The impasse on Jallikattu doesn’t seem like ending. Now the Supreme Court has declined to step into the matter and directed the petitioner to approach Madras High Court. Incidentally the Madras High Court had said just yesterday that it won’t interfere in the matter as the ruling for banning Jallikattu was passed by the Supreme Court. After getting banned by the Supreme Court in 2014, there were protests and public outpouring against the decision, but not quite close to what is being seen now. Not just are a ‘sea’ of protesters cropping up in various parts of Tamil Nadu including Chennai’s Marina Beach, the Jallikattu movement has also got a shot in the arm via various celebrities also showing their support.
So here’s a list of some of the most well known faces, fighting for Jallikattu:
Legendary music composer AR Rahman was the latest to support the movement after he announced his intention to fast tomorrow.
I’m fasting tomorrow to support the spirit of
Tamilnadu!
Just four days ago Rajanikanth had expressed his support for Jallikattu and reports suggest that he might even join a silent assembly organized by Tamil Nadu’s top actors in support of Jallikattu.
Dhanush, most well known for the song Kolaveri Di was one of the first celebrities who showed their support.
Actor Kamal Hassan has been one of the most vocal supporters of Jallikattu by speaking about its millenial old heritage. He also questioned the connection between animal rights and vegetarianism and even talked about his personal respect for bulls.
Even cricketer Ravichandran Ashwin tweeted out to laud the peaceful protests in favor of Jallikattu
Scenes of peaceful protest all around TN.Unity, peace and resolve will show our plea in the right light.#peacefulprotests#jallikattu
Also chess wizard Viswanathan Anand called Jallikattu a cultural symbol which pointing out that the main point here wasn’t animal rights but was tradition and livelihood.
#jallikattu is a cultural symbol . Respect it. Im all for animal rights but here that is not the point.tradition & livelihood are .
Ever since PayTM founder Vijay Shekhar Sharma praised the demonetisation scheme, he has been under a constant attack from Congress, AAP, and the liberal ecosystem of India. The emerging entrepreneur, who was once a big fan of Arvind Kejriwal, is being targeted based on fake charges, for TV ads and for celebrating parties, yes for celebrating parties.
The PayTM founder recently gave a boisterous speech at PayTM’s annual party, the video was circulated on social media and his statements were scrutinized, analyzed and judged on the matrices of demonetisation, Narendra Modi, etiquette and class.
Some of the media outlets thought that this is not enough, so they found patriarchy in it. No, seriously! The news blog NewsLaundry first attacked Vijay Shekhar for celebrating his annual party with his office people despite tragedies related to demonetisation, then preached to him as to how he should celebrate parties and finally declared him a patron of patriarchal culture that threatens to overwhelm workspaces and seats of state power. Here is a portion from the blog:
It is just an irony that NewsLaundry, which portrays itself as a left-liberal site and calculates liberal quotient of people, is publishing articles which are didactic, pedagogic and holier-than-thou in nature. In the same article, the liberal-author sermonises:
When you’re celebrating success, you thank your customers, you thank your employees, instead of taunting your rivals. You don’t use language that your women employees might not be comfortable with – although a fuller version of the video shows no women in the audience, which makes one wonder if this is a boys-only party. (And if so, why?)
Vijay Shekhar was demeaned by the liberal ecosystem for many things, but the most-common line of attacks mentioned lack of class, sophistication and demeanour. These attacks also expose the deep-rooted class bias and hypocrisy of liberal ideologues who talk about freedom of choice, diversity and acceptance, but leave no stone un-turned to eject venom against those with whom they don’t agree.
