Prime Minister Narendra Modi addressing the Indian troops, during his visit to Nimu in Ladakh on July 03, 2020.
Riots had happened in Gujarat. Narendra Modi had been appointed Chief Minister just a few months ago. He had been parachuted into the State of which he had no experience because the local party machinery was rift with feuds and corruption, much like their opponents in the Indian National Congress.
The first challenge before Modi was to contain the riots, ensure that justice was done and provide people with the necessary moral support so that they may overcome the trauma of the riot.
Prime Minister Atal Bihar Vajpayee arrived in Gujarat to counsel Modi. ‘Stick to Raj Dharma’ Shri Vajpayee said. Modi of course did whatever he thought was needed to be done. He was no mass leader. Yet, he reached out to people. Talked to them. Convinced them that no injustice would be allowed to go unpunished. And of course he put extraordinary pressure on the government machinery to ensure that justice was done to everyone, that government help reached to all in a fair and just manner.
The big test for Modi came when elections were declared a few months later. At the advise of Modi the BJP decided to launch the election campaign from a far-off tribal village, especially one that had never ever voted for the BJP before. Mr. Vajpayee and Mr. Advani had to be convinced that this was a good idea. For both of them the most important thing was that going to a distant village would be traumatic. The living conditions in these far off tribal villages were really not up to the high standards of comfort that both the ageing leaders had come to expect. Moreover, these forest villages had extreme weather conditions. That was one of the reasons why only a small number of tribals lived here and everyone else migrated to the towns.
At Modi’s insistence, the start of the election campaign from this remote tribal village was tom-tomed as a great event. Not too many journalists, though, bothered to come here to cover what they imagined to be a non-event. One who did come was a strong Congress supporting journalist who ended up in Chandigarh later on. His report in the Times of India gave a glimpse of things to come. After giving a thick description of the gathering in the tribal village, Harish Khare reported that Narendra Modi, the chief minister of Gujarat got up to speak. The crowd listened to him in rapt attention. Then they walked off. Very few waited to hear the Prime Minister of India or the most powerful man in the BJP.
Harish Khare effectively noted, and I think this is the first such note, that maybe Vajpayee and Advani have had their day. The next big leader on the national stage in India is going to be Narendra Modi.
The only ones to take note of Khare’s observations were the top leaders of the Congress party. They began to target Modi. Much to their dislike, despite their best efforts, once Modi did declare his intention to take on national level responsibilities, the people of India, in large masses, came forward to help him become the Prime Minister of India.
Rajiv Lochan is a renowned scholar, historian and columnist
When there is so much sound and fury on rising fuel prices that have hit the ceiling, we did some calculation on the basis of rising petrol price in a real time frame by breaking it into two distinct segments.
First, lets consider the period between 2004 and 2014 when Manmohan Singh was heading UPA-1 and UPA-2 as Prime Minister and Congress chief Sonia Gandhi was Chair of theUPA. And then we have Narendra Modi as Prime Minister, continuously since May 2014.
In June 2004 price of petrol was Rs 35/litr In May 2014 it was Rs 71 (Manmohan regime) 2014 May to 2021 March (7 years of Modi regime) the price of petrol has gone up from Rs 71 to 100.
To put it on a lighter note, if we take into consideration Manmohan’s ten years in office, then Modi also should get the margin and be allowed to raise the price to Rs. 140 a litre by the time his second term ends in 2024.
Fuel price is also dictated by Central Excise, road cess and VAT charged by the State Governments and is a major source of revenue that supports the budgeted expenditure on welfare and development related activities. Modi government has the option of reducing Central excise but that would bring the massive initiative aimed at HRD, building the economic infrastructure for all round progress to a screeching halt. Credit goes to Prime Minister Modi that instead of taking a populist stand, his government has curbed corruption and is working with a futuristic plan focussing on education, skill development, health, industry and agriculture sectors, self-reliance, infrastructure, defence and security.
In sharp contrast, the 10 year UPA rule is known for rampant corruption, rise of crony capitalists, middle-men and fixers and a series of scams besides dismal showing on infrastructure front. Unfortunately, Manmohan Singh did nothing to address the concern expressed by Rajiv Gandhi, who had lamented at the Congress Centenary celebration event in Mumbai in 1985 that only 15 paise of each rupee spent by the government reach the needy.
