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Dayal, Consul General of India in New Delhi: India will be able to Meanwhile, in Delhi, Mukherjee New York, will be presiding over tide over the financial crisis ema- said during a discussion in the Ra- The NASDAQ Stock Market Closnating from a probable US double jya Sabha, “It is too premature to say ing Bell ceremony on India’s 65th dip recession and downgrade of its what will be the final shape of the US Independence Day on August 15. sovereign debt rating as the Indian downgrade. But there is no doubt that This event is being held as part of economy’s growth was driven by our IT industry may be affected.

India’s Independence Day celebradomestic demand, Finance Minister Pranab Continued on page 4 tions. India conPranab Mukherjee said Thursday. tinues to be an Meanwhile, US stocks, recovered important and some lost ground on Thursday after promising counwild swings earlier in the week foltry on its way lowing better than expected jobs data to becoming a Sikhs gather outside the gurdwara in Southall, south London, and some strong corporate earnings. to protect the area from looters on August 10. global powerThe blue-chip Dow Jones Industrial house.

Average rose 4.4 % to 11191 by the CG Continued London: The fires which have serves as the focal point for local Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee end of the day. on page 4 raged in London’s worst rioting for worshipers, who make up 23 perdecades have forged a sense of com- cent of the area’s population, acmunity rarely seen in the British cap- cording to the 2001 census.

Sunny Bangea, ital, withDayanidhi Sikhs in the western bor- DMK Union Textiles Minister Maran is second minister to exit23, said he was ough of Southall leading Manmohan government in the theway. spectrumprepared scam. “to fight fire with fire� to To celebrate India’s Presidency theinvolved UN Security 53 percent of terror plots worldwide sinceof2004 jihadists,Council, India’s Permanent Hundreds of turbaned men gath- protect the temple and surrounding like Tehrik-e-Taliban and LeT cadres, Singh trained in Pakistan.

Representative to the UN Hardeep Puri hosted a reception at the GeneralUnionered outside “A lot of stupid things theirgovernment gurdwara toand de-thecommunity.

While the showed complicity in the scam.

New Delhi/Chennai: Assembly Building in New York attended by top diplomats,Textiles lawmakers and Indian Ma-fendCongress here,â€? heturn said.of “Onevents Mon- is the westparty London borough on onhappened did not comment Thursday’s Minister Dayanidhi #&$% # $( * !# $ % ! "& % ! % & # # ( % ) &% ' ( % # # $ to the country’s govern- ran resigned Toronto: Pakistan is now the resistance night,to gangs the of after rumorsdevelopment, circulated on andaylikely community leaders, alongside the opening of a ‘Humanitas Images of India’ the big political impacttried both to theset shape Thursday followingTuesday # + # % ' % $% # ! & ( % $%& %$ ment, the draconian imposition of new front inexhibition the war on terror as it temple on fire, but there was no social networking website Twitter emboldened opposition described impending cabinet shufe and deliallegations of involvement in the by award winning US photographer Fredric Roberts. has become a new safe haven for al- Sharia law and the waging of war 2G spectrum scam, becoming thethatit itaswas we look afterthe looters’ hit damage. “toonext littleon toothe lateâ€? and sought cately Since poisedthen, relations between Qaeda, says the Canadian media a against NATO forces in Afghanistan. second DMK minister after A.list,resignation temple 24and hours day.â€? new agencyofAFP said. Minister P.the Congress Home the aDMK. Because of these militant outďŹ ts Raja to exit the cabinet. day after the country blacklisted the Although centred around the 4 Men sporting who traditional garb Chidambaram, they alleged 2G scam continued on page Pakistani Taliban and started with- Pakistan has become “the main including the kirpan, led chants temple, the operation extended to staging area for terrorist plots drawal from Afghanistan Tuesday. as others patrolled the area by all members of the community, one “The war on terror has shifted, around the world and - despite the car and motorcycle looking out of Bangea’s friends explained. and Pakistan is its new front line,â€? United States’ assassination of Osa“It’s the local area, we have to for the looters who have terma bin Laden in Abbotabad - a new said the daily National Post. rorized the city since Saturday. help, even if it’s the pub across the “These two events (blacklisting safe-haven for al-Qaeda.â€?

Amarjit Singh Dhillon, an ad- street,� he said.

Quoting a study by the New of the Pakistani Taliban and the Community defense groups have viserto the hastily-convened gurdstart of withdrawal from Afghani- America Foundation, the paper wara com mittee, said that the op- sprung up across the capital since stan) encapsulate a shift, not only said 53 percent of terror plots erationformer was “not chiefabout sec- vigilantes, unprecedented rioting and looting New Delhi: The billion), believes for Canada, but for all other na- worldwide since 2004 involved valuables found in retary of Kerala began late Saturday after a protest just self-defense�.

CP Nair. tions on the front lines of the war jihadists trained in Pakistan, com- the secret cellars of “My house can be As per a report, Thursday, therebuilt‌but against the death of a man in a poInontheterror. pictureFor from L to R are: Justice Hinds-Radix, District Judge paredAdm. to six percent in YemenFederal and Kerala’s a number of Justice years, Knipel, this is aclaims place of worship, it is for lice shooting turned violent. former bureaucrat that the famousGeorge Sree Daniels, Fredric Roberts, Amb. Vijay Nambiar,, A/SG UN Women Lakshmi Puri, President of the UNSC and India’s three percent in Iraq.

Pakistani jithose lines have been shifting Increased police numbers apeverybody,â€? he the said, adding that he estimated market value of treaPadmanabhaswamy Permanentfrom Representative Hardeep Ranju Batra, Surrogate Judge Gigante, Ravi Batra, Justice hadiPuri, groups have directed 44 persoutheast, Afghanistan to Singh wouldfrom be ashamed of himself if he peared to have quelled the disorder, sures unearthed the temple Temple in ThiruSchneier, Congressman Greg Meeks, Sen. Huntley, Justice Milton Tingling, Justice Aliotta, NY Senate Leader John thethe six secret cellars Padmanabcent of the terror plots since then, v a n a n t h a p u r a m makes it thedidn’t Pakistan,â€? theNeal paper said.Prof. John Humbach Southall Sikhofcommunity protect it. in the Only ďŹ ve ofbut richest temple L. Sampson, Batra, (hidden) and Pace University President Stephen Friedman. haswamy Temple have been opened, yielding # & # &#% * # ! $! #&$% It #&$% # $( * !# $ % ! "& % said the Tehrik-e-Taliban is according to the paper.

Sri Guru Singh Sabha Gurdwara, continued to maintain their vigil as could be worth Rs world.

Gold idols, ornaments and other valuables. & % % ' % Photo: War * on terror continued onMohammed page 4 5 ' # $ $ % ! %&# very dangerous as ' $% # its “stated goal� is # night fell Wednesday. the biggest Sikh Kerala treasure continued ontemple page 4 in Europe, lakhJaffer/SnapsIndia. crore ($100 (%

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Vol. 4 |4No. 17 | August 13-19, 2011 | 60 Cents Vol. | No.12 | July 9-15, 2011 | 60 Cents %,%"1!3)/.2 /& !.!'%-%.3 1 !.'!26!-8

Pakistan turns ‘new front line’ of war on terror

Domestic demand will help India tide over US financial crisis: Pranab

London Sikhs lead 2G scamfightback claims another against riots minister: Maran quits

Celebrating India’s Presidency of UNSC

Kerala temple treasure could be worth $100 billion

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Look out for our Special Edition August 20-26, 2011

Tristate Community TheSouthAsianTimes.info

3

August 13-19, 2011

Nassau county to celebrate India Day on Aug 15 Mineola, NY: For second year running, Nassau County Executive Hon. Edward P Mangano is holding a function to celebrate India’s Independence Day. Together with the National Federation of Indian American Associations (NFIA), the ceremony on August 15 morning will be held at the prestigious Theodore Roosevelt Executive and Legislative Building in Mineola. Hosting organizations are: Association of Indians in America-NY, India Association of Long Island, Rajasthan Association of North America, Kerala Center, International Punjabi Society, Indian American Forum, Indian American Malayalee Association of Long

Island Inc, Long Island Gujarati Cultural Society, National IndoAmerican Associations for Senior Citizens and Rotary Club of Hicksville South.

Dignitaries invited to attend the event include President of Guyana Bharrat Jagdeo, India’s Ambassador to the UN, Hardeep S. Puri, Consulate General of India in New York, Amb. Parabhu Dayal and senior elected officials of Nassau County.

Besides celebrating India Day in Long Island, bringing the community together is another prime goal of County Executive Hon. Ed Mangano, said Kamlesh Mehta, Chair, Coordination Committee of

Sex ed compulsory for public middle and high schools New York: Sex education classes will be required in all of the city's public middle and high schools this school year for the first time in almost two decades, officials revealed Tuesday.

The new mandate calls for schools to devote a course to the birds and the bees in sixth or seventh grade - and again in ninth or tenth grade - starting the second semester of the upcoming school year.

The policy shift means that students as young as 11 will be taught everything from the risks of unprotected sex to issues surrounding pregnancy and puberty. High schoolers will receive pointers on the proper way to use a condom, officials said.

"In high schools, an oral description of how to use a condom will be given," a Department of Education official said. "If students want a demonstration, one can be given in the health resource room."

Parents will have the right to keep their children out of lessons on birth-control methods, officials said.

There will also be lessons on skills such as how to resist a partner's sexual advances when a student is not ready and how to avoid abusive relationships.

"We must be committed to ensuring that both middle school and high school students are exposed to this valuable information so they can learn to keep themselves safe before, and when, they decide to have sex," Chancellor Dennis Walcott said in an email to colleagues.

Up to now, all middle and high schools have conducted a one-semester state-mandated health education course that did not require sex ed instruction.

While some schools have taught sex education for years, others have ignored it entirely. A city Education Department survey this spring found approximately 64% of middle schools and 38% of high schools already used the recommended sex ed curriculum.

the India Day program & Deputy Director, Nassau County Office of Economic Development. It is the first time ever that over 10 Indian American organizations have come on one stage to celebrate any event.

NFIA is delighted to co-host Independence Day of India celebration in Nassau county with Office of County Executive Ed Mangano, said Lal Motwani, President of NFIA. NFIA will be presenting to Hon. Mangano a special memento reminiscent of the freedom struggle of India.

At the event, three Indian Americans will be honored for their con-

tributions to the community, they are Smt Rajinder Kaur (Women Empowerment), Dr Vasundhra Kalapusudi (Senior Citizens) and Vibhuti Jha (Community Integration).

Refreshments are being sponsorod

by Rajbhog and Rasraj restaurants of Hicksville. Community leader Champak Parikh will perform the flag-hoisting ceremony in traditional style. Renowned attorney Jas Mayall will be the emcee of the event.

Theodore Roosevelt Building in Mineola housing Nassau County Executive and Legislative offices.

Pomp and show at IALI’s IndiaFest Melville, NY: The India Association of Long Island (IALI) organized the 20th IndiaFest at Huntington Hilton Hotel here on last Sunday with great pomp and show. An overwhelming 9,000 people took part in the day long festivities at Long Island's largest showcase of India's culture, spotlighting a nation that is now a powerhouse economy. IndiaFest also celebrates the Indian-American communities living in the metropolitan area.

IndiaFest 2011 had one of the biggest displays of Arts & Crafts, Designer Clothes & Jewelry, Floor Shows and Dances, Various types of Delicious Food and Decoration, Henna & Mehndi, Raffle, Games and Entertainment for the children, in other words something for people of all ages.

Renowned Fashion Designer, Gujarat born Sushma Patel from Atlanta, presented a fashion show with heavily embroidered and sequined colorful creations

With his melodious voice, Kamlesh Mehta, Gobind Munjal, IALI President, Nassau actor Manu Narayan County Executive Ed Mangano, Jon Kaiman, Supervisor, enthralled the audience.

Town of North Hempstead, and Joe Galanti, Asstt. Comptroller, New York State, during Pledge of Allegiance. were also set up to provide inof purely Indian ethnic and fu- singers Riti and Vishal Bhalla, formation on diabetes and high sion outfits using a breathtaking and Nipun Marwah. Everybody blood pressure with doctors and variety of Indian fabrics which also enjoyed the excellent Dance nurses on hand and available. kept the audience spellbound.

Performance by Bolly Arts.

Besides community leaders, For the western segment, the Not to be missed were the the invited dignitaries included models wore their hair with great continuous variety on stage of Hon. Tony Avella, NY State Senlooking unique hats.

Indian classical and contempo- ator, Hon. Ed Mangano, Nassau Special Appearance by Manu rary dances from Kathak to County Executive and Hon. Jon Narayan, lead actor of hit Broad- Kuchipudi, Bharatnatyam to Kaiman, Supervisor, Town of way show "Bombay Dreams" Odissi, pop to bhangra.

North Hempstead. drove the young crowd crazy.

Over 40 booths with a large The welcome remarks were Manu’s melodious voice en- variety of Indian merchandise made by IALI President Gobind thralled the audience as did were set up. Nutrition Booths Munjal.

Rival India Day parade in NJ also this Sunday Edison, NJ: After a year of wrangling between two rival organizations laying claim to hold the annual India Day Parade in New Jersey, both are holding their own parade to celebrate India’s 65th Independence Day this Sunday afternoon, albeit on different routes.

A Supreme Court Judge denied a request by the Iselin-based Indian Business Association to prevent the Edison-based

OakTree Indian Business Association (OTIBA) from using its Edison parade permit.

To rival IBA wallas one Bollywood star, Kangana Ranaut, for their 7th parade, OTIBA is bringing three—Soha Ali Khan (Grand Marshal), Kunal Khemu and Southie Shriya Saran (chief guests).

They were behind the 2004 parade in New Jersey.

Soha Ali Khan will be the Grand Marshal of the parade in Edison

4

National Community

August 13-19, 2011

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Tristate Community TheSouthAsianTimes.info

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August 13-19, 2011

Vedic scholars discuss a multitude of aspects of India’s caste system Piscataway, NJ: On July 31, 2011, World Association For Vedic Studies (WAVES) concluded a wellattended three-day conference on Varna, Jati and Kula (Caste) that featured prominent scholars worldwide and robust youth participation from high school, college and graduate school students, including members of Gayatri Pariwar, HSC and Youth for Sewa. The scholars from various institutions and with diverse backgrounds presented historical, anthropological, social, and spiritual aspects of the caste system in India.

The catalyst for the conference was the Hindu American Foundation report denouncing the caste system. WAVES held this conference to provide a forum for scholars and religious leaders to present a diversity of views on the caste system from an Indic / Hindu perspective “as that perspective often goes unheard in discussions on caste and we felt that these voices were missing from the HAF report and deserved to be highlighted in the caste discourse,” according to the press release.

The conference was co-sponsored

by All World Gayatri Pariwar and inaugurated by Dr. Pranav Pandya, Head, All World Gayatri Pariwar and Chancellor of Dev Sanskriti University. Other prominent speakers at the conference included Swami Tattvavidananda representing Arsha Vidya Gurukulam and the Hindu Dharma Acharya Sabha, Dr. Subramanian Swamy, Dr. R. Vaidyanathan, Rajiv Malhotra, Dr. MG Prasad, Dr. Madan Lal Goel, Suresh Chauhanke, Chairman and Managing Director of Sudarshan TV and Prof. Ved Nanda. In addition, several students participating in the youth forum made presentations reflecting unique HinduAmerican perspectives on the topic

Dr. Pranav Pandya at the podium, Dr. Madan Lal Goel (center) and Sanjay Saxena (left) of caste. They expressed a yearning to learn more about Hinduism from authentic sources and appreciation for the original jati / varna system, which many felt had continuing relevance in modern times.

Dr. Pandya, in his inaugural address, remarked, "The origin and purpose of Varna-Ashram-Dharma (the core foundation of Indian civilization) is rooted in the main purpose of life, which is to achieve Self-enlightenment and perfection, for which the Varna-order provided the choice of a suitable path and support system for a thriving social fabric and personal life attainments, including social upliftment and material development as desirable side effects."

Dr. Pandya further noted that, "Had Varna-order been imposed upon the society by brute force, then it would not have survived the test of time in a highly decentralized, diverse, pluralistic and autonomously distributed society that India has represented through the ages."

The conference drew nearly 100 participants over the course of the weekend, sparking lively and provocative discussions. At the conclusion of the conference, many of the attendees voted to adopt a set

of resolutions reflecting several of the key points emerging from the conference presentations.

In particular, it was agreed that jati / varna in their original form were beneficial for the psycho-spiritual development of the individual and for social harmony and prosperity. In fact, several participants on the conference panel on Western Perspectives on Varna, Jati and Kula, including Jeffrey Armstrong and Krishna Kirti Das (Christopher Shannon), strongly advocated for the incorporation of Jati / Varna principles into modern Western society.

Second, it was agreed that the negative social practices of untouchability and the like result from a degenerated and distorted social system that cannot be equated with Jati / Varna and that it is unfair to condemn Jati /

Dr. Pranav Pandya, head of the All World Gayatri Pariwar, visited Long Island, NY on August 1, 2011. During his visit he gave an informative and enlightening lecture about the comings of 2012 and importance of values in children, at St. Anthony’s High School Auditorium in South Huntington, NY. Dr. Pandya received proclamation of Suffolk County. (L to R): Andrew Raia New York State Assemblyman, Angie Carpenter, Suffolk County Treasurer, Sunita Gupta and Dr. Pranav Pandya (Picture by Pranav Mistry)

Varna for the social evils associated with a social system that is a grossly corrupted distortion of Jati / Varna.

"Well, if people have completely discarded the genuine Varna-order, and instead rolled out an unjust and corrupted order then it’s utterly unreasonable to slander the genuine Varna-order," was the view of Pandit Shriram Sharma Acharya, founder of All World Gayatri Pariwar, as quoted by Sanjay Saxena at the conference.

Third, there was consensus that it is inimical to Hindu interests for others, including Hindu organizations not based in India, to conflate Jati / Varna with racism or crimes against humanity—this is a matter for Indians to solve as an internal social issue under the sovereign power of India and one in which much progress has been made by the Indian government, the democratic / legal institutions of India and the grassroots efforts of many Hindu organizations and acharyas.

The resolutions adopted by the WAVES conference will be separately published, along with conference proceedings and a detailed

paper setting forth Hindu perspectives on Jati / Varna / Kula.

The reactions of youth participants at the conference were of appreciation for the forum and readiness for engagement. "I am very grateful for this opportunity to learn so much about my culture", said Kshama Desai of Youth for Sewa. “It was fantastic to see Hindu youth brainstorming the values of their tradition in such a constructive way", said Sashi Kejriwal, President of WAVES. Ravi Jaishankar, Secretary of the HSC (Hindu Students Council) National Body, eloquently expressed the need for the community to provide support to his generation to carry forward the Hindu tradition.

A series of presentations were made highlighting the ways in which the original and practical concepts of Varna and Jati can be integrated with modern social, economic, political, and spiritual lives throughout the world. Projects are likely to evolve to critically evaluate useful elements of the system for the benefit of society.

6

Tristate Community

August 13-19, 2011

TheSouthAsianTimes.info

Indian Business District in Iselin, NJ is now ‘India Square’ Iselin, Woodbridge: On a busy Sunday of August 7, a week before the celebrations of India’s Independence Day, shoppers and motorists smiled as they stopped to see a new sign, ‘India Square’ at the intersection of Middlesex Avenue and Oak Tree Road in Iselin, NJ. Thanks to Mayor John McCormac of Woodbridge Township, who unveiled the street sign to inaugurate ‘India Square’, renaming of the two-

block neighborhood was a timely gift to the Indian American community of New Jersey.

Paying rich tributes to the business owners of the area, Mayor McCormac said that Woodbridge Township greatly benefited due to the growth of Indian owned businesses along Oak Tree Road. “We could see the economic turn around of the area because of the success of Indian businesses.”