Not only this, the same set of people who mocked the Snapdeal protest against Aamir Khan as a case of bullying, united to slam PayTM. A member of the Congress IT cell, who has been caught multiple times for spreading lies and rumours, found this video as an excuse to indulge into organized character assassination of Vijay Shekhar. This campaign was later joined by many Congress and AAP supporters, including Janta Ka Reporter — the alleged mouth-piece of AAP:
No news channel will show PayTM founder’s crass video mocking misery of people. Why? All of them are sponsored by PayTM. So, no -ve news! 🙂
With these kinds of targeted campaigns, AAP and Congress are exposing their desperation. These vile attacks will create more and more hatred against these parties among entrepreneurs. Vijay Shekhar will jump, dance, shout and party because had he cared about these liberal sophistication, he would not have built a multi-billion organisation.
Left inclined media outlet, The Hindu, headquartered in Chennai, is known for its penchant of carrying erroneous reports in India. Just last month we had exposed how The Hindu had lied about a statement by the Indian Government. Later, The Hindu went international and got slammed by the Greek embassy as well for presenting their Minister’s views on demonetisation “out of context”.
Now The Hindu seems to have gone after the big fish, USA President-elect Donald Trump. In the USA, such “digressions” from the truth by media are called “fake news”, and that is what Michael Pillsbury called it. Media reports suggest Pillsbury is an adviser to Trump’s transition team but Pillsbury himself denies being in any such role.
The Hindu had reported Michael Pillsbury as saying:
‘Trump has declined Dalai Lama’s request for a meeting’
This news item was preceded by a another report based on the same quote, titled: “Is Trump preparing to change the script on Tibet?”. This obviously had larger ramifications for the US-China relationship and Trump’s foreign policy on this tricky aspect.
Pillsbury though quickly took to social media to call out The Hindu:
Pillsbury demands retraction of this fake news immediately by Indian reporter in Beijing https://t.co/16IHuQ9CAz
Soon, both the articles based on the one quote from Pillsbury were taken down by The Hindu.
A Tibetan media outlet reported that the Central Tibetan Administration run site Tibet.net had denied such reports. It mentioned that Tibetan PM Lobsang Sangay had responded to the fake news saying:
Pillsbury wrote me an email last night rubbishing the news and said he supports a meeting between His Holiness the Dalai Lama and U.S. President-elect Donald Trump.
Columnist Rupa Subramanya questioned the editorial team of The Hindu as to whether any clarification was issued by them regarding the two stories which have been taken down:
In this entire saga, it needs to be remembered that The Hindu is a left-leaning newspaper and the two reports which The Hindu published were based solely on the reports in the Chinese media. News such as Trump refusing to meet the Dalai Lama could very well have been planted by the Chinese in their media to create a particular perception about Trump, and it seems only The Hindu played along and re-ran the information, or added its own spice to the story.
Whether The Hindu fell for a Chinese trap, or was it hand-in-glove, or this isn’t an issue of ‘fake news’ at all, will depend on The Hindu’s response, which at the moment, is awaited.
Prashant Bhushan isn’t the happiest of man these days after losing the case wherein he alleged Narendra Modi took bribes from Sahara and Birla. He famously reacted to the judgement by calling it a setback to anti-corruption movement and also a ‘Black Mark’ on the Supreme Court’s record.
SC refusing to order an indep inqiry into the Birla/Sahara payoff docs is a setback to anti corruption campaign& a black mark on SC’s record
Now taking it a step further he has made a controversial claim that Supreme Court had reached this judgement because it was scared that the power brokers might land in jail due to its judgement. His exact words were:
Judges who were dealing with this case did not feel emboldened enough to order an investigation against the high and mighty.
Often, the hands of the SC tremble when there is a situation when the judgement is going to determine the fate of high and mighty and may lead to a situation where some of them may land up in jail.
These are very serious allegations wherein he questions the possible lack of independence of the judiciary and the lack of empowerment of the Judges to take on the ‘high and mighty’.
Bhushan later somewhat became defensive after maybe the implications of his statements dawned at him.
Here he says that SC getting scared of the ‘big fish’ isn’t always true, as evident in 2G, Coalgate but often do like in the case of Sahara and Birla. He incidentally refrains from stating other instances wherein the SC was allegedly bogged down by the mighty.
