India and the Wars

Old Apr 7th 2019, 3:59 pm
  #901  
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Default Re: India and the Wars

Originally Posted by Bipat
1) Just some thoughts Morpeth.
''Varanasi-City Hindus think of as the centre of the world'
Which Hindus? Obviously the strictly religious but not many in my experience ----it is tradition to be cremated there or ashes thrown but for most this doesn't happen.
Last views I heard-----'don't go there--- the roads are so busy pedestrians can't cross'.

2) If Hindus number nearly 80% of the population it is obviously a 'Hindu country'---Just as the UK is a 'Christian country' with TV showing many Christian ceremonies and parades.
There is legal equality for all religions (although Muslims retain Shariya law for family and inheritance matters).

There has been so much international criticism of the state of the Ganges----so now complaints about the 'clean up'---you can't have it both ways.

3) The destruction of houses and shops is unfortunate-----just as it is for new airports in the UK. I don't know about compensation.

Change of names-----there have been many changes of from British given names of major cities-----some are used in conversation others only officially.

Money spent for political purposes-----always happens ----- the amounts spent by Congress (a far wealthier party) over the decades is immense. (Leader of the opposition is now campaigning for leadership in 'two' States----'hedging his bets'!!)

4) The statue has been discussed at length-----the cost (the ugliness!!!). Millions are buying tickets to see it!!! So some money back.
Many thought Sardar Patel should have been the first PM but Nehru made sure he wasn't.
He has not had any memorial and as a prominent independence activist people believed that he should be remembered by a statue------Just not that big!!!!!!!!

5) Yogi Adityanath----the tends to be mocked by press and people throughout most States. However he was voted in by his own State ---that is democracy.
The UK is not a " Christian " country, do you knows anything about church attendance, declining every year.
The rest ?
E.G. Oct to March 2017 Varanasi received over 5 million Indian visitors because of its religious importance to Hindus..

Last edited by EMR; Apr 7th 2019 at 4:02 pm.
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Old Apr 7th 2019, 4:30 pm
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Default Re: India and the Wars

Originally Posted by EMR
The UK is not a " Christian " country, do you knows anything about church attendance, declining every year.
The rest ?
E.G. Oct to March 2017 Varanasi received over 5 million Indian visitors because of its religious importance to Hindus..
It is not necessary to go to a church to be a 'nominal ' Christian in the UK.
The Queen is "Defender of the Faith"----The PM is keen church person. Think how many religious services are shown on TV!! Coronation, weddings, christenings, funerals etc.

Varanasi is a great tourist place. Yes it is of religious importance. However not "The centre of the world" ---as in Morpeth's reference.
We have been once and sprinkled ashes. It is quite beautiful to be out on the river, surprisingly clear and fish can be seen. I think a current takes garbage to lower down!

How many visitors go round Westminster Abbey!! ----Think of the ticket price! You wouldn't know what it costs to go out in a boat in Varanasi to sprinkle ashes! The same money-getting!
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Old Apr 7th 2019, 5:00 pm
  #903  
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Default Re: India and the Wars

Originally Posted by Bipat
It is not necessary to go to a church to be a 'nominal ' Christian in the UK.
The Queen is "Defender of the Faith"----The PM is keen church person. Think how many religious services are shown on TV!! Coronation, weddings, christenings, funerals etc.

Varanasi is a great tourist place. Yes it is of religious importance. However not "The centre of the world" ---as in Morpeth's reference.
We have been once and sprinkled ashes. It is quite beautiful to be out on the river, surprisingly clear and fish can be seen. I think a current takes garbage to lower down!

How many visitors go round Westminster Abbey!! ----Think of the ticket price! You wouldn't know what it costs to go out in a boat in Varanasi to sprinkle ashes! The same money-getting!
There is no comparison between religious observance in India and the UK.
As ever facts are yiur Achilles heel whenever you post.
I will let you know how little religious observance we see later this year in Varanasi..
Sprinkling ashes is religious observance, visiting Westminster Abbey for the vast majority including all those non Christian fireign tourists is not.
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Old Apr 7th 2019, 5:31 pm
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Default Re: India and the Wars

Originally Posted by EMR
There is no comparison between religious observance in India and the UK.
As ever facts are yiur Achilles heel whenever you post.
I will let you know how little religious observance we see later this year in Varanasi..
Sprinkling ashes is religious observance, visiting Westminster Abbey for the vast majority including all those non Christian fireign tourists is not.
I didn't say that there was!! I was pointing out that the UK is 'officially' a Christian country! Fact.

I am well aware that there is more 'active' religious observance in India than the UK--Fact.

How do you know how religious are the Indian visitors to Varanasi, many are fanatically religious, others quite religious, many others just tourists like any other tourists. Fact.

As I said we went there---and took ashes----I am not a Hindu.
We live next door to a temple, priest is asked to do pujas for various family things (with 'strict time limits'!) I quite enjoy the ceremony. Facts.