Echoing the sentiments of the Mayor New Jersey

Assemblyman Craig Coughlin and Woodbridge Township Councilman James Major supported the Mayor in his decision to call the area as ‘India Square.’Both of them spoke highly about the entrepreneurial spirit of the Indian American community.

Earlier during the day, the Mayor inaugurated a Cricket Field at Kennedy Park in Iselin.

The event was organized by Woodbridge Wellness Committee.

Arangetram for seva

By Nupur Joshi New York: On July 30, 2011, thirteen-year-old Shreya Bhatt completed her Bharatnatyam arangetram at the Scottish Rite Cathedral in Allentown, PA. Swami Viditatmananda, disciple of Shri Swami Dayananda Saraswati, made a special trip from the Arsha Vidya Gurukulam (AVG) in Saylorsburg, PA to attend Shreya’s arangetram and bless her.

Shreya performed splendidly with agility that is largely due to rigorous practice and training under her Guru Smt. Firuzi Desai of Vedanta Dance Academy. Desai, a wonderful dancer herself, has been trained by her Nritya Kala Guru Neela Raval in Surat, India and has represented India in dance per-

Shreya Bhatt requested guests to donate to AIM for Seva, a nonprofit instead of presenting her gifts formances around the world.

Shreya is not only an accomplished Indian classical dancer but also a trophy-winning soccer player and performing pianist. Along with nurturing these talents, Shreya also takes time out to

educate herself on Hinduism by attending camps and other programs at AVG and is a graduate of Balvihar where she received an in-depth education about Indian culture and history. Shreya practices Hindu morals on a regular basis. In fact, because seva is such a significant aspect of being a Hindu, Shreya asked for the members of the audience to donate directly to AIM for Seva, a project started by Shri Swami Dayananda Saraswati to educate children suffering from poverty, instead of presenting her with monetary gifts or checks to congratulate her for her accomplishment. In this way, Shreya serves to be an inspiration for other youth members of our community to do seva in their own ways. She is the epitome of versatility and generosity.

The Hindu Temple Society of North America arranged a successful health fair open to all members of the temple and surrounding communities on August 7.

Attendees underwent general check-ups as well as heart checkup and blood tests. They were also provided with access to over 20 healthcare providers including physicians specializing in areas such as gynecology, dental hygiene and podiatry, among others.

Attendees were also given the opportunity to ask questions during a Q&A session towards the end of the event. In the picture, electro-cardiogram test being administered to an attendee (Photo: Xitij Joshi)

Mayor McCormac of Woodbridge Township (fourth from right) seen with (from right) IBA president Chandrakant Patel, Nayan Parikh, President of Society of Indo American Engineers and Architects and HR Shah, Chairman, TV Asia at the inauguration.

GOPIO-CT to host a four day film festival Sept 15 New York: GOPIO-CT, The screening of the light and Connecticut Chapter of the entertaining “O Maria” , the Global Organization of People story about a family estate of Indian Origin will open its held for generations now 2011 Film Festival at the Avon being sought after by big Theater in Stamford, business for commercial use.

Connecticut on September 15 An animated version of the at 7.30pm. with a screening of Indian epic “Ramayana, the the internationally acclaimed story of Rama”. will show at film “West is West.” This the Community Theater of sequel to the well received film Fairfield at 2pm on “East is East” has already won September 18. The festival many awards and is scheduled closes at the theater in the to release in North America in A poster of ‘I am Kalam’ to be Westport Town hall with an screened at the film fest the next few months. The fes8pm screening of “Teen tival continues at the Theater at the Westport Behenein” a powerful story about three Town Hall on Friday September 16, at 8pm teenage sisters who want to commit suicide with the screening of “Nauka Dubi”. The because their parents cannot afford a dowry to story by the renowned Rabindra Nath Tagore get them married. is about a husband who goes home with the wrong bride when a storm causes the boats carrying two separate wedding parties, to capsize.

On September 17, “I am Kalam” will be screened. It is about a very young boy who wants an education but has no choice but to earn a living to help his family. An unlikely friendship develops between the boy and a young prince who lives in the palace close to the boys place of work. This 7.30pm screening is followed by a 9.30pm

National Community TheSouthAsianTimes.info

August 13-19, 2011

India will get more prominence at Harvard New Delhi: Harvard alumni in India will join hands with the growing Indian student community to make India the professional, academic and cultural focus at America's premier Ivy League university that is celebrating 375 years of its existence, alumni heads said.

Harvard University, which boasts of high profile names such as union ministers Kapil Sibal and P. Chidambaram, held a first of its kind interactive event in the Indian capital where alumni members rubbed shoulders with current students and newly-admitted students.

Around 100 people, including undergraduate and graduate students and alumni from 12 Harvard schools came together over the weekend for the reunion by the Harvard India Students Group. The US varsity celebrates 375 years of its existence.

"The Harvard India Students Group is the first ever university-wise students group for the Harvard students in India in the long history of the university.

This is also the first time we had a welcome reception in India for newly admitted students to Harvard where the students were introduced to a host of issues," said Namita Wahi, president of the Harvard India

A reunion of Indian students group at the Harvard University recently took place in New Delhi Students Group. the Harvard Students and The event saw participa- community before," said tion from around 100 stu- Meenakshi Datta Ghosh, dents from various disci- president of the Harvard plines yet finding some- Club of India. thing common among them.

"The number of students The disciplines were as is significant. Since this diverse as law, social entre- was the first time Indian preneurship, business and students from Harvard met academics, among others. in India, there was also a Over 100,000 Indian stu- direct engagement between dents are currently studying the alumni and the current in universities across the students," said Wahi, who United States. The number feels the reception brought is expected to rise because them at the threshold of an of considerable increase in important moment in the student visa applications history of Harvard-India from the country. relations with "India "The Harvard Club of increasingly becoming the India seeks to promote academic, professional, and national and global public cultural focus at Harvard." policy discourse, including The event was organized proactive dialogue with the by the Harvard India central and state govern- Students Group, the ments. We have never host- Harvard Club of India and ed an event of this kind for the South Asia Initiative.

3 Indians sentenced for smuggling drugs into US Washington, DC: Three smugglers from India are among a group of five busted in what has been dubbed 'Operation Liquid Dragon', one of the biggest ephedrine rings operated out of the US by a Mexican drug cartel.

The arrests shut down a pipeline that moved the precursor chemical from India to the US to Mexico, much of it in liquid form and labelled "green tea extract", according to Oregonlive.com.

Government prosecutors estimate the shipments helped the cartel put between $20 million and $38 million of meth on the street -- most of it in the US. Most of the money was traced to Antonio Gonzalez, a US customs broker with homes on both sides of the border.

Agents found that much of the money flowed out of Gonzalez's accounts to banks in Oregon and India.

Court records show that more than $5 million in wire transfers -- along with

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$2.6 million in cash -- landed in a Wells Fargo account for Spring Dragon Sourcing, a nutritional company owned

by Forest Grove entrepreneur Verlyn Craig Payton.

He transferred $7.2 million to five businesses in India, primarily Nutramed Biotech, owned by Subhash Naithani of Noida, India.

Arrested at a Las Vegas trade show in November 2009 in a sting operation, all five men pleaded guilty in exchange for reduced punishment.

US District Judge Anna J. Brown in Portland, Oregon Thursday sentenced 40year-old ephedrine broker Naithani to 4 1/2 years in prison. The others were sentenced earlier this year.

Sachin Sharma, 35 also got 4 1/2 years in prison. Manoj Kovummal got a fouryear term.

The Indian businessmen will be deported after serving their sentences.

US drops charges against Rajat Gupta Washington, DC: The US Securities and Exchange Commission has agreed to drop an administrative action against Rajat Gupta, former Indian American director of Goldman Sachs Group Inc. In return, he has agreed to withdraw a lawsuit claiming the regulatory proceeding violated his constitutional rights.

"Mr. Gupta is very pleased that as a result of his lawsuit the SEC has dismissed its administrative proceeding and he will no longer be singled out for disparate treatment," Gary Naftalis, his lawyer, said in a statement. "Mr. Gupta's lawsuit against the SEC has achieved all of the relief he sought."

The SEC started an administrative proceeding in Washington March 1, claiming Gupta passed inside information to Galleon Group LLC co-founder Raj Rajaratnam about Goldman Sachs and Procter & Gamble Co. (PG), where Gupta was also on the board.

According to an agreement filed Thursday in federal court in Manhattan, the SEC will file any future complaint against Gupta in that court, where it would be heard by US District Judge Jed Rakoff.

"The staff is fully committed to the case and will proceed as appropriate," John Nester, an SEC spokesman, said in an e- mail. In the administrative proceeding, the SEC claimed Gupta gave Rajaratnam information about Berkshire Hathaway Inc.'s $5 billion investment in Goldman Sachs. The agency also

Rajat Gupta, former director of Goldman Sachs in return agreed to withdraw lawsuit against SEC alleges Gupta told Rajaratnam about quarterly earnings of Goldman Sachs and Procter & Gamble.

Gupta sued in the Manhattan court March 18, claiming the agency violated his rights by pursuing an administrative action rather than a lawsuit in federal court, where Gupta would have more procedural protections, including the right to have the case considered by a jury and the use of federal rules of evidence.

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National Community

August 13-19, 2011

TheSouthAsianTimes.info

Deven Sharma – The Indian American who downgraded US New York: On 5 August Standard & Poor's, led by Jharkhand-born Deven Sharma, struck off the 'AAA' rating of the U.S. to AA+, considered the Gold standard in the world of finance, for the first time since 1914. The 57-year old Sharma was suddenly in the spotlight after something that was in the air for a few months but which appeared more like a distant possibility: The U.S. country rating was downgraded. This was decided after several conferences between top officials in the Obama administration and Sharma's team of number-crunchers.

Credit rating firm Standard & Poor's is headed by India-born Deven Sharma. S&P officials told Barack Obama's treasury depart-

Deven Sharma, President, Standard & Poor’s ment that the ratings major's analysts have come to a decision that

the US no longer deserves to be among the best rated countries in

Rajan Natarajan named deputy secretary of state in Maryland Washington, DC: A leading Indian American entrepreneur, Rajan Natarajan has been named deputy secretary of state for policy and external affairs in Maryland state.

Natarajan, 51, was appointed to this highest administrative office held by any Indian American to date in the state by Democratic Maryland Governor Martin O'Malley.

Natarajan's responsibilities include representing the governor or secretary of state at designated public and community outreach events, advising the secretary on external affairs, planning and strategies, fostering and promoting international

Rajan Natarajan diplomatic relationships.

"Rajan brings a wealth of corporate business and industry experience to my administration," said O'Malley, noting "he has spent much of his professional life in the corporate world, helping companies

grow."

Natarajan also "has significant experience in the technology sector and is used to thinking out-of-the box to deliver innovative solutions, commercialization of technologies and business development," he said.

Born in Pudukkottai district, Tamil Nadu, Natarajan came to the US in 1989 to pursue post-doctoral research at the Michigan State University after completing his doctoral degree in bioscience at the University of Madras.

After completing his MBA in 1999 at Michigan, he became a technology entrepreneur and business leader.

Lady GaGa coming soon on 'India's most desirable' New York: Lady GaGa will soon be seen in an Indian television show. The American Pop diva, best known for her style statement, will feature on Simi Selects India's Most Desirable. The star anchor had been tight-lipped about shooting with the iconic singer till the shooting had been wrapped up.

Simi had been in touch with Gaga's agents to get her on her guest list for a while and finally

has the one of the world's most popular star being featured on her show soon.

The singer expressed keen interest about India and its culture and said she was keen to travel to India in the future.

Simi's earlier show Rendezvous With Simi Garewal had featured international names like Jackie Chan, Imran Khan and the late Benazir Bhutto.

the world. This downgrade came as shock to the government and investors around the world.

Deven Sharma was named president of Standard & Poor's, the leading credit ratings company and a division of The McGrawHill Companies in 2007. Sharma joined Standard & Poor's in 2006 as executive vice president, Investment Services and Global Sales. Before joining Standard & Poor's, he was executive vice president, Global Strategy at The McGraw-Hill Companies for five years.

Over the last four years as the head of one of the foremost rating agencies in the world, Sharma has faced several US Congressional grillings but has negotiated most of them. He admitted that over the

last four years, comments made

by US lawmakers have changed to appreciation from strong criticism.

Sharma holds a bachelor's degree from the Birla Institute of Technology in India, a master's degree from the University of Wisconsin and a doctoral degree in Business Management from Ohio State University. He is chairman of the Board of Directors for CRISIL, a Standard & Poor's company and India's leading ratings, research, risk and policy advisory company.

Sharma is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and the International Advisory Board of the British-American Business Council and serves on the Asia Society Business Council.

Indian American couple evade taxes, gave out drugs illegally Washington, DC: An Indian-American couple who operated weight-loss clinics in Indiana faces federal drug and tax evasion charges for allegedly providing prescription weight-loss drugs to patients without performing physicals and not paying some $750,000 in taxes.

Rakesh Anand, 55, and Meena Anand, 51, owners of Doctors Weight Loss Centres in suburban Lansing, Orland Park, and Merrillville in Indiana, were charged in a 35-count indictment handed down Thursday by a federal grand jury in Hammond, Indiana, the Chicago Tribune reported.

Federal prosecutors alleged the Anands hired a physician and had him prescribe the amphetamine-based prescription drugs phendimetrazine and phentermine to patients at their clinics without reviewing their medical histories, performing physicals or follow-up care.

They also allege the Anands systematical-

ly deposited money from the clinics in cheques just below the $10,000 threshold that triggers banking monitors, and didn't report all the income from the clinics, cheating the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) out of $750,000 from 2005 to 2008.

Prosecutors are seeking forfeiture of $6.3 million from the couple as proceeds of the enterprise, including $700,000 in cash seized from the couple's home in Tinley Park in a May 2010 raid and $3.6 million in bank and brokerage accounts that have been frozen.

Rakesh Anand is charged with conspiracy to distribute controlled substances, illegally structuring monetary transactions, money laundering, conspiracy to defraud the IRS and tax fraud.

Meena Anand, who managed the locations in Lansing and Orland Park, faces the same charges except distributing controlled substances.

American Airlines offers vacation package sweepstakes Fort Worth, TX: Beginning this month, American Airlines customers can register for a chance to win a "Five Star Vacation" through the American Airlines Five Star Vacation Package Sweepstakes.

Once reserved for celebrities and VIPs traveling between New York, Los Angeles and Miami, American has expanded its Five

Star Service – a personal one-onone airport assistance program – to 11 airports so that anyone can "travel like a star" (paparazzi not included) to a total of 14 airports worldwide.

Through September 30, 2011, customers can register at www.aa.com/fivestarpromo for the chance to win a Five Star Vacation Package that includes

enough AAdvantage miles for two roundtrip First Class flight awards to one of the 14 airports where American offers Five Star Service; Five Star Service for two at the airport; and a $5,000 gift card to be applied toward a five night stay at a five-star hotel, dinner at a five-star restaurant and private car service to and from the airport.

Hindus protest screening of Sita Sings the Blues in San Jose San Jose, CA: On Saturday, August 6, around 100 local Hindus and volunteers of Hindu organizations such as Forum for Hindu Awakening, Hindu Swayam Sevak Sangh, Friends of India Society International, Vishwa Hindu Parishad of America and Hindu Yuva gathered in front of the San Jose Museum of Art to protest the screening of film ‘Sita Sings the Blues.’ The film was being shown at a nearby theatre as apart of an exhibition on Hinduism and Sita,

The protestors in front of San Jose Museum of Art

a deity revered by Hindus for her chastity.

In a press release the protesting Hindu groups said that they found almost every scene of the film ‘Sita Sings the Blues’ denigrating, “as it draws irreverent parallels between animator Nina Paley’s failed marriage and the sacred relationship between Hindus’ revered deities Rama and Sita.”

Over 13,000 Hindus worldwide have joined Hindu Janajagruti Samiti’s online protest campaign. Several San Francisco Bay

Area Hindus, including the Sunnyvale Hindu Temple have protested in writing or by calling the museum.

The movie is about Sita, the Hindu Goddess from the epic "The Ramayana", who accompanies Lord Rama on a 14 year exile in forest. Sita is abducted by Ravana, the ruler of Lanka. This movie tells the story of Rama and Sita, along-with a biographical account of the director's relationship with her husband.

US Affairs TheSouthAsianTimes.info

August 13-19, 2011

Financial turmoil sadly reminiscent of 2008 crisis New York: Stocks are plummeting.

The economy is slowing.

Politicians are scrambling to find solutions but cannot agree on anything. Are we in for a repeat of the financial crisis of 2008. Is talk of double dip recession for real.

Many economists and market experts say the risks are lower today because the financial system overall is healthier and there are fewer hidden problems. But they don't rule out a quick downward spiral if politicians in the US and in Europe can't calm investors by addressing fundamental financial threats.

The core problem, as it was three years ago, is too much debt that borrowers are having a hard time repaying -- but this time it is government debt rather than consumer debt.

A growing lack of confidence is perhaps the most troubling similarity to 2008 and the biggest worry.

Most of the attention so far has been focused on volatility in stocks, with investors spooked by

three heart-stopping declines in the last five trading days -- including Wednesday's 4.6 percent drop in the Dow Jones industrial average, which closed down 519 points at 10,719.94. By points, it was the ninth-steepest decline for the market. The S&P 500 finished the day down 4.4 percent and the Nasdaq composite index down 4.1 percent.

Financial stocks led the market

Republicans name anti-taxers to super committee on debt Washington: President Barack Obama's Republican critics in Congress named Wednesday tax-hike foes including a "Tea Party" ally to a new "super committee" where the next bitter US debt battles will play out.As with Democratic choices announced late Tuesday, the picks reflected a need for expertise in tax, trade, and health care programs, as well as sharp partisan elbows with the campaign to the November 2012 elections heating up. Republican leaders focused on their party's priorities -- deep cuts to the social safety net and opposition to tax hikes sought

by Obama -- but avoided language explicitly dooming a compromise before the committee even meets.

"The two parties have fundamental differences about government and its proper role in our society," said Republican House Speaker John Boehner, who called the committee an "opportunity" for a spirited debate.

"We cannot dig ourselves out of this situation by nibbling around the edges," said Republican Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, who urged the panel to "put the interests of all Americans ahead of any one political party."

The 12-member panel, created by a recent law to stave off a US debt default, must find a compromise for reining in runaway US budget deficits by at least $1.2 trillion dollars over ten years -- a tall order in polarized Washington.

If the committee fails to make formal recommendations by late November, or Congress fails to approve them by late December, that

would trigger painful automatic reductions of $1.2 trillion to programs cherished by both sides.

Those possible cuts to military and health care programs were designed to compel a compromise, which would need majority approval on the committee and would enjoy fast-track consideration by the whole congress.

McConnell appointed Republican Senators Jon Kyl, Pat Toomey, and Rob Portman to the panel, while Boehner named Republican Representatives Dave Camp and Fred Upton to the panel, with Jeb Hensarling as a co-chairman.

All six Republican nominees have signed a pledge, crafted by the fiercely anti-tax Americans for Tax Reform pressure group to vote against and oppose tax increases.

But Republican leaders did not explicitly shut the door to some sort of bargain on tax reform -- even though key party members have said in the past that any revenue increase must be offset by reductions elsewhere. The majority leader of the US Senate, Harry Reid, has announced three appointees to the congressional super committee. They are: Senator Patty Murray to co-chair the Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction, Max Baucus, the chairman of the Senate finance committee, and John Kerry.

Recent public opinion polls show Americans worry far more about over 9 percent unemployment than the deficit, and largely favor Obama's call for raising taxes on the rich and wealthy corporations in tandem with spending cuts.

