Hindutva, Hinduism and the Hindu.

The term Hindutva is a recent innovation and so is the term Hindu which is said to have got coined due to mis-pronounciation of the name of the river Sindhu that underwent a phonetic metamorphosis to become Indu, whereas the dwellers owing origin along its course were called Hindus.

Notwithstanding the historical veracity of the above analogy, neither the term Hindu nor its derivative, Hindutva, has any direct bearing on the scores of belief systems which the race called Hindus followed. For instance, a joint Hindu Family is not governed by two different schools of law, namely the Mitakshara School of Hindu Law and the Dayabhaga School of Hindu Law.

Both these schools still have varying legal mandates .

Each still holds the field and both co-exists, without influencing either despite being diametrically distinguishable.

Suffice it to say that an un-legislated legal system subsisted, better say it still subsists, that all through carried the force of law even without any sovereign's backing. It needs to be appreciated that the legislated laws today exist in such volumes which even the legal professionals might fail to faultlessly enlist without the aid of an in-depth research. Thereby, it would be too much to expect of a common man to be aware of it, much less compliant thereof. Non compliance or disobedience as a result of ignorance is one aspect, express violation is another. The unbearable pendency of litigations which is mounting each moment with greater intensity than its disposal, is a material point of reference. This reference is expedient in evaluating the fact that the ancient legal system known today as the Hindu Law, has stood the test of time without state support, rather say, despite state interference.

These lines are not meant to glorify a system, rather to drive home a rather inconspicuous and thus overlooked and misconceived idea regarding the term 

Dharma as being anything akin to that genre of belief system which is founded on the term religion.

Dharma , in its pure and simple import, is the law that regulate the Karma or human deeds. In that sense, Dharma is the law of Karma. The wholephilosophy of the law of Karma is encoded in the volumes of scriptures, Srimad Bhagwat Gita being one. The Dharma or the thus codified principles of the law of Karma  is not derived from one single source or entity, but from a stream which is more vast and perennial that any stream, river or ocean, which has a name called the Sanatan Dharma, though it has been lost sight of in the glare of the conflicting politics built in the recent times over its recently coined by-name Hinduism, Hinduva, and like things, as though a perennial law of Karma can be incarcerated within such limits as religions.   

Failed legal System or a systemic failure?

When we talk of the Civil and Criminal system of justice, don't  confuse between a systemic failure and a failed system. 

Civil law has a system which suffers from management failures. That doesn't mean there are no systemic deficiencies. 

On the other hand, criminal side is systemically criminal, meant for the luxury of the criminals only, and a hell for the law abiding.  The Revenue side is worse, both ways. It has no system worth it's name. Whatever is there in the name of system is only perfunctory .

 Criminal Justice System in India is primarily a police law. 

Cr.P.C empowers the police to register and investigate criminal cases. A weak alternative is also available for the criminal courts to entertain criminal complaints where police declines to register FIR or fails to dispense proper investigation. Such alternative isn't efficacious in practice. 

Police investigations happen to be  a much  close-door affair. It is not bona fidely accessible . Even courts don't have any intervention powers while investigations are afoot. This gives the investigating agency a long rope to do whatever, justice or injustice. Investigation proceedings are recorded in case diaries in which every detail is embodied. Even testimony of witnesses who wouldn't know whether their version really is what they averred. Only after the investigations are over, the case diaries become accessible legally, from the case record where final form is submitted, whether by way of closure report or by sending up accused person(s) for trial.

Most prosecution cases often fail due to two major reasons. Either the investigation records intentionally carry laches or at trial witnesses are either gained over or cowered into retracting. 

Problem is not easy to be  covered as precisely as a post like this may afford. It may fill volumes, if detailed. 

Suffice it to say, the criminal justice system today is a heaven for criminals while it is of little aid for the rest of us.

 Lal Bahadur Shastri – The Last Nationalist PM from Congress.

In India Today Magazine's September 2017 issue, Shyam Benegal gives the account of 1964 when the then prime minister Lal Bahadur Shastri visited Anand in Gujarat.

Shastri was keen to witness Amul's success first hand.

He requested Verghese Kurien to let him stay incognito in one of the villages for the night. Kurien got a fright. How could he let the prime minister stay overnight in a village without security or any support mechanism? Shastri insisted and, without his security detail's knowledge, was taken close to a village and left there for the night.