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Old Apr 7th 2019, 6:06 pm
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Default Re: India and the Wars

Originally Posted by Bipat
I didn't say that there was!! I was pointing out that the UK is 'officially' a Christian country! Fact.

I am well aware that there is more 'active' religious observance in India than the UK--Fact.

How do you know how religious are the Indian visitors to Varanasi, many are fanatically religious, others quite religious, many others just tourists like any other tourists. Fact.

As I said we went there---and took ashes----I am not a Hindu.
We live next door to a temple, priest is asked to do pujas for various family things (with 'strict time limits'!) I quite enjoy the ceremony. Facts.
6% is the estimate of practicing Christians in the UK.
You are confused and not for the first time,.
The UK does not have religious party in government.
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Old Apr 8th 2019, 3:42 am
  #906  
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Default Re: India and the Wars

Originally Posted by morpeth
A recent article about prestige projects in India :

VARANASI, India – In the Indian city Hindus consider the center of the world, Prime Minister Narendra Modi has commissioned a grand promenade connecting the sacred Ganges River with the centuries-old Vishwanath temple dedicated to Lord Shiva, the god of destruction.

….In his five years as prime minister, Modi has pushed to promote this secular nation of 1.3 billion people and nine major religions — including about 170 million Muslims — as a distinctly Hindu state.

The $115 million promenade is just one of a number of Modi's religious glamour projects, aimed squarely at pleasing his Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party's base ahead of elections that start on Thursday. While India is majority Hindu, critics say such projects undermine India's multiculturalism, potentially stoke religious tension, and come at the expense of far more pressing infrastructure needs.

The project is also part of a larger Hindu nationalist effort to erase evidence of India's diverse past.

There are those who say the money could have been better spent in one of the world's oldest living cities, where men relieve themselves in public on trash-strewn streets and sewage flows into the Ganges near religious bathers…

The Vishwanath project is part of a broader campaign to downplay the Muslim Mughal dynasty's place in Indian history. The campaign includes restoring the Hindu names of cities that were renamed by Mughals centuries ago….

Deepak Agarwal, the city commissioner overseeing the Vishwanath project, said that residents had been paid at least twice the market rate for their properties and that no one had been forced to leave.

….But the temple project is a BJP-led effort to stamp India's Hindu mores onto a multicultural society, historians and political scientists say.

"It's a bid to rewrite the ground rules of Indian republican politics by either implicitly or explicitly arguing that India needs to be remade as a state defined by its majority faith," said writer and professor Mukul Kesavan.

Other examples abound. Last October, Modi unveiled another dream project: a statue in Gujarat of Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, an Indian independence leader, politician and Hindu. The Statue of Unity is the world's largest, almost twice as high as the Statue of Liberty.

And in January, the central government in New Delhi and the BJP-led government of Uttar Pradesh state spent an unprecedented $650 million on a Hindu mega-fest, advertising the event on CNN and plastering the festival grounds with posters of Modi and the state's chief minister, Yogi Adityanath, a Hindu monk who was arrested but not prosecuted for allegedly inciting a deadly 2007 anti-Muslim riot.
I only posted the article in relation to prestige projects. The rest concerning the Hindu nationalism I havent followed much and would be interested in your opinion- seems there is a lot of criticism in the press internationally of the BJP how valid I dont know or have an opinon.
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Old Apr 8th 2019, 3:47 am
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Default Re: India and the Wars

Originally Posted by Bipat
Perhaps hopefully to end this debate with you Morpeth.
I have edited your cumbersome post to two points to agree on.

1) Corruption---- was 'top down' with the Congress Governments, with their nepotism and family money making. (I would leave out Manmohan Singh, known as a good economist---but used as a puppet PM to keep the "seat warm for Rahul"----his own words.

The present Government has made a point to end this----demonetisation was for that. It will not happen over night or within years.

My remark above if you read it, to M.K. about good Legal help----Lawyers in our town always get something wrong that needs re-doing etc. at a 'new price'.
Even our desperately poor neighbour three times sent back to get her gas ration book signed when told they couldn't read it. OH and some 'folding green' as our son calls it, got it signed.
(In another town even a 'death' certificate was delayed until extra payment.) This happens everywhere all the time!

Before you say it doesn't count because my personal knowledge is meaningless---ask all those friends you have.

As I said this is top down-----'I paid him so you pay me.'

2) I have previously put links where economists have predicted India will overtake China
The corruption by which India places so low in international rankings continues, not just a Congress party issue. If the demonetization policy has a long term effect we will have to wait and see. Very hard to eradicate such high levels of corruption overnight.


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Old Apr 8th 2019, 4:04 am
  #908  
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Default Re: India and the Wars

Originally Posted by EMR
6% is the estimate of practicing Christians in the UK.
You are confused and not for the first time,.
The UK does not have religious party in government.
EMR, forgetting whether India can afford such projects, and the effect on intercommunal relations, is there something inherently wrong with India celebrating its heritage ? Any more than why shouldnt the UK celebrate- and more- its own heritage ?