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lower. Bank of America and Citigroup each lost more than 10 percent of their market value, in part because of the worries overseas. The bigger concern of many financiers and government officials was signs of stress Wednesday in European credit markets, which are essential to financing the day-today operations of banks and companies there.

Post-credit downgrade, Fed to keep interest rates low until 2013 Washington: Painting a much gloomier picture of the economy, the US central bank has indicated it would take no new steps to stimulate the economy other than to keep interest rates low for at least two years.

The Federal Reserve's muchawaited statement on the economy Tuesday sent the Wall Street into a spin as traders did what the New York Times described as "a double take" on the announcement to see the stocks climb, then drop, then rocket again. (But on Wednesday they were down again).

Meeting after the historic downgrade of America's top notch AAA credit rating, the central bank also surprised Wall Street with a "considerably slower" reading on the economy, and a bold statement that the Fed stands ready to enact further stimulus measures if needed, CNN said. The Fed indicated it plans to keep "exceptionally low" interest rates in place until at least

mid-2013 as a way to continue to prop up the recovery.

The Fed has kept the central bank's key tool to spur the economy near zero since 2008, but has long been ambiguous on its future timeframe, saying it would keep the federal funds rate near zero for an "extended period."

The central bank acknowledged that economic growth in the United States is "considerably slower" than expected. That marks a change from prior statements, when the Fed had said the recovery was chugging along at a "moderate pace," CNN said.

The Fed also acknowledged that the job market has recently deteriorated, consumer spending has flattened out and the housing sector remains depressed.

But it indicated it is considering a "range of policy tools available to promote a stronger economic recovery," and "is prepared to employ these tools as appropriate.

Statue of Liberty to close for a year New York: After the 9/11 attacks, the federal government closed the Statue of Liberty National Monument, the symbol of a nation’s dreams and one of the city’s bestknown and most-visited tourist attractions. Allowing people inside would be unsafe, the National Park Service said, because rescuers might not be able to get them out in an emergency. Three years later, the base, the pedestal and the observation deck were reopened after $6.7 million in improvements to fire and security systems. In 2009, the crown — and the 146 narrow steps to it — reopened on the Fourth of July.

Now the statue is closing again.

Interior Secretary Ken Salazar says it needs a $27.25 million reno-

Climb inside the statue will be shut from Oct 29 for its renovation, but Liberty Island will remain open enabling visitors to continue to throng NY’s iconic monument. vation for additional safety improvements that he promised in

2009. Officials said the work, which is expected to take a year, could not begin sooner because they did not finish the planning and arrange the financing until a few months ago.

And, they added, they did not want the statue to be closed on the 125th anniversary of its dedication on Oct. 28. So they will shut it down the next day.

David Luchsinger, the superintendent of the monument and of Ellis Island for the National Park Service, said that the vast majority of visitors do not bother with the climb inside the statue. “They’re going to get the exact same experience” while the statue is closed, he said, because Liberty Island will remain open while the work is going on.

Fed planning to rent out foreclosed properties Washington: The Obama administration has started soliciting ideas on turning the federal government’s inventory of foreclosed houses into rental properties that could be managed by private enterprises or sold in bulk. The goal, the administration said, is to stabilize neighborhoods where large supplies of empty, foreclosed properties have hurt property values. The effort is also to clear the nation’s balance sheet of real estate holdings that, because they have been difficult to sell individually, have hung over the housing market and stunted sales of existing homes and new construction.

The Federal Housing Finance Agency, the Department of Housing

and Urban Development and the Treasury Department are jointly requesting ideas for sales, partnership ventures or other strategies that would help to unload some 250,000 properties owned by Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and the Federal Housing Administration. Those properties account for about half of all properties that have been foreclosed upon and are still awaiting resale nationwide.

Greater flexibility in disposing of the houses will have other benefits as well, Timothy F. Geithner, the Treasury secretary, said. “Exploring new options for selling these foreclosed properties will help expand access to affordable rental housing,

promote private investment in local housing markets and support neighborhood and home price stability,” he said in a statement announcing the new program.

While home prices have remain depressed since the 2008 financial crisis, rental prices have not come down. More than 10 million households — or one-quarter of all renters — currently pay more than half their income for housing, a record level.

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Op Ed

August 13-19, 2011

TheSouthAsianTimes.info

US ratings, hot potatoes & India story

By Gautam Chikermane arket sentiment is one thing, real problems quite another. So, when leaders of the world — the very rich G7, the upcoming G20 or any other nation — think about what to do when the world's most powerful economy loses its Triple-A rating (extremely strong capacity to meet financial commitments), they need to grapple with three hot potatoes.

India, in particular.

The first is finance. When the US falls a notch to AA+ (very strong capacity to meet financial commitments, with the '+' indicating a relatively better score than other AA), it will ideally have to pay a higher interest rate on its sovereign paper.

As a result, other countries too will have to pay a higher return on their sovereign debt as well. This has an impact on corporate borrowing, and companies too will have to bear a higher cost when selling bonds.

The US downgrade is not going

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India needs to take advantage of the uncertainty that has infected the globe since October 2008 and attract as much capital into the country as possible by opening up banking, retail, insurance, pensions, mining and so on. to hurt India very much — the Reserve Bank of India has already raised policy rates to levels that are far higher its global rating. And the reason is domestic: inflation.

Which brings us to the second hot potato — economics. While

most of the developed world is fighting a contraction or recession and a strange phenomenon where close-to-zero interest rates are not enough for companies to borrow, the case in India is the reverse.

Excessive economic growth —

the second-highest after China — has unleashed a dynamism and cash in the system without the accompanying increase in supply of goods and services. The result: a high inflation rate.

This is a very nice "problem" to have. Because of high economic growth, a country attracts capital from across the world. This capital, when invested in businesses or even real estate, creates jobs and ensures the accompanying prosperity through secondary and tertiary employment. But sudden growth spurts need equally strong and immediate solutions for managing shortages in food, transport, goods and services. This is particularly important for countries like India that is running on domestic consumption boom — driven by the growth — and not merely exports like China.

But to do that, we come to the third hot potato — politics. While the Obama administration is under pressure of being "less stable, less effective and less predictable than

what we previously believed", according to S&P, and as a result is now in the same bracket as China and Japan (both AA-) and Spain, Kuwait and Slovenia (AA), bad politics is affecting India in a different way.

India needs to take advantage of the uncertainty that has infected the globe since October 2008 and attract as much capital into the country as possible by opening up banking, retail, insurance, pensions, mining and so on. Instead, the government has been frozen into political submission by one scam after another, leading to a perception that we're going nowhere. This is clearly an exaggeration.

Instead of wondering about the Sensex and pandering to markets, the Indian leadership needs to pull its political act together and get moving on reforms. The world is crumbling around us, and we will be hurt, of course. But if we focus on job creation, build real economies and serve real people, markets will come around.

pressed either descriptively in language or symbolically. Those who hold strong convictions express it more through action. The truth is more a quest than a settled issue.

In a streak of Buddhism, non-attachment to ideas plays an important role. Thus one of the principles of ‘engaged’ Buddhism is not to be idolatrous about or bound to any doctrine, theory or ideology. All systems of thought are, according to this principle, only guiding means and not absolute truths. Also human life is more precious than an ideology or a doctrine.

The Quran also says that Allah has created diversity; we must accept diversity as a divine gift. The Norway killer was angry at multiculturalism, and many Europeans are not so enthusiastic about immigration and multiculturalism. This creates narrow-mindedness and anger and can explode in a violent form through an individual or a group. The only remedy is to accept diversity and multiculturalism as part of the divine plot for creation, as the Quran argues.

(The writer is an Islamic scholar who also heads the Centre for Study of Society & Secularism, Mumbai.)

Religion, peace and radicalism

By Asghar Ali Engineer hat happened recently in Norway has not only shocked the world, it has also raised an important question.

Does religion stand for peace or murder? One thing is certain: after 9/11 only Islam is being blamed for violence, war and ‘jihad’.

Now it is obvious that such extremists who go on a killing spree are found in all religious traditions, even in highly developed nations. It is not only ‘backward Arabs’ or ‘fanatical Islamists’ who kill. Even Christians from highly developed and democratic nations can kill innocent people without remorse. Many people would readily blame religion for such killings, but the reality is more complex. Religion is a tool which can be used for both establishing peace as well as for waging war.

Much depends on the individual or a group with a certain ideology. Obviously, all religious individuals do not kill nor do all groups embrace farright ideologies. Is then peace more integral to religion or the hatred of

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the ‘other’? Does one who hates the ‘other’ love his own people? The answers are not as simple as we would like to believe.Religion can be what we want it to be. There are instances of religion being used for peace and also for spreading hate. There have been many deeply religious people who devoted their lives to the cause of peace. Foremost among them in our own times were Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr. Gandhi stood for non-violence and so interpreted his religious tradition as well as other traditions like Christianity and Islam to establish peace.

Similarly, a Vietnamese Buddhist monk, Thich Nhat Hanh, firmly stood for peace in the face of horrible acts of violence committed by America in Vietnam. We often condemn those who use religion for killing others as fundamentalists but interestingly those who use religion for peace too make very hard use of religion and are, in that sense, no less fundamentalist.

Interestingly, Gandhi also rejected a complete public-private split, stating “I could not be leading a religious

life unless I identified myself with the whole of mankind, and that I could not do unless I took part in politics. …You cannot divide social, economic and purely religious work into watertight compartments”. Islamic thinker Iqbal, by no means a narrow-minded Islamist, also said that if religion were separated from politics, only changezi (cruelty) would be left in it.

Divine truth is manifest in different ways in different religious traditions. The truth of one religion cannot conflict with the truth of another.

The Quran calls it ‘wahdat al-deen’ i.e. unity of religion; Maulana Abul Kalam Azad devoted one whole volume to the nature of the subject. Dara Shikoh also dealt with it in Majma’ul Bahrayn (‘Co-mingling of Two Oceans’) and points to some striking similarities.

The nature of divine truth is complex. It must be understood more in action than thought. The truth is more than empirical fact; it lies more in values. It may be a combination of fact and value or at times only value, mainly a spiritual one. It may be ex-

The views expressed in Op Eds are not necessarily those of The South Asian Times.

India Newswire TheSouthAsianTimes.info

11

August 13-19, 2011

Modi acts against Rahul's new role to impact second top cop UP strategy New Delhi: According to media reports, Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi has cleared chargesheet against Deputy Inspector General (DIG) of Gujarat police Rahul Sharma.

Sharma allegedly violated service conditions and passed on information to Nanavati Commission probing Godhra riots. Sharma told SIT that phone calls collected in Naroda Patia case were destroyed.

On August 8, the Modi government had suspended Sanjiv Bhatt , the controversial IPS officer for not reporting to work for nearly 10 months.

Bhatt had taken on the government when he first went public on chief minister Narendra Modi's role in the Godhra riots of 2002 in an affidavit filed before the Supreme Court. Bhatt stated in the affidavit that he was present in the meeting on February 27, 2002 at the CM's house after the Godhra train-burning, where he heard Modi telling top officials to allow

Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi.

Hindus to vent their anger. The apex court is yet to take this affidavit on record.

Reports also said that Bhatt in his PIL has also included emails that allegedly show how the state government was sharing information with the lawyers of some of those accused in the riots through RSS ideologue Gurumurthy Swaminathan.

New Delhi: Under not so happy circumstances, Congress general secretary Rahul Gandhi has been catapulted into a national role, and this would certainly take away a big chunk of his ‘mindspace and timespace’ that is currently focused on Uttar Pradesh and the affairs of the youth and students’ wing of the party.

“In Uttar Pradesh, he faces the biggest challenge to his skills as a politician and vote catcher within the next 10 months, and the odds are certainly stacked against him,” said a senior UP politician who has been a witness to the trials and tribulations of the party over the last two decades.

By common consensus within senior party leaders, the problems in the state that is currently ruled

by Mayawati’s BSP on the strength of an alliance among the dalits, and the upper castes fall in thee categories; leadership, strategy and organization.

“Our national leadership comes from UP, with both the Congress

Rahul Gandhi is projected as India's future Prime Minister. president Sonia Gandhi and her son firm in their traditional parliamentary strongholds, but we do not have a state leader who can match either Mayawati or Mulayam Singh. Besides, the party has always been loath to project anyone as the chief ministerial candidate,” said another

senior MP. But there is no dearth of claimants for this position.

Besides, the state PCC chief Rita Bahuguna Joshi and the long standing leader of the legislative wing Pramod Tiwari, Union ministers Salman Khurshid, Sriprakash Jaiswal and even the young Jitin Prasada from the young brigade all fancy their chances for this post.

The question of strategy in terms of pre-poll and post-poll combinations is very critical as the party quite clearly does not have the wherewithal to emerge as the ruling party on its own. Its strategy to going alone worked well in the 2009 Lok Sabha polls when it surprised everyone by winning 21 seats.

“But that was a different setting, as the party was seen as the winner at the national level, with a clear leadership and pre-as well as post poll strategy. All these elements are lacking at the state level,” the MP added.

Sangay succeeds Dalai Lama Hazare team satisfied as political head of Tibetans with fasting venue N e w D e l h i : Wi t h H a r v a r d scholar Lobsang Sangay succeeding him as the political h e a d o f Ti b e t a n s , t h e D a l a i Lama today said he always believed political and religious institutions must be separated from each other.

The 76-year-old Tibetan spiritual leader said that he always said that religious and political institutions should function separately but was himself discharging both the roles as the situation necessitated it.

"Now I feel I am committed to what I have been saying all these years,"he said addressing the fourth annual lecture of National Commission for Minorities here.

The Dalai Lama said that he had served as political head of the Tibetan government for 60 years during tough times and now had the right to claim retirement from this responsibility being a senior Buddhist monk.

T h e s p i r i t u a l l e a d e r, w h o described himself as a "son of India", expressed concern over corruption in the country saying it was a "disgrace" especially as India is a religious country.

"This is not criticism but I am concerned. Corruption by religious minded persons is really disgrace. When I hear of

Anna Hazare will begin the indefinite fast against Lokpal Bill in New Delhi from August 16.

Dr. Lobsang Sangay with His Holiness the Dalai Lama. immense corruption in China, I think OK because they are nonbelievers, they believe in power and money.

"But look at India. This nation is more or less a religious minded nation. Every Indian worships in the morning but in the mean time is this corruption. I say there is no third way. Either remain believer, God fearing or if you really want corruption, then carry corruption as a non-believer," he said, adding, "Corruption by religious minded people is really a disgrace."

Asked why the Tibetans needed to elect a Prime Minister of the government-in-exile if they are only seeking autonomy within China, the Dalai Lama made it clear that they have "never formally used" the terms like "exile government" or Prime Minister.

Sangay, who succeeded the Dalai Lama as political head was sworn in at function in Dharamashala presided by the Dalai Lama and attended by 5,000 Tibetans, including community leaders settled outside Tibet and India.

New Delhi: The Anna Hazare team expressed satisfaction over the venue offered to them by police for holding the indefinite fast against Lokpal Bill even as they denied any going back on their stand on the legislation.

The core committee of the Hazare team met here in New Delhi. The meeting was attended by Hazare and others including, activist Arvind Kejriwal.

"We are satisfied with the venue provided by Delhi Police. It is at a good location. Core committee is chalking out the plan on how to go about the fast," he told reporters.

Delhi Police offered Jai Prakash Narain Park adjacent to Firoz Shah Kotla Ground as the venue for his

protest against the Lokpal Bill subject to permission from the land owning agency.

Kejriwal said there was no going back on the demands raised by them.

"We are not ready to compromise with anyone till our demands are met. The deadlock continues. We are open for any dialogue but there is no invitation from the government yet," he said.

His comments came when asked about activist Swami Agnivesh's comments that the Hazare team was "very very flexible" on issues like inclusion of Prime Minister or higher judiciary under ambit of the ombudsman but the sticking point is bringing lower bureaucracy in it.

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India Newswire

August 13-19, 2011

TheSouthAsianTimes.info

UP, Punjab ban 'Aarakshan' Chandigarh: After Uttar Pradesh, the Punjab government has also imposed a ban on the release of filmmaker Prakash Jha's controversial Hindi film Aarakshan' (Reservation) in the state following apprehensions that some scenes and dialogues may trigger trouble.

The Shiromani Akali Dal-BJP government said the ban will remain in force till screening committee constituted by the state previews the movie and submits its report.

The decision to ban the Amitabh Bachchan-Saif Ali Khan starrer was taken after receiving intelligence reports that 'Aarakhshan' has certain scenes/dialogues which may inflame the passion of some communities in Punjab, an official spokesman said.

The Mayawati government had banned the film in UP for two months on the grounds that it could

"The main theme of the movie is about commercialization of education followed by several objectionable dialogues against people from backward communities. There is no discussion on reservation in its second half. We have asked the censor board to make necessary changes in it," National Commission for Scheduled Castes Chairman P L Punia said.

The Punjab government has constituted a seven-member committee consisting of Samir Kumar, IAS, Secretary home, Raj Kumar Atihai, Policemen stand near the banner of the film 'Aarakshan' in Mumbai.

Filmmaker Prakash Jha has agreed to make "appropriate" alterations in his film 'Aarakshan.' create law and order problem in the tion by a high level official commitstate. The decision to ban the film tee set up by the Bahujan Samaj was taken following a recommenda- Party (BSP) government.

Chairman Safai Karamchari Board, Punjab and Vijay Danav, chairman, Scheduled Caste Welfare Board and a member of the Punjab Scheduled Caste Commission.

Meanwhile, filmmaker Jha has agreed to make "appropriate" alterations in his film "Aarakshan", themed on caste-based reservations, after facing protests. "Reservation is a sensitive issue but we have kept that in mind. Political reasons could be behind the ban on the film. I will make appropriate cuts in the film as per suggestions," Jha told reporters.

Congress seeks to prevent Parliament stalling

The Indian Parliament.

New Delhi: With a combative opposition disrupting parliament over alleged irregularities in the Commonwealth Games preparations and a host of other issues, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh held a strategy meeting with his senior party colleagues to find a way to ensure the smooth functioning of the monsoon session of parliament.

The meeting of the Congress core group, which was held in the absence of party chief Sonia Gandhi who is recuperating from a surgery in the US, was attended by Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee, Home Minister P. Chidambaram, Defense Minister A.K. Antony and Political Secretary to the Congress president Ahmed Patel.

The meeting voiced concern over repeated disruptions of parliament by an aggressive opposition which is trying to pin down the government over various issues, including the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) report on alleged irregularities in the conduct of the Commonwealth Games.

The opposition has contended that the CAG report blamed the Prime Minister's Office and Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit for the alleged irregularities in the 2010 Games.

The meeting also discussed the legislative agenda and explored ways to ensure the passage of at least some of around 30 bills which are said to be pending even if the opposition failed to cooperate fully.

UPA caught off guard in Lok Sabha New Delhi: Opposition caught the government on the wrong foot in the Lok Sabha on August 10 when its members pointed out that no cabinet minister was present in the House during a debate on a bill to amend State Bank of India Act. The point of order was raised by BJP's Shahnawaz Hussain when his party colleague Nishikant Dubey was speaking on the State Bank of India (Subsidiary Banks

Laws) Amendment Bill, 2009.

He drew the attention of Karuna Shukla, who was in the Chair, saying "not even one cabinet minister is present when an important discussion is taking place".At that time, only minister of state for finance Namo Narain Meena was present on behalf of the government. BJP members were soon on their feet and Dubey said he would not speak till some cabinet minister is present.

India Newswire TheSouthAsianTimes.info

August 13-19, 2011

Patil rejects mercy plea of Rajiv's killers New Delhi: President Pratibha Patil has commuting Nalini's sentence to life rejected the clemency petitions of three imprisonment. killers of Rajiv Gandhi whose death senThe trio, charged with criminal conspiracy and execution of the suicide tences were confirmed by the Supreme Court in 2000. The apex court had senattack plot, had filed mercy petition tenced members of the banned Liberation before the President after confirmation Tigers of Tamil Elam (LTTE) Murugan, of sentence by the apex court.

