मातृ देवो भव ...Once again

With all the recent well deserved hype around the issue of rapes in our country, I went back to read a post(मातृ देवो भव) of mine from 3 years ago. I realized that my anger is unabated, and my ideas are unchanged. It is true that we need tougher laws and more responsible law-enforcers. But, what about us? What about the disease in the minds of these men of my country? What sort of hell breeds such base monstrous evil in human minds? For the women's sake we need tough laws, but for the men, is there any hope? Can the evil in their minds be cured?

Education is undoubtedly a pillar of progressive thought, but there is evidently a missing component of moral upbringing. I am curious to know what section of  society these offenders come from, what sort of family setting they grew up in, and their childhood experiences. This statistic will be useful ,not as a political agenda of discrimination, but to analyze and possibly chart a method for improved morality.

As a developing country, we concern ourselves with improved quality of life, higher literacy, and a higher number of college graduates (irrespective of whether the purpose of education is achieved), but in-spite of the very obvious decline in morality in all sections of the society, we neither hear nor ask for improving that. We can safely agree that growing up in a "good" family plays a big role in an individual's sense of right and wrong, but it is not just the fact  that the parents are righteous people, it is the importance they gave to moral and spiritual education. I have said before in other posts, and I only grow more convinced of it, there is no hope for us as a nation when we insist on turning our backs on the importance of moral and spiritual development that is inherent to our nature.

As more and more NGOs are reaching out to the economically backward sections of our society, and taking modern education to their doorstep, I pray that there is some emphasis on moral education as well. It can be done without obeisance to any particular religion, Jataka tales can be as instructive as stories from the Ramayan.

Our laws and policies must be geared towards an ideal society, where evil is not contained, but eradicated; where men and women live with mutual respect; where all cravings of the mind and heart lose to our love for mankind. 

HA- I am not Alone in my Insanity

Some people who read my precious article Will India Be Great Again? have found my ideas too archaic/ radical, or too negative and condescending in the context of India now largely being built on imitations. Today, I stumbled upon this article by Koenrad Elst, and it gave me goosebumps to read a whole exposition on what I had merely stated in four lines. Well, if I am wrong, atleast I am in intellectual and scholarly company.

The notable difference though is that he has specifically made his criticisms against Hindus  while I wrote a generalized "we". However, in the context of my article it is the same. In the glorious era that I talked about, we were almost a completely Hindu nation, and still populate 80% of this country.

Please do read it, and please give it consideration, before rejecting it out rightly..

Hindu Survival - Koenrad Elst

Will India be Great Again?

Will India ever regain her past glory is a question lot of Indians ask longingly? What have we done though to regain her greatness? Why were we great a few thousand years ago? When and where did this degeneration start? In that age when we were truly great; morally, intellectually spiritually there were few counterparts. This is not a statement made out of my blind patriotism; history, art, architecture and immense volumes of literature are testimony to this fact. I consider it very significant that all of it was native to the land, her people and reflected her culture, and ideas. The essence was of contentment, of pride in our own beliefs, and ideas. We never shirked away from expressing who we were, be it in art at Khajuraho, or harsh vedic rites. No matter how distasteful or pointless some of it may seem today to the new age.

Can we say the same for ourselves today? We have foregone everything inherent to our innermost natures, indeed we are actually ashamed of it. We have tried to imitate the west in everything that we do. Our architecture is not original, our literature follows plot patterns from the west, our movies are cheap imitations of other tinsel-towns across the globe, and our own traditional clothes are as novel to us as they are to foreigners. Even Tagore and Satyajit Ray are artists from history's back pages, to be read about and admired, but not to be emulated. This is the glorious new Shining India, engaged in a complete transformation based on imitations. Imitations of countries that have about a 100 years of history to testify their greatness. Greatness only visible through economic splendor, no hallmarks of contentment.

If we are successful in our endeavor, we will be great in that sense too. But, we will never be as great, because we will still be just that...an imitation, even if a good one. But to answer the first question that was posed, no, we will never be great again if we continue on this route. Because, I do not believe we will be successful in our endeavor of imitation. No matter how hard we try and pretend that our way of life is repulsive, and that there is need for complete upheaval, we have not been able to put our hearts and souls into it. The society still reeks of unforgotten past,  some grudging pride, and some meaningless devotion to other lingering attributes. We have to fully let go to manufacture a good imitation.

