India's Revolutionary Icons who followed the paths of The Buddha

India's Revolutionary Icons who followed the paths of The Buddha
It all began with Buddha... and these are some of the great Torch Bearer's of Buddha's Dhamma.... This Blog is a Scholarly Blog created to provide insights into the life, services and Social contributions of some of the Greatest of Indian Scholars, Humanitarians, Saints and social activists about whom the vested interests and Rotten Indian media do not write. Nor there is a State or center policies to restore and protect the stunning stories of these great men and woman...let me walk you through the greatness..!!

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Father of Nation of India Dr.Bheemarao Ambedkar

The first Law Minister of India and the Father of Indian Constitution Bheemrao Ramji Ambedkar (Dr.B.R.Ambedkar)spoke, wrote and demonstrated quite extensively and comprehensively than any other known living or dead humans of India as to how treacherous, dangerous this so called Indian hindu society and it's deadly cultures that spread discrimination and bigotry between each of thousands of heterogeneous groups. To find a way to bring them all these "heterogeneous mess of India", and to put them in single order to lead a happy, free and prosperous life, to make them behave like humans and to treat fellow humans DrAmbedkar crafted this finest of the fine Constitution that even Americans refer to it when they are in crisis. Ofcourse, Dr.Ambedkar was an American Scholar and Columbia Doctorate, he did learn lots about humanity and freedom while he was in America, but he also studied American Constitution, so a well learned scholar and genius DrAmbedkar fathered the Indian constitution in real sense, he is the Father of Modern India, while SakyaMuni Buddha was the Father of ancient and all time Father of India. Here is the dedication to the Father of India: http://fatherofnationi.blogspot.com/

Monday, December 18, 2006

WHAT DO YOU KNOW ABOUT THESE GREATS!?


Second row, seen sitting second from left is Babaji Baloo
India's finest first great cricketer? a Dalit!!!.

BABAJI PALWANKAR BALOO (Born:March 1876, Died: July 4, 1955)

One of the greatest cricketers of India, played for Indian team for about 20 years as Slow left-arm orthodox, interestingly he was the very first cricketer for the Indian Hindu team started playing even before India was independent. According to this report, this great sports man was traveled to England at that time the British were staunchly enslaving the Indians and India by occupying India. At such a time of fear, filth, racism and casteism was ruling the roost, Baloo a chamar by birth and a dalit, shattered the England team in their own soil and it was carried out by a Dalit, he was one of the top knock out bowler and made several record breaks in Indian cricket histroy. Are there any one there with any knowledge of cricket at all to ascertain and honor such greats of great cricketer who is a dalit. Or is this is just the reason that the Indian communities and authorities burried the name, fame and power of Baloo.
Social leveler Until the 1880s:
As one must know for sure, it is not just politics, economy, education, land issues, employement or just name any issues, the castiesm will be rooted in to ruin progress, as was and is sports too. Not many would have ever imagined let alone read and understand the hitory of cricket that the first cricket hero was a dalit?. Nor will they develop insights to accept the real great humans like Baloo or all of them listed in this blog. Anyways, there are always good people who do not care much about one's color, caste or race or whatever. Cricket is full of filthy caste system ever since they played under the team "Hindu" and it is kept continuing just like the other issues of casteism that continues. Mostly, cricket is robbed by the upper caste elites, that too does not reach teh poor upper castes, nor does it reaches the poors in the rural areas of India. The so called upper castes intertwined the subjugation of the less fortunate poors, made sure that the upper castes almost owned everything from land to cricket as theirs, and then come out to the street to spit against reservation, as in fact they all reserved all the wealth and resources of India to their upper castes for centuries illegally, forcefully and by brutal means. Infact in 1880's it was parsi's who adopted cricket even before hindu's even learned about cricket?. It was an upper caste magalomanical owned territory was not permitted for others, during 1884 or so when the cricket game was getting more popularity and attraction, the sports spreaded all over India, during this time, many so called low caste people showed interest and shattered the cast barrier to enter into playing cricket, it was Baloo the hero of dalits who broke this caste pathology. Who later became the greatest cricketer of all and was recognized by every Indian whether or not upper or lower castes as a hero. Baloo was even inspired B R Ambedkar, the father of modern India and a great scholar. The link below provides evidence that Baloo contested elections in 1934 and 1937 in Bombay and celebrated Baloo as their hero irrespective of what caste they belonged?.
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/South_Asia/GC05Df04.html
& Baloo's Brother Palwankar Vithal, a great Dalit Batsman & Captain
During 1919 and 1923 these Dalit cricketers even attracted Gandhi to get involved in certain issues of caste discrimination. At that time, the mumbai quadrangular did not give the captainship to Baloo because he was a dalit, against which Gandhi fought to help Baloo brothers.
Later on, in 1923 that Vithal the younger brother of Baloo, after the caste struggle that was condemned by Gandhi and others that Vithal became captain of the Hindus. http://www.hinduonnet.com/2001/09/30/stories/0730028p.htm
This book "A Corner of Foreign Field" authored by Ramachandra Guha, Picador India, Rs. 495 is one of the few book about this great cricketer that must be worth having in our collections of books. He writes "C.K. Nayudu is toppled from his pedestal as India's first great cricketer as Guha pins the badge on the little-known Dalit cricketer Palwankar Baloo, who preceded him by many years. The left arm slow bowler, who played very successfully for the Hindus in the Quadrangular, learnt his cricket by occasionally bowling at the nets of a cricket club where he was paid to sweep and roll the pitch. When he played for his first team (the Poona Hindus), he was more than equal on the field but less than equal off it (being served his lunch on a separate table and his tea in disposable matkas)".
Also read this book on cricket, politics and our society: Twenty-Two Yards to Freedom: A Social History of Indian Cricket by Boria Majumdar. Penguin Books India, New Delhi, December 2004. ISBN: 067005794-0. Price: US$13.25; 483 pages.
Dr. Ambedkar was Inspired & Influenced by Baloo:
Dr.Bhimrao Ambedkar regarded Ballo as a Great Hero of dalits and a great of Hero of Indian cricket. Baloo should be respected and placed in the top of Indian cricket history. The greatest of scholars and humanitrains our father Bhimrao Ambedkar himself was absolutely inspired by the fine qualities and talents of Baloo.
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WESTERN BUDDHISTS TO LEARN FROM AMERICAN JEWS By PPLakshmanJi

