Bharatham : Uthishtatha-Jagratha : (wef-05/11/2012. )

AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY: THE STORY OF MY EXPERIMENTS WITH TRUTH by Mohandas K. Gandhi Part-1.   4.  PLAYING THE HUSBAND : About the time of my marriage, little pamphlets costing a pice, or a pie (I now forget how  much), used to be issued, in which conjugal love, thrift, child marriages, and other such subjects  were discussed. Whenever I came across any of these, I used to go through them from cover to  cover, and it was a habit with me to forget what I did not like, and to carry out in practice whatever I liked. Lifelong faithfulness to the wife, inculcated in these booklets as the duty of the husband,  remained permanently imprinted on my heart. Furthermore, the passion for truth was innate in  me, and to be false to her was therefore out of the question. And then there was very little chance  of my being faithless at that tender age. But the lesson of faithfulness had also an untoward effect. 'If I should be pledged to be faithful...

AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY: THE STORY OF MY EXPERIMENTS WITH TRUTH by Mohandas K. Gandhi Part-1. 3. CHILD MARRIAGE : Much as I wish that I had not to write this chapter, I know that I shall have to swallow many  such bitter draughts in the course of this narrative. And I cannot do otherwise, if I claim to be a  worshipper of Truth It is my painful duty to have to record here my marriage at the age of thirteen. As I see the youngsters of the same age about me who are under my care, and think of my own  marriage, I am inclined to pity myself and to congratulate them on having escaped my lot. I can  see no moral argument in support of such a preposterously early marriage. Let the reader make no mistake. I was married, not betrothed. For in Kathiwad there are two  distinct rites--betrothal and marriage. Betrothal is a preliminary promise on the part of the parents  of the boy and the girl to join them in marriage, and it is not inviolable. The ...

AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY: THE STORY OF MY EXPERIMENTS WITH TRUTH by Mohandas K. Gandhi PART ONE 2. CHILDHOOD : I must have been about seven when my father left Porbandar for Rajkot, to become a member of the Rajasthanik Court. There I was put into a primary school, and I can well recollect those days, including the names and other particulars of the teachers who taught me. As at Porbandar, so here, there is hardly anything to note about my studies. I could have been only a mediocre student. From this school I went to the suburban school and thence to the high school, having already reached my twelfth year. I do not remember having ever told a lie, during this short period, either to my teachers or to my schoolmates. I used to be very shy and avoided all company. My books and my lessons were my sole companions. To be at school at that stroke of the hour and to run back home as soon as school closed--that was my daily habit. I literally ran back, because I cou...

AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY: THE STORY OF MY EXPERIMENTS WITH TRUTH by Mohandas K. Gandhi PART ONE 1. BIRTH AND PARENTAGE The Gandhis belong to the Bania caste and seem to have been originally grocers. But for three generations, from my grandfather, they have been Prime Ministers in several Kathiawad States. Uttamchand Gandhi, alias Ota Gandhi, my grandfather, must have been a man of principle. State intrigues compelled him to leave Porbandar, where he was Diwan, and to seek refuge in Junagadh. There he saluted the Nawab with the left hand. Someone, noticing the apparent discourtesy, asked for an explanation, which was thus given: 'The right hand is already pledged to Porbandar.' Ota Gandhi married a second time, having lost his first wife. He had four sons by his first wife and two by his second wife. I do not think that in my childhood I ever felt or knew that these sons of Ota Gandhi were not all of the same mother. The fifth of these six brothers was Ka...

AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY: THE STORY OF MY EXPERIMENTS WITH TRUTH by Mohandas K. Gandhi INTRODUCTION Four or five years ago, at the instance of some of my nearest co-workers, I agreed to write my autobiography. I made the start, but scarcely had I turned over the first sheet when riots broke out in Bombay and the work remained at a standstill. Then followed a series of events which culminated in my imprisonment at Yeravda. Sjt. Jeramdas, who was one of my fellow-prisoners there, asked me to put everything else on one side and finish writing the autobiography. I replied that I had already framed a programme of study for myself, and that I could not think of doing anything else until this course was complete. I should indeed have finished the autobiography had I gone through my full term of imprisonment at Yeravda, for there was still a year left to complete the task, when I was discharged. Swami Anand has now repeated the proposal, and as I have finished the history of ...

http://www.civilserviceindia.com/subject/Essay/is-india-fit-for-democracy.html Having walked all way through the bridge, I saw an old man sitting at the end and babbling with himself. I confronted him and asked,” Baba why are you sitting here?” He looked at me with his clumsy eyes and perplexed expression and said,” I am wondering what will I say when the National Population Statisticians will ask me my ‘caste’, I never thought myself to be something other than an Indian”. I was awestricken by his answer and realized how ill equipped our democracy was. Our country has been developing rapidly economically but it still lags behind in the Social developments. When China started its economic reforms, India was a larger democracy. But now we are far behind the Chinese in almost every aspect of development. Despite china being the most populated country in the world, it has soared to the second fastest growing economy in the world behind Japan just on the model of expo...