Or we can let go of this charade, acknowledge our strengths, weaknesses, all of them, and start afresh building a new civilization that is original and realistic. I think in that path, there is a hope for greatness.

What is Wrong with the World Today

      If you start out thinking in your mind that the answer to the above question is "nothing", then this post is obviously not aimed at you, for you have through great austerities reached a mental equilibrium where no external forces can disturb your peace, or have been simply to lucky to have been unexposed to sorrow or to have been blind to social injustice. However, I, as a commoner wonder what other people think is wrong with the world today, and whether their answers will go on to prove my own theories.

    To state the answer simply, people have no principles anymore. We have forgotten what principles actually mean, and people who exert strong opinions on the claims of uncompromising principles are just deluded in self created blur over principles and pleasures. Let me first present my case to people who do actually believe that there has to be some reason or rhyme to this existence of ours, albeit incomprehensible. I shall pose a few questions towards the end of  this blog to those who believe otherwise.

      When we set our "principles", what do they really achieve? "Good" people are principled in that they do not steal, or lie, or break the law. So far, so good. But, why do we believe that these qualities comprise good principles? Because, they help us to be better people, and we presumably care about becoming better people because we are not endowed with intelligence and wisdom, and put onto this Earth simply to lead depraved and indolent lives. But, today's society is far more complex than it was 4000 years ago, when these simple virtues were substantial to define a man's character, and by extension, the society's character. Today, we seem to have formulated and unquestioningly accepted a new standard for principles which no longer seek to improve our personal integrity, character, or contribute in anyway to making this life of ours more meaningful or at least move towards something that could hope to make this life more meaningful. These "principles" now address the need to be more economically, and socially powerful. For example, many "good" people believe and accept that social drinking is not only acceptable, but necessary because it is rude not to do so in a gathering and might hurt our status among our peers and colleagues, thereby affecting our chances to move up the fabled corporate ladders. Some argue that this is morally no different from adopting the prescribed dress code at work or in society even when this was not our preferred choice of attire. Unfortunately this only reinforces my understanding that we have completely blurred out the meaning of "principles". 

      I see no need to quote any scripture of any religion to exert that stealing and lying are despicable traits. For as long as history can remember, humans across continents and over thousands of years have expostulated through laws and religions that these are unfavorable and punishable traits. This is a self- realized truth, or in mathematical terms, a Law of human nature.

    Back to my example, we have to work, because we need to clothe and feed ourselves to live in this world.  It is an inevitable need of existence. Compromising something as superficial as a choice of clothing only to follow a work-code is a compromise of one's pleasure in order to facilitate one's basic function for an existence in the physical world. However, drinking is a matter of pleasure, and in some hypocritical cases only to elevate oneself in the workforce by appearing contemporary. Drinking is however slow poison to our bodies, quick death to our minds and cobweb over the brain. (Being drunk is an extreme situation not relevant to me. One does not need to be drunk in order to diminish these faculties; three sips are enough to initiate the process). All three faculties in that order are essential to us in understanding and moving towards a more meaningful existence. I urge my reader to understand that my issue here is not with people's drinking habits, but it has been used as an example to show how our principles in general are not concerned with making us into more moral or duty-bound people. When people deny the relevance of any act in impeding this progress, they testify my statement that people have no principles. When people justify the necessity of an act in the context of economic and social progress, they have blurred the lines between principles and pleasures, as defined in the preceding paragraph.

  Let me now redefine good people as those who are committed to the progress of man’s very existence, not single-mindedly involved in mundane idiosyncrasies.  The issue of drinking is only one tip of many icebergs. If we assess the relevance and necessity of every single act of our lives, we will be forced to conclude that a majority of them are in pursuit of pleasures. In other words, society as a whole is increasingly moving away from a path of inherent progress. With this as the fundamental nature of today’s society, we have no right to expect anything other than the sorrows and anomalies we perceive around us. 

