No incident in recent Indian history has gained the notoriety of being politicized and led to unabated religious bashing like the Enrica Lexie shoot out. A close watch at the developments since the shooting raises concern as to whether the Italian marines are being tried according to the law of the land or the emotional outburst of dangerous fundamentalists on the prowl? The consistent outbursts by the fundamentalists have even influenced the impartial majority to take a partial stand. It is the Italian involvement that matters.  Even though the killers who brutually murdered  thousands of people in Gujarat and Odisha walk scot free, why this added excitement and concern over this incident? Should we hand over punishment if and only if the murderers are foreigners?

The central government and the state government in Kerala have asserted themselves and has never shown any indication of buckling under diplomatic pressure. Thus the accusations expected against the ‘Italian’ Sonia Gandhi were forced to the back burner.  Now the focus is on Indian Catholics. The Indian Catholics are specifically targeted over the comments of Cardinal George Alecherry on the shootout.  The men behind the show have been successful in trending #Cardinalsin on twitter.

The extremist right wing fundamentalist from long have been raising hue and cry over the connection the Church has with Vatican. Making full use of the situation, they are trying hard to establish and prove that Catholics are anti Indian! The way the whole issue of the Cardinals comments got publicized over the internet especially in social networking sites underlines this fact. Armed with the misquoted comments of Caridnal Alencherry that accused him of showing allegiance of Italy, there has been a series of comments doing the rounds online, seriously questioning the patriotism of the Catholics in India like: “Two ‘Christian’ Indian fishermen shot dead. But Catholic Church stands for Italian ‘Christians’!”

Analyzing the above tweet reveals dangerous motives behind the whole episode. Rather than using ‘Two Fishermen killed’ the qualified with the terms, Indian and Christian.  These qualifications are compared with the Christian Marines charged with murder. On reading this tweet along with the Cardinal’s misquoted statements on the alleged help which he promised to Italians, the conclusion which any dick and hardy can draw from this tweet is that, Indian Catholics owe their allegiance to Italy and not India! This then substantiate the call of Hindutva outfits to make an Indian Church severing ties with Vatican.

Anyone who have browsed through history will be aware of the fact that the head of Catholics, the Pope resides in Vatican, the smallest country in the world and not in Italy! The Italian government has nothing to do with the Catholics in India. Pope is the head of Vatican. The allegiance of Catholics in India to Vatican is not political but spiritual.

Cardinal Alencherry has denied making the controversial statements regarding calling the ‘Catholic minsters in Kerala. But the context in which Cardinal Alencherry made the statements prove that there was nothing unnatural or anti Indianness associated with it. It was the Italian Press agency Fides, which quizzed him on the shootout. His expressed his intention not to precipitate the matter. This statement has to be taken in context of the anti western feelings handed over from the colonial era and still lingers on in our minds.  He was clarifying and resolving the issue peacefully. He had not told that they will be left scot free! Going by the outburst of fundamentalists and also the communists who have joined in to take a dig at cardinal, his response should have been ‘The Marines killed our men and we will finish them off too! This would have made these guys happy.

Take a situation where an Indian is caught in Germany for shooting. If a German cardinal visits his place, how should his response be? Should he be harsh? A rather positive comment regarding the fate of the Indian would really comfort us. This is what exactly Cardinal George Alencherry has done. He has neither told anything against the country nor has he promised to bring them out through backdoor talks.

The Indian Catholics does not have Senas or Sanghs to unleash terror nor have planned out strategies to conquer online medium and spread hatred. The silent services that the Catholics render to this nation speak for itself. India is the motherland of the Indian Catholics and this in no way comes as a hindrance to the spiritual relation that we maintain with the Pope in Vatican. The Indian Catholics will never buckle down to malicious intention and pressure of right wing fundamentalist and communists. The Catholics in India doesn’t need the measuring scale of any organization to assess their patriotism.

(The author is on twitter as @jeffshawn)

Took a deep breath

Set my face straight

Gather all my strength

Sorrow will have to wait

Requiem for my heart

Singing in the dark

Love at the tip of dart

Burning without a spark

Eyes gone dry

Seeing bad dreams

Pillows watery

Echoing screams

Lost in clarity

Clear fogginess

Individuality

Blinded in darkness

People don’t see

The window bleeds

Onlookers’ glee

As the heart pleads

Curtains down

No number to dial

All that’s shown

Upside-down smile

Sex toys are still a difficult topic in many South Asian countries. In India they’re often sold as massage products because officially they’re banned. Even though the demand on black markets across the region is high, a law change is nowhere near in sight. But across the border in Nepal, the authorities have shown a much more progressive attitude towards the positive effects of sex toys.

“When new customers come here the first thing they ask us is ‘Is this legal?’ When we show our licence they are relieved to find out that it’s legal what they are doing,” says Manish Paudel, the owner of the first shop for sex toys in Nepal.

Paudel’s shop Sweet Secret is located on one of Kathmandu’s busiest streets, but the entry is discretely tucked away in a corner ally. That was one of the criteria the government office set for Paudel before he could open his shop. Though legal in Nepal, his products cannot be openly displayed.