Santhan, Perarivalan and Nalini to death The Home Ministry had sent its opinion on June 21, 2005 which was called in 1999 for the assassination of the former back for review on February 23, 2011 Prime Minister in Sriperumbudur on May and was re-submitted to the President on 21, 1991.

A Rasthrapati Bhavan spokesperson March 8 this year. said the clemency petitions of all three Earlier, in May, the President had Nalini, one of the three accused were turned down by the rejected mercy petitions of Devinder Pal LTTE members who killed Singh Bhullar of Punjab and Mahendra President last week.

Rajiv Gandhi.

Nath Das of Assam following the recomThe apex court had confirmed the death sentence of Murugan, Santhan and Perarivalan while mendations from the Union Home Ministry.

No Reddys in Karnataka ministry: Gowda New Delhi/Bangalore: The new Karnataka ministry will not have a deputy chief minister nor will the mining barons, the two Reddy brothers, find a berth, Chief Minister D.V. Sadananda Gowda said.

The Bharatiya Janata Party central leadership was not in favor of creating a deputy chief minister's post in Karnataka as it was not there in any BJP-rule state, Gowda told reporters in New Delhi.

He also ruled out making the Reddy brothers - G. Janardhana Reddy and G. Karunakara Reddy -

ministers again as they have been indicted in the illegal mining scam by the Lokayukta (ombudsman).

"I am not the only one to take decisions on all these things. All the directions given by the central leadership will be carried out," he said on his visit to New Delhi after becoming chief minister Aug 4 succeeding scam-hit B.S. Yeddyurappa.

Besides the two Reddy brothers, the Lokayukta has also named their close associate B. Sriramulu.

Janardhana was tourism minister in the Yeddyurappa cabinet while

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Karunakara handled revenue portfolio and Sriramulu held the health ministry.

Gowda, who defeated former rural development minister Jagadish Shettar to become BJP's second chief minister in Karnataka, said all differences with him (Shettar) would be sorted out.

He said he had handled differences within the party when he headed the Karnataka unit for four years. Like he had sorted out the differences then, now also "all issues will be resolved", Gowda asserted.

'No mercy for Afzal Guru' New Delhi: Nearly five years after Afzal Guru filed for clemency, the home ministry has asked President Pratibha Patil to reject the plea of the prime accused in the 2001 Parliament attack.

The move is expected to end the BJP’s scathing criticism of the Congress-led coalition for the delay in Guru’s hanging. The case has been illustrated as a symbol of what it says is the Congress’s soft approach on terrorism.

Minister of state for home Mullappally Ramachandran told the Rajya Sabha that Afzal’s mercy plea was submitted to the president’s secretariat on July 27. Officials confirmed that home minister P Chidambaram had backed lieutenant-governor Tejinder Khanna’s view, rejecting the mercy petition.

A Delhi court had on December 18, 2002 sentenced Guru, and two others to death. Subsequently, SAR Geelani, a DU college lecturer, was acquitted and Shaukat Hussain Guru, Afzal’s cousin, was let off after 10 years in jail. The ministry’s move may not mean that Guru will be hanged immediately. The President recently rejected mercy pleas of DPS Bhullar for planting a bomb outside the Youth Congress office in 1993 and Mahendra Nath Das for killing a man. These two cases were the first

Parliament attack convict Afzal Guru. time that Patil had rejected mercy pleas. Her predecessor, APJ Abdul Kalam, had reluctantly rejected the mercy plea of Bengal resident Dhananjoy Chatterjee, who had raped and killed a young girl.

In the last four years, Rashtrapati Bhavan has only processed the mercy petitions when the recommendation was to commute death to life imprisonment. More than a dozen cases — where the home ministry has recommended rejection of the mercy plea — are pending with the president’s secretariat.

Chidambaram — who devised a system to take up pleas in the order they came — had punctured the BJP-Sena campaign linking the delay in Guru's hanging to his religion, reminding them that mercy pleas of Rajiv Gandhi’s assassins and convicts in terrorist cases, too, were pending.

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Diaspora

August 13-19, 2011

TheSouthAsianTimes.info

Killing of wife by husband stuns Indo-Canadian community Vancouver: The daylight murder of a young Indo-Canadian woman by her husband in the city suburb of Surrey last week has shamed and shocked the community which is trying to come terms with the latest case of family violence.

Twenty-four-old Ravinder Bhangu was stabbed to death last Thursday by her 26-year-old husband Manmeet Singh while she was at work at the weekly English/Punjabi Sach Di Awaaz in Surrey on the outskirts of Vancouver.

The victim, who came to Canada from the Rajpura area of Punjab in 2009, had been staying with her after marital problems with her husband.

The murder comes four years after a spate killings of four wives by their Punjabi husbands within a couple of months stunned the huge Indo-Canadian community.

'Frankly, we are embarrassed as a community. This tragedy has revived our old fears. The worst part is that this happened in broad daylight in an office. We are in a shock,'' community leader and

Ravinder Bhangu was stabbed to death while at work retire school psychologist Balwant Sanghera told media.

Sanghera said since the multiple murders of wives by their husbands four years ago community leaders and activists have been offering counseling to people facing family problems.

'Quite a few organizations are helping couples cope with marital tensions. But this case shows that this is not helping. We are puzzled that our people have no problem solving skills.''

He was angry that despite all their counseling 'people are still keeping their problems to themselves and the result is this

tragedy.''

Raminder Dosanjh, community activist and wife of former Canadian health minister Ujjal Dosanjh, said the killing of this young woman by her husband is “a black mark on our whole IndoCanadian community.''

Dosanjh, who formed the India Mahila Association in Canada in 1973, said the brutal murder is symptomatic of “a mind-set among men who think women are their property. They can do whatever they want with their women.''

She said, 'Our volunteers always tell women: don't hide your family problems and remain quiet. Please speak up and don't risk your life for anything. If you don't get along with your husband, go your own way.''

As the community comes to terms with the murder and adverse media publicity, the husband of the victim has been charged with firstdegree murder.

Called the Southall of Canada, Surrey is home to the largest concentration of the Indian community in this country.

103 Indians died in Australian attacks: Vayalar Ravi New Delhi: As many as 103 Indians were killed or injured in attacks in Australia last year and steps have been taken to prevent such assaults, Overseas Indian Affairs Minister Vayalar Ravi told the Lok Sabha Wednesday.

'It has been conveyed to the Australian government Indian students protest the racism that it was the responsibility motivated attacks of the Australian authorities to ensure the well being and marches, saying attacks on them security of all Indians in Australia,' were motivated by racism and were Ravi told the Lok Sabha. not being sufficiently addressed by In 2009, 52 Indians either lost the Australian government. their lives or were injured in There are over 600,000 internaAustralia in attacks on them, while tional students from over 100 11 such incidents were reported in countries pursuing university or 2008, the minister said. vocational studies in Australia.

The attacks resulted in a diploIn 2009, there were over 150,000 matic row, as India blamed racism Indian students enrolled to underfor the targeting of Indians, espe- take an Australian qualification and cially students. The Australian India was the second top-source authorities said they were also tak- country for Australia's international ing steps to curb the attacks. education industry. After the series On many occasions, Indian stu- of attacks on Indians, many students have taken out protests dents returned home.

Indian woman named NRI businessman offers rural students scholarships Australia's 2011 young Thiruvananthapuram : An Oman- 50 percent scholarship to one stubased Keralite businessman will dent each from Indian states who executive offer scholarship for rural students has completed his/her schooling in Melbourne: A 35-year-old Indian, Preeti Bajaj, has been named one of the Australian Financial Review's Young Executives of the year 2011.

The annual BOSS Young Executives of the Year Awards are run by the prestigious AFR magazine in association with global talent management consultancy Development Dimensions International.

The awards, now in their seventh year, recognise the achievements of aspiring future leaders and is said to identify six young Australians with the skills, talent and drive needed to make a successful future leader.

Bajaj, a Delhi University student, was among the six winners this year who were tracked down on the basis of an analysis of how they perform compared to more senior executives.

from across the country to do a postgraduate course in management at the Asian School of Business (ASB) here. George M. Thomas incidentally is the patron of the ASB and is doing this to give a boost to the industry's rural thrust.

The annual intake would be 240 seats and the fees for the two-year program is Rs 6.50 lakh.

"Besides free laptops, we will give

rural schools. Four students will be offered 25 percent scholarship and ten students 10 percent in a bid to discover and nurture rural talent.

These scholarships are being offered

by George M. Thomas Foundation," Thomas told reporters here Friday.

ASB director S.Rajeev, who has mentored Indian and Silicon Valley start-ups, is overseeing the initiative to develop management graduates

who can drive the marketing thrust of Indian and multinational companies eying the booming rural market. "Students with rural upbringing are better positioned to feel the pulse of the rural consumer. Our training will make them effective marketers who can relate to the rural ambiance and this emerging economic segment more effectively," said Rajeev.

The ASB has now moved to its own swanky 16-acre full-fledged eco-friendly residential campus designed by a Singapore architectural firm, located near the state's premier IT destination, the Technopark campus.

Preeti Bajaj She currently works as regional manager of an Australian property firm, Brookfield Multiplex Services.

She leads a team providing facility management, predominantly for government departments.

She said building a business was her most satisfying experience, as prior to her current role, she worked as a managing director of a software company, Vision Software.

Indian diaspora in Netherlands to hold first annual meet The Hague: Representatives of the Indian diaspora organizations in the Netherlands will meet in The Hague Sep 25 for the first Dutch edition of the annual diaspora conference, EuAsiaNews reported.

The theme of the day-long meeting is 'Indian Diaspora in Netherlands: Achievements, Contributions & Challenges.' The conference aims to enhance mutual understanding and strengthen relations between various sections of the Indian diaspora in the Netherlands.

At least 400 participants, most of them representing

various Indian diaspora organizations are expected to participate in the conference, said Wahid Saleh, spokesperson of the conference. The conference also aims to increase participation and visibility of the Indian diaspora in the Dutch social, cultural and political spectrum, besides broadening and deepening the ties with India in various fields. It aims to work as a catalyst to further the cause of economic and cultural cooperation between India and the Netherlands. The organizers previously conducted the Pravasi Bharatiya Divas-Europe in 2009.

Veggie Fest TheSouthAsianTimes.info

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August 13-19, 2011

Sant Rajinder Singh to speak at Veggie Fest in Chicagoland The annual two-day event is sponsored and hosted by the Science of Spirituality Meditation Center, Naperville, Ill., to educate the public on the benefits of vegetarian lifestyle. n August 13–14, His Holiness Sant Rajinder Singh Ji Maharaj will be the keynote speaker at the sixth annual Veggie Fest, a huge vegetarian food festival in Naperville, IL held on the grounds of the Science of Spirituality Meditation Center, 4S 175 Naperville Rd., Naperville, IL 60653. Twentyfive thousand people are expected to attend.

Sant Rajinder Singh Ji Maharaj is respected by the international community of spiritual leaders as one of the great spiritual Masters of our time. Three of his books are Barnes and Noble bestsellers.

He has taught his meditation technique to millions of people all over the world through meditation seminars, conferences, books, CDs, DVDs, magazine articles and through appearances on television, radio and Internet broadcasts.

In our day-to-day lives, we interact with many different kinds of people. Rarely do we come in contact with someone who truly sees beyond our outward appearances and can recognize us at the level of our true selves, the level of the soul.

Sant Rajinder Singh Ji Maharaj, an internationally renowned spiritual Master and bestselling author, is such a being.

He says, “The soul’s power has been forgotten.

The mind, the senses, the body and the pulls of the physical world have placed the soul in a state of forgetfulness from which we must awaken.”

“When we look at life through the consciousness of the empowered soul, we begin to live in a gentler manner and start respecting all forms of life. This is one of the reasons that many people who are in touch with their soul turn to a vegetarian diet. They feel that God has provided enough food in the form of plants to sustain them and it is not necessary to take the life of any of the Lord’s creatures for food.”

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Sant Rajinder Singh Ji Maharaj will be delivering his first keynote talk, "Ignite the Spark of the Divine" on Saturday, August 13 at 2:30pm.

Following the talk, his new book, Spark of the Divine, will be released and made available for purchase.

The spiritual Master will give his second keynote, "Health Secrets: Vegetarian Diet & Meditation," on Sunday, August 14 at 2:30pm. Afterwards, he will personally sign books of those whose names will be chosen in a drawing.

Sant Rajinder Singh Ji Maharaj will be delivering his first keynote talk, "Ignite the Spark of the Divine" on Saturday, August 13 at 2:30pm. Following the talk, his new book, Spark of the Divine, will be released and made available for purchase.

The spiritual Master will give his second keynote, "Health Secrets: Vegetarian Diet & Meditation," on Sunday, August 14 at 2:30pm. Afterwards, he will personally sign books of those whose names will be chosen in a drawing.

Veggie Fest is also honored this year to present the Consul General of India in Chicago, Mukta Dutta Tomar, as guest speaker. On Saturday, August 13 at 4:30pm she will talk on, "The

Rich History of Vegetarianism in India."

Jonathan Kruger, Veggie Fest coordinator says, “In just six years, Veggie Fest has become one of the largest vegetarian food festivals in the country. Some of the best chefs from around the country are coming to do food demos. We have live music all day, over 100 vendor booths, an extensive children's program and an incredible international food court.”

If you're curious about vegetarianism, Veggie Fest is offering a Vegetarian Challenge, a new initiative to help you go vegetarian for seven days. Visit the Vegetarian Challenge booth for a complete support package with recipes and tips to make your

The event will have live music all day, over 100 vendor booths, an extensive children's program and an international food court

Veggie Fest is offering a Vegetarian Challenge, a new initiative to help you go vegetarian for seven days. experience of vegetarianism fun, easy and delicious.

The first 2000 people who sign up for the Vegetarian Challenge will receive a free goodie bag.

For more info visit www.veggiefest chicago.org.

Veggie Fest is sponsored and hosted by the Science of Spirituality Meditation Center as part of the Center's mission to provide a needed community

service of educating and sharing the benefits of the vegetarian lifestyle with others.

This is their way of giving back. Veggie Fest is a fun, family event where everyone can explore new ideas while having a great day.

For complete program details, visit www.veggiefestchicago.org or call 630.955.1200.

Veggie Fest is a fun family event

In six years, Veggie Fest has become one of the largest vegetarian food festivals in the country

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Festival

Festival

August 13-19, 2011

TheSouthAsianTimes.info TheSouthAsianTimes.info

17

August 13-19, 2011

Rakhi celebration: Nuggets from history Rani Karnavati and Emperor Humayun he story of Rani Karnavati and Emperor Humayun is the most significant evidence in the history. During the medieval era, Rajputs were fighting Muslim invasions.

Rakhi at that time meant a spiritual binding and protection of sisters was foremost.

When Rani Karnawati the widowed queen of the king of Chittaud or realized that she could in no way defend the invasion of the Sultan of Gujarat, Bahadur Shah, she sent a rakhi to Emperor Humayun.

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Rakhi is a promise of unconditional care, love and protection from the brother

eRakhi: With changing times, now rakhis are even sent electronically.

Raksha Bandhan: Bonds of love aksha Bandhan is that one festival that is celebrated across the country irrespective of religion, caste and community.

With its origins lying deep in history, Raksha Bandhan has a special place in our hearts. Taught right from childhood – that the silk thread sisters tied on to the brother's wrist was a bond of protection.

Rakhi is the sacred thread that is tied by the sister for the well being of the brother and the brother on the other hand blesses her and promises to protect and honor her forever. The festival of Raksha Bandhan is celebrated on the full moon day (Shravan Poornima) of the Shravan month of the Hindu calendar.

Rabindranath Tagore popularized the rakhi tradition by tying rakhis to his Muslim brothers. The action, especially during the troubled times of the Independence struggle, helped unite the disparaging religions together in a bond of brotherhood.

The main force of thought behind the Rakhi is a promise of unconditional care, love and protection from the brother. Over the years, Raksha Bandhan has grown out of the sibling relationship and has extended to brethren of any sort.

In North India, the occasion is popularly called Rakhi or Raksha Bandhan.

In ancient times a woman tied a 'rakshaa' on her husband's wrist to protect him from evil. Gradually this changed; she tied a 'rakshaa' on her brother's right wrist, to protect him from evil influence and those factors which may taint his character and to strengthen the bond of sibling love between them. On the occasion of Rakshaa Bandhan she visits her brother's home and performs his 'pujan' by applying kumkum and rice grains on his forehead. In return the brother gives her a gift and vows to protect her too. The 'rakhadi' for rak-

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Avani Avittam Significance Upakramam means the beginning.

On this day the Yajurvedis begin to read Yajur Veda for next six months.

The day is auspicious because as per Indian mythology Lord Vishnu was incarnated as Lord Hayagriva,the lord of knowledge, the one who restored the Vedas to Brahma.

Sisters tie rakhi and wish well-being of the brother shaa bandhan itself ranges from a colored cotton string to exquisitely decorated balls of various sizes and materials such as fluffy cotton, 'zari' paper, tinsel, beads and so on.

Some parts of India also reserve Rakshaa Bandhan day importance for the sacred thread changing ceremony when the young brahmin boys discard the old one and don a new one ritualistically. However, on rakshaa bandhan it is the emotions which are important. The rakshaa bandhan ceremony performed is the symbolic everlasting bond between brothers and sisters that reinforces ties between them even across continents, and it is the one which has the most importance on this auspicious day.

Avani Avittam / Upakramam Avani Avittam or Upakramam or Avani Attam is a ritual followed by the Brahmins who read Yajurveda. It is most commonly celebrated in southern states of Tamil Nadu and Kerela, and states of Orissa and Maharashtra. It falls on the Shravan Purnima that is the same day as Raksha Bandhan.

Avani Avittam Rituals On this day, a Mahasankalpam or a vow is taken for atonement of all our sins in the past year.

The Brahmins take a holy dip and wear a new holy thread called Yajnopavit or Janeyu.

The first step is a 'prayashchita', a prayer to atone the sins. It says, "For the removal of all my sins and thereby to secure a divine blessing and for qualifying myself to perform the essential duties of Brahmanas as prescribed in the vedas and smritis and adopted by the really good in their conduct I put on this Yagnopavita".

When the thread is worn another mantra is recited which means -"I put on the sacred thread which is highly pure, is inseparable from God, is capable of prolonging life and is the foremost in the accomplishment of a Brahmana. May such pure Yagnopavita bring strength and dignity.

While removing the old thread, the mantra means -"I throw away the broken dirty old thread, may the new one bring on long life and Brahmana's brilliance.”

Kajari Purnima Kajari Purnima falls on the same day as Raksha Bandhan that is on the Shravan Purnima. This festival is mainly celebrated in the Central India that includes Madhya Pradesh, Chattisgarh and part of Uttar Pradesh. Since this festival falls at the end of the monsoon season, it is of great importance to the farmers.

On the ninth day after Shravana Amavasya, the preparations of the Kajari festival start. This ninth day is called Kajari Navami. The rituals are performed by the ladies blessed with a son. The rituals continue till the Kajri Purnima or the full moon day.

On the Shravan Shukla Navami, women go to fields and bring earth in the leaf cups. Leaf or barley is sown in it and kept in a dark room where no sunlight or fresh air reaches.

The place where this leaf cup is kept and the surrounding walls are cleaned and washed with mud and cow dung. The place then is decorated patterns made by rice solution.The motifs are generally the house hold articles and activities.

Figures of a house, a child in cradle, a mongoose and a woman with a pitcher are mandatory figures. This art of drawing with the rice solution on mud washed floor is called Navami. And then the cup is worshiped.