     For those who do not believe that life has any greater purpose other than the attainment of self established goals and the “pursuit of happiness”, why do you believe that it is only your goals and your pursuit of happiness that has been sanctioned? Why is the thief down the alley not allowed to pursue his own happiness and his own fancies? What is the need for the law and order in our society, if there was no meaning to being good or being bad? Acting according to one’s own conscience seems to be the general laughable norm of this age; (I wonder what defines conscience and who defines it) if this is the right way of living, why is there so much suffering and unhappiness among conscientious people? Conscience should not be defined as a product of any scriptures or religious texts, for it is unscientific to reject their rhetoric on purpose of one's life but accept the means to achieve that very purpose. This only creates a paradoxical situation inducing one to redefine portions of "prescribed right way of life" according to one's own convenience. If conscience was another self-evident "Law of human nature", no two people should disagree on what is right and what is wrong. On the contrary, no two people completely agree on every single right and wrong in this world. The problem with conscience is that it is an exceptionally relative term, and as of today, there are 6 billion frames of reference for conscience, with a different value in each frame of reference. How can this then be an acceptable universal value of life?

      This is what is wrong with the world today: a mangled understanding of principles, and self-placating desire to act according to one’s own conscience instead of evaluating our progress towards making every individual life count for their time on this planet.

                       

The Trap for Corruption

This is a first hand story of my friend who was narrating his experience with the customs officer at the Hyderabad airport on his recent visit to India.

 Image copyright@www.tisrilanka.org

My friend had two laptops with him. One was a gift to someone and one was his personal computer. The rules on this are slightly ambiguous. The general understanding is that as long as you can prove that only one is a gift, it is ok. Anyway, the customs officer refused entry to my friend and demanded a customs fine of $300. When my friend realized that the officer was not going to accept his interpretation of the rules, he gave up, and this was the conversation that followed.

Friend: Ok, Sir. I'll pay the fine. Where should I pay it?
Officer: You can pay here in cash.
Friend: I will need a receipt.
Officer: You can pay 250 here, no receipt.
Friend: I will pay, but I need a receipt.
Officer: Sir, please pay 200 and go! The office is closed. You will not get a receipt.
Friend (Looking all around him): Why is office closed when there are so many international flights landed in the last hour. I just want to pay, get a receipt and go home! I am tired and jet lagged....
Officer (Now extremely impatient) : Pay 100 dollars here or wait until tomorrow morning.

My friend paid and left. Although he got away with reducing the bribe to 1/3rd its value, he wasn't very pleased with the whole affair. I however think that this was a wonderful way of atleast not letting that man get what he wanted so easily. If more people are as conscientious in any place they are asked for a bribe, we can go a long way in reducing this evil.

Response to Comments on Previous Post

This is in response to many comments I got(not just the ones who were good enough sports to share their views openly)on my last blog. For the record, I would like to note that so far I have more approvals. This is heartening for I could have wept otherwise.

Firstly, that blog was not a personal attack on anyone. I am too out of touch with all your lives to know or care how you live. So there is no need to get offended . Just like you claim your right to break a few more links in the society to which I also have a right, I have my right to express my opinion and hope a fool's hope to keep people like me from being extinct. I cannot always tone it moderate to appease my readers.

Secondly, I donot care a cent about how you live, I want you to care about how you live. There is a difference, and you need to understand that.

Thirdly, do read and post comments only if you care to go through the whole thing and respond with an open mind. I am not here to preach to anyone, but just to influence atleast 1 reader. If you have already made up your mind, go no further and continue your blissful existence.On the other hand, if you too hope to change my mind, then read on!

This particular post is not a debate between love and arranged marriages, I might like to take that up on some other day, but not here. It is about being in a relationship and being married/ with intentions to get married or being in a relationship and deliberately choosing to be unmarried.

I shall reiterate that if one spends enough time understanding how any culture evolved and degrades, one will have to figure the family system in the equation. Are people disagreeing with me of the opinion that our mothers lead a worthless life. Did they make all those sacrifices for us ,encouraging us to be what we are proud of being today just so we can stand on our "independent" feet and claim that they added no value to the society. So if they too had been selfish and had thought only about themselves, I gather our world would have been a better place to live in. For believe me, maybe the next generation will not see the impact of this shortsightedness, but a few generations down will..that too only if they are lucky enough to realize their loss.

OK, I understand when people say they donot want the hassle of a marriage, the whole big package, the responsibilities and the commitments, and that they are not ready for it. I DONOT have an objection to not getting married. That is indeed one's personal choice. But I have an objection to spreading the epidemic of a mindless and meaningless existence in the same society where I have a part, and my children will too. If one doesnot want to perform their dharma, then one should atleast have a damn good excuse up their sleeve for their time on this Earth. Be it Mother Teresa style or Isaac Newton style or Mirabai style.

