Don’t blame minority Brahmins for past ‘tragedies’: Pejawar seer

coastaldigest.com news network
October 18, 2017

Udupi, Oct 18: Strongly opposing the separation of Lingayat community from Hindu religion, Paryaya Pejawar Mutt chief pontiff Vishwesha Teertha Swami said that worshipping Hindu god Shiva is part of Lingayat-Veerashaiva tradition.

Speaking to media persons on the eve of Diwali, the seer said that in his opinion though there were two traditions (Lingayat and Veerashaiva) in the Lingayat community, they were not separate. Lingayat and Veerashaiva were branches of the same religion.

The Dwaita and Advaita schools had fundamental philosophical differences but were branches of the same Vedic religion. The two traditions of Lingayat and Veerashaiva could never be separate.

However, as this was an internal matter relating to the Veerashaiva-Lingayat community, he would not like to interfere in it. “But if these two traditions are accepted as branches of the same religion, the Veerashaiva-Lingayat community would get more strength. This is my opinion and suggestion. I leave it to that community to decide the rest,” he said.

The seer said that when people of both these traditions were worshipping Shiva as their chief deity, doing Shiva Panchakshari Japa and offering prayers to the Shiva Linga, how could they be different or separate from the Hindu religion?

The followers of Lingayat tradition had stated that they did not accept the caste system in Hinduism, he said. But even the followers of Sri Ramakrishna Mission and Arya Samaj did not accept the caste system and so also various other traditions of Vaishnavism and Shaivism. Did that make them separate religion? he asked.

He had posed this question some time ago but none had answered it. “Hence, all the Lingayats and Veerashaivas should not separate from Hinduism. They should stay with us. This is my fervent appeal,” he said.

Some had questioned his interference in this matter. “When a brother thinks of leaving a family, the other brothers persuade him not to do so. My fraternal intervention should be seen in this light. Let us all stay together and try to protect our religion and culture,” he said.

In today’s society, it was not possible for one community to exploit another community. “In the present political scenario, the minority Brahmin community could not do injustice to the majority non-Brahmin community. Is it correct to blame the Brahmins for the tragedy which took place during the time of Sri Basaveshwara? Is it correct to blame today’s Muslims for the violence during the medieval period in the country?” he said.

“Just as Hindus and Muslims have to live in harmony now, so too communities among Hindus too should live together in harmony. Besides Vaishnavas or the exponent of the Dwaita philosophy Sri Madhwacharya never lived during the period of Sri Basaveshwara,” the seer said.

Comments

Wake UP
 - 
Wednesday, 18 Oct 2017

Na Tasya Pratima Asti ... There is no image of God (Then U should really think "Why am I worshiping the stones, pictures and such things which are LIFELESS and will not harm or benefit anybody? Honesty in searching the TRUE GOD, will find your way to recognize the CREATOR of all that exists who is ever living & ever watching... Praise be to the lord who gave us the soul & intellect  in this life to think and PONDER and not just live like the ways of the demons... Even animals are praising the lord of the universe ... U will find it when U honestly look for the TRUTH. 

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News Network
January 22,2020

Mangaluru, Jan 22: Mangaluru Commissioner of Police PS Harsha said that Aditya Rao, who surrendered before Bengaluru Police after planting an improvised explosive device (IED) at the Mangaluru International Airport, is now in their custody.

"Our Investigation team arrested Aditya Rao in Bengaluru in connection with planting of an explosive device at Mangaluru Airport on January 20. We produced the accused before Bengaluru first JMFC court and court issued transit warrant," said Harsha.

"We have brought him to Mangaluru from Bengaluru, now the accused is in our custody, our investigation team will interrogate him. We will investigate all aspects. He will be produced before Mangaluru 6th JMFC Court," he added.

Rao hails from Udupi and has engineering and MBA degrees.

According to the police, the IED was recovered from a bag at Mangaluru airport on January 20. It was later defused in an open field by the personnel of the bomb disposal squad.

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News Network
February 26,2020

Feb 26: Looking out over the world’s largest cricket stadium, the seats jammed with more than 100,000 people, India’s prime minister heaped praise on his American visitor.

“The leadership of President Trump has served humanity,” Prime Minister Narendra Modi said Monday, highlighting Trump’s fight against terrorism and calling his 36-hour visit to India a watershed in India-U.S. relations.

The crowds cheered. Trump beamed.

“The ties between India and the U.S. are no longer just any other partnership,” Modi said. “It is a far greater and closer relationship.”