Yes I agree there is quite a difference between religious observance between UK and India- and certainly instances of mobs attacking other places of worship in Britain is a bit unimaginable on the scale that has occurred occasionally in India.
Officially the Queen is Defender of the Faith ( a title if I am not mistaken bestowed upon Henry VIII by the Pope) , and it would be quite common to describe the UK as a Christian country notwithstanding the decline in Church attendance and the animosity one often encounters in the UK against Christianity- but certainly centuries of Christianity have had an effect on British culture.
So I dont know if Bipat callng the UK a Christian country is off-base, though perhaps in the context of this discussion a qualifier could have been inserted.
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Old Apr 8th 2019, 7:49 am
  #909  
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Default Re: India and the Wars

Originally Posted by morpeth
EMR, forgetting whether India can afford such projects, and the effect on intercommunal relations, is there something inherently wrong with India celebrating its heritage ? Any more than why shouldnt the UK celebrate- and more- its own heritage ?

Yes I agree there is quite a difference between religious observance between UK and India- and certainly instances of mobs attacking other places of worship in Britain is a bit unimaginable on the scale that has occurred occasionally in India.
Officially the Queen is Defender of the Faith ( a title if I am not mistaken bestowed upon Henry VIII by the Pope) , and it would be quite common to describe the UK as a Christian country notwithstanding the decline in Church attendance and the animosity one often encounters in the UK against Christianity- but certainly centuries of Christianity have had an effect on British culture.
So I dont know if Bipat callng the UK a Christian country is off-base, though perhaps in the context of this discussion a qualifier could have been inserted.
​​​​​​
Religion however has very little influence if any on UK politics or the general society.
​​​​​​Whereas in every country or society where religious influences are strong it has a negative, divisive influence.
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Old Apr 8th 2019, 8:12 am
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Default Re: India and the Wars

Originally Posted by EMR
​​​​​​
Religion however has very little influence if any on UK politics or the general society.
​​​​​​Whereas in every country or society where religious influences are strong it has a negative, divisive influence.
Well, rather odd that a country can have a religion for centuries that will have "very little influence" though yes obvious it is declining in the UK and has been for decades, though I guess as a general discussion way off -topic. But Bipat's designation of the UK as a Christian country would be quite a common usage.

As far as religious influences necessarily being a negative I am not sure whether historically that it necessarily true in all cases- considering Tibet or Bali would be hard to imagine the religious influence was negative.

As far as Hindus in India today as I wrote I am not really too aware of the actual situation, though there seems to be some negative reports in the media these days.
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Old Apr 8th 2019, 8:28 am
  #911  
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Default Re: India and the Wars

Originally Posted by morpeth
Well, rather odd that a country can have a religion for centuries that will have "very little influence" though yes obvious it is declining in the UK and has been for decades, though I guess as a general discussion way off -topic. But Bipat's designation of the UK as a Christian country would be quite a common usage.

As far as religious influences necessarily being a negative I am not sure whether historically that it necessarily true in all cases- considering Tibet or Bali would be hard to imagine the religious influence was negative.

As far as Hindus in India today as I wrote I am not really too aware of the actual situation, though there seems to be some negative reports in the media these days.
I was referring to the modern context of the negative effect of religion on world affairs , intolerance, racism etc..
Christianity is a religion , not a label , and as such the UK is and has not been for a very long time a Christian nation..
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Old Apr 8th 2019, 11:16 am
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Default Re: India and the Wars

Originally Posted by EMR
I was referring to the modern context of the negative effect of religion on world affairs , intolerance, racism etc..
Christianity is a religion , not a label , and as such the UK is and has not been for a very long time a Christian nation..
EMR the labeling of the UK , or European countries, is quite common worldwide and understood as such. And considering the deep influence of Christianity on the UK at what point it stopped being a Christian country could be debated- correctly as you say its influence has been declining, though church attendance is only one criteria. I think Bipat is well aware that the influence has been declining just using 'shorthand'in a label commonly understood.

As far as the litany of negative effects secularists like to apply to Christianity, they apply equally to ideologies quite common in the modern world- and certainly debatable how much the religion was a factor, Muslims consider one of the strengths of Islam its non-racist approach in reality, and Bipat can weigh in but I would have a guess, forgetting caste prejudice, that Hinduism probably not too racist. Considering the leading role Christians and clerics played in ending the slave trade( Wilberforce), slavery and civil rights a bit challenging to ascribe to the religion itself the blame for such things as you mention in most or all cases- and racism certainly alive and well in areas of the world without a major role of religion. We would all agree there are aspects that from the standpoint of the 21st century we would disagree with, but to describe religion as uniformly negative in the areas you mention seems in itself to betray a certain bias.

In any case way off topic, but though Bipat could have qualified her label, I think it was understood as meant. Back to India,as far as Hindu nationalism a lot of press, perhaps more relevant how much is it an issue and a potential threat to minorities in India ?
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