Readers' Forum

R
Theatrics of the absurd:
Indian communists are a strange bunch. Most of the seats they have won in the recent Lok Sabha elections were against the Congress candidates. They fight bitterly and kill each other in Kerala, West Bengal and Tripura. Now the question is: How can the same communists support the Congress-led coalition government at the Centre to rule? Kerala, with the highest literacy rate, is a strange place. Common joke in Congress circles is: During the daytime the A.K. Antony and Karunakaran groups fight each other bitterly, but during the night, they befriend and share the plum posts between them. Now A.K. Antony and Karunakaran have one more partner?communists?for the drama. Congress and communists fight bitterly during the daytime and decide in the night what posts to share at the Centre. The situation is similar in the ?enlightened? West Bengal and Tripura. Only in these states, these high-level contradictions can happen. Their fights, alliances, theatrics, and betrayals are beyond the comprehension of simple folks.
?R.K. Mani, Mangalore

Modi, the real hero:
Instead of finding the actual causes of the defeat, we find a scapegoat for the defeat and even the BJP'stop brass was not hesitant in putting the blame squarely on Narendra Modi and the Gujarat violence (No mud slinging, please, Organiser, 27-6-2004). The humiliation that the BJP and its allies received at the hands of voters needs deep introspection. BJP must find the real causes for this defeat. If Chandra Babu Naidu failed in Andhra Pradesh due to Gujarat, how was Naveen Patnaik able to retain his throne? What went wrong with ?India Shining? and ?Feel Good? factors? Were the BJP not over-confident about its victory? Then why blame Modi and Gujarat violence only?
?Nand Kishore Sethi, New Delhi

The public statementby the former Prime Minister at Manali indicates that there is no discipline in the party. Are the ?tallest? leaders free to express their views or throw dirt on the co-workers publicly as and when necessary to suit their personal agenda? How can the BJP claim to be a ?party with a difference? when the leaders have no respect for party discipline? If the BJP wants to be an ideology-based party, then its style of function should be changed?the same leader having one foot in the party and another foot in the legislative wing is not workable. One group should work only for the organisation and for framing the policies; another group should work on the legislative side to implement those policies. ?R.K. Sarkar, West Bengal

Narendra Modi did what he promised. At least, we have one great leader in Bharat who supports Hindutva sincerely. Therefore, he got a thumping majority in the Assembly elections last year. His performance in the Elections 2004 is also not as bad as Shri Vajpayee?s. There is no reason for Atal Behari Vajpayee to blame Narendra Modi for the defeat.
?S. Arundhati Reddy, Hyderabad

Discredited historians:
Apropos of What is this desaffronisation? (Organiser, 27-6-2004); N.S. Rajaram has rightly denounced the role of discredited historians to ?desaffronise? the ancient Hindu history, which has nothing to do with other religions. These ?historians? are attempting to denigrate the composite culture of the Vedas and of ancient India into a mere nomadic episode of the ?wandering? Aryans. They are doing immense dis-service to our civilisation and India in their bid to change the textbooks.
?M.R. Mallya, Bangalore

Act of impropriety:
The panel of historians comprising of S. Settar, Barun De and J.S. Grewal has committed a great impropriety by making its recommendations, sent to the Ministry of HRD, public, as it has caused extreme confusion in the education field. It seems that these historians have never taught in a school and are ignorant of school problems. In fact it is a fight over loaves and fishes, i.e. royalty to be earned from the books written by them or by their bed-fellows. Who cares for the education of the child?
?Man Mohan, Gurgaon

True assessment:
All seekers of truth will agree with Shri Raj Kumar Bhatia'sassessment in his article Blessing in disguise (Organiser, 20-6-2004). However, I want to add that real workers of not only the BJP, but all workers of the Sangh Parivar, who used to work silently for the BJP, got disillusioned, as the BJP on the pretext of keeping the NDA united, so as to stay in power, expressed only lip service on the important issues. Further, your letter to readers on Prof. V.P. Bhatia expressed the anguish of those like me. Let us hope that future generation will care for books.
?Gottipati MuralIMohan, Vijayawada

The reason for the TDP'sand BJP'sdebaclein Andhra Pradesh is that their cadre failed to co-ordinate in the respective segments. They did not meet the local people, but restricted themselves to the local councillors. Nor did the top brass meet the people. As a result of this, people remained ignorant of the good works done by the ruling TDP in the state and the NDA government at the Centre.
?Sitaram Swamy, Allahabad

Defective democracy?:
This has reference to a reader'sviews (Organiser, 13-6-2004); irrespective of various explanations for the recent election results, the reality is something else. Basically our democracy is defective and most deceptive. The adult franchise is for blind votes for various considerations. Except for a few literates, who are associated with the political parties, the others refrain from voting, finding no suitable candidates on the ballot. Alliance of parties, which is an unhealthy procedure, has further damaged the situation. In our country, party politics and linguistic states are the most hazardous hurdles for an ideal election since different states are ruled by different parties.
?K.V. Sadashiviah, Bangalore