Another interesting aspect of this whole saga is the support Prashant Bhushan is getting from Arvind Kejriwal. You might have noticed that the tweet of Mr Bhushan targeting the Supreme Court was re-tweeted by Arvind Kejriwal who according to common logic wasn’t on friendly terms with Bhushan, as evident by the fact that he ensued Bhushan’s exit from the AAP.
Another year in exile has passed. Another “19th January” is here.
On 19th January 2017, as we Kashmiri Pandits observe “KP Holocaust Day” yet again, we will begin our 28th year in exile. In just half of those years in exile, sons of King Dasharatha became immortal. Sons of Rishi Kashyap though, continue to tread towards oblivion.
Kashmiri Hindus – a community forgotten?
I was in 10th standard when the Jihadi tsunami triggered ‘ethnic cleansing’ in Kashmir, resulting in forced exodus of Kashmiri Pandits from the valley. Most of us had never stepped outside the valley before we were forced out.
Kashmir had been the only cocoon we had known. That year, when we were forced to cross the Banihal tunnel – little knowing that the return journey will remain an illusion for decades – we not just lost our roots, but a little bit of our identity too.
After a few years in Jammu, I landed in an engineering college in sleepy town of Pilani. That was the southern most I had traveled till that day. From Kashmir to Jammu to now Rajasthan, a lot had changed rapidly. Identity fog had thickened.
‘Fresher period’ rituals in college became an amusement. My introduction that would go “I am … basically from Kashmir, now from Jammu” soon turned comical with a chemical twist, “basically from Kashmir, acid-ically from Jammu, now neutrally a Rajasthani”. Genuine inquiries, jokes, ridicule and debates about the situation in Kashmir – all were part of the routine.
Then one day, a senior asked out of the blue, “So, what do you think of Kashmiriyat?”
I was stumped. I knew lot of things from Kashmir were popular across the country. Kashmiri Hangul. Dum-aloo, Wazwan, Pulao, shawls, carpets, other handicrafts, and many such things. But, what was this “Kashmiriyat”? I had never heard of it!
But, here was a nerdy senior who was apparently reading beyond front & sports pages of the newspapers. Little did I know, as Kashmiri Pandits had joined the endangered Hangul in a race towards extinction, newspaper editorials had begun projecting this magic of “Kashmiriyat” as panacea.
In these 28 years though, the hoax of Kashmiriyat has been spun and continued to spread far and wide. Yet failed to deliver.
Kashmiriyat was brokered bliss, if any, paid for by the silence and subjugation of a microscopic minority, swallowing bitter cups of insults repeatedly over decades. If at all anything like Kashmiriyat existed, it was just the silent agony of submission of the Kashmiri Hindus over centuries in an attempt to survive in the valley.
As a minuscule minority in Kashmir, Hindus were largely a diffident lot – cautious not to get their majority ‘brethren’ on the wrong side. And, be silent when an insult was hurled at him for his religion or being an Indian at heart. Yes, there were good days, personal friendships, individual bonds. But, the moment those individuals merged into a crowd – the bonhomie vapourised.
A few days ago, when I saw this, I realised, all they need is to create a fable of “Pakistaniyat”.
It must have been Kashmiriyat, when Pandits’ homes in downtown Srinagar would get pelted with stones each time India and Pakistan met in a sporting arena. Be it a celebration of a Pakistani victory or anger over India winning, stones flew at our homes. I vividly remember when Indian hockey team lost miserably to Hassan Sardar’s onslaught in 1982 Asian games, our home in downtown received a shower.
Stones were pelted on KP homes to mourn Bhutto, when Zia executed him. And again to mourn Zia when he died. KP’s bore the brunt even during factional wars between Shers (Sheikh Abdullah supporters) and Bakras (Mirwaiz supporters).
