Holi in India:

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Holi is considered to be a pious most festival in India. In certain places in the country it continues for several days starting from Holika Dahan to Holi Milan. The festival relates to the story of a boy named Prahlad, a great devotee of the God whom Hirnakashyap, a demon, wanted to do away with as he didn’t like him to worship the Lord whom he considered a foe. He took the help of his sister Holika who had the bliss of never to get harmed by fire. She hatched a plan to take the child Prahlad in to her lap as a dodge and plunge to the flames of fire with the belief that she would come out of it as per the bliss she had but Prahlad would perish in the process. What happened was just the reverse. Holika was burnt to ashes and Prahlad was rescued by the grace of God a great devotee of the Lord as he was. To religiously commemorate the event Holika Dahan takes place every year culminating in to Holi Milan a day later.The clear message this festival directs is that of love and communal harmony and even the people opposed and inimical to each other meet heart to heart with an affectionate embrace. This year it is due the next month on 17th of March. Let us wish that the message gets flourished and flashed to the nook and corner of the country, nay the world as a whole.

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Gods getting richer day by day:

Name any temple any where in the country, it is getting richer every day. The talk is not about Balaji, Sanyee Baba temple or several others alone, getting richer holds good for all and sundry, big or small, run by trusts or individuals. The much disputed Ramlala Mandir in Ayodhya has no reason to lag behind. There are disputes after disputes confronting the temple both in different courts and outside but money wise their position has much of a growing graph. They have more than 3 crores of rupees in their fixed deposits with State Bank of India and the periodical interest alone amounts to more than 27 lakhs of rupees. Vibekanand on his visit abroad gave a call that temples, mosques, and churches should not waste their money on themselves, they should better spend it to feed the poor. There could be several Vibekanands to release such a call, but the fact remains that the temples are earning sumptuous wealth for themselves and the poors are where they were several decades back.

Technorati Tags: temples,mosques,churches,money,poorpeople,poor,rich

Worshipping a two headed snake for good luck!

There are people who have faith that their Gods and Goddesses never discriminate between what is good and what is bad, they go by the desire of their devotees only. They respond to their devotees irrespective of good doings or bad doings, is the belief. Criminals are known for serving their Deities sumptuously well before they proceed to commit a crime with a view to get success in their targeted task. It is difficult to comprehend as to how the Deity behaves when a criminal and his concerned victim are both the devotees of the Lord.

Quite a few days back, as brought out by the media, a gang of robbers in Farrukhabad (India) was busted by the local police. On search, the police found a two headed snake from their possession. The snake known as a sand boa which is called a domuha saanp (two headed snake) in the rural areas is non poisonous but has the reputation of securing success to its devotees if served well by them. The criminals kept it with them on a regular basis and worshipped it before launching their targeted act with the faith that it will elicit them success. Such a snake they purchase from snake charmers at a high price. Criminals are criminals after all and for them any thing is good that serves their purpose including the heinous acts like loot and murder they commit, and so are Gods, including species like a snake, who, as they think, fall in line with them with their beck and call, whenever so needed. Practicing dogmatism has no end in the society we have.

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The abode of the God:

Facing tall trees, a cemented canopy and a tower of apartments it is a tiny peepal tree recently planted by the locals with a marble platform for the devotees to worship the Deity of theirs when the sapling so planted blossoms to its full size. Their faith is that peepal tree is the abode of their God.

Link:http://gallery-neelkanth.blogspot.in/2012/02/entity-of-gods.html 

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Forgive my languor

Geetanjali by Rabindranath Tagore became a controversy and surprisingly it happened in a country like Russia. The issue raised was that it was pro terrorism. Strange! The book that won a Nobel Prize to Tagore is by and large a devotional work and no where it denotes any note of terror. It quite softly deals with human behaviour and approach in the context of routine dealings. In a way it is quite devotional a work inspiring people to submit to God, the Almighty. A line from the book reading as “…forgive my languor O! Lord if ever I lag behind” is enough to amply reveal the very spirit of it and it is very difficult to understand the reasons behind all this fuss.

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Qualifications of a priest

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Priests are worshippers according to their faith and creed and normally the custom grows to the level of a sect pursued from generation to generation. Like it was in Nepal with South Indian Brahmins worshipping in Pashupatinath temple for the last several centuries, the particular sect was doing the job there till such time the Maoist Prime Minister Prachanda made it free for any one to become a priest or Chief Priest some time back which decision was ofcourse reversed on account of a vehement protest offered against it. The question arises if worshipping is an area to be socialized extending eligibility for the purpose to all and sundry or it has to be based on criterion of worshipping by faith and conviction. Faith in religion with conviction and commitment are the basic requisites for a priest and this is highly unfair to make it a saleable commodity which any tom, dick or hary can buy.

Struggling to attend a task

We are proud Indians, proud of our country, our culture, our history. We are infact selflessly proud of our nation as if we try to put material reasoning behind it it just fails. No safe drinking water, no roads, no sanitation, no electricity but it is our commitment and the very bond of attachment we have with our country that making us proud citizens. Committed patriots as we are we are not to hear any thing that undermines the prestige and image of our Bharat Mata and there is no dearth of professional politicians who are available in an abundant number to take advantage of this weakness of ours. We can't afford putting our bond of love for the country to test knowing as we do that there it is a flop for us. We believe in work as we have been hearing since our childhood that 'work is worship' but factually speaking such a worship is hardly practiceable. Only the other day I made a note of preparing certain writeups  for my blogs going through different references which I had to peruse in several breaks as the electricity supply was there as a matter of only glimpses never lasting for more than a few minutes. My inverter already failed because there was no charging in the absence of electricity supply. Kept waiting for the light sitting in the dark in my office. Half an hour, an hour, 2 hours and then it appeared after 4 hours. Felt happy that I could now finish my work taking my laptop into confidence. No it was not to happen as immediately after a few minutes work my laptop stopped again for the reason that no supply of power was there. And like this it is now a matter of 4 days plus that I am struggling to complete my writeups dutifully as my hosts expect me to do but every time I try I miserably fail realising that we are living in a world where we can have any amount of talks on progress and development but are not situationally placed to make any contribution to it work wise, job wise.

Technorati Tags: task,country,culture,history

Procession of worshippers:

 Journeying from one place to the other I came across several processions with several trucks full of clay idols of different gods and goddesses particularly the most worshipped goddess Ma Kali sumptuously decorated. The procession moving forward on drummers tunes, it made the sight pleasant and inspiring with the big crowd  singing and dancing frantically looking like they were fully lost into themselves in a frenzy making the scene aweful at times to please their Dieties. Who are these people? Certainly the ones who committedly direct their worship to their gods and goddesses but how come it is this very crowd that consists of the persons who are anti social elements, creaters of riots, loot the people in the train, kidnap innocent men, women and children. Is it not very difficult to reconcile with the people with their double face -one that they wear for public and the other one for their own gains through nefarious methods. Do they take it for granted that their demonstration of this sort of worship pleases their deities allowing them to commit any nonsense for the society as a whole.The question that always remains unanswered is that possible they are the people who can't behave themselves.