I currently reside in a country where this started spreading maybe about two generations back. Not all people I know approve of this, but they already do not even have a choice. Some of their parents and grandparents lived without the concept of a family. One person I know was at his work all day instead of at the funeral when his sister died, because he said he was not close to her. That is all very well, but look at his life and grapple a meaning out of it. He makes loads of money, he does not have any ties that he can be sure will not break, so he tries to lead his life for himself because only that is permanent for him. I pity him and many others like him. I cannot even blame him, for he did not have the choice that our generation is faced with today. What, may I ask is the purpose of this purely materialistic and carnal way of life? We might as well be born animals, if we cannot do something better with our intellect.

No matter which type of lifestyle one chooses, there should be a constant aim to transcend from one mental plane to the other. Random wandering without any bearing of where you are going is futile. I am not talking about this body, but one's soul..for it has a much longer journey , the length of it depending on how much time one aims to waste without any progress in mental level. Acknowledging that is the very first step. Acknowledging a futile existence is better than simply living through it. One needs to look at the bigger picture.

One person actually said that staying married to one single person is no longer a viable option because of globalization and our mobile careers, and claims that this is better than repeatedly obtaining divorces. Any comment I make here on this statement will be inappropriate in my blog.

One person says we are mature enough to not be influenced by others. I am afraid we over estimate our race, and there is a lot of rot involved in the statement (Sorry for the rudeness, but so were you). Because wherever I look in the world, people are influenced by something or someone and there is this mad craving to "fit-in". If history shows anything, it is that people are easily influenced. Why, history itself is written by the most influential piece of write-up.What is easy becomes popular, and what  is popular becomes an accepted norm of life. One's political knowledge is limited by what the media presents to us. Our consumer knowledge is limited to what the advertisements present to us. One cannot buy a simple product or good without reading/ obtaining a 100 other reviews and suggestions. One would not go to a business meeting in summer in cotton T-shirts and shorts just because it makes sense. We do it, because we have to follow the norms at some places. One will not wear a dress if the whole world says it makes them look ugly. If the human race is indeed above such dependence, why is there a furor every time somebody influential makes an inappropriate remark. He/ she is accused of causing discord among people. Why care if Raj Thackrey makes insane remarks, the human race is above all that, isn't it? Why does not someone tell S.Tendulkar that he is wasting his time and efforts in setting an example, for people cannot be influenced. Most of today's adolescent and youth problems ranging from drinking to anorexia are a product of peer influence. If indeed people cannot be influenced, there would not have been a Hitler, a Gandhi or a Karl Marx. The human race thrives on influence.

There is no "right or wrong" in this situation: Wrong period

When one is faced with two options in life, the easier one is most likely the wrong one. One who cannot stay married to one person, will find the option of not mating with anyone harder I suppose.

I cannot force anyone to my views, and I would not grab hold of some one and give a lecture, for I have no wish to preach like I said. Someday, maybe this will be a part of the digital remains, and  someone might atleast realize their loss and what might have been.. This is not aimed at any individual, so please tone down your comments.But I wish I too had the right to live the way I like and bring up my children the way I like but that becomes more and more impossible when we live not in seclusion.

A Right to Live, Not Live-In

The Supreme Court has done away with the need to use the term “illicit relationship”, and to satisfy whom this time? I cannot believe that a purely immoral and illogical behavior can now be justified as a fundamental right. I am not afraid of social censure here to suit “modernists”.

Our whole society and culture has been built over 1000’s of years with certain basic building blocks. There is no doubt that the concept of morality has been waning exponentially, but that is no reason to make a wrong-doing legal in order to artificially free people’s mind of any guilt, or to encourage it as acceptable.

Indian culture and society has been built on the family-system as the foundation and to take that away ensures the demise of our only stronghold in this world. One needs to reflect on his/ her life and acknowledge that the strongest impacts on their character and way of living come from the ones closest in blood. It is the way our parents have lived that sets an unattainable example to us. It is the attempt to ape an elder sibling’s virtues that salvages a younger one, and the elder’s knowledge of this fact and hence the need to remain an example that provides a balance to this tightrope act in life. Of course in later years, friends play a large impact, but for most of us, the ability to distinguish right from wrong has already been deeply ingrained. But, even the spirit of independent thought never really came independently.