Kashmiri Pandits were not just all-weather whipping boys to uphold Kashmiriyat, we apparently were quite international too. Since UN office was somewhat away from downtown, often Friday afternoon protests against some act or statement by US/Israel around Palestine or Iran would result in a token round of pelting on Hindu homes in the downtown. If not stones, abuses or taunts of “Dal’e Batta” (pulse eating weaklings who can’t match the might of the non-vegetarians) were commonplace. No one objected, lest Kashmiriyat would get tainted.
For decades KPs have lived with an annual insult, as the state observes July 13th as “Martyrs Day”. On July 13th 1931, Muslims mobs, supposedly out agitating for self-rule, went into a frenzy of communal violence and looting against minority Hindus. What should have been a “Black Day” is officially observed as Martyr’s day in Jammu & Kashmir. Calling arsonists, looters and criminals who rained hell on hapless Hindu minority that day as martyrs is another sample of classic “Kashmiriyat”.
In Feb 1986, some events of Jammu were used as an excuse to loot and ransack Hindus in valley. Hundreds of old and sacred shrines across Anantnag, Pulwana, Kupwara, Baramulla and Srinagar were destroyed, desecrated and razed to ground in another rousing tribute to Kashmiriyat.
Kashmiriyat formula was always simple. Kill a KP and become a hero; be it those killer mobs of 1931, or Bitta Karate and Yasin Maliks of recent times.
It must have been Kashmiriyat in literature, when on 4th January, 1990, a leading local Urdu newspaper Aftab published a press release from Hizb-ul-Mujahideen ordering all Kashmiri Pandits to leave the valley. Few days later, another Urdu newspaper Al-Safa issued this two day ultimatum on their front page.
“musalmano per zulam va sitam dalney ke zimedar Pandit do din ke andhar chale jayee”
And even few years later, newspapers in Srinagar openly carried hate speech against Kashmiri Pandits.
Not welcome to return – reality of Kashmiriyat
The state has since then been slowly and steadily obliterating all signs of our existence. In last decade or so, Hari Parbhat has become Koh-i-Maran, Shankaracharya hill is now Takht-e-Sulaiman and Anantnag is Islamabad. Talibanization of centuries old Hindu names of iconic places in the valley must be an intellectual tribute to “Kashmiriyat” as well.
Blatant refusal of the state and majority community in 2008 to even allow a mere 99 acres for Amarnath Yatra amenities was another tribute to Kashmiriyat. Followed up by curbs on Kausarnag yatra in 2014.
And now, they do not even try to feign Kashmiriyat anymore. The very people who beat their chests over sanctity of Article 370 and cried wolf over so-called attempts to “change demographics of Kashmir” are conniving today for settlement of illegal Burmese Rohingya and Bangladeshi muslim immigrants in J&K, and yet continue to outrage over even a mere suggestion of Kashmiri Pandit resettlement colonies in Kashmir.
Today, those who have lived through the nightmares of 1989-90, still recall those blood curdling chants of “Kasheer bann’e Pakistan! Batav ross’, Batnev saan” (Kashmir will be Pakistan, along with Hindu women, but without Hindu men), or still remember Nadimarg, Wandhama, Sangrampora – can only manage a wry smile when they hear “Kashmiriyat” romanticised in public discourse.
Yet, the hoax continues to live and thrive in lit-fests, TV debates and liberal Op-Eds.
Meanwhile, I wonder if my nerdy senior is still tracking how Kashmiriyat continues to thrive and swell.
In 2003 at the Wanderers stadium in Johannesburg, it wasn’t the power batting of the Australians that snatched the World Cup from India. It was ghosts in the mind of the Indian team, which had lost the game long before they stepped on to the field.
Understandably, the word “Mahagathbandhan” has a chilling effect on the psyche of BJP workers, leaders and supporters. It’s a ghost, much like the ghost of 2004. And I am here to tell you that BJP can conquer this ghost. All it needs is rational thinking.
Here are four simple ways.