To Paudel this limitation is not an issue. With a steadily growing client base, his shop has become so successful that he’s opening three more branches across Nepal in the coming months.

Promoting safe sex
Sweet Secret provides a wide range of imported products, from dildos and colourful vibrators to blow-up dolls. But most customers that come here are not looking for the more ‘kinky’ toys. It’s the basic condoms that sell the best.

“Condoms are slowly becoming widely available in supermarkets all over the country. But people still feel uncomfortable buying from there. Here they feel like we have seen it all,” says Paudel, who started his career distributing condoms and promoting safe sex in Nepal’s rural areas.

“Because of my long career promoting safe sex as an NGO worker in Nepal it was easier for me to convince the authorities of the health care reasons behind opening this shop.”

Paudel says a lot of his customers are infected with an STD and are looking for safer ways to enjoy themselves. By using sex toys they are not spreading the disease.

Nepalis are becoming increasingly aware of safe sexual behaviour, a report by the National Centre for AIDS and STD Control in Nepal recently confirmed. In 2011 the number of HIV infections and active Syphilis cases stabilized.

Questions
Co-owner of Sweet Secret, Prabin Dhakal, says he tries his best to boost his customer’s morale when they come to him with questions. Sex education in Nepal leaves much to be desired, he says.

“There are men who come in here with the question if a blow-up doll feels the same as a real woman. Of course it’s plastic – our toys are only a substitute, not the real thing!”

To address the many questions they get from the often shy Nepalese as effectively as possible, there is an online question desk on the shop’s website. The owners say they receive about 200 questions a day via this service.

“We take the time to answer all these questions. We have now invited a doctor to come to the shop once a week, so our customers can consult him before buying our products,” Dhakal explains.

Sweet secret
Nepal’s sweet secret is slowly becoming a topic of public discussion, with more sex shops opening around the country. Nepali men who go abroad to work now pick up toys for their wives before they leave. And who knows, they might be taking Nepal’s changing morals with them across South Asia’s borders.

You’ve probably heard that math is the language of science, or the language of Nature is mathematics. Well, it’s true. The more we understand the universe, the more we discover its mathematical connections. Flowers have spirals that line up with a special sequence of numbers (called Fibonacci numbers) that you can understand and generate yourself. Seashells form in perfect mathematical curves (logarithmic spirals) that come
from a chemical balance. Star clusters tug on one another in a mathematical dance that we can observe and understand from
millions and even billions of kilometers away.

Quick Tricks: Easy (and Impressive) Calculations

INSTANT MULTIPLICATION

Consider the problem:

32
x 11
To solve this problem, simply add the digits, 3  2  5
, put
the 5 between the 3 and the 2, and there is your answer: 35
2

What could be easier? Now you try:
53 x
11
Since 5  3  8, your answer is simply
583

Now before you get too excited, I have shown you only half of what you need to know. Suppose the problem is
85
 x 11
Although 8  5  1
3
, the answer is NOT 81
3
5!
As before, the 3
goes in between the numbers, but the 1
needs to be added to the 8 to get the correct answer: 93
5

“Can we use this method for multiplying three-digit numbers
(or larger) by eleven?” Absolutely. For instance, for the problem 314
11, the answer still begins with 3 and ends with 4. Since 3  1  4
, and
1  4  5
, the answer is 34
5
4.

Please Stay Tuned For More Interesting Tricks

charles.augustine@gmail.com

It all began with the Times of India’s Chennai specific ad that called on the Chennaites to shun the news paper (The Hindu) that puts them to sleep and ‘wake up’ to times of India.

The grand old Hindu was struck by the innovative advertising tactics of the young Times of India. But they say wisdom outsmarts knowledge. What followed was a series of advertisements from The Hindu doing irreparable damage to the Times of India with the tag line ‘Stay ahead of Times’!. If ToI ad was chennai specific, the Hindu ad went beyond the boundaries and has an all India effect. This is how The Hindu retaliated:

Followed by:

Then came:

The Print ads too were sharp and specific:

This is how Times of India Responded!

(The author is on twitter as
@jeffshawn)

Some big day indeed! I can see
The big red building colorfully alight,
Dotted with Sahibs and Memsahibs in white.
They step down from plush, sleek white cars
To velvet green, red carpet with charm.
I see, I see them, they unseeing,
Men in white but men in dark.

How different it looks out there,
Colorful but in stark contrast
To where I stand; I son of none,
I am, I was forever………here
The black-market mongrel; austere
This place, I call………….my home
Where I design my thoughtful poem.

Together as white, as brown and grey.
They shout I hear a soul-less sound-
The “Vande Mataram,Vande Mataram” rounds.
Pathetic, I pity their perilous ways
Weighed down by heavy pockets, I say.
Cuffed by chains of ‘I’, ‘Me’ and ‘Mine’.
How can they have straightened spines?

