Not "Sanskrit" but "About-Sanskrit"…an interim solution

Sanskrit?.....Just one chapter is needed in school text book of ever grade to begin the process of change in mindset and bring about love for essential Indian-ness..... So, what would that one chapter be?

This is a suggestion to those who are in the enabling circumstances- Please include one chapter in school textbook that helps students to understand how Sanskrit relates to their own language and other major international languages and why many intellectuals have described it as ‘mother language’  they have opted as medium of education. 

For example, the chapter can include, the presence of elements of Sanskrit language that are adapted in other languages.  Further, the content can also include the logical arrangement of Varnamala in Sanskrit. Abundant synonyms of each word and yet how each synonym has a slightly different meaning, other anecdotes and humor related to Sanskrit, quotes from experts, its IT enabling characteristic, etc., wealth of literature, some examples of fine descriptions (Extracts from ‘Shakunta’l, description of citizen of Ayodhya from ‘RaghuVansh’ etc.) A word of caution, just describing language features will not give enough impact unless it is contrasted and shown how different it js when compared to some popular international languages. (example: Absence of many syllables (p, ch, etc) in Arabic, its architectural inability to combine syllable ‘r’ with following letter(there is no way, you can write or speak, chocolate… written and spoken as Shokulate, or Petrol..written as spoken as Betatorl, etc..) Plus the artificiality in assembly of letters to create  spellings in the European languages and their inability to write what is spoken…Absence of many vital words. There is no word for ‘Punya’ the antonym of Sin, no proper word for Tapasya, … austerities-asceticism-penance-etc. are not equivalents) http://nmsresolution.blogspot.ca/2014/04/sequencing-of-alphabets-in-sanskrit-and.html

http://nmsresolution.blogspot.ca/2014/10/diwali-and-famous-sentence-what-is.html

The scope and content of text should vary, based on grade. A lesson in class 5 will have less depth but as one progresses upward, the 12^th grade, will have maximum depth to unravel all that is special about Sanskrit and all that is absence in other international languages.

A student who goes through this grind will have a natural respect and appreciation for Sanskrit and will know why Sanskrit is recognized by many intellectuals, world over as ‘mother language’. For those who do not know, even Tamil language has about 50% Sanskrit-sourced words and a lot of elemental Sanskrit grammar. Sanskrit as source language is one factor that unites Indians despite their diversities. Know it.

At the present pace of education reforms, Sanskrit is not likely to get a place it really deserves. Hence as an interim measure, above suggestion will help produce many citizens who will love Sanskrit and will also know why, even if they may not be able to read of write or understand too much of Sanskrit. It is Sanskrit language that gives us ‘Sanskriti’ while devoid of it, rest of the people merely have their ‘culture’. We already know culture is an organic growth in a given ecosystem. Culture is more or less bottom-up situation. On the contrary, ‘Sanskrit’ is a top-down system of behavior where grandeur inspires an individual to grow above pettiness and then generates an evolved bottom-up ‘sanskritik Culture’.

Skill development begins from early age

Skill development begins from early age. My suggestion: From grade 3 till grade 12, every class of every school gets a chance once or twice in a year to visit an industrial activity, a factory or municipality water works or a food processing facility, farm, port, fire-station, etc. This activity is not mere visit but is well planned with education and ‘values’ in mind. For example, every child visiting a place would be given a special gift on which student has to work after going home. For example, if it is a visit to farm, then flowering seeds which student can plant at home. If it is an auto plant, a plastic replica of working pistons, if it is an electrical plant, solar operated small light or fan etc. Thus, the gift is something ‘to do’ in addition to play or decoration. The visiting group should be small so that the designated staff at the industrial site can impart working knowledge to the students. Budget can come out of CSR of each industrial organization. This measure will help in a big way to give an idea to students as to what skills mean and how much important it is for their later working life. This will, in addition give the students ideas as to what sort of work would they like in future.

One more practical soIution to help prevent illegal Migration or Infiltration through porous borders

Countries from where illegal migration happens are generally happy getting rid of their population. They are never serious to stop human trafficking. UNLESS THERE IS SOMETHING SERIOUS AT STAKE.  Land is a valuable commodity. It is consumed by the illegal immigrants. To compensate for their land use, the recipient countries should begin claiming territories of sending countries in a proportionate, pro-rote basis to accommodate illegal immigrants.