(1) First, the BJP needs to recognise that the SP+Congress+RLD alliance in UP is not even a Mahagathbandhan in the first place. It’s not even remotely in the same league as the RJD+JDU+Congress Mahagathbandhan in Bihar. The BSP still controls a big chunk of the opposition vote. The opposition in Uttar Pradesh is still divided, just not as much as the BJP perhaps was hoping it would be.
In fact, take the Lok Sabha vote shares of SP and Congress and RLD and add them up. It’s just a shade over 30%, which is miles behind the BJP’s Lok Sabha vote share of 43%. There is no comparison to the Bihar MGB, which had a lead of 4% over the NDA in Lok Sabha vote shares.
(2) Secondly, Akhilesh is offering the BJP a huge number of sitting ducks. We still don’t have official confirmation, but Akhilesh Yadav is going to offer the Congress some 80-100 seats. Some estimates say this number could be over 100. That is about 100 seats where the party that is contesting has zero cadre and zero ground presence.
The BJP has to relentlessly target these weak seats and a sweep here can guarantee a victory in the Assembly. This was the magic formula behind Jayalalitha’s victory. The strike rate of the DMK and AIADMK was exactly the same whenever they contested each other, but Jayalalitha’s party gobbled up all the seats allotted to Congress.
(3) With Mayawati vanishing from view, the time is ripe for BJP to approach Dalit voters for a 2014 like endorsement. No one likes to vote for a party that is a sure loser. The Dalits, especially the non-Jatav Dalits, have voted for BJP in 2014. With the BSP out of contention, these voters can be convinced to go for the BJP again. Here is a very profound statement I read on Twitter:
What people don’t realise is that BJP has today become first or second choice of nearly every Hindu caste group. Y, Jats, Dalits every group
Unless blocked by a caste leader in an Assembly election, every group of Hindus whether Jats, Dalits or Yadavs would go with the BJP. Should Lok Sabha polls happen tomorrow, the SP would lose large segments of its Yadav voters and the BSP would lose large segments of its Dalit voters to Modi. In an Assembly poll, where a leader of their own caste has a chance of becoming CM, these voters are held back by traditional loyalties.
Dalits won’t move to SP and Yadavs won’t move to BSP, but BJP is acceptable to both of them. If BJP can successfully remind Dalit voters that Mayawati stands no chance, the Dalit voters would migrate to their obvious second choice. In this effort, the emotional connect between Mayawati and her Dalit voters stands in the way. This is where it can come in really handy for the BJP to point out that Mayawati has given 97 tickets to Muslims and only 87 to Dalits. Perhaps Mayawati is not as emotionally attached to Dalits as Dalits are emotionally attached to her?
(4) Let us come to Akhilesh Yadav’s so called “image”. Here is just a gentle reminder: Brand Akhilesh was built over 6 months, while Nitish Kumar is credited by every Bihari for saving the state over a decade of hard work. Yet, Brand Nitish did not get the Mahagathbandhan even 1 vote over and above its Lok Sabha vote share. Worse, Nitish Kumar’s JDU won 10 seats less than Lalu Yadav’s RJD. The lesser said about Lalu Yadav’s “development image”, the better.
Is there a good reason to believe that 6 months of branding by Akhilesh can give better results than the 10 years of Brand Nitish in Bihar?
When it comes to effects of branding, let’s talk about where it all started. Let’s talk about Brand Modi in Gujarat. Actually, the BJP lost votes in every successive election in Gujarat: it’s voteshare dipped between 2002 and 2007 and again between 2007 and 2012. So what did Brand Modi achieve? It merely slowed down the erosion of votes due to anti-incumbency. Branding can help a ruling government hold on to a big vote gap from the previous election. Branding cannot save a ruling government that is hanging on by the skin of its teeth.
Akhilesh Yadav cannot win Uttar Pradesh by slowing down the erosion of SP votes, he needs to actively add at least 2-3% votes (more likely 5%) to win the election. Is his branding really that good? Is he really a bigger icon than what Nitish is to Bihar and what Modi was to Gujarat?
