Dear Friends: Thanks to your unstinted support and encouragement, what started as a simple newsletter almost six years ago has turned into a repository of 1200+ articles and 16000+ comments on subjects ranging from “An Indian Identity” to “Women in Hinduism and India“
In the process, some of the user-friendliness may have been lost. This brief primer is meant to help you make the most of my personal “knowledge management system”!
There are now 1200+ posts on this blog. You can rely on serendipity to …

Pl. read this in the context of the on-going discussion re. governments, economy, market intervention and liberal policies…Below is a great summary of the positions on the “right” and “left” of the economic spectrum by Prof Greg Mankiw:

The right sees large deadweight losses associated with taxation and, therefore, is worried about the growth of government as a share in the economy. The left sees smaller elasticities of supply and demand and, therefore, is less worried about the distortionary effect of taxes.
The right sees externalities as an occasional market failure that calls …

Some of you may remember this post from a while back: Saving the planet by going vegetarian… in which I had said: “I wish someone likes Shri Pachauri makes it part of his/her agenda…”
Seems my wish has been fulfilled!  Last week, Dr Rajendra Pachauri appeared to confirm that eating less meat will help protect the environment:
People should have one meat-free day a week if they want to make a personal and effective sacrifice that would help tackle climate change, the world’s leading authority on global warming has told The Observer
Dr …

The “Big Bang” experiment seems to have started well and I am still able to write and post this…which can only mean that the world has not come to an end …
I feel sorry for the girl who apparently committed suicide over fears of the world going up in smoke…(as an aside, I think this matter needs to be thoroughly investigated…I find this hard to believe…
Her father, identified on local television as Biharilal, said that his daughter, Chayya, killed herself after watching doomsday predictions made on Indian news programmes.
“In the …

In response to my previous post, a loyal reader emailed me and asked, what about reforms in Hinduism? or did I think that Hinduism was perfect and really did not need any changes?
That question prompted this post…Now, I have written on this subject before (pl. see list of related posts at the end) but I realised there was still some value in enumerating what is “wrong” with Hinduism and what needs to change for the better…
So here is my first cut (and I must say that this is an amateur’s attempt – I am by no …

Thanks to a comment left on this blog, I was alerted to this website maintained by Brian Champness and dedicated to the memory of one of the greatest scientists that India has produced in modern times – Sir J C Bose.
I have written about Acharya Bose before…but he deserves far more attention than one single post…and I was very glad when I came across Brian’s site in which he explores aspects of consciousness and feelings in plants – a subject first studied by Sir Bose and now coming inder increasing interest from …

Last week while in Bengaluru, I chanced upon this article which highlighted the dire need for clean toilets – especially for women – in India.
The bit about almost 100 school-children having to use just one toilet was the saddest part…Lack of clean toilets in schools and the almost complete absence of hygienic public conveniences should be a matter of national shame – and a top priority….Could one reason for this state of neglect be that most planners and govt. officials are men – who may find it hard to sympathise …

Keeping my reservations on her policies aside for the moment, I salute Behenji for having the courage and the audacity to come clean with her income and getting herself an entry in the Top 20 Income Tax payers in the country (- leaving aside the small matter of how some of the wealth was acquired).
I doubt there is any other politician on the list…although at the current going rate, should we not expect to see at least a few more?

Truly, MerA BhArat MahAan !
Related Posts:
Looks like someone is gunning for Behenji
How to earn Rs 50 …

…or has he relied on some half-baked research presented to him as a backgrounder?
I was alerted today to this excellent analysis of ”Rama Setu in Padma PurANa” by Sh Sarvesh Tiwari.  I sincerely hope that Sh Nariman reads this…although I am not very hopeful.
Regardless, the lie about BhagwAn Shri RAm “destroying” the Rama Setu needs to be nailed…(remember, a lie told often enough will become the truth etc…?)
But do you think any of the mainstream media (or the TV anchors) are going to take notice of this? I bet not.
*** Excerpts Begin …

Excerpts from a great article by Prof Walid Phares, “The Deobandi Fatwa Against Terrorism Didn’t Treat the Jihadi Root” underscoring some of the points I had made in an earlier post (Thanks to Krishen-ji for alerting me to this)
*** Excerpts Begin (emphasis mine) ***
Many in the West and in other regions of the world were impressed by the issuing of a fatwa (Islamic theological edict) condemning Terrorism by one of the leading religious centers in the Muslim world, the Darool-Uloom Deoband in India. An Islamic seminary said to have ‘inspired’ the …