At least some of you must have read an extraordinary piece in the New York Times earlier this week provocatively titled, Yoga and Sex Scandals: No Surprise Here. In that piece, William Broad made a number of assertions – some misleading, some just plain wrong including the remarkable assertion that “(Yoga) began as a sex cult“(sic)!  Thankfully, rebuttals were quick and fast in coming..Most of them highlighted Mr Broad’s false premise and his apparent ignorance about the origins of Yoga, its spiritual aspects as well as the tradition of Tantra. …

This post has been some time in coming – and I am penning my thoughts on something controversial after a long time. It was prompted by the recent decision of government of MP to increase the punishment for cow slaughter. As many of you would know, the issue of cow-slaughter is not a new one.  In fact, the demand for a ban on slaughter of cows is more than a century old – and was first raised in modern times by Swami Dayanand Saraswati and the Arya Samaj. It has …

I read this interview of Dr Prodosh Aich a few months back but did not post it as I wanted to get my hands on his book. “Lies on Long Legs” is a painstakingly researched book that goes back to primary sources in an effort to find out more about the “History” of India – as we know about it today. Who were these people who “authored” this “history”? What was the basis of their interpretations? What were their intentions? What was their training? What were the factors that might …

Excerpts from an essay by Swami Chinmayananda on non-violence and righteous violence titled, DHARMA HIMSA TATHAIVA CA (emphasis added):

Personally, I am no advocate of violence. But violence, too, has its rightful place in life, life does not preclude death. The average Indian has been moulded into a particular national mentality of quixotic tolerance. His attitude is shaped into its distinct pattern by the ideologies and moralities preached in our national literature. And no single work in our classics has gained such a wide influence on our people as the Bhagawad …

Dear All: I am reproducing below a brief but very interesting email exchange between Sh Yoginder Sikand and Sh Jay Vachani precipitated by a recent article in Tehelka by Sh Sikand, titled, Converted dalits get no justice. In the article, Sh Sikand has suggested that “Muslim and Christian Dalits should be given reservation just like those who embraced Sikhism and Buddhism“. This argument is not new but Sh Vachani has done a fine job of exposing the core of it – viz. caste being a sociological phenomenon…Pl read on (Thanks …

Thanks to Parthasarathy-ji for alerting me to this recent interview of Jeffrey Armstrong. I found it fascinating for the breadth of subjects it covered and the insights it offered. Some excerpts below (emphasis added). As some of you may know,
Jeffrey Armstrong is an award-winning author of numerous books on Vedic knowledge..He is a philosopher, practitioner and teacher of the Vedas for the past 40 years. He has degrees in Psychology, History & Comparative Religions, and Literature and had a successful career as an executive in Silicon Valley before turning to …

Dear All, some of you – particularly those from Kerala and/or familiar with Sabarimala Devasthanam – may have read about the recent controversy surrounding the Makara Jyothi (that surfaced in the aftermath of the tragic stampede a few days back).  Below are some excerpts from an email by Rajesh Pillai in response to a particularly gratuitous article that appeared in the Kerala press a few days back (unfortunately I dont have a translation; the original in Malayalam can be read at this link). Rajesh’s response was triggered by an email …

Sadanand Dhume explains it well. A brief excerpt below (emphasis added):
Simply put, the notion that the radical Hindu threat to India is comparable to that posed by radical Islam is ludicrous. First there’s the question of scale. Alleged Hindu terrorists—not one of whom has been convicted—are accused of bomb blasts in 2007 and 2008 in Andhra Pradesh, Rajasthan and Maharashtra that killed 17 people. According to the South Asia Terrorism Portal, the toll in India from about two dozen radical Islamic terrorist attacks since …

Stumbled on this yesterday in the NY Times (emphasis added):
“We started this, really, for our kids,” said Dr. Shukla, a urologist and a second-generation Indian-American. “When our kids go to school and say they are Hindu, nobody says, ‘Oh, yeah, Hindus gave the world yoga.’ They say, ‘What caste are you?’ Or ‘Do you pray to a monkey god?’ Because that’s all Americans know about Hinduism.”
The “Dr Shukla” mentioned in the article is Dr Aseem Shukla and what he is talking about is the “take Yoga Back movement..Below, some excerpts …

…but still could not find anything to support your contention that “many…jain/buddhist temples (were) destroyed to build hindu temples” (pl read the beginning of this discussion here; emphasis added, throughout)
*** CAUTION: Long Post ***
Below, I have made an attempt at addressing each of your points (in bold blue) one-by-one. I have also made serious efforts to provide references wherever possible. Pl do point out if I have missed something.  You will recall that in the first response to my tweet asking you to name three Jain/Buddhist temples destroyed to build …