Warrier's COLLAGE June 24, 2021 : History

Welcome to Warrier's COLLAGE Thursday June 24, 2021 Good Morning See C3 : Someone is waiting for your call! "Collage in Classroom" Today : History Tomorrow : Geography Nice Day M G Warrier A Select Responses 1) Vathsala Jayaraman Chennai We have heard and experienced Iyappa in so many forms, bhajans, shastha pooja and vrat for 41 days. Shri Warrier has brought up an excellent essay combining therein the essential principles of Marxism along with multitudes of rituals in Kerala. There is a hint to Shri Pinarayi Vijayan neither to hurry nor to procrastinate but look through all open doors not being worried about the closed door. That in effect is an advice to each one of us. Thank you very much Warrier. Vathsala Jayaraman 2) A P Ramadurai Cheñnai Collage 23 June--Tribute to K V Mahadevan https://youtu.be/MxPAqIUP3Dc (Link Courtesy : Prabha Ramadurai Cheñnai) When I saw this performance the first time on the You Tube, I just couldn't believe it. Such a great song- one of the immortals in Tamil films- such a great music director, such a great playback singer, such a great dancer, such a great orchestration- “How could a team of ladies dare to attempt at this period to restage this Magnum Opus-each performing from her home-synchronise and present it to a knowledgeable audience?" This is what I wondered at the start. Gradually as the recital progressed, my skepticism slowly gave way to profound wonder. The entire participants-main singer cum dancer, other singers, accompanists, and editor/synchronizer gave off their best. They have combined to create a remarkably impressive presentation which would have done the music/dance directors and the inimitable Smt P Suseela all proud. Not to mention the Tamil film industry A P Ramadurai 3) Dr T V Surendran Mananthavady "Write up on Kerala model and Pinarayi.... is quite relevant" 4) A reader from Mumbai "A lot is being said about Yoga to the extent of its being the panacea for all our health problems. American President, Jeo Biden is 78 plus. He is non-vegetarian, and whisky drinking. He does not practice Yoga. But look at his health. So was Donald Regan who was 88 when he completed his second term. In all likelihood judging from the present trend Biden may go for a second term. What is the secret of their health and long life? (Let's assume this is an innocent query. I have no direct answer. But I am sure, as of now, we don't have any exercise or medicine that guarantees that one will live a day more. Reversely, no reliable research evidence is available yet, about accidental longevity of individuals with strange lifestyles. My own personal view is that literate adult individuals should be allowed to follow lifestyles of their choice, consistent with law of the land and family/social traditions. We don't take to crime, just because someone else was not punished! 🙏-Warrier) B Book Review : My Experiments with Truth : M K Gandhi https://readingreligion.org/books/autobiography-or-story-my-experiments-truth Those who have not before read Gandhi's Autobiography will benefit from the information contained in this critical edition. The thirty-five-page introduction by editor Tridip Suhrud provides helpful background information about the production of the book, both with regard to Gandhi's writing, the book's translation into English, the 1940 revised edition, and the present critical edition. Little is written about Gandhi’s ideas or the impact of the book. The potential new reader should be aware that in the years shortly before writing My Autobiography, Gandhi had written two other books that reflected in depth on his philosophy of active nonviolence: Hind Swaraj and Satyagraha in South Africa. Apparently as a consequence of having made those books available, Gandhi actually has very little to say about the emergence and practice of Satyagraha in the story of his “experiments with truth.” In this story, he focuses much more on themes such as diet, self-disciple, sexual abstinence, child rearing, and health self-care as he details various incidences of his early life in India, his time studying law in England, and his work as a lawyer in South Africa C Readers' Contribution 1) Maharishi of Thiruvannamalai : V Babusenan Thiruvananthapuram Ramana Maharshi Introducing his master Sree Ramakrishna to his western audience, Vivekananda concluded his fairly long speech saying that whatever spirituality was there in his speech, was that of his master and the blunders were his. At that time, perhaps, he was only faintly aware of a boy in the south with very strong spiritual leanings who would one day become as great as his master. The reference is to Sree Ramana Maharshi of Thiruvannamalai who was only fourteen years old when Vivekananda made his famous Chicago speech! To use a cliche, comparisons are odious. Suffice to say that as loquacious Sree Ramakrishna was, so silent was Sree Ramana. The latter opened his mouth only when absolutely needed. In his ashram those who came with doubts had them mostly clarified through silence, reminding one of the Sanskrit expression : 'Gurosthu mounam vyaakhyaanam' (Guru's silence is the explanation) Sree Ramana was introduced to the spiritually inclined westerners by the British author Paul Brunton who