The worship is repeated for seven days till the full moon day. The evening of the full moon day has the final ritual. The women move out in procession carrying the leaf cups on

their heads. They carry it to a pond or any other water body and immerse it. Women keep fast on this day and pray for the well being of their sons.

The festival is of importance to the farmers as it signifies the beginning of the sowing season for wheat and barley. They worship Goddess Bhagwati and seek blessings for a good crop.

Narial Purnima This festival is important for those who depend on sea for their life.On this day the Sea God, Varun is worshiped. Coconuts are offered to the Sea God thus the name Narial purnima or the coconut full moon.

It is the time of retreating monsoon. It is festival time for the people of the coastal areas.

For the fishermen it is the beginning of the new fishing season. During the monsoon the seas are more violent. The fishermen don't wade into seas during this time. Shravan Purnima signifies the end of monsoon. Fishermen decorate their boats, paint it new and put flags.

They then carry decorated coconuts to the sea. It is kind of a community gathering there. They celebrate together, sing and dance together. In the end they worship the Sea God and offer coconut. The decorated coconuts are thrown in the water with prayers of a plentiful fish catch.

Why Coconut?

A coconut has three eyes. It is said to represent Lord Shiva, the three eyed God. Coconut is considered to be an auspicious offering to Gods. A coconut is broken in front of the deities before taking up a new venture to seek blessings and on successful completion for thanks giving.

Coconut is important for all religious occasions. Thus coconut is considered to be an ideal offering to the Sea God as well.

Alexander The Great and King Puru he oldest reference to the festival of rakhi goes back to 300 B.C. at the time when Alexander invaded India. It is said that the great conqueror, King Alexander of Macedonia was shaken by the fury of the Indian king Puru in his first attempt. Upset by this, Alexander's wife, who had heard of the Rakhi festival, approached King Puru. King Puru accepted her as his sister and when the opportunity came during the war, he refrained from Alexander.

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Rani Karnavati was widow of King of Chittaud, Rajasthan The Emperor touched by the gesture started off with

his troops without wasting any time.

King Puru accepted rakhi from King Alexander's wife

King Bali and Goddess Lakshmi

Lord Krishna and Draupadi n order to protect the good people, Lord Krishna killed the evil King Shishupal. Krishna was hurt during the war and left with bleeding finger.

Seeing this, Draupadi had torn a strip of cloth from her sari and tied around his wrist to stop the bleeding. Lord Krishna, realizing her affections and concern about him, declared himself bounded by her sisterly love. He promised her to repay this debt whenever she need in future. Many years later, when the pandavas lost Draupadi in the game of dice and Kauravas were removing her saari, Krishna helped her divinely elongating the saari so that they could not remove it.

he demon king Mahabali was a great devotee of lord Vishnu. Because of his immense devotion, Vishnu took up the task of protecting Bali's kingdom leaving his normal place in Vaikunth. Goddess Lakshmi the wife of Lord Vishnu - became sad because of this as she wanted Lord Vishnu along with her. So she went to Bali and disguised as a Brahmin woman took refuge in his palace. On Shravana Purnima, she tied Rakhi on King Bali's wrist. Goddess Lakshmi revealed who she is and why she is there. The king, touched by her and Lord Vishnu's good will and affection towards him and his family, Bali requested Lord Vishnu to accompany her to Vaikunth. Then on this festival also came to be known as Baleva as Bali Raja's devotion to the Lord Vishnu.

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I

Krishna came to Draupadi’s rescue when Pandavas lost her to Kauravas in game of dice

Festival also known as Balev after King Bali’s devotion to Lord Vishnu

Breaking free this festive weekend In India families will be holidaying away from home New Delhi: Where will you be this Raksha Bandhan? Basking in the sun on a beach in Pattaya, ambling down the mall in Shimla or maybe shopping in Jaipur with the family... It's the perfect getaway time for many with the first extended weekend of the year combining the festival celebrating sibling love with Independence Day. Unlike other festivals like Diwali, where most people would like to stay at home, Raksha Bandhan presents few obstacles. And several families, complete with sister and brother, are planning the quick escape from the humdrum of daily life.

Travel portals have witnessed tremendous surge in booking for the first long weekend this monsoon and everyone is smiling.

Aamit Jaivir, 33, for instance, is off to Thailand along with his family and would be celebrating Raksha Band-

Travel portals have seen a surge in booking for exotic escapes as well as nearby hotspots han in Pattaya, Thailand, along with his sister and parents.

"We have always celebrated Raksha Bandhan at home but this year we

wanted it to be different. So I decided to gift my sister a perfect family holiday. Festivities should not force you to follow certain regimes. They, in fact, should inspire you to spend good quality time with your family.

This is what we are doing this year," said Jaivir.

Travel lovers look for long weekends at the beginning of the year itself. This year, the monsoon break is from Aug 13-15, which includes Raksha Bandhan and Independence Day. "This is the first extended weekend this monsoon season and therefore it has attracted a lot of attention in terms of holiday bookings," Keyur Joshi, COO and co-founder of travel portal MakeMyTrip , said.

Thomas Cook's Madhav Pai points to the changing face of Indian festivities.

"Families now wish to spend the moments of joy and festivities with

their near and dear in picturesque locations," said Pai, COO, leisure travel, outbound.

According to Sabina Chopra, cofounder and executive vice president (operations) of Yatra , the number of travelers goes up by 50 per cent during long weekends and business doubles.

"Various hotels are promoting special packages for this extended weekend. In fact, the traffic on Yatra has risen by 50 per cent in the last couple of days," she said.

"The most popular destinations from Delhi are places like Jaipur, Shimla and Manali as they are drive down to destinations.

In the western region, destinations such as Lonavala, Mahabaleshwar and Goa are most in demand," she added.

People are also targeting international destinations.

18

Diplomacy

August 13-19, 2011

TheSouthAsianTimes.info

Ambassador Hardeep Singh Puri making his opening remarks at the reception marking the opening of the exhibition ‘Humanitas - Images of India’ by Fredric Roberts (left)

Lakshmi Puri, Assistant Secretary-General for UN Women, admiring a photograph, flanked by Amb. Puri, and Fredric Roberts.

Marking India’s Presidency of UNSC by celebrating everyday Indians Ambassador Hardeep Puri, India's Permanent Representative at the United Nations, hosted a reception August 8 in the General Assembly building, at the opening of an exhibition 'Images of India' by an award-winning photographer. India has the prestige of presiding over the UN Security Council this month.

Photos: Xitij Joshi

Prof. John Humbach admiring a photograph by Fredric Roberts.

Another lifelike photograph by Roberts

Lakhsmi Puri, PR Hardeep Puri, Ranju Batra, Surrogate Judge Gigante, Ravi Batra, Justice Schneier, Congressman Gregory Meeks, Sen. Huntley, Justice Tingling, Justice Aliotta, NY Senate Democratic Leader Sen. John Sampson, Neal Batra.

Ranju and Ravi Batra, Federal Distt Judge George Daniels, Lakshmi Puri, Jamaica’s PR to UN Amb. Raymond, and Adm. Justice Sylvia Hinds-Radix.

Ravi Bhooplapur, Kamlesh Mehta, Amb. Puri, Dr J. Ganesh Bhat, Lakshmi Puri, Ranju and Ravi Batra, and businessmanJack Rosen.

Diplomacy TheSouthAsianTimes.info

19

August 13-19, 2011

Celebrating India’s Presidency of Security Council

By Parveen Chopra United Nations: To mark India’s Presidency of the United Nations Security Council, Ambassador Hardeep Singh Puri, India’s Permanent Representative to the UN, hosted a reception at the General Assembly complex here for the diplomatic corps, US lawmakers and prominent Indian community members to coincide with the opening of the exhibition ‘Humanitas - Images of India’ by award winning US photographer Fredric Roberts.

Amb. Puri told the august gathering that after he discovered Roberts’ exquisite photographs of India, he’d promised to organize his show at the UN during India’s month-long presidency of the UNSC. Puri also recommended him to the Indian government, which honored Roberts as Best Foreign Photographer for India earlier this year.

Puri noted that most of his fellow Permanent Representatives (PRs) of other countries were out of New York on vacation (the ones who attended included PRs of Sri Lanka, Netherlands, South Africa, Belgium and Jamaica).

So he invited to the rostrum eminent attorney Ravi Batra, who in turn invited and introduced quite a few judges and New York politicians.

When asked to speak, Roberts alluded to the fulsome praise by Indians of his photographs in the

Neil Batra, Ranju Batra, Pakistan’s Deputy PR Raza Bashir Tarar, Hardeep and Lakshmi Puri, NY Senate Leader John L. Sampson and Ravi Batra. (Photos: Xitij Joshi/xitijphoto.com ) show and said it was like “being work has the unintended value of recognized as a doctor by other serving as an archive of a culdoctors, and not merely parents ture. He has recently set up the blinded with pride”.

Fredric Roberts Photography Talking to the SATimes, Workshop for Indian students in Roberts said the photographs on conjunction with Sanjhi, an show were culled from what he Udaipur based NGO focused on shot on his visits to Rajasthan in environmental issues.

2003 and Gujarat in 2006.

‘Humanitas’ (Humanitas The Los Angeles based invest- means the development of hument banker turned photogra- man virtue in all its forms, to its pher said he had been travelling fullest extent) will remain on on business to India since 1974 show at the UNGA till Aug 19, but started taking photographs and from Sept 8 - Oct 1 at Sunsince 2000. Others go to India daram Tagore Gallery in looking for the poverty, the mis- Manhattan. ery, but Roberts said he is enchanted by the majesty of India, particularly in its villages, in people’s family, community and Eminent Attorney RAVI religious life. “These villagers may not have money but they are rich, because he who is happy fter nearly 20 years, India with what he has is rich.” sits on the Security Council Yet, Roberts agreed that that and for the month of AuIndia is vanishing--so his art- gust, presides over it. In those 20 years, India has not only become a "strategic partner" of the US but also "Incredible India!" That India has at this precious moment in history Amb. Hardeep Puri as its Permanent Representative seems to now be a benefit to not only India, but to the world itself as India's system-rich maturity is on great display as the Arab Spring has turned into a troubled, and perhaps, bubbling, "Summer".

That Ambassador Puri, while presiding over the Security Council during the normally "relaxed" month of August, happens to be dealing with Syria while avoiding Ravi Batra, Justice Zweibel, PR Puri, Justices Schneier and Knipel. the then latent pitfalls of rushing into Libya when the Arab Spring was still a spring is awe-inspiring as it makes the Council more powerful. The body of work during this rotational presidency is being appreciated beyond expectations with Amb. Puri's graduated and calibrated course of action gives the world community, including the Council, more options, and hence, more power and more relevance. If there is a central message of India's service on the UNSC, it is that the world is safer with India on it, as each crisis is better addressed and world expectations better calibrated.

Dr Harbans Gulati, Dr Subhash Gulati, Vikas Dhall, Willie Rapfogel, What was unique about the celeand Kamlesh Mehta. bration of India's presidency of the

Rachel Knipel, Justice Knipel, Justice Deborah Dowling, and Justice Schneier.

Ranju and Ravi Batra with Amb. Manjeev Singh Puri, India’s Deputy PR to the UN.

“The world is safer with India on UNSC” BATRA on the central message of India's service on the Security Council.

A

Ravi Batra was called to the podium by Amb Puri.

Security Council was Amb. Puri's desire to have a low-key event, which celebrated everyday Indians in India, captured by the affectionate lens of Fredric Roberts rather than some high level event focusing on the UN or the Council. One would normally think that India and her happy PR would have wanted a "loud" self-congratulatory event; instead, it was a quiet, dignified, happy event focused on everyday culture, rich and tradition soaked rural Indians; almost as if being on the Security Council on a permanent basis or its presidency is now to be expected naturally and is no big deal. Indeed, those present at the exhibition seemed to think so.

In the global community present at the UN, it is now expected of India, because of her team led by PR Puri, to have great substance, great

follow through, great interpersonal relationships, great attention to detail and especially, great value added to the discussion, subject, content, tone and outcome with greater consensus; but, always, in a low key manner, consistent with one used to wielding power, carefully, for the greater good. Those accustomed to power's proper use intimately know the infinite calibrations of power, and that in the calibration itself, is power.

The great American philosopher, Mark Twain, if present at the Fredric Roberts exhibition, would have declared to all present: Don't ever expect India to crack walnuts with the great seal of the SC, for it is a real prince who presides. As the majesty of America comes from its everyday people, so is it true for India.

20

Subcontinent

August 13-19, 2011

TheSouthAsianTimes.info

Pak wants new ties with India: Hina Islamabad: Pakistani Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar told parliament that Pakistan wants to build a new era of cooperation with India.

Khar traveled to New Delhi last month and held talks with her Indian counterpart S.M. Krishna, which were described as cordial.

"We want to build trust, rather than to evaporate trust.

We want to build new foundation of relationship with India," she said in the National Assembly, Xinhua reported. Khar said the main purpose of her visit to India was to have an uninterrupted dialogue with New Delhi. She said both countries talked to

each other many times in the past and whenever talks gained momentum they were interrupted abruptly.

She said "the uninterrupted and uninterruptible dialogue means that we want meaningful and result-oriented dialogue and for that both the sides need to ensure conducive environment".

Pak, US need each other: Haqqani Islamabad: There is recognition in both Pakistan and the US that the two countries need each other even though there have been events that have given rise to mutual distrust, said Pakistan's Ambassador to the US Husain Haqqani.

In an interview with Pakistan's Ambassador to the US Husain Haqqani.

WTOP radio, the envoy also sought understanding of Islamabad's perspective in the US. Haqqani said two incidents this year - a unilateral US action on Osama bin Laden's hideout in Abbottabad and the killing

of two Pakistanis by a CIA contractor - have led to a negative image of the US among people. "When the Americans come into Pakistan in a military fashion, unilaterally with guns blazing, essentially they are creating fear amongst the populace which, instead of looking upon them as friends, starts being suspicious," Associated Press of Pakistan quoted Haqqani as saying in Washington. "There are enough suspicions about the US in Pakistan already," said Haqqani.

Taliban kill 22 US Navy SEALs London: A majority of the US soldiers who perished in the shooting down of an American chopper in Afghanistan were part of the elite forces that killed Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, a media report said.

Thirty-eight people, including 30 US special forces troops and seven Afghan soldiers, were killed when their Chinook helicopter was brought down by Afghan insurgents in Wardak province.

Seven members of the Afghan National Army, one dog handler, an interpreter and an unknown number of crew were also on board the downed helicopter.

Of the 30 US troops who died, 22 were Navy SEALs from the elite Team Six unit that killed Osama May 2, the Daily Mail reported.

Meanwhile, as NATO begins an operation to recover the remains of the large helicopter, an Afghan official said heavy fighting has erupted in the area of the crash.

Wardak provincial spokesman Shahidullah Shahid said that a joint operation was taking place in the Tangi Joy Zarin area of Sayd Abad district.

He said there were reports of Taliban casualties overnight, but had no additional information. The SEALs who died in the crash were not among the 23 who killed Osama.

According to intelligence officials, the SEALs who killed Osama in Pakistan had

The SEALs who died in the Taliban attack were not among the 23 who killed Osama bin Laden recently returned to Afghanistan from their base in North Carolina.

However, they were members of the same 120-strong SEAL Team Six and would have trained alongside and been close friends with those who carried out the Osama raid, the Mail said.

It was not clear if the Taliban had deliberately targeted the helicopter as an act of revenge. But its shooting down is bound to be greeted in the Arab world as terrible vengeance for the death of the Al Qaeda leader, it noted.

The attack is the deadliest single incident since the Afghan war began in 2001. Obama, who learned of the incident at Camp David, issued a statement saying his thoughts and prayers go out to the families of those who perished.

Welfare of Lankan Nepal Maoists inked pact with Tamils must: Krishna

Chinese NGO

Kathmandu: A controversial deal between a Chinese organization and a UN agency to develop the birthplace of the Buddha in southern Nepal, that was repudiated by a top official, was actually the outcome of a secret pact with the Himalayan republic's ruling Maoist party.

Though the Maoists, the dominant party in the coalition government, are keeping mum about a proposed $3 billion project to develop Lumbini, the sacred garden city where the Buddha was born, their own leaders agreed to the deal and also inked it, according to information provided by the Chinese ambassador to Nepal, Yang Houlan, to

Nepal's ethnic politicians Tuesday.

The controversy was triggered last month when the Chinese media reported that a Hong Kongbased organization, the Asia Pacific Exchange and Cooperation Foundation, had signed a $3 billion deal with the UN Industrial Development Organisation to develop Lumbini into a "Buddhist Mecca", complete with an international airline and rail tracks. The reports were rebutted by the then cultural secretary of Nepal, Modraj Dotel, who said an agreement without the host country's presence was invalid and that Nepal would not allow it to take place.

Graft case against Khaleda Zia Indian External Affairs Minister S.M. Krishna.

New Delhi: Underlining that the welfare of Tamils in Sri Lanka is of utmost importance, India Thursday urged Sri Lanka to pursue a lasting political settlement that provides for harmonious coexistence of all communities, including minorities, in the islandnation.

Making a suo moto statement in the Lok Sabha on "The Situation in Sri Lanka", External Affairs Minister S.M. Krishna called for a "just and fair" settlement of the Sri Lankan political problem and immediate priority to the Tamils' rehabilitation.

"Our primary objective in all that we are doing in Sri Lanka is to ensure the welfare and wellbeing of Sri Lankan Tamils, includ-

ing internally displaced persons (IDPs), and to assist in the development of northern Sri Lanka," Krishna said.

Alluding to questions raised about the conduct of the war by the Sri Lankan troops, which has been scrutinized in a report by a panel of experts set up by the UN secretary general and a documentary on Britain's Channel 4, Krishna said India has taken note of these concerns, but stressed that the focus remained on the welfare of the minority Tamils.

"Presently, our focus should be on the welfare and well being of Tamils in Sri Lanka. Their rehabilitation and rebuilding should be of the highest and most immediate priority," Krishna said.

Dhaka: The anti-corruption officials in Bangladesh lodged a police complaint against the country's main opposition party leader Khaleda Zia after she failed to reveal the source of a portion of the money used in buying a piece of land in Dhaka, Xinhua reported.

The Anti Corruption Commission (ACC) said the Zia Charitable Trust, which Khaleda Zia heads, did not have any known source of income for 12.6 million taka used for buying the land. ($1 equals 70 taka).

The trust bought the land in January 2005 for 65.2 million taka.

But the seller received 12.6 million taka more, an ACC official said requesting anonymity. The trust failed to show any valid source for the money, the official added.

"We have accused Khaleda Zia along with five others in the case

Opposition leader Khaleda Zia. since she is the chairperson of the trust," the official said adding the case was filed in a Dhaka police station. This is the first corruption case against the chairperson of

Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) since Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina's Bangladesh Awami League government took over the reigns of the government in January 2009.

International TheSouthAsianTimes.info

21

August 13-19, 2011

London calms down, riots spread ore than 500 people were arrested after a fifth night of rioting spread from London to some of England's biggest cities, including Birmingham, Manchester, Nottingham, Bristol and Leicester.

The Metropolitan police arrested 81 people on a much quieter night with 16,000 police officers from forces around the country deployed in the capital.

Manchester, Birmingham and Nottingham bore the brunt of the rioting and looting overnight, with trouble also erupting in Liverpool, Salford, West Bromwich, Wolverhampton, Bristol and Gloucester.

Prime Minister David Cameron was to chair another meeting of the government's emergency Cobra committee to discuss the continuing unrest.

Cameron pledged to speed up court procedures to deal with the "many more" arrests expected as

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Sporadic violence broke out in various cities across Britain, although London remained largely calm following a heavy police presence.

Violence began in Tottenham over the fatal shooting of a man by police. police scour hundreds of hours of the punishment."