So many reasons have been advancedfor the NDA'sdefeat in the elections. I feel the main reasons for the defeat are?(a) introduction of PAN, which the middle and lower-middle class think an irritation; (b) aggressively reducing the interest rate on FD; and (c) in spite of objections from many trade unions, the interest rate on PF accumulation was drastically reduced thus alienating the working class.
?M. Gangadharan, Trichur

Old-age problems:
Uma Joshi'sarticle Creating social sensibilities for the aged (Organiser, 27-6-2004) has made some good suggestions to mitigate the problems of old people. It may be emphasised that the problems of the aged are largely because of the breakdown of the joint-family system and migration of young people to the far-away places. Based on my personal experience (myself being in the late seventies), I believe that instead of depending on others, old people should start planning for old age when they are in their fifties.
?Dr Vidya Sagar, Delhi

Ignite Hindu minds:
Please accept my congratulations for this new post. I clearly see that during your editorship there would be quite some rough and tumultuous politics in the country. You would be in the academic centrestage and would have to bear quite some share of responsibility for igniting the minds of Hindus and drifting them to our cherished goal of Hindu rashtra, which the ?secular? brigade calls ?saffronisation? of socio-politics of the country.
?Dr Damodar Vishnu Nene, Vadodara

Overseas subscription rate:
The present-day get-up of Organiser is attractive and it contains more informative articles. A friend of mine residing in Australia, connected with Sewa International, wants to subscribe to Organiser. Since the annual overseas subscription rate for Organiser is not mentioned anywhere in Organiser, I shall be grateful if you can kindly let me know the same immediately.
?S. Raghuraman, Chennai (The annual overseas subscription rate for Organiser is Rs 1,300.)

Tit for tat:
During the Lok Sabha elections there was a propaganda amongst Muslims through a section of Urdu press and by Muslim religious leaders that Muslims should come out in maximum numbers to vote against BJP and support any strongest non-NDA candidate so that BJP did not come to power. As a reaction to it, Bal Thackeray has suggested creation of a Hindu vote-bank?that Hindus should be told to vote for BJP/Shiv Sena and participate in elections in maximum numbers if they want to save India from another partition. BJP, VHP and RSS should take Shri Thackeray'sadvice seriously.
?Anand Prakash, Panchkula

The point missed:
This is with reference to S.P. Gupta'sreply to my letter (Organiser, 20-6-2004). I am sorry to say that Shri Gupta did not get my point. Not all mosques in India are precisely west-east oriented as it depends upon the relative location of qiblah, that is the grand mosque at Mecca. For example, mosques in Kashmir would slightly be south-west in direction for their qiblah. This is so perfectly done that any little deviation necessitates major architectural alteration in the building of the mosque.
?A.T.M. Anwar, Hyderabad

Uncle Sam'sday-dreaming:
Reference to Non-Nato ally status of Pakistan and Indian foreign policy by Dr Dipak Basu, (Organiser, 6-6-2004); Pakistan is under the protective umbrella of unipolar super power, USA, which is looking for mercenaries to control pygmies like Iraq. USA is our natural ally, but only in democracy, not in mutual national interests, which seldom coincide. The days of unipolar imperialism to retain empire, where once sun never used to set, through mercenaries are over. Paper tiger with nuclear teeth can fight pygmies like Iraq, but not the colossals like India, China and Russia.
?Pran Salhotra, Gurdaspur

One-sided welfare:
A number of Christian leaders, both from churches and social organisations, held a press conference to broadcast their intention of meeting with the Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh to request him to set up a special government enterprise to promote the welfare of Christians (1.44 per cent according to the Census of India but 10 per cent according to their claims?the divergence is indicative of the fraud of unregistered conversions) of the state. This is indeed astounding. The state and the Government of India are secular. How can they spend people'shard-earned money on the welfare of one religious community only? Besides, is there any one Christian-majority State in the world (such as USA, UK, Germany, Canada, France, etc.) where Hindus live and the government of such a country set up a government enterprise for the welfare of the Hindu minority?
?Santosh Kumar Jain, Secunderabad

?Pak? fancy:
When RJD chief Laloo Prasad Yadav visited Pakistan recently, he put on a Jinnah cap at New Delhi Railway Station before his departure to Pakistan. Likewise, our External Affairs Minister Natwar Singh too put on the Jinnah cap during his recent US visit. Now, I want to ask: Have our ?secular? leaders discarded the ?Gandhi cap? for ever? Have they now a fancy for ?Jinnah cap? during foreign visits? What a pity!
?Manmohan Sethi, Delhi