Come again, heroes to Rama’s abode
And see how white-washed it looks.
They are all united now, all together-
Fair, dark, olive, sun burnt, all forever.
They now here celebrate celebrities
But name it now “Celebrating Diversity”.

Never  still, never quiet,

As unpredictable as silent night,

One moment, needless to say,

Can tune, alter your beat away.

Loving one, then another,

Only constant, for dad and mother.

Sometimes death, at times life you desire,

Sometimes tears like rain, or wrath like fire.

There are times when you disappear,

And times when I feel you’re close, my dear.

I’ve never been without you,

Without you have I never been true,

But every time you change colour,

Love loses all its splendour.

Why, oh why, have you be to change,

Give me feeling and needs so strange?

Loving one, then another,

Only constant, for dad and mother.

Cry out loud, for need of solace,

Bleed alone, pay your own malice.

Someday, you’ll see, you’re going to die,

Some corner, you’ll rot, for every lie.

Hasn’t your thirst satisfied?

Hasn’t your wickedness, died inside?

Why do you change faster than season?

Why do you want, hatred and treason?

It’ll all perish, all of you and your skew,

One day, when this knife pierces through.

Oh chameleon heart, pure inside,

Have you forgotten, the last time you cried?

He closed his eyes
She opened hers
His head filled with cries
Memories hurt her like curse
She was all he needed
He always made her smile
But now his heart, bleeded
She had missed him, now a while
His love, it was taken
Her heart only just realised
He wished never to awaken
His number, she tried and tried

He heard the phone, ringing
She stood at the end, praying
His hand moved up, gun held tight
She had to go now, it was close to night
Sweat trickled, down his forehead
She ran, out her house to his
For one last wish, he prayed
She looked for a sign in the darkness
He wanted to be with her
She wanted to be with him

He pulled trigger till he heard sound
She ran blinded, in love and tear
He felt his head hit ground
She sensed his pain and fear
His vision blurred, blood draint
She opened the door, to see him dying
He saw a blur, familiar, faint
She ran to him, crying
He heard her voice, heard her say
She told him, over and over, “I love you”
He smiled as his breath was taken away
She begged for his life, through and through
He died at the arms of love
She looked at the love she let go of
His wish, it did not disappoint
But she’d lost her love, her love at gunpoint.

The school admissions are in full swing across India. School managements are leaving no stones unturned to woo students. An allegation against the school during this crucial time of admission would do irreparable damage to the reputation of the school. The rival schools cashes in on the opportunity by ‘buying’ a particular  reporter/s ensuring  the maximum possible damage.  In this context, the sexual allegation against Dr. Paul Francis Meekin, the principal of the Trio World School, Bangalore must be analysed with suspicion regarding the real motives behind this expose.

I strongly stand for maximum punishment of the principal if found guilty. Till then, media has no right to pronounce judgment and dedicate exclusive pages discussing sexual abuse of children. The Deccan Chronicle dated 24 January 2012 carried a front page main headline that read, “Headmaster who preyed on kids?” It carries sharp criticism by Nina P. Nayak, chairperson of the Karnataka Child Rights Commission who spoke ‘exclusively’ to Deccan Chronicle. The title “School Sat on Four Complaints” also is added below the main headline. The story doesn’t end with front page, the second page is dedicated exclusively to discuss the child abuse issue in detail.  The focus headlines are interesting, “Our Children in monsters’ shadow”,” Parents need to watch out for signs”, “Children need to be assertive” followed by excrepts from the principals facebook profile and the press statement of the management of Trio World School.

While the other news papers limited themselves to reporting the issue, Deccan Chronicle has gone a step ahead in analyzing the issue of sexual abuse of Children as if it was the supreme authority in judging an issue. There is something fishy in this whole affair. The reasons are:

1. The timing of the allegation

According to Deccan Herald four parents have come up with complaints or their complaints were un answered. Why have they waited till January? It is impossible for any school or institution to satisfy the over demanding parents. Most parents make full use of an occasion like this to vent the ire against the school management.  Did this happen here too?

1. The exclusive reporting by certain news papers

There was an allegation. Why jump the gun when allegations are not proved. Check out the DNA report. They have reported the fact whereas Deccan Herald has made it an occasion to celebrate by the discussion on Child abuse.

1. The sex factor

Anything related to sex sells anywhere in the world. The Deccan Chronicle has cashed in on that to give the detailed analysis. In the mad race to increase readership, reputation of the institution and person s doesn’t matter.

1. The allegation itself

The Telegraph reports that “The parents complained that the teacher had used AN INAPPORIATE WORD”. The other allegation as reported in Deccan Chronicle includes, “beat children on their bottoms and allegedly misbehaved with them.” Should a principal be crucified for AN inappropriate word? Can someone guarantee that those children with whom the principal allegedly misbehaved are well disciplined students?

In a country where what is printed and broadcasted is considered by the general public as true, media has the responsibility to limit themselves to reporting. It is inappropriate to go overboard with the issue and pronounce judgment when it has been only ‘alleged’, damaging the reputation of the person and institution.

(The author is on twitters as @jeffshawn)