Mathrubhumi 12/08/2013. Street children survive on porn, videos; not food : New Delhi:In a dark and dingy room, the only thing visible is the blue flickering light from a television set as a dozen-odd boys, teens and below, watch with eyes riveted on the screen. 'Ohs' and 'ahs' are heard on occasion. At first it seems they are watching a Hindi film, but a closer look reveals they are hooked on to a porn movie. The boys are runaways or vagabonds who beg at many of Delhi's crossroads or are rag-pickers. According to child activists and NGOs working with these children, most of them are hooked to either porn movies or video games and spend most of their earnings on them, on occasions forgetting to eat. 'I can sit for hours playing video games or watching movies. I spend Rs.50 or more on them. So I have stopped eating from outside and survive on tea and beedis,' Vishal Kushwaha, a rag picker, told IANS. The 17-year-old rag-picker makes Rs.150 to Rs.2...

Rebuild our Bharatheeya Samskaram - Regain our Paithrakam ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Many thousand years back - Ancient days Our Bharatham drew world attention, because our Upanishadik culture, Sanskrit Language, natural resources, unity in diversity, Spiritual way of living, knowledge, and many more. We have world greatest epics, Veda, Upanishads, ....many more, to guide us. But history has recorded many foreign invasions some 2000-3000 years back, later Mohammad Gori, Mohammad Gazni, thereafter Moguls, still later British, French, Dutch, Portuguese..finally got freedom from Briton,............. In ancient Bharatham about 5000---10000 years back Bharatham world leaders, our Great Rishies knew science in detail and etc..... But today where we are? In front of world we are in pity, because of our Nation's poverty, lack of resources, it is the responsibility of our citizens to rebuild the Nation, and reg...

The Hindu 06/08/2013. OPINION » COLUMNS » VIJAY NAGASWAMI Published: August 3, 2013 16:45 IST | Updated: August 3, 2013 20:40 IST THE SHRINKING UNIVERSE The great personality makeover : -------------------------------------- BY VIJAY NAGASWAMI Can one’s personality really be changed through workshops and classes? --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The recent mushrooming of innumerable “centres”, whether of the hole-in-the-wall variety or more exotic five-star initiatives, offering to transform the personalities of young men and women in the country, tells me that large numbers of young, urban Indians are unhappy with their personalities and are more than willing to cough up hard-earned money to trade theirs in for the latest model. I have always been intrigued by how precisely these centres went about accomplishing what they promised, and naturally pursued the matter a bit. From what I’ve been able to gather...

The Hindu 04/08/2013. OPINION » LEAD August 1,2013. From the granary to the plate : ---------------------------------------- JEAN DRÈZE TOPICS social issues (general) food security Despite its many flaws, the food security bill is an opportunity to end the leakages from the PDS and prevent wastage of public resources : --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The National Food Security Bill, now an ordinance, has been a target of sustained attacks in the business media in recent weeks. There is nothing wrong, of course, in being critical of the bill, or even opposed to it. Indeed, the bill has many flaws. What is a little troubling, however, is the shrill and ill-informed nature of many of these attacks. Statistical hocus-pocus has been deployed with abandon to produce wildly exaggerated “estimates” of the financial costs of the bill, and no expression seems to be too strong to dispar...

       The Hindu What now? Photo: S. Subramanium The Hindu 04/08/2013. OPINION » COLUMNS » KALPANA SHARMA July 20, 20 THE OTHER HALF :---- -------------------------- { The forgotten bill  } BY KALPANA SHARMA It’s important that the Women’s Reservation Bill becomes law so that more women find a place in Parliament and in the State assemblies: ..................................................................................................................... It should be renamed the Forgotten Bill. The Women’s Reservation Bill, also known as the 108 Constitutional Amendment Bill 2008, has been up in the air for so long that it has virtually vanished into thin air. Of course, officially it still exists. The Rajya Sabha passed it in 2010. As a result, it remains on the record and will not be sent back to the drawing board once a new government is elected. But before it becomes law, and 33 per cent seats...

The Hindu 01/08/2013. OPINION » COLUMNS » HARSH MANDER July 27, 2013 BAREFOOT The invisible presence : BY HARSH MANDER It is a fallacy that the elderly are a burden. Many old people are not dependent on anyone, but self-reliant and contributing workers and family members : Millions of old people do work that gives them dignity, autonomy, respect and a sense of continued social and economic relevance. Old people are living much longer today than they were a couple of generations back. Life expectancy at the time of Independence was 35 years. Today it is 67 years. People are not only living to older ages; they are, for many more years, healthier in body and mind and, therefore, fit and willing to work. However, despite evidence of useful work by many old people, it is routine for planners, scholars, even lay people to routinely speak of old people as a “burden”. We speak of the “working age group” as between 15 and 59 years, and assume that people below and above thi...