Making live-in relationships a right is just modernistic trash and perhaps the most short-sighted constitutional right ever. The repercussions of this are enormous and I mean it in a bad way. If two people are in love, what is to stop them from getting married? It is the fear of commitment, and responsibilities. With any kind of sustainable happiness, comes along a certain amount of responsibility. One cannot turn their backs on their duty towards their families and the society. It sounds alright to say that people have a right to live their lives the way they want to. I cannot but disagree. If one’s actions bear an impact on people around, they need to be conscious of the right way of life. Every society is a dynamic, intricately complicated and inter-linked mechanism. People learn their virtues and tolerance for virtues by accepted norms among others in their line of sight. Perhaps, in today’s generation, there are still a lot of people who can relate to what I am saying. But the moment we are forced to turn a blind eye towards this sort of rampant immorality, we endanger the coming generations. Love, trust and responsibilities can give society a foundation, not lust. A hundred years from today, we will have nothing original in our country to boast of, no identity. A few hundred years later, we shall have nothing more than digital remains to show for ourselves.

No doubt, one has a right to live his life, but only to live it responsibly.

Please read next blog for possible rebuttals to your arguments. Thanks!

Omnipresent Irksome Human Flies

This post comes out in an hour of frustration but this recent incident in my life only re-emphasizes my dislike of people of a certain kind and my dislike at the fact that the world is full of such people. I know hate is a very strong word, but I hate it when people have no respect for another person's time and efforts. I know for a fact that most people do not think it is a big deal to tell a friend that they will meet him/ her at a particular time and come 20 minutes/ half an hour/ one hour late without a moral justification. The only thing they could say is that they never thought it to be a big deal. Its just a meeting with a friend and not an interview for a job. I HATE THAT ATTITUDE. My time is more valuable than sitting in a coffee shop or standing in a bus stop looking at my watch. You might have nothing better to do..but I most certainly do!
Now that that is out of my system, I will come to the incident that makes me disbelieve that there are a lot of fair minded people in this world whose thoughts and responses take into account people other than themselves.
I have been looking to move out into a 2 bedroom apartment (living alone until now) for various personal reasons. I have been looking for room mates for almost two months now. I stoppped when this seemingly nice girl agreed and it did not looklike we were going to have major unaccepatble differences. I was willing to look for an apartment with her, but she made excuses (at the time I thought they were genuine) about not having enough time to spare, and when she did she made not just me but my mother wait for her for 40 minutes as well (No respect for time or for someone's age either!). Then she went on a two week vacation out of the country. Meanwhile I braved the texas heat, spent days and weekends looking for apartments, sending her pictures detail information, floor plans, making international calls...all because I did not want the apartment to be my own choice and make some one feel like they had no say in the matter.
She agreed to one apartment, I signed the application. Next day she wanted me to change the apartment to a different flloor in the same complex, I took timeoff work and went there to get that changed. Everything seemed to be going fine until she came back to Houston. She took a week to go see the apartment, she wanted me to go along (I waited half an hour for her in scorching heat although her commute was less than half of mine). She saw the original one and the one we got it changed too...she decided she likes the original one better..I sayd it was ok with me whatever she decided (Was I being too nice? ). She dilly dallied for quite a while and decided to keep things unchanged. I was relieved and I went home. I got a call the next day saying she had decided to continue the lease in her current apartment for a lot of personal reasons she had no wish to be vocal about! Awesome great!!!

I have invested a lot of fruitless time and effort for some one else too so far and have less than 5 days to find another room mate(extremely unlikely) and less than 10 days to find another apartment to move within 2/3 days after finding it (I also work rememeber?). And I am going to have to pay twice the amount I am currently paying in rent because Miss. Inconsiderate left me with no time for anything...Ok, I donot blame her for coming up with personal problems..after all they might be genuine. All I am asking is she atleast pay the penalty for her change of mind by bearing the deposit that I gave at this apartment complex..and we can still be friends...

Is that fair or what???? But, no..it so happens that Ms. Inconsiderate is also Ms.Amoral. She says she is just being professional about the whole deal and I am getting carried away by asking her to do what is only fair!!!
I am at her mercy because I was physically present here and made the payments? What if she was here and I had allowed her to make the deposits???
Oh hell!!! I hate this whole lot of people...if you are one such person too, then please do not incur a person's righteous curse by neglecting to do the right thing ...all for a paltry some of money. Please do not be late without reason no matter what the purpose of such a meeting is!