The two people the BJP needs to learn from are the (late) Jayalalitha and more ironically, Mamata Banerjee. Both of them saw Mahagathbandhans taking them on, but they were unfazed. They laughed off the desperate efforts of their opponents. They went around electioneering with the confidence of a victor. A simple confident and clear headed campaign won them the election.
That’s how you slay a ghost. You just use rational thinking to figure out that it doesn’t exist.
Samajwadi Party has literally been throwing a party for all the drama enthusiasts by putting up a family feud of a lifetime between Patriarch Mulayam and his firstborn Akhilesh. We had recently published a report about a leaked email which claimed the whole victimization of Akhilesh by removing him from the party and the family feud was a scripted affair based on the suggestion of their political adviser Steve Jarding. This theory of course denied by all people concerned.
Now after Akhilesh was removed from the party and again admitted back, another drama unfolded where father and son locked horns over who should be allotted the ‘Cycle’ symbol of the party with both Mulayam’s and Akhilesh’s supposed factions staking their claim. The affair was pretty dramatic after the Election Commission heard both side’s arguments for about 5 hours on 13th Jan which were presented by senior lawyers like Rajeev Dhavan and Kapil Sibal in favor of Akhilesh and former solicitor general Mohan Parasaran and RC Dhingra presented Mulayam’s side. Akhilesh won after the election commission recognized his faction as the real Samajwadi Party and assigned the cycle symbol on 16h January. This might mean that Akhilesh is now the official defining face of the party ahead of Mulayam.
Interestingly or in a “You gotta be kidding me!” way even this fiasco could have been scripted.According to this report, father Mulayam didn’t put up any serious fight to ensure that he won the SC ruling. First, as per the ruling neither did Mulayam claim there was a split nor did he produce any documents which suggested he had the support of members of the legislative party which would have inferred that there indeed was a dispute between him and Akhilesh in the first place. A lawyer who was present at the rulings was apparently befuddled by the fact that shrewd Mulayam could take “such a silly line“.
This raised questions as to whether he indeed was serious in taking on Akhilesh. The only other explantion could be Mulayam just threw in the towel and did not make a fight out of it.
Further credence was provided to the ‘fixed match’ theory by @IndiaBTL who put out documents of the EC order:
So clearly Akhilesh had the support of 4716 out of 5731 delegates which either shows that Mulayam’s popularity within the SP had completely dwindled or that he ensured that his son had the required numbers.
These other documents further provide credence to the fixed match theory as Mulayam didn’t even file a single affidavit of any delegate or MP or MLA in support of his claim to the party on January 9th and also failed to do so after EC gave them another reminder on 10th January.
So in short Mulayam didn’t even try to fight against Akhilesh and the logic that he couldn’t procure the support of even a single delegate or MP or MLA is not very convincing to say the least.
Now with Akhilesh as the main election face it remains to be seen if the supposed drama and fixed match reaps political benefits for the SP in the coming election.
Jallikattu is a festival that shares the deep connection that we have with our land and the animal that helps us till that land. The Bull used in Jallikattu is especially reared for the occasion, and is brought up like a family member. Yet the hypocrites, in the guise of “animal rights activists” are trying to get this centuries old festival completely banned, and had it not been for the Tamil people defying the idiotic supreme court imposed diktat, Jallikattu as a festival would have perhaps ceased to exist, and along with it a portion of Tamil heritage and culture would have died a silent death.
Almost all the religions forbid killing of any sentient being, but other than Jainism none prohibit eating of meat. In fact, Jainism is perhaps the only religion in the world that has put a BAN on meat consumption, and even though love, compassion, mercy and kindness are fundamental to most religions across the world, animal sacrifices for religious practices dates back to the time various religion across the world were established. Yet, we don’t see much outrage from the pseudo-liberals and hypocritical animal rights activists against animal sacrifices in the name of religion.