Of course, there is a problem here. No one knows exact number of illegal immigrants, and if you do know it, it is the responsibility of government to send those illegal back. However, the practical ground reality stays that illegal immigration is not possible to eliminate due to economic compulsions of sending countries and receiving countries,

This can be taken care of either in a friendly way or in a hostile way.  Hostile way is obviously not first choice. A receiving country can enter into a long-lease or purchase agreement with sending country for its territory in a friendly spirit of mutual accommodation.

Once, the receiving countries take up this suggestion aggressively with the sending countries and start claiming/demanding territories, these sending countries will get messages and will stop sending illegal immigrants by creating appropriate mechanism in their countries. Then they will know that something serious is at stake if illegal trafficking is not stopped.

If India can act on above suggestion and convince Bangladesh government on this legitimate requirement, they would either solve influx of Bangladeshis or help create wider land corridor to North East states or even obtain corridor to Bay of Bengal for North Eastern states.

If USA tries this suggestion, they would get some territories of Mexico or a strategic foothold in Cuba.

Adopting Sanskrit Numerals in everyday Yogaasans and PT excecises

RSS is an outstanding organization doing incredibly important work at grassroots level. Their love for devbhasha  Sanskrit is known. Their daily prarthana is not in Hindi, but in Sanskrit. However, during physical training exercises, they use Hindi numerals, ek, do, tin, chaar etc. They can make a very easy little modification in that. Use Sanskrit numerals:  शून्य एक द्वि त्रि चतुर् पञ्च षष् सप्त अष्ट नव दस... The shakha going kids will learn these numbers easily while doing their Surya-Namaskaars, in just a few days. This would add to his Sanskrit-awareness and understanding how ‘das- दस’ of Sanskrit numeral became root of the European/English word ‘decimal’ and that decimal  based mathematics was Indian Invention and how thousands European words have their root in English.

It would add distinctiveness and pride among swayamseveks.

If you are running any school, its PT or Yogaasan teacher also can start using Sanskrit numerals instead of currently used numbering.

Even, private yoga teachers can begin using Sanskrit pronunciation of numerals in their work.

Mumbai Suburban Trains: Obnoxious advt stickers on the walls of train compartments. How to eliminate them.

Mumbai suburban railway: Stickers of obnoxious, immoral and misleading advertisement are pasted on the inside walls of train compartments.

Advt of witch doctors promising relief from 'bad eye’ bad luck, marital problems etc,

Advt of quacks offering pain free relief from piles, kidney stones etc

Advt of instant loans without documents,

Advt of application forms for jobs,

Advt of marital services, companionship services, passports, pancards, Jobs for young boys and girls where 'no experience’ is required

etc.

Surely, these are illegal and unauthorized. To stop this I have a simple suggestion. All the stickers carry phone numbers of the advertiser. Let someone nominated from railway/Railway Police contact them as a respondent and then collect address/names etc details of the advertiser. Armed with the details, a full-fledged FIR be registered with police. FIR can be withdrawn if the advertiser pays fine to railway (amount not less than double of the estimated cleaning cost + estimated litigation cost). In case of delay (for whatever reason except due to fault of Railway) the advertiser should pay every month an interest equivalent to bank rate. To eliminate corruption, there should be no discretionary power wrested in anyone to reduce/change the fine amount. The failure to pay the fine after certain time will automatically attract imprisonment. With this measure, unsocial elements, both, the advertisers and their agents will come under control and Railways will accrue income. It will attract genuine advertisers as well.  

Rename our Chess associations as “Chaturang’ Associations.

Chess: Chaturang to Shataranj

This game was invented by ancient Indians. They called it Chaturang, चतुरंग as it employed 4-tire army formation.

it is an irony that in India, they have forgotten its original name and know it by its Arabic-Persian word, 'Shataranj' शतरंज. A patriotic Indian would get a sense of shame, having forgotten own heritage and parroting alien name for own creation. 

It was not a fault of Arabs, who began calling चतुरंग as शतरंज. Their language does not allow certain pronunciations. Although it is essentially an Indian game, presumably, due to prolonged Islamic rule over India, we began to imitate rulers of the day and followed their Arabic word for denoting our game. Can we restore original name? At least, to begin with can we change names of Chess Associations as Chaturang Association and gradually, build a grand narrative of History of Chaturang?  