Central Manchester and Salford CCTV for evidence about those responsible for the violence. He saw serious looting and disorder warned the young people involved as gangs waged running battles in the riots: "You will feel the full with police, ransacking dozens of force of the law. And if you are shops.

In Manchester groups of young old enough to commit these crimes, you are old enough to face people repeatedly evaded police

from the late afternoon onwards, breaking into upmarket shops and setting a branch of the Miss Selfridge clothing chain on fire.

As evening fell up to 200 youths raided an off-license and other shops in the main shopping precinct of Salford, a couple of miles to the west.

The violence ebbed in Manchester city centre around midnight and police regained control. Assistant Chief Constable Garry Shewan of Greater Manchester police said Manchester and Salford had been badly damaged. "These are pure and simple criminals running wild tonight," Shewan said. "They have nothing to protest against.

There has been no spark. This has been senseless on a scale I have never witnessed before in my career."

Shops including a branch of Marks & Spencer and a hi-fi store were again targeted in

China's aircraft carrier begins sea trials Beijing: China's first aircraft carrier has set sail for sea trials, officials said, as concerns mounted about the country's rapid military buildup amid flaring regional disputes.

The refitted former Ukrainian carrier platform left its shipyard at Dalian Port in northeast China's Liaoning Province this morning to set sail for its maiden sea trial, Xinhua news agency reported.

The agency said that the sea trials were in line with the country's program to rebuild the carrier. Beijing has spent almost 10 years retrofitting the Ukrainian carrier Varvag.

Refitting work will continue after the vessel returns to the port, Xinhua said without specifying the duration of the sea trials.

The carrier was originally built by the former Soviet Union, which failed to complete the ship's construction before collapsing in 1991.

The still-unnamed aircraft carrier was bought from Ukraine, which disarmed it and removed its engines before selling it to China.

As it set sail, the Liaoning Provincial Maritime Safety Administration publicised a notice restricting navigation in waters off the Dalian coast, saying that vessels are forbidden from travelling through an area of sea 13. 25 nautical miles wide and 22 nautical miles long in the northern Yellow Sea and Liaodong Bay from August 10 to 14.

Military enthusiasts and tourists flocked to Dalian to view the carrier before it set sail.

The carrier is being launched amid escalating disputes between China and several ASEAN countries over islands in South China Sea. Defending the carrier Chinese officials have pointed to India, US and several other countries already having the aircraft carriers.

Currently, China is the only nation among five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council that does not have an activeservice aircraft carrier, they say.

Armed Sikhs protect Southall gurdwara London: Armed with swords and hockey sticks, over 700 Sikhs took to the streets to protect the Guru Singh Sabha gurdwara in Southall as the police in the UK were stretched to maintain law and order in London. Local vigilante groups were formed in various areas in London to protect homes and business establishments that have been vandalized by rioters - mainly of Afro-Caribbean origin - in London over the past four days. These include shops owned by businessmen of Indian origin in Harrow and Ealing. Southall in west London has a large population of Indian origin, which rallied together when, apprehending violence, elders in the gurd-

The Guru Singh Sabha gurdwara in Southall. wara appealed to the community for guard at different parts of the town, help. Groups of Sikh men stood keeping in touch via their mobiles.

Birmingham with reports of a gun being fired, while there were reports of large groups of people in West Bromwich town centre and vehicles being set on fire.

Scotland Yard confirmed a fire involving a number of vehicles broke out on an industrial estate in Tottenham and its cause was being treated as unexplained.

Some Londoners took to the streets to defend their homes and stores, with a number of people standing guard outside a Sikh temple in Southall. Another group marched through Enfield, in north London, aiming to deter looters.

Businesses and shops across London had shut down early in a bid to avoid attack from the gangs of youths who ransacked buildings across the city over the previous days.The violence first erupted in Tottenham, north London, after a peaceful protest over the fatal police shooting of Mark Duggan, 29.

Syria uprising: US steps in

The United States is moving toward issuing an explicit call for Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to step down. he international cries for Syria's government to end a bloody crackdown on civilians could intensify as activist groups reported fresh onslaughts in several cities.

The United Nations Security Council was expected to follow up on a statement last week that condemned the Syrian regime for attacks on peaceful protesters and called for both sides to end the violence.

Meanwhile, the United States is moving toward issuing an explicit call for Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to step down, U.S. government sources said.

The move is expected to be announced in coming days after U.S. officials consult with the United Nations Security Council, the sources said. They said the question of whether to call for al-Assad to step down has been under discussion over

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the past few weeks, the sources said.

While international leaders mull their next steps, heavy gunfire, explosions and tanks permeated the eastern city of Deir Ezzor, an activist group and a resident said.

The conflict in Syria was fueled five months ago when Syrian forces swiftly suppressed protests in the southern city of Daraa. Anti-government fervor caught on nationwide as more protests were met with tougher crackdowns.

While activists blame government security forces for the violence and casualties, the alAssad regime has consistently said "armed groups" are responsible.

The death toll had reached 2,417 -- including more than 2,000 civilians, said the Local Coordination Committees of Syria, a network of activists.

22

Business

August 13-19, 2011

TheSouthAsianTimes.info

New $3bn window for foreign investors in India New Delhi: The Securities and Exchange Board of India and the government have opened a fresh $3 billion (around Rs 14,000 crore) window for foreign investors to invest in debt instruments issued by domestic infrastructure companies.

The foreign investors, who comply with know-your-customer (KYC) norms, would be eligible to invest through mutual funds, the finance ministry said.

The new facility is in addition to a similar benefit available to foreign investors to invest in the equities, which was announced by finance minister Pranab Mukherjee in the budget.

Together, foreign investors can now invest up to $13 billion (around Rs 58,000 crore) directly in Indian markets using the mutual fund route. Earlier, their investment was limited to foreign institutional investors but the government expanded the ambit to bring about more stability in the flows as investment from retail investors are seen to be more stable than portfolio, often called hot money.

The move comes at a time when the global markets are nervous following the US

Foreign investors can now invest up to $13 billion (around Rs 58,000 crore) directly in Indian markets using the mutual fund route. rating downgrade and the sovereign debt problems in Europe, which has raised fears of a slowdown in India and possible withdrawal of funds by FIIs. Finance ministry officials said the move to expand the ambit of the window was taken following recommendations made by the country's top industrialists during their meeting with Mukherjee on August 1.

US rating: Mixed implications on India

India is the 14th largest creditor to the US, with an exposure of $40 billion.

New Delhi: Even as policymakers, including those at the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), sought to downplay the impact of US debt ratings downgrade on domestic economy, experts differ on what's in store due to the crises in the world's largest economy. Take the case of crude oil. One set of experts say fuel prices could go up if investors move out of US treasury markets to commodities, but others feel the prices may actually fall, since a further slowdown in the global economy can temper demand.

Standard and Poor's, which shook the global financial markets with its decision to cut the US rating last weekend, has said there will be no immediate impact of its action on the Asia-Pacific region.

But it has, nevertheless, issued a cautionary note. For one, India is the 14th largest creditor to the US, with an exposure of $40 billion. "The adverse impact on Asia Pacific in that scenario would likely require governments to use their balance

sheets to support their economies and financial sectors once again.

And in our opinion, most governments would promptly oblige," the agency said.

"But some of them continue to bear the scars of recent downturn -the fiscal capacities of Japan, India, Malaysia, Taiwan, and New Zealand have shrunk to pre-2008 levels. If a renewed slowdown comes, it would likely create deeper, more prolonged impact than last one."

Yet, leading merchant banker and advisory Goldman Sachs actually upgraded India's equity markets, as it saw a turnaround in the mediumto-long term with lower commodity prices, better valuations of stocks and promise of pushing reforms.

"Given the recent developments in the macro landscape, we are moving India to a market weight neutral stance from underweight, which we have held for over a year," said a report from seven of Goldman Sachs analysts.

'Stimulus if US crisis begins to bite' New Delhi: The Government will provide stimulus measures to absorb the impact of moderation in exports following a rating downgrade of the US by Standard & Poor’s, Union Minister for Commerce and Industry Anand Sharma said.

Reacting to the concerns, Sharma told reporters on the sidelines of the launch of Assocham’s Africa manual, “Opportunities Unlimited”, that the current volatility in global markets seems to be a temporary turbulence and that Indian exports should grow more than 25 per cent in 2011-12.

Sharma, however, evaded any projections about exports in the current fiscal.

India’s merchandise exports rose by 38 per cent to $246 billion in the last fiscal.

“We hope the figure will nearly double to $500 billion by 2014,” he said.

While the government will ensure that cost of credit to the industry is within manageable limits, Sharma assured that the situation has not reached a stage for India to become anxious.

Industry has started a clamor for stimulus to deal with the fallout of the global financial crisis. “A slow pace of recovery in the

Union Minister for Commerce and Industry Anand Sharma.

US could prompt hard hit sectors in India to call for another package by the government to boost investments and demand,” Dilip Modi Assocham president and Managing Director, Spice Mobility Ltd told Express. ”We would need stimulus in capacity building to revive investments and take forward the India growth story,” he said.

We have strong fundamentals: Pranab New Delhi: Indian equities markets, which stemmed losses, were a sign of the economy's strong fundamentals, Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee said.

"I would like to emphasis that some of the investment banks have upgraded India to market weight, that means the basic fundamentals are strong and macroeconomic recovery is moving in a positive direction," Mukherjee said referring to a report released Monday by investment banking firm Goldman Sachs.

The 30-scrip benchmark of the Bombay Stock Exchange, Sensex, which fell over 550 points in early trade Tuesday, almost recovered its losses in the afternoon before closing with a 132.27 points or 0.78 percent loss at 16,857.91 points.

The minister said the Indian

Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee. markets managing to pare its early losses signified the resilience of the Indian economy. In comparison, Asian markets closed deep in the red.

The benchmark Japanese Nikkei closed 1.68 percent down at 8,944.48 points, while the Chinese Shanghai Composite index too closed flat at 2,526.07 points.

Satyam to wind up US Depository Shares Mumbai: After putting up a brave front for several quarters on its US listing, Satyam Computer Services has finally given up the idea of becoming SEC compliant.

The company has decided to wind up its American Depository Shares (ADSs). This means the company would completely withdraw from the US bourses, including the OTC platform on which it is currently traded.

“We have decided that it is not possible for the company to become current as per the US SEC (Securities and Exchange Commission) regulations. There

were certain data that were not available to the company following the fraud committed by the earlier management.

The non-availability of those numbers was pointed out by the auditors while auditing the financials. Though the Indian regulator was accepting the auditors’ comments, the US regulator was not.

So we have decided to wind down the ADS programme,” Vineet Nayyar, Satyam’s chairman, said.

Nayyar was pointing at a set of numbers that were qualified by the auditors during the recent review of the accounts including

the alleged investment of about Rs1,232 crore made by the founder of Satyam B Ramalinga Raju.

Satyam has not been able to file the required documents with the SEC post September 2008 due to the financial irregularities identified for earlier years.

Nayyar also claimed that the SEC officials were willing to work with the company to set the records straight.

However, the company has found that it would not be able to comply with the regulations of the SEC.

Sports TheSouthAsianTimes.info

23

August 13-19, 2011

Test series: India on edge against England Birmingham: As the third Test began at Edgbaston, there was mainly trepidation in the ranks.

India know history is against them: they have lost four out of their five Tests here, the other one being a draw.

Worse, they have already slipped from winning positions in the first two Tests to look in disarray now; their main bowling hope, Zaheer Khan, has finally been ruled out.

Harbhajan Singh and Yuvraj Singh have also been consigned to the injured bay, giving the team a desolate look.

Virender Sehwag is the only sliver of hope: the maverick opener has returned from a long layoff and

brings a sense of audacity along with him. His batting mates know that he can be utterly destructive; his bowling foes realize that too. In theory, it changes the equation.

The good news is that Gautam Gambhir has recovered from his Lord's blow. Together, they offer solidity to the batting, which has sorely been missing so far. With Rahul Dravid returning to No. 3 and VVS Laxman to No. 5, India should finally hope to show their full prowess with the bat.

Sachin Tendulkar will be more comfortable too, sandwiched between the two Test protagonists.

He is the only Indian to have scored a century here but that was way

back in 1996, when his outlook towards his art was so different.

Suresh Raina should take the No. 6 spot, even though he didn't seem too happy in the line of fire. Virat Kohli has come as replacement for Yuvraj Singh but he didn't have a great time either in West Indies; he will be happy just to soak it in.

India's bigger concern will be their bowling. They will seriously consider going in with four seamers, especially with Harbhajan Singh out of the equation.

Virender Sehwag is the only sliver of hope: the maverick opener has returned from a long layoff and brings a sense of audacity along with him.

Gavaskar, Shastri in Tiger Woods a contender at PGA! line of controversy Mumbai: Former India skippers Sunil Gavaskar and Ravi Shastri have a Rs3.6 crore annual contract with the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) that leads to a conflict of interest in their roles as commentators, news magazine Outlook reveals in its upcoming edition. As India hurtle from one poor performance to another in England, many questions have emerged over poor scheduling, fitness management and shoddy preparation for the big Sunil Gavaskar and Ravi Shastri. series.

However, the contract is Former skippers Bishan Singh holding back two of India's Bedi and Kapil Dev spoke to prominent voices in the commen- Outlook and expressed concern. tators' box from airing their views "It's impossible for these guys to freely about the board, such as its be unbiased! If the BCCI shifts its role in the cramped schedule, and position on the DRS, will these the impact of the Indian Premier two change their minds? Forget League (IPL) that could have left them, there's a greater problem the players drained, mentally and when an institution behaves like physically. this." The BCCI's Chief Outlook magazine has revealed Administrative Officer Ratnakar that Gavaskar and Shastri have Shetty refused to comment. A been signed up directly by the board official said part of the BCCI with the lucrative deal to be money it pays the duo is reimrenewed annually. The contract bursed by broadcasters. The cost allows the board to provide their of the IPL match production is services to event broadcasters, borne by the BCCI, which does who cannot refuse to employ not pay them anything extra for them or deny them their daily fee, doing commentary during the the weekly says in its cover story. league.

Georgia: British Open champion Darren Clarke believes Tiger Woods can contend for PGA Championship, the year's final major, despite only recently coming back from a three-month injury layoff.

Woods practiced at the Atlanta Athletic Club, enjoying a brief session on the range and the practice green before heading out on to the course with his good friend Arjun Atwal of India.

There was surprisingly little attention paid to Woods by the fans, perhaps due to the low expectations surrounding the former world number one, who has now sunk to 30th in the rankings.

Woods, who has claimed four PGA Championship titles, has struggled this year while battling injuries and

trying to rebuild his golf swing and his private life following the breakup of his marriage.

He returned to the PGA Tour, after three months on the sidelines with leg injuries, at last week's WGCBridgestone Invitational where he tied for 37th after displaying erratic form.

However, Northern Irishman Clarke believes Woods showed enough form last week in Akron, Ohio to indicate he could be a genuine contender for the PGA Championship.

"I thought his game last week in the first two rounds was pretty good," said Clarke, who played alongside his good friend Woods for the first two days. "I thought he hit an awful lot of really, really good golf shots.

Dravid to quit ODI and Twenty20 cricket London: Hours after the surprise recall to the India One-Day squad, Rahul Dravid announced his decision to quit the shorter versions of the game at the end of the series in England.

The highly dependable batsman with three hundreds in the last five Tests in the West Indies and in the ongoing series in England, said he was quitting the ODIs and Twenty20s so that he could concentrate on Test cricket.

Dravid, 38, who has not played much one-day cricket in the last four years after being dumped by the national selectors in the wake of a none-too-successful home series against Australia soon after the disastrous 2003 World Cup under his captaincy save for a brief return for the 2009 Champions Trophy in South Africa, admitted

Rahul Dravid. the latest recall was totally unex- both the Test and ODI cricket, with 10,765 runs in 339 one-dayers -pected.

Dravid, like his teammate Sachin the seventh highest scorer in that Tendulkar, has over 10,000 runs in format.

24

Ultimate Bollywood

August 13-19, 2011

TheSouthAsianTimes.info

Who says models can't act rom Aishwarya Rai and Sushmita Sen to Priyanka Chopra and Katrina Kaif - these top rung actresses have proved time and again that models can indeed act!

Of course, there have been male models like John Abraham, Arjun Rampal, Sonu Sood, Dino Morea, Milind Soman, and Rahul Dev who made a successful transition from the ramp to the big screen. But the women outnumber them and have garnered more success in the glitzy and glamorous Hindi film industry.

In the 1970s, Zeenat Aman shifted from the ramp to the silver screen, setting the trend for many young girls. Even Juhi Chawla followed in her footsteps and made it big in Bollywood. Here's a list of some of the present-day actresses, who made a name in the modeling world and are blazing a trail in the film industry.

Aishwarya Rai: After being crowned Miss World in 1994, she worked in Tamil films, moved to Bollywood and earned international fame through film projects and appearances at prestigious events across the shores. Counted among the world's most beautiful women, Aishwarya has proved her acting mettle in films like "Taal", "Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam", "Devdas", "Guru" and "Guzaarish". In 2009, she was given the Padmi Shri for hercontribution to cinema.

Priyanka Chopra: At 29, Priyanka is a former Miss World, has featured in over two dozen films, is a National award winner and is now ready to break musical grounds internationally. One of the most versatile actresses, her work has been appreciated in films like "Fashion", "Dostana" and "Saat

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Priyanka Chopra in the upcoming Don 2 with SRK

Katrina Kaif in the hit number Sheila Ki Jawani.

A deglamorised Deepika Padukone in Khelien Ham Jee Jaan Se

Khoon Maaf". She features in some of the most awaited films - "RA.One", "Don 2” and the remake of "Agneepath".

Katrina Kaif: Starting as a model in London at the age of 14, with six back-toback hits -- "Namastey London", "Apne", "Partner", "Welcome", "Race" and "Singh Is Kinng" - this 'Sheila' girl proved her critics wrong and followed up her success with "Raajneeti" and more recently, "Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara".

Deepika Padukone: Daughter of badminton champ, Prakash Padukone, Deepika was a successful model when she had a

dream debut in "Om Shanti Om" opposite Shah Rukh Khan. Her subsequent report card was average, with projects like "Bachna Ae Haseeno", "Chandni Chowk to China ", "Love Aaj Kal", "Housefull" and "Lafangey Parindey". She also turned experimental with a de-glam role in "Khelein Hum Jee Jaan Sey". She will soon be seen in Prakash Jha's "Aarakshan".

Bipasha Basu: The dusky Bengali beauty, a former supermodel, has improved by leaps and bounds over a decade of her film journey. From "Ajnabee" in 2001 to the latest "Dum Maaro Dum", she has come a long

way, thanks to projects like "Jism", "Raaz", "Corporate", "No Entry", "Dhoom 2", "Race" and others. She is now going international with Roland Joffe's "Singularity".

Neha Dhupia: Miss India Universe 2002, Neha doesn't have a quintessential Bollywood face and style, nor is her choice of films typically Bollywood. She has won praise for films like "Kyaa Kool Hai Hum", "Shootout at Lokhandwala", " Mithya", "Singh Is Kingg" and "Dasvidaniya". In her latest release "Dear Friend Hitler", Neha plays Eva Braun, the longtime companion of Adolf Hitler.

Hollywood blackout in India?

Rise of the Planet of the Apes is yet to come to India.

elhi youngsters who hopped theaters in the hopes of catching James FrancoFreida Pinto starrer Rise of the Planet of the Apes, were left disappointed. The film, which is number one on international charts and opened to an estimated $54 million in North America, didn’t make it to India’s multiplexes. The reason: multiplex owners and distributors are at loggerheads over the sharing of revenue, a problem that began back in 2009.

According to an MoU signed that year, the revenue sharing between distributors and multiplexes was 50:50 in the first week, which would then be reduced to 42.5%, 37.5% and 30% in the second, third and

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fourth weeks respectively.