Personally, I am a vegetarian, I find that killing of animals for consumption as meat is deplorable, and should be banned outright. But does that or should the fact that I don’t eat meat give me the right to call those who eat meat different derogatory names?
I think not.
What inspired me to write this short article is the fact that I was taken aback at the viciousness of the comments many people made against Jallikattu festival. Most of the people were have called those who celebrate Jallikattu with various derogatory names – “Barbaric,” “Monstrous,” “Uncivilized”, “Uneducated” “Jangalee” and so on.
Let me get some basic facts in front of you, for India the per capita consumption of meat currently stands at around 4 kgs/person. Take a moment to think about it. The amount of meat consumed in India every year comes down to almost every man, woman and child in India eating around 4 kgs of meat per person.
Now do a simple math roughly 4 kgs per person X 1.2 billion citizens = 4.8 billion Kgs of meat is currently being consumed in India each year.
This amounts to killing of 63 Lakh Beef/Buffalo (at average weight of 753 kgs/cow) being slaughtered yearly, or 17000 of them being killed on a daily basis
If it were chicken it would amount to killing 220 Crore chickens (at average weight of 2.4 kgs/chicken) every year, or around 60 Lakhs chickens killed every day.
Is this not, ‘Barbaric,’ ‘Monstrous,’ ‘Uncivilized’, ‘Uneducated’ ‘Jangalee’ on our part?
It is easy to point fingers at others and blame them of cruelty, when we are ourselves indulging in the same cruelty every day.
Here are is an example
India today stands as one of the LARGEST CARABEEF (water buffalo) EXPORTERS in the world, with an annual production of 40 million metric tonnes. You might be surprised to know that Buffalo meat has emerged as India’s highest agri-export ahead of Basmati rice, and that after 2012, in fact, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, India became the world’s No. 1 beef exporter, beating such perennial beef powerhouses Australia and New Zealand.
India also ranks very high in terms of Fish, Poultry and Goat meat export and consumption.
So who are all these people who are eating all these meat?
According to NSS Survey nearly 40% of Indians are strictly vegetarian, which means majority of us are not. So those of us who eat and consume meat, should we have any right to call others names for following their religious beliefs and practices?
Most of us who have friends in USA and Canada recently congratulated them on Thanks Giving and Christmas, liked the pictures they posted of roast Turkey and commented on how Yummy it looked, do you know how many turkeys were killed this year alone for Thanks Giving? OVER 45 MILLION… are they not animals? Where was our outrage then? Every year in Bakri-Eid millions of cattle and other animals are killed every year, no one seems to mind.
If you think Jallikattu is cruel, try living near a slaughter house anywhere in India. I do, and I know what pain the animals have to go through.
Most of the bigger animals – Beef, water buffalo which you eat, are not killed in one swift move, rather they are repeatedly hit on their forehead by a big hammer, the aim being crushing their skull and smashing their brains. Can you imagine the pain these animals, which you consume every day, have to endure? Muslims kill the animals by slitting their throat and wait for the animal to bleed to death. Is that not cruel?
Most of the Pigs are repeatedly stabbed near their left front leg, till the pierce finds its heart and it dies, the pig screams in agony, which those of us who live near the slaughter house get to hear every day.
The Goat and Chicken that you enjoy an eat get their heads chopped off. Aren’t those CRUEL??
Most of us see meat hanging by a hook in our cities and towns every day, have you ever wondered how that meat arrived there?
So let us not be judgmental to others, unless we want ourselves to be judged. It is beautifully put in Bible, Matthew 7:1-3 “Judge not, that ye be not judged.”
Religion and traditional practices that may seem irrational today have been based on some amount of reasoning in the days when they started such practices, in terms of Jallikattu festival, it is practiced to protect the local (desi) breed of cow and bulls. This is not based on religion, this is based on pure scientific fact, any Ecologist worth their salt knows the fact that Indian cows and bulls produce healthier milk and are environmentally more beneficial than the industrial livestock that are reared in western countries.