described him thus in his famous book 'A Search in Secret India,', published in 1934: "I like him greatly because he is so simple and modest when an atmosphere of authentic greatness lies so palpably around him; because he makes no claims to occult powers... to impress the mystery loving nature of his countrymen, and because he is so totally without any traces of pretension...." The book made Sree Ramana internationally known. Among the European visitors to Thiruvannamalai was the well-known English novelist Somerset Maugham who was much impressed by the Rishi and the atmosphere of spirituality in his ashram(Maugham was a materialist) He narrated his experience in a later novel 'The Razor's Edge'. For the questions put to the Rishi, both spiritual and temporal, the answers were crisp and practical. Here is an example : One young woman approached him *with a predicament. She was spiritually oriented and wished to spend her life in the service of God. But there was tremendous pressure on her to get married. What was she to do? The answer she got was : "Give your body to your husband and mind to God." Her mind was to be,as Kumaran Asan described, "Thadasilapole tharangaleelayil". However much the waves may try, not a drop of water(sex desire) will enter the stone on the brink of the lake. The Maharshi passed away in1950 at the age of 70. *Or to Kanchi Paramacharya, I am not quite sure. 2) Thus spake Ramana Maharshi* : "A dreamer dreams a dream. He sees the dream world with pleasures, pains. etc. But he wakes up and then loses all interest in the dream world. So it is with the waking world also. Just as the dream-world, being only a part of yourself and not different from you, ceases to interest you, so also the present world would cease to interest you if you awake from this waking dream (samsara) and realise that it is a part of your Self, and not an objective reality. Because you think that you are apart from the objects around you, you desire a thing. But if you understand that the thing was only a thought-form you would no longer desire it. All things are like bubbles on water. You are the water and the objects are the bubbles. They cannot exist apart from the water, but they are not quite the same as the water." ~ Sri Ramana Mahrishi. *Received from G Rajam Sastamangalam 3) N Nagarajan resumes Group Interaction : M G Warrier https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/readersblog/warriersviews/reconnecting-with-friends-26375/ Following excerpt is from a Group mail received from N Nagarajan, Ex-RBI : "For old members, I am back. For new members, I was an active member of the Exrbites group till about 3 years back. Due to some problems in my eyes, I was inactive so far. For both types of members, I hope to renew my participation and remain reasonably active. As years pass by, we become more and more isolated. Children, grand children and even great grandchildren tend to live their own life with growing importance of their peers and friends. As a result, we start and continue to live with our own past. Memories of old events become our present life. We crunch and chew our pleasant memories. Most of us stop there. But, it is possible that some of us may still remember the effects of those events on our lives : also, recalling some events may raise certain interesting questions. Here, I briefly mention a few of them which were my own experience. It will be great if you could offer your comments and also share your own experiences for the benefit of this Group." The quote has come handy to bring home one or two interesting aspects I covered in a Blog at WarriersViews Times of India Readers' Blog ( see link above) I concluded that post thus : "....I started calling my elders with whom I worked during last century. When I talked to A, he wondered about B who had health issues last year. My contacting B ended up in queries about C and D, then D asking about E and so on. In between, I had to report a couple of deaths which happened months before also. All living friends were easily accessible over the phone. No one was “driving”, “not responding” or “engaged”. Like the old-timer domestic electrician, I ensured all networking connections were intact by replacing fuse wires wherever there was a mis-connect or disconnect." What are you waiting for? Connect with as many old contacts as possible. Create new contacts. Someone is waiting to interact with you somewhere. Relative, friend or an old acquaintance... 4) M G Warrier : Track change? Temporarily I have excused myself from contributing articles for The Global ANALYST which I have been doing every month, almost for a decade now. The break, I'm using to look back to my own "writings" so far since 2003/4. Will share with Collage if I stumble upon something interesting. Let's start with this Moneylife article : https://www.moneylife.in/article/how-to-make-budget-2016-17-a-game-changer/44420.html Public funds Government should come out of the temptation to use public funds (deposits) with banks and profits and income of public sector units (PSUs) and statutory bodies, as 'own funds', which can be diverted in any direction. Also, slowly, government should align its own borrowing with market realities. There is nothing wrong in the dependence on statutory