I read with great interest "A Challenge to Buddhism" by Ven.Bhikkhu Bodhi that I was fortunate to read on the internet. 
We all know and revere Bhikkhu Bodhi. His talks and writings are always inspiring and  provocative. His distress evident in the above-mentioned article will be shared by all those who read it.
Of late we have been hearing a lot about the expression  "Engaged Buddhism". I find the expression mostly among the Mahayanists rather than among the Therawadis in the Western world. Mahayanists also use the expression "Humanistic Buddhism". To everyone who is not a Buddhist, it simply means Applied Buddhism or practical Budhism.
There has been  challenges to Buddhism in all eras. To my mind, there is no greater solution, no enduring remedy to the challenges in any era than the creation of Buddha's disciples known as Arhants who would advice and give lead to people to solve their problems as and when they arise, regardless of color, race, creed or nation. Whatever the problems - social problems like injustice or natural catastrophies like earthquake or global problems like climate change 
-  the cutting edges of weapons in Buddhist armory to counter them always lay in individuals in the first instance, and subsequently in their organizations, with or without the support of governments. Therawada Buddhism which I am more familiar with has had a monastic order in place since Buddha'.s time where trained monks are turned out in large numbers, year after year, in Therawada countries -  Sri Lanka, Myanmar (Burma), Thailand, Laos, Cambodia.  Many of the trained monastics become bodhisatvas (seekers of enlightenment), few if any become fully enlightened worthy ones known as arhants who are worthy to advice and lead. Finding arhants is like mining for diamonds.
Many of the social service organizations, Buddhist or other,  fail because of the absence of arhants, the fully enlightened ones, to lead them. The fully enlightened arhants emerge out of the multitudes of monks, worthy to advice and worthy to lead..  
 
There have been a plethora of institutions with long histories of social service like the CARE, the American Peace Core, Red Cross, YMCAs, and many others. Bhikkhu Bodhi has mentioned American Jewish World Service (AJWS) which is relatively a new organization like the Islamic Relief USA and others, all of which "aiming to alleviate suffering, hunger, illiteracy and disease, worldwide". On the other hand,  organizations with limited goals also take birth like the Armenian Relief Society with its limited goal of serving the humanitarian needs of the Armenian people worldwide, who still suffer from the effects of its underreported holocaust of early 20th century. I wonder what make AJWS exceptional. 

Has AJWS  tested its declared objective of social service on the soils of Israel's next door neighbors or in the  Arab sector inside Israel itself?  Some material on the internet gave me the impression that AJWS perhaps took birth out of cognitive dissonance among American Jews suffering from psychological conflicts between incompatible beliefs and attitudes.  
The highly efficient style of working of organizations like AJWS backed by media support can make favourable impression of them even if they do not have enlightened leaders and violate one or more of the five precepts that the Buddhists always practise in all their endeavours.
Social service is the objective of most organizations, but they have besides social service something which make them distinct. For instance, the U.S. after taking thousands of lives in Japan with their nuclear armory seek to create a better image of the U.S.with its Peace Core volunteers, YMCAs seek to spread Christian messages behind their altruism,  what if AJWS seeks to show Jewish presence in world service, no matter that the Jews are only 0.2 percent of a world population of 7 billion.   
 
I wish to draw the attention of my readers to an organization which I had in  mind when I wrote earlier in this piece about arhants and searching for them like mining for diamonds. 
The organization is called Fo Guang Shan (FGS), which means literally "Buddha's Light Mountain", and its organizer is Master Venerable Hsing Yun, born in mainland China in 1927. Master Venrable Hsing Yun founded FGS in 1967 in a remote quiet area in the hills of  Kaohsiung in southern Taiwan. It is a Mahayana Buddhist order promoting Humanistic Budddhism, a modern Chinese philosophy. Humanistic Buddhism aims to make Buddhism relevant in the world and in the people's lives and hearts. It is a monastic order and not a theoretical school of thought per se.
In May 1997, Hsing Yun got the gates of FGS closed to the general public in order to give a cloistered atmosphere to the temple residents.
But, following the plea of the public headed by the President of Taiwan, FGS reopened the gates in December 2000. In the last 40 years since its inception, FGS has been remarkably successful in extending its services beyond Taiwan,  setting up temples and organizations in 173 countries and encompassing more than 3,500 monastics. FGS also created an affiliate in 1992, Buddha's  Light International Association (BLIA),  
which has now over 100 chapters in the world.  The monastic order represented by Fo Guang Shan and Buddha's Light International Association has now over a milliom followers worldwide. It has been said  "In Master Venerable Hsing Yun, Buddhism has found a reformer, an innovator and an educator. Under his strong  leadership, Buddhism has extended beyond traditional temple life to integrate and further enrich the modern city dwellers."
 
 P.P.Lakshman
December 18, 2008
 
 

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Ravana & the depiction of 10 Heads? What is the Rationale?

Ravana's ten heads represent the ten crowns he wore as a result of his being the sovereign of ten countries.