since she is also seeking a boon, she would hold the son in her hand...

So much had been written and discussed ad nauseum about the new parliament building for India which was inaguarated by the PM last week, and there is no point in elaborating on that again. Let us look at the other aspect of the parliament building opened amid so much fanfare and installation of a sceptre next to the speaker's chair in the Lok Sabha in the new parliament building. in the days leading to the Indian independence in 1947, the British were discussing why they had to hand over the power to the then congress party as they had taken over from different regional satraps and kings.  This was conveyed by the British government to the then Governor General Lord Louis Mountbatten who was spearheading the handing over of the power to the Indian people.   The congress party went into a huddle on this unexpected turn of events just before the freedom and discussed the matter threadbare in their meeting. Finally, it was Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel who broke the imbroglio sug...

  The WHO deferring to the Chinese demand, gave a nomenclature to the deadly virus that originated in the city of Wuhan in China as n-COV-2019 or COVID in short for Corona Virus Disease.  The spread of the virus across the globe is something extraordinary in such a short time, more facilitated by people traveling from one place to another, one country to another and also not curtailing the travel when the symptoms of the disease started appearing in far off shores from the place of origin, is beyond belief.  As much column kilometers had been written about this in various forums, it serves no purpose to go through the same and it is not the aim of the author to recount the various measures adopted by different countries to fight the disease and the spread of the same.  Finally, it has been determined by the scientists in WHO that the virus spread mainly through air and the best antidote is to wear a mask covering the face and nose completely and also maintain so...

It is reported in press that the Chief of Defense Staff, General Bipin Rawat has proposed some changes which affect the serving officers and their terms of commission into the armed forces.   First the age of retirement of the serving officers and men from that of the Colonel and equivalent ranks have been revised upwards by three years, effectively taking the retirement age to 57 instead of 54 as of now.  Likewise the retirement age of Brigadier or equivalent ranks is also proposed to be 58, Major General or equivalent ranks is revised to 59 with Lt. General or equivalent rank remaining 60 same as of now. The age of retirement of JCO and other ranks are also increased to 57 instead of the present 54.   The armed forces also have a statutory period of service which is governed by a contract between the individual and the armed forces, entered into at the time of the individual joining the academy for his training and education.  The normal duration of pensi...

The modern day administration started with the advent of Europeans into the country sometime in the 15th or 16th Century CE when the Europeans who came for trading with India for its spices, silk, and various other produce, started usurping power and ruling in various pockets.  The British, who came to India brought with them their own idea of administration with a cabinet of ministers to help the viceroy (who was the senior most political person in the country and reporting only to the British monarch through the British parliament) and a plethora of administrators or bureaucrats who were selected based on an examination conducted and sent to England for training.  This service was called Indian Civil Service, ICS for short.  The people who were well qualified with a university education in various disciplines (there were only basic arts, mathmatics and science in those days) and who could speak English fluently were the ones who were selected in the examination for trai...

The time frame in the ancient Vedic times was divided into four yugas comprising of Krita, Treta, Dvapara and Kali.  The least number of years is in Kaliyuga and the number of years is expected to be around 10% of the total years i.e. 4,320,000 years in all the four yugas.  These yugas are cyclical.  The cycle of the yugas for one thousand times is called Kalpa - Day for the Brahma - God of creation. In the night of Brahma, a pralayam, Tsunami or dissolving all that is created by Brahma including himself takes place.  In the next morning Brahma is reborn and starts his creation work again. Brahma, at the start of each cycle of the chaturyuga (meaning four yugas) designates a person as a Manu for that chaturyuga. E ach cycle of chathuryuga had its own manu starting from Svayambuva - the one who self manifested.  The manu formulates the rules and regulations for the humans to follow to live in harmony with nature and other living beings.  In the present chatu...

A well reputed wrestler, who had won many fights across the nation, was challenging the people in a small town to fight him and win a huge prize.  Seeing his muscular body and his prowess in wrestling no one dared to challenge him.  But the townspeople found it below their dignity to allow the fighter go unchallenged. Finally they settled on a young man who was practicing in the local gym for taking up wrestling.  The young man asked the reputed wrestler fifteen days' time to wrestle him in a title fight.  The wrestler agreed. The young man grouped his friends and told them to visit the wrestler every day in the morning and evening. Each day a friend visited the wrestler and was inquiring with him why the wrestler was looking tired and asked whether the climate in the town or the food did not suit him or what.  This continued till the day for the wrestling.  On the day of the prized fight with the young man, the wrestler was looking totally drawn, emaciat...