He walked into the village and introduced himself as a traveller who had lost his way. A family in the village invited Shastri to stay with them. He took the opportunity to talk to them about their lives and how they had been affected by the cooperative.

By the time Kurien came to pick him up the next morning, the prime minister was not only convinced about the Anand pattern of cooperatives but put his full might behind Kurien to set up the National Dairy Development Board in Anand to help replicate the movement across the country – The Story behind THE WHITE REVOLUTION.

In his book, Patriots and Partisans, RAMACHANDRA GUHA Writes

“Had Shastri continued as prime minister until the end of the 1960s, the economic history of India would have turned out very differently. In the 1950s, under the direction of the state, India had nurtured a robust domestic industry. It was now time to allow for the free play of market forces.

In speeches made in 1965, Shastri clearly indicated that he would like to open up the market to enterprise and free competition. Sadly, he died soon afterwards. Instead of trusting to the energy of the private sector, Indira Gandhi strengthened the control of the state over the economy.

Had fate given Shastri longer innings as prime minister, the Indian economy could have been more robust and resilient, but he was also a pragmatic reformer.

He would have freed the processes of production from state control and also initiated welfare measures to ameliorate poverty. As a man of vision and integrity, he would have also sought to improve the performance of India’s public institutions.

Had Shastri lived for another five or ten years it is highly unlikely that Indira Gandhi would ever have become prime minister and it is certain that her son would have never occupied that office.

Had Shastri been given another five years on earth, there would have been no Nehru-Gandhi dynasty. Had Shastri lived another five years, Sanjay Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi would almost certainly have been still alive. Sanjay Gandhi would have been a failed entrepreneur and Rajiv Gandhi, a recently retired airline pilot with a passion for photography.

Finally, had Shastri live another five years, Sonia Gandhi would still be a devoted and loving housewife and Rahul Gandhi, a middle-level manager in a private sector company.”

Infact Guha in Oct 2016 argued quite convincingly that in spite of his many achievements, Shastri did not get his due either from the nation or from the Congress party, which he had served for his entire life.

(What Guha writes in book is usually far more sensible than his tweets)

Lal Bahadur Shastri – The 5.4 Ft Liitle Man Who Braved The Giants. His-Story UNRAVELS……

To start with his family name was Verma and that Shastri was actually a title accorded to him when he passed the “Shastri” degree examination in the first division in 1925.

Young Shastri was attracted to the Indian National Congress which was spearheading the nationalist movement. He came under the influence of two tall leaders who sometimes didn’t see eye to eye with each other, Purushottam Das Tandon and Jawaharlal Nehru.

(Irony isn’t it, 1 was Khattar Hindu & the other Namesake Hindu)

Will Recollect 2 Incidents Here About LBS Which Makes You Think….. Is This Possible?

C P Srivastava recollects that as a young IAS officer in Lucknow he met Shastri who went out of his way to make him feel comfortable, something that most politicians in India would not do. A couple of years later, he was at the Lucknow railway station waiting to receive his family when on the adjoining platform Shastri alighted from the train. He was then the Union Minister for Railways and Transport.  Though he saw Shastri, the author didn’t want to disturb him when he was surrounded by his aides and other railway officials. Much to his astonishment, Shastri walked up to him and said, “How are you, Srivastava saheb? You have not recognised me. I am Lal Bahadur.”!!

The other charming story I have read about him has been recounted by journalist Kuldip Nayar in his autobiography, Beyond the Lines. Nayar was press secretary to Shastri when the latter was home minister. The two were travelling by car. The car halted at a railway crossing. It was a hot day, and Shastri spotted a man selling sugar-cane juice. He got out, walked over to the shop, bought two glasses of juice and paid the man, who had no idea that the little man he had just served was perhaps the second most important person in Indian politics.

In his first broadcast as Prime Minister on June 11, 1964,  LBS said:

“There comes a time in the life of every nation when it stands at the crossroads of history and must choose which way to go. But for us, there need be no difficulty or hesitation, no looking to right or left. Our way is straight and clear—the building up of a secular mixed-economy democracy at home with freedom and prosperity, and the maintenance of world peace and friendship with select nations.”