India, it seems, loves Donald Trump. It seemed obvious from the thousands who turned out to wave as his motorcade snaked through the city of Ahmedabad, and from the tens of thousands who filled the city’s new stadium. It seemed obvious from the hug that Modi gave Trump after he descended from Air Force One, and from the hundreds of billboards proclaiming Trump’s visit.

But it’s not so simple.

Because while Trump is genuinely popular in India, his clamorous and carefully choreographed welcome was also about Asian geopolitics, China’s growing power and a masterful Indian politician who gave his American visitor exactly what he wanted.

Modi “is doing this not necessarily because he loves Trump,” said Tanvi Madan, the director of the India Project at the Brookings Institution in Washington, D.C. “It’s very much about Trump as the leader of the U.S. and recognizing what it is that Trump himself likes.”

Trump likes crowds — big crowds — and the foot soldiers of India’s political parties have long known how to corral enough people to make any politician look popular. In a city like Ahmedabad, the capital of Modi’s home state of Gujarat and the center of his power base, it wouldn’t take much effort to fill a cavernous sports stadium. It was more surprising that a handful of seats remained empty, and that some in the stands had left even before Trump had finished his speech.

For India, good relations with the U.S. are deeply important: They signal that India is a serious global player, an issue that has long been important to New Delhi, and help cement an alliance that both nations see as a counterweight to China’s rise.

“For both countries, their biggest rival is China,” said John Echeverri-Gent, a professor at the University of Virginia whose research often focuses on India. “China is rapidly expanding its presence in the Indian Ocean, which India has long considered its backyard and its exclusive realm for security concerns.”

“It’s very clearly a major concern for both India and the United States,” he said.

Trump isn’t the first U.S. president that Modi has courted. In 2015, then-President Barack Obama was the first American chief guest at India’s Republic Day parade, a powerful symbolic gesture. Obama also got a Modi hug, and the media in both countries were soon writing about the two leaders’ “bromance.”

Trump is popular in India, even if some of that is simply because he’s the U.S. president. A 2019 Pew Research Center poll showed that 56% of Indians had confidence in Trump’s abilities in world affairs, one of only a handful of countries where he has that level of approval. But Obama was also popular: Before he left office, he had 58% approval in world affairs among Indians.

The Pew poll also indicated that Trump’s support was higher among supporters of Modi’s Hindu nationalist party.

That’s not surprising. Both men have fired up their nationalist bases with anti-Muslim rhetoric and government policies, from Trump’s travel bans to Modi’s crackdown in Kashmir, India’s only Muslim-majority state.

And Trump’s Indian support is far from universal. Protests against his trip roiled cities from New Delhi to Hyderabad to the far northeastern city of Gauhati, although those demonstrations were mostly overshadowed by protests over a new Indian citizenship law that Modi backs.

Modi, who is widely popular in India, has faced weeks of protests over the law, which provides fast track naturalization for some foreign-born religious minorities — but not Muslims. While Trump talked about ties with India on Tuesday, Hindus and Muslims fought in violent clashes that left at least 10 people dead over two days.

In some ways, Modi and Trump are powerful echoes of each other.

They have overlapping political styles. Both are populists who see themselves as brash, rule-breaking outsiders who disdain their countries’ traditional elites. Both are seen by their critics as having authoritarian leanings. Both surround themselves with officials who rarely question their decisions.

But are they friends?

Trump says yes. “Really, we feel very strongly about each other,” he said at a New Delhi press briefing.

But many observers aren’t so sure.

“The question is how much of this is real chemistry, as opposed to what I’d call planned chemistry” orchestrated for diplomatic reasons, said Madan. “It’s so hard to know if you’re not in the room.”

Certainly, Modi understands America’s importance to India. While the two countries continue to bicker about trade issues, the prime minister organized a welcome that impressed even India’s news media, which have watched countless choreographed mass political rallies.

“There is no other country for whose leader India would hold such an event, and for which an Indian prime minister would lavish such rhetoric,” the Hindustan Times said in an editorial.

“The spectacle and the sound were worth a thousand agreements.”

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News Network
January 16,2020

Mangaluru, Jan 16: Following the widespread protests against the National Register of Citizens (NRC) and Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), former minister and MLA UT Khader on Thursday urged the Centre and State government to address the concerns of the people.

Speaking to reporters here on Thursday, he said there is widespread confusion among the public with regard to the implementation of the Act. People are reluctant to open their doors to Asha workers, out of fear that the NRC exercise is being implemented, said Khader.

He urged the chief minister and home minister to gain the trust of the people on the CAA issue.

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