As many as 210 websites connected with the State and the Union Government, including the educational institutions, have made Aadhaar information public. The argument is that data is out in the public domain to ensure transparency. The information contained in the Aadhaar Card is confidential. No person should be privy to it.As the list of  cybercrimes keeps spiralling by releasing such information,  we are playing into the hands of identity thieves and the criminals. Already there has been reports of online and credit card frauds by hackers. If citizens are harassed by the release of this confidential information, then the responsibility shall lie squarely with the Government. The Supreme Court too, has given favourable judgement with regard to privacy. It is said it is up to the individual to disclose what he wants and he cannot be coerced. We need to ensure a safe network before putting it all out there.
MANISHA CHANDARANA, Mumbai
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Practice What You Preach
This refers to the article ‘Superfluous Move’ by Prasanth Vaidyaraj in Organiser dated Nov 26. Isn’t it hypocritical on the part of Karnataka’s Chief Minister S Siddharamaiah to
have cleared the Hindu-specific Anti-Superstition Bill, when he himself is afraid of “superstitions”. He once  changed his official car because a crow sat on it. Strangely, vastu and astrology have been excluded from the Bill. Why because the members of the Congress themselves follow these? Even Jawaharlal Nehru, the so-called champion of all things rational, had to take the help of the “unscientific” astrology in his final days, as told by Durga Das, an eminent journalist of the Nehru era, is his book India from Curzon to Nehru and After. In 1964, at the instance of Cabinet Ministers Satya Narayan Sinha and Gulzarilal Nanda, Nehru had to take recourse to astrology and Ayurveda, to save himself from his failing health and also the dire astrological predictions about his lifespan. To quote Durga Das: “Fifty learned pundits were engaged by his admirers to perform the prescribed rites at a temple in Kalkaji, a suburb of Delhi. At the end of the daily ceremonies the pundits repaired to the Prime Minister’s residence, to place an auspicious tilak mark on his forehead.” Hinduism does not blindly support superstitions in the name of religion. Practices that are not compliant with the Vedic rules are
deprecated. Animal sacrifices (they have been expressly banned in Kaliyuga, since they cannot be performed in a win-win manner), fire-walking etc are disapproved and not recognised by the Shastras. Whereas practices like “Made Made Snana” etc, fall in the realm of innocuous remedies and faith healing. They harm neither the self nor others. Also, so scientific an organisation like ISRO itself, based in the same Karnataka, seeks the blessings of Lord Venkateswara at Tirupati before the launch of a rocket. Now, can all these be dismissed as superstitions? The Government, therefore, should seek the opinion of Vedic scholars first, before presumptuously pronouncing a Hindu practice as superstition. Above all, remaining silent on superstitions in Islam and Christianity is plain monstrous and pseudo-secular.
C V KRISHNA MANOJ, Hyderabad
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Collective Efforts Required 

It is not for nothing that the Union Minister Shri Nitin Gadkari is known as a very hard task master and a doer in the real sense. Helming the Ministry of Road Transport and Highway, most of his projects have been translated into reality. But all Ministries are not in tandem when it comes to performance. It is nothing but shameful that despite having started way back in the 1980’s we have not been able to make much headway in the clean Ganga project. The UK which started river clean-ups much later was able to showcase the Thames River in a much better fashion. Kudos to Shri Gadkari that he has been able to rope in an industrialist for whom resources are not an issue and assign him a select section of the Ganga River stretch for 15 long years of maintenance and beautification. I am sure this is a very innovative way of cleaning our river and we can replicate this with the Yamuna River as well. But ultimately it is the collective efforts of all the stakeholders—both the Government as well as the citizens—to restore the pristine health of River Ganga and rescue our environment.
BAL GOVIND , NOIDA
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A Curse
We would have no terrorist if Pakistan was disciplined and prosperous. A neighbour like Canada is a boon to the US and a neighbour like Pakistan is a curse to India. Now China has become a problem for the world as it is involved in strategic matters, from North Korea to Zimbabwe courtesy its economic expansion policy. The Chinese role in Mayanmar and Nepal is known to all. If China and Pakistan really want to maintain peace in the region and try to solve their own problems, instead of middling in the affair of others, then we would have a solid democracy, sound economy and a stable region.
SUNIL, Odisha
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Tit for Tat
Refer to ‘Valour needed to protect freedom’ as stated by the RSS Sahsarkaryavah Dr Krishna Gopal, while remembering the king of Delhi, Hemchandra Vikramaditya, as mentioned in Organiser dated 22/29.10.2017. He is very correct. We lost, not because there was lack of valour in our kings and warriors. We lost because, Muslim invaders and kings always fought for the spread of Islam by force, killing and looting the Hindus, called as kafirs by the Muslims. Whereas Hindu kings fought only for self defence, without any aim of
protecting dharma and defeating Islam. This is what exactly happened in the case of Hemchandra also. He was defeated because Rajputs considered it below their dignity to fight under his command. He being from a non-Rajput caste. Secondly Muslims never fought against a Muslim, taking help from a Hindu king. But Hindu kings did take help of Muslim kings to defeat Hindu kings. Even today a Muslim would never take the help of a Hindu to take revenge from a Muslim, but the Hindus do not mind taking help of a Muslim. And lastly Hindu kings and warriors followed high code of moral conduct and never harmed those Muslims who were not in the battle field but Muslims indulged in all sort of war crimes and did not spare even women and children. The pity is that still we refuse to learn a lesson. We must adopt a policy of tit for tat, like Shivaji. All sects and subjects of Muslims joined hands in 1947 to liquidate entire Hindu and Sikh population in Pakistan, although otherwise they fight bloody wars against each other. But we are not only bearing the burden of 20 crore Muslims and allowing them to move in Bharat as if they are the original inhabitants and Hindus are refugees. We Hindus are more worried about Rohingya criminal Muslims of Myanmar, but have miserably  failed to settle Hindus/Pundits in Kashmir. It is very dangerous to continue like this? Let us hope that the present Government would soon end  situation and make truncated Bharat a homeland for the Hindus and the non-Muslims, just as Pakistan and Bangladesh are homeland for the Muslims.
ANAND PRAKASH, Panchkula, Haryana