liquidity ratio (SLR) requirement of banks and funds with organisations like Life Insurance Corporation of India (LIC), Employees Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO) and now National Pension System (NPS) for funding GOI or State Government investments. But managers of such funds should not be bullied to invest in Government securities (G-Secs) or to create artificial surpluses and transfer funds to GOI. Every rupee coming from savers should fetch a reasonable positive return, if savings have to remain in the mainstream accounts available for social benefits. Sooner the government looks at its financial planning with a prudent ALM approach, it would be better for the country. D History 1) History of India https://knowindia.gov.in/culture-and-heritage/ancient-history.php "India's history and culture is dynamic, spanning back to the beginning of human civilization. It begins with a mysterious culture along the Indus River and in farming communities in the southern lands of India. The history of India is punctuated by constant integration of migrating people with the diverse cultures that surround India. Available evidence suggests that the use of iron, copper and other metals was widely prevalent in the Indian sub-continent at a fairly early period, which is indicative of the progress that this part of the world had made. By the end of the fourth millennium BC, India had emerged as a region of highly developed civilization." 2) World History https://www.britannica.com/browse/World-History World History Does history really repeat itself, or can we learn from the mistakes of those who came before us? History provides a chronological, statistical, and cultural record of the events, people, and movements that have made an impact on humankind and the world at large throughout the ages. Investigating the causes and results of past events is critically important in gaining a full understanding and perspective of present-day issues. E History of Money https://www.britannica.com/video/187664/history-money Money and Saving the Banks To understand how governments tried to prevent global financial meltdown after 2008, economists distinguish between two kinds of money, money created by banks inside the banking system and money created by governments outside the banking system. When a bank creates money by making a new loan, the bank acquires a new private asset, the loan, with an equivalent private liability to the borrower to pay it. This is money created inside the banking system. Governments can create money by selling new bonds. These bonds go into circulation as new private assets, but there is no equivalent private liability to pay them. Instead, this outside money is added to the public debt. Although it's normally a very small percentage of total money in the economy, it was this outside money that was used to buy up the banks' bad private debts and write them off. The private sector retained its wealth with new assets inside the system, supported by government with public debt from outside the system. " F 1) If you are serious about jokes... https://wealthynickel.com/money-jokes/ Like : "The easiest way for your children to learn about money is for you not to have any." – Katharine Whitehorse (Katharine Elizabeth Whitehorn CBE was a British journalist, columnist, author and radio presenter. She was the first woman to have a column in The Observer, which ran from 1963 to 1996 and from 2011 to 2017. She was the first female rector of a university in Scotland. Her books include Cooking in a Bedsitter) 2) Answers are not welcome!* Meaningful questions 👊Why is the place in a stadium where you SIT, called a STAND ? 👊Why is that everyone wants to go to HEAVEN, but nobody wants to DIE !! 👊Shall I say that there is racial discrimination even in chess, As the WHITE always moved FIRST. 👊We have FREEDOM of SPEECH, Then why do we have TELEPHONE BILLS ? 👊If money doesn't grow on TREES, then why do banks have BRANCHES ? 👊Why doesn't GLUE stick to its BOTTLE ? 👊Why do you still call it BUILDING, when its already BUILT ? 👊If its true that we all are here to HELP others, What are others HERE for ? 👊If you aren't supposed to DRINK and DRIVE, Why do bars have PARKING lots ? 👊If All The Nations In The World Are In Debt, Where Did All The Money Go..? 👊When Dog Food is 'New With Improved Taste', Who Tests It ? 👊If The "Black Box" Flight Recorder Is Never Damaged During A Plane Crash, Why Isn't The Whole Airplane Made Out Of That Stuff ? 👊Who Copyrighted The Copyright Symbol ? 👊Can You Cry Under Water ? 👊Why Do People Say "You've Been Working Like A Dog", When Dogs Just Sit Around All Day ?? 👊We all are Living in a seriously funny world. So, laugh often !! *Received from Vivek Amin Nagpur G Quotes about History https://www.thoughtco.com/famous-history-quotes-2832302 Like : "Mohandas Gandhi "A small body of determined spirits fired by an unquenchable faith in their mission can alter the course of history." (Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi was an Indian lawyer, anti-colonial nationalist, and political ethicist who employed nonviolent resistance to lead the successful campaign for India's independence from British rule and in turn inspired movements for civil rights and freedom across the world.)