But, the memorandum expired on June 30, and since then, the multiplexes are now demanding a 55% share in the profits in the first week of a film’s release, reducing the distributors’ share to 45% in the first week, 37.5% in the second, 32.5% in the third and 25.5% in the fourth weeks respectively, which is unacceptable to producers.

“Multiplexes are not ready to pay 50% on foreign films’ revenue in the first week to producers. So, temporarily, all Hollywood studios are releasing their movies only in single screens,” says Joginder Mahajan, a leading Delhi-based distributor.

“The negotiations are on ... we’re waiting for a decision,” he adds.

Aamir not the new Munna Bhai he grapevine in B-town is that the Munna Bhai jodi Sanjay Dutt and Arshad Warsi - has been replaced by Aamir Khan and Sharman Joshi in the next edition of the "Munna Bhai" franchise. When we quizzed Vidhu Vinod Chopra's official representative, he rubbished the rumours saying, "We are not even ready with the script of the next "Munna Bhai"

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flick and this is a baseless humour.

Vidhu Vinod Chopra doesn't begin the casting for his films until he completes his script. Besides, Aamir Khan is not free for another two years." Quiz him about the promos of the third edition (which have Sanjay and Arshad) that are on air, he clarified, "The promo with them was shot two years ago."

Aamir Khan.

That girl…' my last film with Kalki: Anurag ilmmaker Anurag Kashyap said 'That Girl In Yellow Boots' will be his last high-voltage intense film with newly-wed wife Kalki Koechlin as such movies take a toll on their relationship.

"I am very serious about it. I won't work with Kalki again till the time I have a lighter romantic film for her. When we work on intense films, our relationship gets very intense," Anurag said in a statement.

"It takes a toll on our personal interactions. Besides this, the chances of creative clashes are high while working on the same project, and convincing the other becomes difficult at times," he said.

"This stresses out our relation. So, we have decided to keep our relation safe by avoiding working together," he added.

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Kalki Koechlin.

Ultimate Bollywood Thesouthasiantimes.info

25

August 13-19, 2011

'...Planet Of The Apes' ape-solutely wonderful very revolution has three phases: rampant injustice, germination of revolt against it, and full-fledged revolution usually led by someone.

"Rise Of The Planet Of The Apes" (ROTPOTA) chronicles these stages, reminding us to be grateful that animals perhaps cannot rise up against brutal humans who butcher them in the millions everyday even when they can eat other foods.

Caesar, a genetically modified ape who's been secretly raised by a scientist Will Rodman (James Franco), grows up with an intelligence exceeding human's. After being confined with other apes, like the Buddha he witnesses injustice for the first time. He unifies other apes, and rises up against the ruthless humans.

Hollywood has a history of action films full of computer generated imagery (CGI) but lacking basic imagination. ROTPOTA is surprisingly good in almost every department making it one of the most perfect commercial films ever.

Action films are not simply the display of violence. They are essentially about humanism and feelings whose subjugation finds

expressions that give representation to the fact that his humanism exceeds his superior intelligence, again unlike most humans.

In terms of the Planet of The Apes franchisee, it is similar to the fourth film - "Conquest Of The Planet of the Apes". Those following the film closely will see a foreshadowing of the first

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Not married to Dev Patel: Pinto Freida Pinto and James Franco in 'Rise of the Planet of the Apes.' expression in physical violence.

Thus, the violence outside becomes a metaphor and a physical representation of the violence inside and is a statement against the rampant injustice that causes it in the first place.

External violence is thus shaped by internal conflict. Most filmmakers don't understand this and though one does not need to know this to like an action film, the disproportionate nature of internal vs external violence makes for a far less satisfying film. Director Rupert Wyatt understands this perfectly and

though he could have gone overboard, considering the potential the story presents, he exercises restraint making ROTPOTA that much more enduring.

Frieda Pinto tries hard to imitate the accent of a South American. Thankfully, she is meant only to be an eye-candy.

James Franco, expectedly, is good but the winner is CGI. All the apes in the film exist only on the computer. But to get right so many facial expressions makes all the difference in the film and brings the apes alive in the viewer's imagination. It is Caesar's

With 'Pyaasa' West discovered auteur work in Bollywood rench film critic Jean-Michel Frodon introduced Indian filmmaker Guru Dutt's 1957 classic "Pyaasa" to the audience at the 64th Locarno International Film Festival as a dark film that helped the West discover the auteur theory - reflecting the director's personal creative vision - in Bollywood.

"Pyaasa", a cinematic masterpiece by the master craftsman, was a satire on the social system.

Directed by Guru Dutt, the film that boasts of flawless performances by Directed by Guru Dutt, 'Pyaasa' was a satire on the social system.

Dutt and other cast, including "'Pyaasa' is a dark film that showed Guru Waheeda Rehman, Mala Sinha and Rehman, was screened here as a part of Open Doors Dutt's specific style - use of close ups and programme that put the spotlight on Indian even of songs not only as an entertaining movies. "With 'Pyaasa,' the West discovered interplay but also as a part of storytelling," he that there is auteur film inside Indian cinema. added.He also informed the audiences about There is not only Satyajit Ray, but also others Guru Dutt's relationship with the film's lead inside Bollywood," Frodon told the audiences actress Waheeda Rehman and his wife Geeta Dutt. who came to watch the movie.

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Charlton Heston movie, which will perhaps follow ROTPOTA, either immediately or after a few films. In essence though, this has the humanism of "The Elephant Man" and is the closest any film in the franchisee has come to the basic premise of the first film, revolution against injustice and the stupidity of humans.

reida Pinto has rubbished reports that she has secretly married her ‘Slumdog Millionaire’ co-actor Dev Patel, insisting that she does not know when she will get hitched to her boyfriend. British actor Patel met her on the sets on Danny Boyle's film and have been together ever since.

“With [Slumdog Millionaire], we went through the same experience together and no one will ever know - not even our friends and family - what that was like,” she said in an interview with the Sydney Morning Herald.

When asked as Internet speculation has suggested - they have secretly married, she said, “No,

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we're not married. I can't even imagine we'll be married in five years… OK, I'm saying no right now; tomorrow I might surprise you. Who knows?”

She admitted that although her career has been on an upward trajectory post ‘Slumdog’, Patel's career has been significantly quieter.

“We have to deal with it and it hasn't been the easiest,” she said.

“I literally did four films in 11 months and I hardly got to see him. But we know these things are part and parcel of the relationship - especially being in a relationship with an actor,” she added.

Locarno Open Doors to highlight Indian films s many as 12 independent filmmakers are in the spotlight at the 64th Locarno International Film Festival.

From networking to meeting co-producers to having access to Western audiences, the event is providing them a platform to turn their scripts into movies at the Open Doors section.

"What we are trying to do is to provide access to independent filmmakers to cooperation partners in Western European and other countries.

We have sort of pitching exercises where they have an opportunity to present the film," Martin Dahinden, director general of the

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The Open Doors CoProduction Lab is trying to assist the directors and producers in finding co-production partners.

Swiss Agency for Development Cooperation, said.

The ongoing Open Doors

Co-Production Lab is trying to assist the directors and producers in finding co-production partners for select films - Ajay Raina's "Aharbal Falls", Natasha Mendonca's "Ajeeb Aashiq", Partho SenGupta's "Arunoday", Alka Raghuram's "Burqa Boxers", Sourav Sarangi's "Char, The Island Within", Satish Manwar's "Jat Panchayat", Anup Singh's "Lasya", Sidharth Srinivasan's "Samaadhi", Vasant Nath's "Sebastian Wants To Remember", Shanker Raman's "The Trapper's Snare", Lilium Leonard's "Thread" and Ashish Avikunthak's "Vidhvastha".

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Festival

August 13-19, 2011

TheSouthAsianTimes.info

Flavorful Rakhi delights Vermicelli Kheer

Ingredients 1cup Roasted Vermicelli 1.5 liter Milk ½ tsp. Cardamom Powder ½ tsp. Saffron Dry fruit and resins Method Boil the milk in a broad mouth pan, add the roasted Vermicelli and sugar to taste. Let it boil till thick. Dissolve saffron in 1tsp. water. Add cardamom and saffron to the thick vermicelli and milk mixture. Garnish with soaked almonds and resins.

Khoya Burfi

Rakhi Ghevar

Ingredients Plain flour- 3 cups Solidified Ghee -1 cup Ice cubes - 3-4 pieces Water - 4 cups Milk -1/2 cup Yellow food color -1/4 tsp Kewra essence - 5-6 drops Ghee - 1 kg Powdered cardamom -1 tsp Chopped almonds & pistachios -1 tbsp Milk in which 1/2 tsp. saffron has been rubbed

Method Take oil and flour and mix them together so that they are bound together. Now add some water and knead the entire mixture thoroughly. After a while it forms soft dough; now cover it with a damp cloth and keep it aside. The next step involves light frying of khoya in oil and then mixing it with sugar. Afterwards, add almonds, raisins and other dry fruits and fry for a few more minutes. Let the whole mixture cool for some time. Now, take the kneaded dough and start making little rotis (chapattis). Fill the half of each roti (chapattis) with the khoya mixture and fold the rotis to seal the sides to make sure that the khoya mixture is securely wrapped inside.

The edges can be sealed securely either by fingertips or a plastic cover which is exactly the shape of a gujia. Now the most important part of the preparation. Keep the flames low and deep fry the gujias until they become golden brown.

Place the gujias on a newspaper or tissue paper so that the oil drains away. The mouth watering and delicious gujias are ready to be served.

Mal Pua

For syrup Sugar -1 1/2 cups Water -1 cup Method First of all prepare sugar syrup of one thread uniformity.

Take the solidified ghee in a large wide bowl and rub it vigorously with ice cubes till the ghee becomes white in color.

Then add milk, flour and one cup water together and mix to make a smooth batter. Put the food color in water and add to the batter and then add the essence. If required, add some more water to the batter. Batter should be such that it flows if released. Take a cylindrical container of aluminum or steel of at least one feet height and a half feet diameter. Fill the container with ghee and heat it. When the ghee becomes hot, pour about 50 ml batter into it in a continuous flow, in the center of the hot ghee. Allow the froth to settle down and then pour another glassful in the center. When the froth settles down, take out the ghevar and put it on a wire mesh to drain the oil.

Now take the sugar syrup in a large and flat container (fit enough to hold the ghevar) and dip the ghevar in it. After a while, take out the ghevar and put it on mesh again. Cool it for a while and spray a few drops of saffron milk, chopped dry fruit and the cardamom powder.

Rakhi Gujia

Ingredients 250 grams plain flour, sifted 1 tbsp. powdered sugar Oil for frying Sugar Syrup 500 grams Sugar 625 ml Water For garnish 1/4 teaspoon ground cardamom Rose water Fresh cream sweetened Method Sugar syrup: Put sugar and water in a saucepan and bring to boil. Simmer for 8-10 minutes till thick syrup is formed.

Mix sifted flour, sugar and water to form smooth, medium thickness batter and keep aside for 30 min. Heat oil in a shallow flat bottomed pan. Carefully spread the mixture in the pan and fry till golden brown. Transfer the pancake into the sugar syrup. Serve hot garnished with cardamom, rosewater and fresh cream.

Raksha Bandhan on celluloid: Some memorable Hindi songs from Bollywood films

Ingredients 1 lt. Milk 75 gms Sugar 50 grams Coconut powder 20 grams Pistachios, chopped 20 grams Almonds, chopped Method Boil milk reduce heat and let it simmer for 45-minutes to one hour till thick paste like. Keep stirring in between. Add sugar and coconut powder and stir till sugar dissolves.

Grease a thali and pour the batter. Garnish with pistachios and almonds.

Let it cool and cut into square or rhomboid pieces.

Almonds and dry fruits- 200 grams Cooking oil - 6 tablespoon for kneading the dough and a substantial amount for deep-frying the Gujias Water- 250 ml.

Sugar- 500 grams

Ingredients Flour- 500 grams (for 50 gujias) Khoya- 1000 grams Raisins- a few

Rang birangi rakhi lekar – Anpadh Mere bhaiyya – Kajal Phoolon ka taron ka – Hare Rama Hare Krishna Chanda re mere bhaiya – Chambal Ki Kasam Behna ne bhai – Resham Ki Dori Bhaiya mere raakhi ke bandhan ko nibhana – Chhoti Behan Yeh rakhi bandhan aai aisa- Beimaan Jhula bahon ka – Doli Saja ke Rakhna Gudiya jaisi behna – Meri Adalat 1984 Chhote chhote bhaiyon ke – Hum Saath Saath Hain

Lifestyle TheSouthAsianTimes.info

August 13-19, 2011

Why do women like pink? hink of colours as a bunch of high school kids. If black is the goth loner, blue your average jock, orange – (ping) nerd alert, then pink has got to be the most popular chick on the campus, right? Think about it, what else has its own theme song (Aerosmith’s Pink), its own city (Jaipur), a trademarked pop diva (P!nk), signifies compassion and caution (breast cancer and female reproductive health mascot) and is the focal point of more surveys than any other colour can dream of? What else but pink! A slightly intricate and precise shade of pink (honeysuckle) was even named the colour of the year by Pantone LLC, the world’s leading

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colour authority, officially making 2011 the year of the pink! Designers like Jil Sander, Nanette Lepore, Peter Som, Christopher Kane and Marc Jacobs liberally used it in their SpringSummer collections and Pantone called it “something to lift our spirit, a captivating, stimulating colour that gets the adrenaline going – perfect to ward off the blues.”

But despite its instant association with Barbie and nauseating cotton candy, pink spawns as many hate clubs as fans. Many loathe the colour because of its clingy, controlling, princessy associations. Nevertheless, the colour maintains a vice-like grip on most women’s wardrobes, some-

Clearing some myths on drinking water nybody who has grown up in a middleclass household is familiar with the rituals surrounding drinking water. We drink a lot of water. There are always water glasses on the table at meal times and in some households – mine, for instance – there is even a superstition about drinking a glass of water before you leave the house.

Because tap water in India is rarely drinkable, all of us have our own methods of purifying the stuff that comes out of the tap. In Bombay, in the Sixties and Seventies, the water was always boiled and sometimes, when there seemed to be too many impurities suspended in it, a filter was used to remove them. The boiled water was allowed to cool down and then decanted into bottles (in my house, old empty bottles of whisky or sherbet) and kept in the fridge for drinking.

When I was young, I assumed that the rest of the world shared our attitude to water. But as I travelled abroad, I discovered that other countries had their own methods. For a start, you didn’t always find water on the dining table at meal times in England and you rarely found it on the Continent. In France or Italy, if you wanted water with your meal, you had to order it, rather as you would order a Coke, and they would charge for the bottle – sometimes even more than they would charge for a Coke.

Nobody I met abroad had bottles of drinking water in their fridges. In England and America at least, you drank water straight from the tap. If the weather was very hot (which was rarely the case in England) then you put some ice into your water glass.

So what should you do?

Here’s my view. Drink when you are thirsty.

Drink when you like – in the middle of the meal if you want, no matter what dieticians may say.

Do not pay for water unless you have no choice.

If you are not sure of the safety of the water available, then do buy a bottle of ‘mineral’ water.

Otherwise, do what our parents used to: purify your tap water using one of the many devices now available (most of which were not around when our parents used to get the water boiled every day).

And the next time somebody lectures you on the advantages of the minerals in expensive water or tells you how five litres of water will make your skin glow, tell them to take a flying jump. The one thing we have always understood in India is how to purify our own water and when to drink it. We do not need to fall victim to the marketing patter of bottled water companies or to follow the fads of the West. In this – as in so many other things – our parents knew best.

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times taking over completely. So we raided the rooms of a few such pinkloving girls and asked them to defend their much maligned choice of colour.

Prabhleen Bawa, Intern at a Real Estate Firm Hates being called ‘Pinky’ and doesn’t care what people think of her borderline obsession with pink Owns about 30 outfits, at least five pairs of shoes and many accessories, all in pink I think I like it because I have grown up being surrounded by this colour. Right from my frocks, cots, hair clips and even diapers, everything was pink,” laughs 22-yearold intern Prabhleen. And she isn’t kidding – there is a childhood photo-

Prabhleen Bawa, graph hanging above her bed, depicting her exactly like that. Her mum, who enjoyed dressing her daughter in pink when she was a baby, chips in, “She had a beautiful complexion and such pink cheeks, everyone suggested that she should wear pink more since it suited her the best.”

As she lays out one pink outfit after

another, along with matching laptop, iPhone case, makeup bag, countless nail paints, lipsticks, a pink pen and a diary and even a pink tea set, we ask Prabhleen about being stereotyped during her growing up years. “I have never thought so, in fact most of my friends consciously gift me items in pink. A friend even gave me a pink stone dug out from under his home during construction, which has been immensely lucky for me,” she answers. Coercing her father to dress in pink on casual Fridays, Prabhleen says she’d also love to see footballers in hot pink jerseys. “I think it’s a better colour than red, which is way more aggressive. I can’t imagine someone not falling in love with it,” says this pink champion.

28

Humor

August 13-19, 2011

TheSouthAsianTimes.info

Humor with Melvin Durai

Some inventions are just disappointing very now and then, a great invention comes along that transforms the world and makes our lives easier, if not better.

The plane, invented a century ago, gave people the freedom to travel anywhere in the world, meet all kinds of foreigners, and, if necessary, drop bombs on them. It also created the need for large airports, where thousands of passengers could stand in line, waiting for their next flight to be cancelled.

The television, invented some 80 years ago, allowed people to invite a variety of guests into their homes, guests who would inform and entertain them but unlike real guests, would never expect any food. Some of these guests would even wrestle each other, saving people the trouble of visiting the zoo.

The Internet gave people the ability to chat with strangers around the world, visit thousands of interesting websites and download pictures of actors and models, while pretending to be working. Yes, thanks to the Net, millions of people with no athletic skill whatsoever have managed to become professional surfers. And not all of them work for the government.

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It's no wonder people get excited when they hear rumors of another great invention. They can't help imagining how it might improve their lives: "Perhaps it will allow me to drive my car while taking a nap.

Perhaps it will allow my mother to send me delicious food by email.

Perhaps it will allow my cat to operate the lawn mower and my dog to do the dishes."

Such wonderment was rampant in recent months with the news that Dean Kamen, a prominent inventor with more than 150 patents, had created something called "Ginger," expected to be more revolutionary than the World Wide Web. Even I was excited. "More revolutionary than the Web?" I asked. "Oh my goodness. What has this great inventor created? Has he helped mankind

everywhere by inventing a machine that will warn us, in a reliable way, about any nearby occurrence of PMS? If so, I want to be the first to own it. And if I can't afford it, I want to be the first to steal it. It could be the greatest invention in history, even greater than the nose-hair trimmer."

With the PMS-Detector, I would know when to keep my mouth shut, when to get out of the way, when to hide under the bed. I'd finally feel safe. But unfortunately Kamen's invention isn't that revolutionary.

Though he has revealed little about it, Inside magazine apparently did enough investigating to conclude that "Ginger" - also known as "IT" - is nothing more than a hydrogen-powered scooter. What a disappointment, especially to Americans, who couldn't care less about scooters, whether they're hydrogen-powered or hyenapowered.

Scooters are just too small to get Americans excited. The average American has gained 30 pounds in the last few decades and is now large enough to EAT several scooters. And what about all those Americans who don't want to be just average?

Americans, in general, do not like to

be bigger than their mode of transportation. That's why Oprah rarely travels by bus. Most Americans prefer vehicles that are big enough to haul not just their entire families but also several sumo wrestlers. Just in case they go to Japan.

Never mind that a scooter would be more fuel-efficient. If it can't haul a

fat foreigner, what's the use?

So maybe Dean Kamen needs to go back to the drawing board. If he's intent on inventing something that's hydrogen-powered, I'd be willing to invest all my money -- every last penny -- in a hydrogen-powered PMS-Detector. Even if I had to make all the hydrogen myself.