On the same page, we thought it would go a long way towards educating the masses, so we are reproducing below a post doing the rounds on social media over the past few days:
All the petrol pumps should have a board like thisso that people could understand who is responsible Basic rate 30.50 Central govt tax 19.97 State govt tax 38.55 Distributor 3.50 ———— Total. 92.52
Coinciding with the Assam government’s decision to close all the state-run madrassas from November 2020 announced by the State Health and Education Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma, London based humanist Khalid Umar has advocated the urgent need for India to implement a Uniform Education Code in the country. He has underscored the drawbacks of the Islamic Madarsa system and said they should be closed down for the sake of maintaining unity and peace. We are publishing his brainstorming piece on this issue for initiating debate and building public opinion.
One country, one curriculum is the recipe of communal harmony and peace in India
Before the Uniform Civil Code, India needs a Uniform Education Code. One secular curriculum for all. When there be 3,60,000 young minds stuck in the curriculum developed in the 1700s in 3,000 madrassas in the Indian capital alone you can’t dream to take the nation ahead with millions enrolled in the 600,000 madrassa countrywide with additionally 40-50 lac mosques with attached makatab or madrasa.
WHAT IS TAUGHT IN MADRASSAS
A madrasa is an exclusivist religious school, where MUSLIM children are taught Quran, the Sharia, Hadith, Islamic history of invasions (Jihad). The institution of Islamic madrasas in India is as old as the history of Islam in India, say 1000 years. The syllabus teaches the students to hate all non-Muslims, especially the Hindus who being idolaters are dubbed as hateful human beings, called ‘kaffirs’. Ghana-i-Hind (the goal of establishment of Islamic rule across India through Jihad) is also taught in almost every madrassa, both in India and Pakistan. Madrasahs produce indoctrinated minds, full of hate, fear and false pride.
This derelict institution can’t be reformed. Outright scrap page is the solution. Helping them is writing your own obituary.
The UPA Government initiated an ill-thought plan. A “Scheme for Providing Quality Education in Madrasas” (SPQEM in 2009-10 to encourage Madarsas and Maktabs to introduce formal subjects i.e. Science, Mathematics, Social Studies, Hindi and English; The scheme is STILL ongoing in 18 states in the country. So far under SPQEM, over 21,000 Madarsas spread over different states have been given Rs. 1138 crores. Only in the Uttar Pradesh there are 18,27,566 children in 8584 Madrasas, as per GOI figures.
THAT is absolutely mindless.
Core Islamic scripture, as taught, can’t be made secular and humanistic. This scheme initiated by Congress is a sheer loss of time and exchequer and it must be scrapped forthwith.
WHY MADRASSAS CAN’T BE REFORMED
ISLAMIC TEACHINGS and modern education can’t coexist. Would the students of madrassa trust Science that says Earth is spherical and revolves around the SUN or will believe QURAN which say, Earth is flat and the SUN sets in murky water of a lake? How can you teach them harmony and love when they learn from Quran that all IDOLATORS are consigned to the eternal HELL-FIRE?
WHAT THE MODI GOVERNMENT MUST DO IMMEDIATELY
1- All madrassas must be nationalised, registered and the state should have the writ to appoint teachers, administrators and approve the curriculum. Their financials & source of income be scrutinised. All the madrassa be converted into modern schools open to all the communities. Community exclusive, organised & institutionalised religious education must be scrapped for any religion. ALL children must be taught uniform curriculum.
2- All the mosques must be monitored through CCTV recording to check what is being taught and fed. If China and Egypt can control mosques, why can’t India, the second largest Muslim population country?
If you don’t control mullah, mosque and madrassa, peace and communal harmony in India will remain a pipe dream.
Prime Minister of India Narendra Modi and Prime Minister of Sri Lanka Mahinda Rajapaksa at the India – Sri Lanka Virtual Bilateral Summit
New Delhi: India and Sri Lanka have agreed to enhance cooperation to combat terrorism and drug trafficking and also in the fields of intelligence, information sharing, de-radicalization (of a section of the population) and capacity building.
Prime Minister of India Narendra Modi and Prime Minister of Sri Lanka Mahinda Rajapaksa held a Virtual Summit on Saturday 26 September and discussed bilateral relations and regional & international issues of mutual concern.
Prime Minister Modi congratulated Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa on his assumption of office of Prime Minister with a decisive mandate at the Parliamentary Elections held in Sri Lanka in August 2020. Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa expressed his gratitude for the good wishes and conveyed his keenness to work together closely with Prime Minister Modi.