One thing, I am sure of is that, Jallikattu festival alone cannot be made a target, definitely not unless you can ban/stop people from killing Turkeys in Thanks Giving, or Goats/Lambs/Camel in Bakr-Eid which happen every year, or STOP people from EATING MEAT altogether which happens on a daily basis.
Even though I am from Darjeeling, Gorkhaland in North East India, I support Jallikattu festival, because it is a festival of the farmers and deeply engrained in the culture of Tamil people.
Here is a message to anyone who class for banning Jallaikattu, unless you are willing to stop people from eating Turkey in Thanks Giving, or Goats/Lambs/Camel in Bakr-Eid, you have NO RIGHT to call it cruel or ask for its ban.
So instead of pointing out fingers at those who go to Jallikattu festival once every year… can we prevent killing of animals which happens and is happening at our own homes – EVERY DAY?
In a sensational claim, the Bihar police, which was investigating the derailment of the Indore-Patna Express near Pukhrayan in Kanpur that left over 150 people dead, has claimed that there was a possible ISI (Pakistan’s intelligence agency) hand behind the “accident”.
In the early hours of November 20th, train number 19321 going from Indore to Patna had derailed but the cause remained unclear. The railway authorities first suspected a possible rail fracture behind the accident. But providing a completely new angle to this, SP Jitendra Rana said that the police had arrested three people in connection with an IED recovered from the outer tracks of the Ghorasahan railway station on Oct 1 2016. After intense interrogation, the suspects confessed that Pakistan had hatched a conspiracy to derail the fourteen coaches of Indore-Patna Express.
They claimed that an IED blast was the cause of the derailment and that ISI, with monetary help from Dawood Ibrahim, was behind the attack. According to this report, three men – Moti Paswan, Uma Shankar Patel and Mukesh Yadav – were arrested from Adapur Police area and were reportedly paid 3 lakh rupees to plant the IED near Ghorasahan railway station by a Nepali citizen Brajesh Giri who had ISI links.
So if these confessions are true, not just was the ISI involved in the Indore-Patna train accident in November, it had been trying to target Railways on other occasions too such as planting the IED in October. Only further investigation would reveal as to the involvement of ISI in other recent derailments. It should be noted that even the Railways Minister had earlier hinted at possible sabotage behind recent train accidents.
This isn’t the only case for which the ISI has been in the news recently. Ajit Doval had claimed yesterday that the terrorists behind the hijacking of Indian Airlines flight IC-814 in Kandahar were also actively supported by the ISI.
According to an article published in the Harvard Business Review (HBR), the world we currently live in is facing a serious trust deficit. Quoting a survey by Edelman, a multi-national communications firm, the article said that this was the first time in 17 years that the survey had found a decline in trust across all institutions.
Edelman uses four institutions to measure the level of public trust, and these are – Government, Media, NGOs, and Businesses. Their survey was done in 28 countries including India, and in almost two-thirds of them, ‘the general population did not trust the four institutions to “do what is right” — the average level of trust in all four institutions combined was below 50%’ – the article in HBR said.
However, what could come as good news for the Government of India, India bucked this trend and the trust in government actually saw a significant gain of 10% over the last year.
Government of India is trusted by a majority of the Indian population (source)
According to the Edelman survey, 75% of the general population of India trusted the government while globally this average was just 41%. The survey was carried out between October 13 and November 16 last year.
During 2013 and 2014, when the then UPA government was rocked by allegations of massive scams, this trust in government of India was at 57% and 53% respectively.
The government of India was the second biggest gainer in trust in 2016, if the survey findings are to be believed.
The biggest loser, globally, was the media that was almost as distrusted as the governments world over. Media took the biggest year-on-year hit and is now distrusted by the majority in 82% of the surveyed countries.
“People now view media as part of the elite,” Richard Edelman, president of the firm that did the survey, was quoted by Quartz while explaining this lack of trust in the media.