Adolf Hitler was in the army during the first world war.  He was frustrated by the German defeat in the war, the treaty of Versailles and the reparations that Germany had to pay.  He joined a small political outfit called German Workers Party in the same year it was founded in 1919.  The party and its founders felt that the treaty at Versailles was unduly unjust to Germany and the party was founded on the principles of German Nationalism and anti Semitism.  Hitler soon became a charismatic public speaker who could attract many German youth to the party.  He used to espouse the Aryan supremacy and German nationalism in his speeches and blaming the Jews and Marxists for the all the ills of Germany.   Though in 1923 he was arrested and imprisoned for a five year term, he came out of prison in a year and started rebuilding the party he joined which he renamed as German Socialist Workers Party or Nazi party.  After his release from prison he went a...

The border skirmishes in eastern Ladakh where India lost twenty of its braves including the CO of 16 Bihar and an undetermined number of casualties on the Chinese side, continues to be a matter of discussion in various forums. The full details though not available, has given rise to many speculations doing rounds as to what had happened on the night of 15th June.  The GOI had been very guarded in its statement that there had been no transgression  into Indian territory by  PLA. Stopping short at that gives rise to lots of speculation of IA crossing the LAC into Chinese territory and pay the PLA in its own coin. The reported exchange of personnel after two days confirms this suspicion.  This apart, one of the news channel pieced together a story, from the interviews with injured soldiers being treated at Leh hospital, giving details about the attack on the night of 15th June. From the day one of the skirmishes, the spokesman of the foreign ministry of China had been...

The de-escalation process that was agreed upon between India and China at top military levels reportedly not percolating down to the operational units is the reason for the skirmishes, body blows and death of a commanding officer and few men on the Indian side and undetermined number of casualties on the Chinese side, reports one of the TV channels.  The death of personnel now in 2020 after 1975 has given rise to a jingoistic call of boycott of Chinese products from many especially in the social media.  There are many ex military officers and citizens who talk of India is not the India of 1960s vintage and the present leadership is far removed from the one that was totally clueless in the 1962 limited war with China forgetting for a moment that China has gone way ahead of India in the last sixty years.  Let us take an objective look at the issues and what the country must do to stand up to the bullying China. China had been cultivating all the nations surrounding In...

The war between the Sikhs and the Chinese in the 1840s when the Chinese over-ran Ladakh, which was under the Sikhs, and consequent treaty between them allowed the Sikhs to rule over Ladakh and the Chinese withdrew beyond Tibet.  The British defeated the Sikhs and took control of Ladakh.   In the year 1865, W H Johnson, an official with the Survey of India, proposed a line along the Pongong Tso lake and including Aksai Chin into Ladakh. This map was presented to the Maharaja of Kashmir who accepted the same and stationed troops in a fort constructed at Shahidulla (Xaidulla) in the upper Karakash river region.  As Chinese did not control either Uyghuristan or Tibet, the map of this line was never presented to them.  Likewise, British survey officer Henry Mcmohan in the year 1914 drew a demarcation line on the eastern part of the country originally known as North East Frontier Area (NEFA), known as Mcmohan line demarcating the border between India and Tibet i...

China had been and continues to be antagonistic towards India from early 1960s.  Under the then premier Zhou-En-Lai the famed Hindi-Chini bai bai of Indian prime minister J Nehru did not cut much ice and India faced one of its worst military defeats in recent memory. China claimed part of the Indian state of Arunachal Pradesh as its own and had been voicing its objection whenever any development work is undertaken in that area. Economically and militarily, being behind India in the early 1960s, it had overtaken India in the 1990s thanks to its relentless push for opening its economy to the global companies offering them everything a bottom-line driven capitalist corporate looks for. Presently Chinese economy is second largest in the world and its military might, though may not match some of the western powers, is still to be feared as most of the war machines are locally made and its military is very aggressive. It is trying to undermine the resurgence of India as a power in the ...