Laughter is the Best Medicine

by Mahendra Shah Mahendra Shah is an architect by education, entrepreneur by profession, artist and humorist, cartoonist and writer by hobby. He has been recording the plight of the immigrant Indians for the past many years in his cartoons.

Hailing from Gujarat, he lives in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

Tech Life

FBI app to help find missing kids Washington, DC: The FBI joined the booming mobile phone app market with the launch of a tool to help parents find missing kids.

"You're shopping at the mall with your children when one of them suddenly disappears. A quick search of the nearby area is unsuccessful. What do you do?" the promotional blurb for the application says.

The answer? If you have the free FBI app -- which is only available for iPhones at the moment -and stored photos and vital information about your children on it, the data you need to be reunited with

your missing child would be "literally right at hand."

Parents using the app "can show the pictures and provide physical identifiers such as height and weight to security or police officers on the spot" or email the key information to the authorities using a special tab on the app in the event their child goes missing.

According to the Federal Bureau of Investigation, a child goes missing in the United States every 40 seconds, and "many never return home."

The FBI has plans to expand the app for use on other mobile devices, and to add more features.

Beware! CyberStalking causes intense stress: Study Houston: Cyberstalking has been proved to cause more intense stress, that may be worse than being harassed or stalked in person, according to a new study. Trauma associated with being stalked or tormented via modern technology can have far-reaching implications for mental health. The psychologists say it's important to find ways to cope.

For all its obvious benefits, there is also a dark side to the cyberworld: online stalking and harassment that can leave victims feeling as if there's no safe haven providing escape from their pursuers. "It's a new method for an old problem," says Dr Elizabeth Carll, a clinical psychologist in Long Island, NY. "Obviously the ones that everyone is aware of is putting false and humiliating information on the Internet, such as discussion boards, blogs, message boards, Facebook, as well as sending harassing emails and text messages", she said. But the psychological fallout from such electronic bully tactics can be even more devastating for those targeted than face-to-face exchanges, said Carll, who presented a talk on

the issue on Saturday at the annual meeting of the American Psychological Association in Washington.

"The symptoms of harassment and e-harassment are very similar, anxiety, fear, nightmares, feelings of helplessness, hypervigilence, having eating and sleeping difficulties, feeling out of control, a loss of personal safety -- all of those kind of things go with harassment," she said. Someone being harassed at work can't necessarily evade their persecutor at home because computers and cellphones can allow incoming emails, texts and phone calls to continue 24-7, she said.

Even telephone caller ID isn't foolproof for avoiding contact -- there are ways to alter the name that comes up when the phone rings, a technique dubbed "caller ID spoofing."

Cyberstalking is particularly traumatizing because its reach is global, Carll said in an interview from Washington.

Citing statistics from the US Justice Department and other sources, Carll said 850,000 American adults, mostly women, are

targets of cyberstalking each year.

40 per cent of women have experienced dating violence delivered electronically, including harassing text messages and disturbing information about them posted on social media sites. 20 per cent of online stalkers use social networking to keep tabs on their victims. 34 per cent of female college students and 14 per cent of male students have broken into a romantic partner's email. One insidious form of cyberstalking involves installing spyware on a victim's computer, allowing the perpetrator to read the person's personal emails, track websites visited and steal passwords. "They could also send viruses and spam and harmful programs that could compromise or destroy their computer," she said.

A number of American states are looking at legislation to counter cyberstalking, while some already have laws in place.

Carll said that if ignoring a cyberstalker's actions doesn't stop the harassment, then getting law enforcement involved may be the only way to bring it to an end.

Astrology TheSouthAsianTimes.info

August 13-19, 2011

By Dr Prem Kumar Sharma

Chandigarh, India: +91-172- 256 2832, 257 2874; Delhi, India: +91-11- 2644 9898, 2648 9899; psharma@premastrologer.com; www.premastrologer.com

Stars Foretell: August 13-19, 2011 Aries: This week you would put in some extra working hours finalizing the creative ideas, which are on your mind. Work quietly towards your goals and avoid discussing your project until you have results. Sudden changes regarding your domestic scene are certain. You will use your charms and intelligence to gain popularity, but you need to relax and go for a little recreation later in the week. Yoga and meditation will bring remarkable results. Overseas transactions will ensure good monetary gains.

Taurus:Dealing with family members and issues would be the focus this week. You would be on the verge of breaking down emotionally, but do not loose heart. You will not be the cause of the problem, but you could certainly bring about some valuable solutions. An unexpected support from some near ones raises your spirits.

Try to avoid inappropriate outburst of anger, as it would do no good. Blessing from a holy man provides mental peace.

Gemini: Your energy would be at all time high and you would look forward to some highly exciting and entertaining time in the next few days. You won’t have any trouble completing your work and also take out time for your hobbies.

You would feel active, confident, and strong to accept any challenges. Everything would look beautiful to you and your positive attitude will turn things to your favour. Few unexpected things will happen for the good, and you will be pleased with the outcome.

Cancer:This week you may be recipient of some false information, which might create little trouble with loved ones. Your spirits would be low and you would lack confidence.

Sensitive issues might be touched at home which will play havoc with your mental peace.

Emotional situation like these will make you stubborn and irritated. You will have two options to either go on your own or to bend down to others whims, but be extra careful not to say the wrong thing at the wrong time.

Leo: This week jealousy could come in the way of good relationship. Be sure you have all the facts before you speak anything. Even if you think you are being funny, others may not see it that way. Thoughtless remarks and comments could put you in an embarrassing situation. An older family member may be of significant help to you provided you are willing to give him the chance to speak his mind. By focussing on your goals, you will send a signal of your commitment and dedication to your seniors.

Virgo: Financial gains are certain, but there would be lot of planning you need to do. Make a budget for yourself and stick to it to avoid financial constraint. There could be a sensitive situation at work, which might add lot of pressure to your mind. Ultimately the outcome will depend on how you handle people around you.

Expanding your knowledge and signing for new courses will be beneficial. Someone at home will try to induce new confidence into you. Investment during this period will bring long-term gains.

Libra: This week some disturbing news makes you worried about relatives who live at distant places. Although you might be much tensed, but in reality things would not be that bad.

Avoid travelling unless absolutely necessary. Try to

29

go out of the house and mix around with friends and acquaintances. If you must stay in, distract yourself from your thoughts with a book or a movie.

Religious feelings will arise making you spend more time on religious and spiritual activities.

Scorpio: This week take advantage of the new opportunities that present themselves to you. You would move with new confidence and would have an urge to learn new skills and techniques. You will gather knowledge through books, Internet and the discussions that you have with experienced people. Your views and thoughts will impress people around you and you will establish important contacts. Losses are likely if you leave financial decisions in the hands of others. Minor health problems could also trouble you.

Sagittarius: This week you might need to spend more time on your job than you generally do, and the hardest part of the next few days would be in getting along with seniors at work.

Some of you would be travelling. You would meet new and interesting people while en route.

Opportunities for growth will develop through new contacts. Sportsmen, writers and marketing professionals can look forward to recognition and rewards for their recent efforts. A new romantic alliance might also develop for some.

Capricorn: Hectic social activities would be on your agenda this week. You would be in the limelight wherever you go and would easily attract people with your charms, intelligence and wit. Financial gains are certain during this period, but avoid speculation or risky financial schemes. Friends are likely to disappoint you if you expect too much from them. Property related disputes would settle to your satisfaction.

Aquarius: This week travel, although enticing, would cost you more than what you might expect. Although you would enjoy your exposure to new cultures, people and places, but excessive spending could send your budget on a spin. Arguments with spouse seem inevitable if you do not avoid interference of friends and family members into your personal life. A spiritual person might be an important source of inspiration in your life during these days.

Pisces: This week financial gains are certain, but avoid putting too much money into any financial schemes just on the advice of others. Sudden good news later in the week brings happiness and cheers for the entire family. Your business sense would be upbeat and new ideas will bring you fresh gains. Residential moves will be beneficial. If you need to take a break then a pleasure trip with loved one will be both relaxing and rewarding.

Before you consult... i) Accurate Data: Please make sure Date, Time and Place of birth is accurate. ii) Careful: Did you check background of the astrologer before disclosing your secrets. iii) Fee: Discuss the charges before, don’t feel shy. It’s his business. iv) Expectation: Expect the best, if the outcome is not as desired, never give up. v) Consult: Take second opinion before spending thousands on cure/remedies.

Annual Predictions: For those born in this week Aug 13: Influenced by number 4 and the planet Uranus, you are energetic, creative, trustworthy, systematic, reliable and studious person. In school or at work, you always hold position of immense importance and responsibility, but you need to control your tendency to behave moody, stubborn and jealous at times. You would immensely enjoy the work you do this year, but your busy schedule would leave you with very less time for social activities. You would also plan new projects to increase your income, but it would not be possible to implement your plans without the support of others. You would develop new and trustworthy friendships that would provide financial and moral support at times of need. The latter half of the year could bring in opportunities for some of you to travel overseas for business or pleasure. Some good news can be expected from friend’s circle towards the last quarter of the year. The months of August, December and April would prove to be highly significant.

Aug 14: Ruled by number 5 and the planet Mercury, you are active, energetic, honest, systematic and highly courageous person. You are true sportsman and you play every game in the right spirit. You have excellent leadership qualities, but you need to curb your tendency to behave vindictive, jealous and reckless at times. This year you would develop very strong opinions on how important work should be completed. Some of your supporters however would not agree to your methods of doing things. You should put your thoughts in front of them in a positive manner to win their confidence. You would also increase your income through work, which you would complete at home. New romance could develop for some during this period. Relationship with your spouse would be healthy and highly cordial. Some tension and anxiety due to health of your parents may mar the peace at home. Your brother or sister would be very helpful in finishing your pending tasks. The months of Aug, October, January and May would be significant.

Aug 15 Ruled by number 6 and the planet Venus, you are energetic, smart, attractive, accommodating, diplomatic & highly practical person. Your greatest assets are your confidence and determination. You do not shy away from challenges and fight till the end, but you need to control your tendency to behave outspoken and spendthrift at times. This year your career seems to move towards some most unexpected direction.

Although results would be slow but should prove beneficial in the long run. You would have new set of responsibilities. Your seniors would depend a lot on your performance and if you fail their expectations, things would prove difficult for you. Wonderful period to put efforts towards creative works. Your ideas will be helpful to those around you. The months of October, January and May would prove to be highly important.

Aug 16: Influenced by number 7 and the planet Neptune, you are trustworthy, affectionate, creative, sensitive and an emotional individual. You have a strong attachment to people who are sincere and open in their thoughts, but you face extreme criticism because of your tendency to behave stubborn and arrogant at times. This year you would witness some significant changes at your place of work. You would be loaded with additional responsibilities and your time sched-

ule would be shorter than ever before, leaving you with very little time for family matters. Rewards at the completion of project would be excellent. Promotions and monetary gains are most certain. New love affairs would be pleasant, exciting and promise a romantic future. The months of September, February, April and June would be highly exciting.

Aug 17: Influenced by number 8 and the planet Saturn. You are smart, practical, honest, disciplined, methodical and authoritative person. You are very sober, docile and caring and you love spending time especially with children, but you need to check your tendency to behave rigid, jealous and introvert at times. This year you would form several great business partnerships that would be beneficial for your career. You are likely to receive financial benefits from more than one source. Your current employer would depend a lot on your skills and capabilities, which would ensure you lot of rewards in the long run. Unexpected financial gains can come through affairs associated with land or its product.

The months of August, November, March and Aug will be highly significant.

Aug 18: Ruled by number 9 and the planet Mars. You are intelligent, energetic, confident, enthusiastic and courageous person. You make firm commitments and once you make decisions it lasts forever. You are bold and possess a sharp analytical mind, but you need to check your tendency to behave short tempered and vindictive at times. You would travel excessively because of your work this year. You would meet new and important people, who would help you gather valuable information and work on new ideas. Some of these new ideas would also improve your finances.

Financial gains are certain but speculation should be avoided on all fronts. Family members, especially spouse may behave bit erratic, primarily due to health reasons. Overall this year is highly promising and ensures rewards for times to come. The months of October, December, May and June will prove to be highly important.

Aug 19: Influenced by number 1 and the Sun, you are authoritative, confident, determined, responsible and creative person. You enjoy to lead an unusually busy life. You are fond of moving about with important people and do things, which bring you instant fame, but you need to curb your tendency to behave stubborn, spendthrift and hypocrite at times. This year you would be attracted to new philosophies, religions, people and investments. Your openness and views would win you new friends. With luck on your side you have strong chance of bringing pending transactions and negotiations to your benefit. Real estate transactions can also be made profitable if done with minimum risks. New alliances are certain but some of your independent views would conflict with those of family members. The months of September, November, January and May will prove to be highly beneficial.

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30

Spiritual Awareness

August 13-19, 2010

TheSouthAsianTimes.info

Achieve Unity through Spirituality

By Sant Rajinder Singh Ji Maharaj e all know about Isaac Newton and that many scientific developments are based on his insight. Once, when someone talked to him about his knowledge, which was helping many people all over the globe, he said that his knowledge was just like a pebble on the shore of an ocean.

Whatever heights we might attain in the physical, mental, or emotional arena, we have no real knowledge of the truth, and unless we are enlightened spiritually, there will be no unity between humans in the true sense.

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What we first need to understand is that we, ourselves, are love. We are love because we are each a part of God, who is an ocean of all love. The second thing that we need is to accept that love in others. They might look different from us, belong to different faiths or speak different languages, but if we would learn the language of love then we would be able to communicate with others. If we love someone, we will care for them. We will never do anything to hurt them. So when we truly, truly love anyone, then we will take care of them, share in their problems, and make sure that the quality of their life is better.

As we help each other, unity will definitely be a part of our existence.

As we look at our life, how do we really live? Most of us spend time during the day in pursuit of this materialistic world. We search for happiness, we search for truth, and we search to have unity, but the object of our search is on the outside. As long as the object of our search remains on the outside, we will never find eternal truth and unity, because everything of this world is perishable.

The only thing that is permanent

is the divine treasures, God the Creator, and what has been called the Holy Word, Naam, Shabd, Kalma, Jyoti and Sruti, Sonorous Light, Celestial Music, or Harmony of all harmonies. These are different names given in different languages to talk about the creative force that emanated from the Lord and created regions after regions of existence.

When humans set foot on the moon and looked at the earth, it seemed like a small, insignificant speck in the universe. As science has developed, we know there are many, many other galaxies in the physical region. Likewise, the great saints and mystics tell us that there are many, many other regions beyond the physical: regions that are more conscious and more spiritual than this physical region of ours.

As that realization sets in that we are only a part, then the desire in us is ignited to know the whole.

It is natural that we all want to know who we are, and what is our relationship with the Creator. As that realization sets in, the passion to understand our true state comes to us. That passion is fulfilled only when we go within ourselves.

The great saints and mystics have always talked about being able to focus our attention within ourselves because this is where the treasure house of divinity resides. As we connect with the divine power, we will be transported to regions of love, peace, and bliss.

When we start on our spiritual journey, we will find that unity comes automatically in our lives because as our soul merges in the Creator, we realize that every living form is a spark of the Creator.

When that happens we realize that we are not only a Sikh, a Hindu, a Christian, a Muslim, a Jain, or a follower of any other religion, but, in truth, we are soul. In truth, we are spirit, a part of God. Generally what happens is that as a human being, we feel that we are not capable of making a difference.Many of you might remember that it was Benjamin Franklin who put the first street lamppost in front of his house. When he did so, everyone said, “He is crazy.

Why is he putting light in the area?” But he lit it up night after night. Soon everyone in the neighborhood started putting up street lamps and there was light for everyone to see where

they were going.

Similarly, if we were to connect to the Light within ourselves, we might think that it won’t make a difference, but if we recognize the divine Light within ourselves, that Light is going to remove the darkness in our own surroundings, in our families, and in our work environments.

Soon, those with whom we come in contact will also follow our examples. As the great mystic poet, Sant Darshan Singh Ji Maharaj, has said: I started alone on the journey of love filled with faith and zeal. At every step, travelers joined me, and soon we were a caravan.

As we become peaceful within ourselves, let that peace radiate from us to everyone with whom we come in contact so that we will be living in an age of peace, of love and of harmony as we spend our time on this earth.

Sant Rajinder Singh Ji Maharaj, an international spiritual leader and Master of meditation, affirms the transcendent oneness at the heart of all religions, emphasizing prayer and meditation as building blocks for achieving peace.www.jyotimeditation.org

Freedom from strife

By Sant Rajinder Singh Ji Maharaj ife and strife seem to go hand in hand. We have all experienced this. Any happiness that we receive is often short-lived, for at any moment we may suddenly find ourselves in states of sorrow.

Disturbances occur at each and every stage of our life. Although existence in this world is turbulent, life should be more than a pendulum in which we swing back and forth between moments of joy and moments of sorrow.

The dictionary defines peace as “freedom from strife,” a state of serenity, calmness, and stillness.

Despite the obstacles, we can attain true peace in this lifetime, but to do so, we need to undergo a shift in our way of thinking. Our angle of vision needs to change.

We tend to look for peace in the outer world. We hope to find it in our possessions, positions, and relationships, but the loss of any of these causes us to become agitated and distraught. Our peace of mind is disturbed.

Everything in this world is subject to change and eventual decay.

So long as we look to the transitory world for happiness, we will be disappointed. We need to change the way we look at this problem.

An anecdote from the life of the Moghul Emperor Akbar can help

We cannot change the nature of the world or its problems, but we can add a new dimension to life that will give us peace. Lasting peace can be found within us.

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us in this regard. Akbar is considered to be one of the most enlightened emperors of India. He had a number of advisors to help run his kingdom.

Among these great minds was Birbal, the wisest of them all. He was quite clever and could figure out solutions to difficult problems by looking at them from a totally different perspective.

One day Akbar wanted to test his advisors, so he presented them with a puzzle. He took a stick and drew a line in the sand. He asked the advisors to try to shorten the line without erasing any part of it.

Each counselor took a turn, but all were stumped. They could not figure out how to make it shorter.

Finally, Birbal came forward, took the stick, and carefully drew a line next to the one the emperor

had drawn, but Birbal made his line longer. By drawing the second line longer, it made the original one look shorter.

The solution to finding peace requires us to look at the problem from a new perspective. We cannot change the nature of the world or its problems, but we can add a new dimension to life that will give us peace. Lasting peace can be found within us. Enlightened luminaries throughout history have had mystical experiences which verified for them the existence of an inner spiritual reality.

Mystics from every religious tradition have described their inner spiritual experiences. They have spoken of heavenly realms that co-exist with the physical world.

These are realms of joy and love which are within us. They are

regions of eternal peace and bliss beyond time and space. Although we cannot change the fundamental nature of the world, we can become attuned to the worlds lying within us. In order to find peace in the world, we must first find it within ourselves. We can do this only by changing our perspective in life.

The way to reach the spiritual realms is to invert through a process known as meditation.

Through meditation we can separate our soul from the body and voyage into the regions within.

We have within us an opening or door by which our attention can enter the higher regions. This entryway is located between and behind the two eyebrows, referred to in many ways by various religions and philosophies. It has

been called the single eye or third eye, the shiv netra, divya chakshu, daswan dwar, or tenth door. If we can withdraw our attention from the outer world and focus it at this point we will see the Light of the higher regions reflected therein.

As our soul collects at this point, it rises into the beyond. We may spend our time seeking worldly enjoyments, but they last for only short periods of time. So long as our attention is identified with the world outside, we are faced with the problems and miseries that are inherent in physical existence. By inverting our attention and rising above the physical body through a process of meditation on the inner Light, we will find regions within which give us lasting peace.

For more visit www.sos.org

August 13 & 14, 2011 11am – 8pm Naperville IL

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