After Nehru, Morarji Desai was the senior most in the cabinet & naturally Morarji wanted to become PM, but Congress President Kamraj had other plans, Kamaraj and his allies sought to stop Desai’s bid and “support the man who was least likely to divide and most likely to unite the party.”

Kamraj knew that the world’s eyes were upon India and whether this nascent democracy could transition from Nehru and keep his vision alive. (As Modi’s ministers are singing his bhajan, those days too, it was the same)

Thus we had our First Accidental Prime Minister

#LalBahadurShastri.

He inherited a Government that was slowly recovering from the defeat handed out to India by the Chinese in 1962, shattering Nehru’s long held dictum of ” Hindi Chini Bhai Bhai” or ” India & China Are Always Friends”.  The economy was in a mess and there was a massive scarcity of food grain.

“A Man Who In 18 Months Made A Mark Not As A Puppet, But A Leader Worthy Of Respect And Admiration.”

"Unlike Nehru, Shastri did not harbour any ideological hostility towards the Jana Sangh and the RSS. He used to often invite Shri Guruji for consultation on national issues." – L K Advani in his Autobiography.

At a time when our country was at war, our second Prime Minister, Lal Bahadur Shastri decided to cut across party lines and invited RSS Sarsanghchalak Guruji MS Golwalkar, to an All-Party Meet.

The purpose of the invitation was to task the Delhi Police with more strategic activities and relieve them of their routine duties which were then taken over by RSS workers. (Dr. Harish Chandra Barthwal in his book, The Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh: An Introduction)

Barthwal even goes further to claim that upon Shastri's request, RSS workers also provided food and other essential supplies to soldiers deployed on the war front.

The year was 1965 and the Indian subcontinent was going through a turbulent time due to an all-out war with Pakistan. The severity of the seventeen day Indo-Pak war of 1965 can be summed up by the statement that it was the largest engagement of armoured vehicles and the largest tank battle since World War II.  After Pakistani forces attempted to infiltrate the Indian part of Kashmir, Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri retaliated by launching a military assault against the infiltration.

With President S Radhakrishnan and Prime Minister Shastri at the helm of the Indian Armed Forces, LBS in Loksabha made this speech before the war…

“In the utilization of our limited resources, we have always given primacy to plans and projects for economic development. It would, therefore, be obvious for anyone who is prepared to look at things objectively that India can have no possible interest in provoking border incidents or in building up an atmosphere of strife… In these circumstances, the duty of Government is quite clear, and this duty will be discharged fully and effectively… We would prefer to live in poverty for as long as necessary, but we shall not allow our freedom to be subverted,”

The infiltration bid was foiled and India emerged victorious with an upper hand at the time of the UN-initiated cease-fire on 23 September 1965. While many stories of bravery and nationalism during that time of war have come to light over the years, this one that is also worth taking note of is perhaps the least known.

The public memory of LBS, Bharat’s PM after the death of Jawarhalal Nehru, is almost anecdotal.

Shastri, whose 19-month prime ministership was hemmed between Nehru and Indira Gandhi, has, without doubt, not got the space he deserved in public memory.

From calming the violent anti-Hindi agitation that erupted across the southern states to taking the first steps in resolving India’s biggest food shortage by promoting the Green Revolution (and convincing people to voluntarily give up one meal so that the food saved could be distributed to the affected populace) and the White Revolution (Amul cooperative), LBS also oversaw India’s first major shift away from Nehru’s socialist economic policies based on central planning.

Verghese Kurien, the chairman and founder of Amul, was named the chairman of NDDB by the then Prime Minister of India Lal Bahadur Shastri. Operation Flood was based on the experimental pattern set up by Kurien.

Shastri was way ahead of his times as far as economic policy goes. His pragmatism would have helped put us on the path of high growth at least two decades earlier.

The US ambassador to India during that time Chester Bowles said “Shastri was an extra ordinary man.’ He divided the Indian leaders into Adams and Jacksonians. The Adams were the ones educated in UK/USA. These people according to him were not thoroughly Indian. They had one foot in Asia and one foot in Europe. Bright and charming people.  Shastri was a Jacksonian, he had roots in India. He had never been out of India until after he became Prime Minister. There were many of these, and Chester Bowles concludes by saying that he had more faith in the Jacksonians for the future.

