World can follow Indian tradition of dialogue and tolerance

“World can follow Indian tradition of dialogue and tolerance”—Mark Tully By Pramod Kumar India has an established tradition of ‘dialogue’ and the Indian society will have to re-learn the tradition itself so that it can become an exemplary society for the world to follow,” said the famous journalist and columnist Shri Mark Tully while delivering the third Chamanlal Memorial Lecture on What India can Teach the West in New Delhi on March 25. more >

Think it Over Judeo-Christian history: A mini sketchBy M.S.N. MenonHalf the humanity is guided by revelations. The rest, by logic and reasoning. One by blind faith, the other by reasoned faith. All gods began as tribal deities. Yahweh was no exception. He was the warrior God of the Jews (Jehovah to Christians.) He drank human blood! But, over the years, he gave up blood, gave up killing and became an advocate of ahimsa (non-violence). Remarkable transformation? Yes. more >

Islam and iconoclasm By N. Kunju IN the cartoon controversy regarding the publication of Prophet Mohammed’s caricature by the Danish journal Jyllands-Posten, the charge against the cartoonist was that his drawing was a vulgar representation of the Prophet. This is a half-truth. The objection actually is not to vulgar representation, but any type of representation that is prohibited in Islam. more >

The Moving Finger Writes The Muslims should shun violence By M.V. Kamath What on earth is the matter with Muslims in the Indian sub-continent? And when one speaks of the sub-continent one includes under that rubric all three countries, India, Pakistan and Bangladesh. One had hoped that once Pakistan was conceded, Muslim who decided to stay on India would learn to live in peace with the non-Muslims majority. more >

Column Minorityism: UPA brand equity By Shyam Khosla Fundamentalist Muslims have come to believe that they can blackmail the country on all issues - whether domestic or foreign - because of the pseudo-secularists’ craven surrender before them. The insatiable hunger for Muslim votes the Congress, the Communist parties and other practitioners of the vote bank politics make them do things that are either unconstitutional or against national interests or both. more >

Readers´ Forum Intellectual terrorism: The way Romila Thapar and Michael Witzel have criticised the proposal of California State Board of Education (CSBE) to teach Rama, Krishna, the Ramayana and the Mahabharata in textbooks, in an article published in a Delhi-based English daily, reveals the anti-Hindutva attitude of the two careerists. more > Organiser Home Vol. LVII, No. 39, New Delhi, April 09, 2006