{For those who know Arabic language, know that Arabic language has certain limitations and pronunciation norms that compel Arabic speakers to use their alphabet ش (Sh) wherever च (Ch) exists. And pronounce ج (J) at some places where ग (G) exists. Even if you are not an Arabic expert, you can easily verify this using www.translate.google.com ; there, whether you input ‘Shataranj’ or ‘Chaturang’, it would auto-fill as ‘شطرنج ‘(check its audio and you will hear ‘Shataranj’). Arabic speakers pronounce Chocolate as Shokolate and Gabriel as Jibreel, Chai as Shaai and Gamal as Jamal. Arabic script does not have alphabet corresponding to many pronunciations, such as Ch, Pa, etc. and although Arabic script has ع(G), its pronunciation tends to be ج(J) in many Arab countries}.

It is no different from an Indian calling his river Ganga as Ganges, city of Khambhat as Cambay, city of Vadodara as Baroda etc. because recent colonial royals called them so. Again, it was perhaps no fault of colonial powers that they could not pronounce Indian names. However, we woke up to the self-negating colonial tradition and restored original names. In the same spirit, patriots should try to revert shataranj/chess to chaturang and build its grand narrative making Indians proud of their stuff.

I know that recently, especially in Gujarat, they have started big-time promotion of this game by roping in Vishwanath Anand. It is a step in right direction and needs to be supplemented. 

Perhaps we cannot make abrupt change in the name due to natural resistance from society and its backlash, hence what we can do easily is rename our Chess associations as “Chaturang’ Associations. And then gradually make other changes. At a later stages, we can indigenize appearance and names of pieces.

Do something for great sons of our town, give pride to the people of their heritage

Sharing pleasant experiences 1-Glasgow airport Poet Burn’s Birthday 2: Chief of Municipality about Gujarati Poet Kavi DalapatRaam DahyaaBhaai.

Glasgow Airport

By chance, it so happened that the day I reached Glasgow, capital of Scotland, it happened to be Birthday of British (Scottish) poet Robert Burn. As I was alighting from flight, every passenger was greeted by a pleasant official and each were presented with 1- a well-bound book containing collection of poems by Burn 2- celebration program schedules at various locations in city on that day. 3- Pamphlets from restaurants that offered celebratory dinner with poet’s favorite dish, haggis. 4- Small bottle of scotch. Scotland is proud of her son, who had died nearly 250 years ago and whose poems evoke Scottish nationalism.

Certainly worthy of copying similar thing in our country with our heroes.

(As for haggis, I being a vegetarian did not taste that dish however my friends and others to who I spoke, told me that it is not a tasteful dish and no one likes it and yet no one missed the tradition of cooking/eating that dish on Burn’s b’day. It speaks volumes of their pride in their poet. (Haggis is an old-fashioned almost tasteless dish of boiled beef)

 

Wadhawan City

My ancestral home town is Wadhawan city. A great poet, DalapatRaam DahyaaBhaai Kavi was born here in 1877. Hardly any Gujarati would have missed his poems during their childhood. However, until recently, hardly any knew in the city that their city had produced such a great man. There was no square, no road, nothing named after him. Nothing to remind people of their great heritage. During my one-day-visit to my home town about a decade ago, when I was on an annual vacation from my overseas job, I went to the office of the municipality. However,as it was past office hours, it was already closed. I had a very little time before my flight back. Hence, I decided to go direct to the home of the chief. She was a BJP corporator. I was surprised, she looked an ordinary looking lady. She invited me in her home and listened to my suggestion. Upon reaching my home overseas, I wrote a letter thanking her and repeating my view, ‘do something for great son of our town, give pride to the people of their heritage’. I was not expecting much, however, I was glad to see that they did act upon suggestion and named a new garden, very next to my old primary school, after my favorite poet’s name.

I recall this experience very fondly, although, I forget the name of that corporator, who, I was told,  was chief of the municipality.

 

State boundaries and sizes need reorganization

State boundaries and sizes need reorganization.

Food for thought: Goa is a small state. For better viability, it should be expanded taking Goan-influenced areas of Maharashtra and Karnataka.

Wonder why central Government should be burdened with administration of any territory and maintain staff for it. All UTs can be merged with nearby states and center can breath easy.

For example, Dadara-Nagar Haveli-Diu serve no useful purpose as UT. They should be merged with Gujarat for better administration and streamlining civic facilities, revenue records etc and solving inter-state boundary issues

Field-Trips of school children to utility companies for better understanding of civic amenities and showcasing efforts of govt.

 

School children field trips are organized with many objectives from time to time. The place where field trips should consider that an opportunity to showcase and foster values. For example, on a field trip to water works department for pre-school children on 21 May 2014, the department had distributed this small pouch of approx. 5x8 cm paper pouch. This pouch had following message on it and it contained some seeds of flowering plants that children could plant at home.