I do not have to curse her..my experience with life has taught me that nothing good you dont deserve never peranently stays with you..She thinks she is saving herself a couple of hundred dollars..haha, but I know she is going to lose it in some other form along the journey.

Eyes Wide Shut

Ram Sena- are they hypocrites or simply misguided fanatics? All their recent 'moral' policing has evoked a lot of outrage and indignation but in the midst of it all, I find that the crucial point is missed...by all parties. The whole 'Pink Chaddi' campaign reminds me of the hindi movie ' Asthithva' of which I whole heartedly disapproved.
The movie disgusted me because of the moral it was trying to preach and the justifications given by Tabu for her perfidy and the expected sympathies from the audience towards her. I could see a whole bunch of other reasons to feel sorry for her but not the one point which formed the crux of the movie. Her extra-marital one-night stand was preached to the world as a pardonable offense. The reason? Simply that a man is pardoned for the same indulgence. The point the movie failed to make was that the act itself is unacceptable irrespective of whether a man or a woman performs it. One cannot justify the morality behind any offense stating that someone else is being allowed to perform it.
Ram Sena as well as the ' Pink Chaddi' supporters are in my opinion manifestations of the same hypocricy and badly reasoned arguments. What is Ram Sena actually opposing? Drinking itself or just women drinking? The later is obviously a hypocritic cause while if it is the former I would still find them objectionable. My reservations are against their methods no matter what their beliefs are. Let them make speeches or print booklets or host TV shows to reach to people. I doubt if modern men and women will be swayed by any of this but what have the Ram Sena achieved anyway? They may have provoked fear but not reformation. As for my objection towards the 'Pink Chaddi' brigade...well, I have already explained why I found Tabu's arguments inappropriate. Each of those women who said their cause was 'women liberation' or 'equality of men and women' could have donated 20 or 30 Rs or the cost of a pink chaddi towards the education of a poor village girl than indulge in this immature and pointless response.

मातृ देवो भव

An unadmirable growth rate of 700 percent over the last 30 years... grown from 7 reported a day to 53 reported a day and growing...children and grown ups treated alike...villages,cities,everywhere...India's fastest growing crime.

Welcome to Incredible India, a glorious civilization degenerated; a land of integrity and culture, in posters and presentations,the land where values from time immemorial are still remembered, in books।It is the country whose earliest scriptures describe women as a divine race. Even by the rules of the detestable caste system, women were not allowed to lower their status.Today, even as women are expanding their presence into every field imaginable, they are being lowered to mere objects of play by the physically stronger human species.

My outrage has been fed by the lately regular reports of foreign women being raped and murdered in my country.The anger is not directed at the fact that the victims are foreigners, but that every woman, no matter the color of her skin has a right to walk anywhere on god given land without fearing for what is not her fault, and yet has to. The foreign victims have only brought the shocking statistics to light.The fuss made by the foreign media have sparked retorts that rape rates in India are by no means the highest in the world(sexual assaults are reported in the US about every 6 minutes). I shudder to think that there are people who justify the worst crime in the world in such a crass manner!and I donot wonder that justice has not been meted out even in publicised cases like that of Jessica Lal.
Everybody knows why such crimes occur, but why do they continue to occur? Even after the victim, if alive and has answered humiliating questions, the culprits walk free sooner or later. I am not being an extreme feminist but I do believe that only extreme punishments can rein these uncontrolled acts. Anything less than capital punishment will not suffice. I am sure Christ did not think of this when he asked us to show the other cheek when slapped on one...this is what we are precisely doing. The culprits are certainly among the lowest breed of mankind, but are the adjudicators any better? I wonder how they can bear to hear about lives being ruined in this fashion and not exercise their power when they can.Atleast the knowledge that a kid who has no clue why she is suffering should melt a human heart.
These stories are told by statistics, and they do not tell half the story. The victims are put to shame more than the culprits.The family is ashamed and try to hide her than bring her justice. If they do try for justice, the media without discretion capitalize on another's misery under the pretext of reaching out to the public.I wonder,would the women have been better off if they had been murdered?
I am sorry if this article makes an extremely unpleasant reading, but these are my thoughts on these gory crimes. I wonder if people who wrote the taittiriya upanishad wrote what was or what should be when they wrote "मातृ देवो भव "