Both the leaders recalled the successful State Visits by President Gotabaya Rajapaksa and Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa to India in November 2019 and February 2020, respectively. These visits gave clear political direction and vision for the future of the relationship.
Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa commended the strong leadership shown by Prime Minister Modi in the fight against COVID-19 pandemic based on the vision of mutual support and assistance to the countries of the region. Both leaders agreed that the current situation presented a fresh opportunity to give added impetus to bilateral relations. Both the leaders expressed happiness that India and Sri Lanka worked very closely in dealing with the COVID-19 pandemic. Prime Minister Modi reaffirmed India’s continued commitment for all possible support to Sri Lanka for minimising the health and economic impact of the pandemic.
For imparting further impetus to the bilateral relationship, the two leaders agreed to:
(i) Enhance cooperation to combat terrorism and drug trafficking including in the fields of intelligence, information sharing, de-radicalization and capacity building.
(ii) Continue the fruitful and efficient development partnership in accordance with the priority areas identified by the Government and people of Sri Lanka and to further broad base the island wide engagement under the Memorandum of Understanding for Implementation of High Impact Community Development Projects (HICDP) for the period 2020-2025.
(iii) Work together to expeditiously complete construction of 10,000 housing units in the plantation areas, which was announced during the visit of Prime Minister Modi to Sri Lanka in May 2017.
(iv) Facilitate an enabling environment for trade and investment between the two countries and to deepen integration of supply chains in the backdrop of the challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic.
(v) Work towards early realization of infrastructure and connectivity projects including in the sectors of Ports and Energy through close consultations as per the Bilateral Agreements and MoUs, and strong commitment towards a mutually beneficial development cooperation partnership between the two countries.
(vi) Deepen cooperation in renewable energy with particular emphasis on solar projects under the US$ 100 million Line of Credit from India.
(vii) Strengthen technical cooperation in the areas of agriculture, animal husbandry, science & technology, health care and AYUSH (Ayurveda, Unani, Siddha and Homeopathy) as well as skill development by increased training of professionals thereby realizing the full potential of the demographic dividend in both the countries.
(viii) Further strengthen people-to-people ties by exploring opportunities in the field of civilizational linkages and common heritage such as Buddhism, Ayurveda and Yoga. Government of India will facilitate visit of a delegation of Buddhist pilgrims from Sri Lanka in the inaugural international flight to the sacred city of Kushinagar, which has recently been announced as an International Airport recognizing its significance in Buddhism.
(ix) Facilitate tourism by enhancing connectivity and by early establishment of an air bubble between the two countries to resume travel, bearing in mind threat posed by Covid-19 pandemic and to take all necessary preventative measures.
(x) Continue engagement to address the issues related to fishermen through regular consultation and bilateral channels according to the existing frameworks and shared goals including the UN Sustainable Development Goals.
(xi) Strengthen cooperation between armed forces of the two sides including through mutual exchange of personnel visits, maritime security cooperation and support to Sri Lanka in the spheres of defence and security.
Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa welcomed the announcement made by Prime Minister Modi of India’s grant assistance of US$ 15 million for promotion of Buddhist ties between the two countries. The grant will assist in deepening people-to-people linkages between the two countries in the sphere of Buddhism including inter alia through construction/renovation of Buddhist monasteries, capacity development, cultural exchanges, archaeological cooperation, reciprocal exposition of The Buddha’s relics, strengthening engagement of Buddhist scholars and clergy etc.
Prime Minister Modi called on the Government of Sri Lanka to address the aspirations of the Tamil people for equality, justice, peace and respect within a united Sri Lanka, including by carrying forward the process of reconciliation with the implementation of the Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution of Sri Lanka. Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa expressed the confidence that Sri Lanka will work towards realizing the expectations of all ethnic groups, including Tamils, by achieving reconciliation nurtured as per the mandate of the people of Sri Lanka and implementation of the Constitutional provisions.
Both leaders acknowledged the increasing convergence on regional and international issues of mutual engagement, including within the frameworks of SAARC, BIMSTEC, IORA and the United Nations system.
Recognizing that BIMSTEC is an important platform for regional cooperation linking South Asia with South East Asia, both leaders agreed to work together to ensure a successful BIMSTEC Summit to be hosted under the Chairmanship of Sri Lanka.
Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa congratulated Prime Minister Narendra Modi for the strong support received from the international community for India’s election as a non-permanent member of the UN Security Council for the term 2021-2022.
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