‘In the four decades in parliament ‘- Prime Minister Atul Bihari Vajpayee

Compared Prime Minister Nehru and Prime Minister Shastri.

“Nehru with regal up bringing on the one hand and Shastri who fought his way through abject poverty”.

A barrister who had acquired western education and imbibed western culture at Cambridge University on the one hand and Lal bahadur Shastri who obtained his ‘Shastri’ degree at Kashi Vidya Peath on the other.

I G Patel, who was working in the finance ministry at that time, has recounted in one of his essays how the decision to devalue the currency had been taken in principle and conveyed informally to the International Monetary Fund (IMF) when Shastri was the prime minister.

Indeed, Shastri had taken an equally bold step before intimating the IMF about his government’s decision to devalue the currency. His finance minister, T T Krishnamachari, was not comfortable with the idea of devaluation. As Medha M Kudaisya notes in her biography of G D Birla, the only man that stood in the way of India agreeing to removing government controls on imports and industrial activities and devaluing the currency was Krishnamachari.

For Shastri, the state of the Indian economy after the ravages of the war had left the country with no option other than agreeing to the IMF-World Bank prescriptions for economic liberalisation and currency devaluation. So, Shastri used a clever tactic to remove Krishnamachari as the finance minister.

 

For Krishnamachari, this was the second time in his political career that he had to step down as the finance minister. Once under Nehru’s prime ministership, he had to resign after the Mundhra scandal broke out. Now, under Shastri, there were allegations of malfeasance against Krishnamachari’s son. Shastri refused to clear him of those charges until investigations were completed and he wanted his finance minister to step down till the inquiry to be conducted by a Supreme Court judge gave him a clean chit. Krishnamachari took it as an insult and offered his resignation, which Shastri promptly accepted and appointed Sachin Chowdhury as the new finance minister.

 

Shastri did not live long after that. His successor, Indira Gandhi, retained Chowdhury as the finance minister and agreed to implement the decision on devaluing the currency taken by Shastri. It is, of course, a different matter that she did not fulfil the other part of the commitment to dismantle the control and permit raj.

 

Shastri’s reformist credentials were also evident from his economic team. All his team members – S Bhoothalingham, Dharma Vira, I G Patel and L K Jha – believed in the urgent need to unshackle the economy and go in for reforms to realise the potential of the Indian economy by modernising agriculture and allowing the private sector to operate with relative freedom from controls.

Winds of change were also felt in some decisions of the government under Shastri. In August 1965, the prime minister announced in Parliament that government controls over economic activity would be reconsidered. Soon thereafter, regulations for sectors such as steel and cement were relaxed.

P.N. Dhar, a close adviser to Indira Gandhi wrote in Indira Gandhi, the ‘Emergency’ And Indian Democracy, that,

“Lal Bahadur Shastri, the unassuming prime minister who had succeeded Nehru, seemed an unlikely person to face up to the (economic) situation, but in his own quiet way he did initiate a series of steps which would have not only brought the economy out of the existing crisis but possibly put it on a high-growth path in the long run.

He wore no ideological blinkers; he saw facts as they were in all their starkness. Chronic food shortages made him shift investment from basic industries to agriculture. Roaring black markets persuaded him to make a relative shift from controls to incentives, and the glaring inefficiency of the public sector made him accept a larger role for the private sector and foreign investment.

He also took measures to shift the locus of economic decision-making from the Planning Commission to the ministries and from the Centre to the states. These measures reduced the influence of the Planning Commission—which had developed a rigid, almost doctrinaire outlook on economic policies—and at the same time decentralized decision-making."

What’s more, Shastri even ordered a review of all major public sector projects which had not taken off by then. As Kudaisya writes in The Life and Times of GD Birla, Shastri even tried to decentralise governance by shifting decision-making on projects from the Planning Commission to different economic ministries. A national planning council was set up that reduced the scope and role of the Planning Commission.

Shastri was trying to generate fresh thinking on our development strategy at around the same time that many other Asian countries were fundamentally reorienting their development strategy, embracing export promotion rather than import substitution. For example, India and South Korea had around the same level of average incomes in 1964; then South Korea pulled ahead and there is now a yawning gap between the two countries. There is thus good reason to speculate whether things would have turned out differently had Shastri been blessed with a longer life.

What happened subsequently is well known. Indira Gandhi responded to the economic crisis with a sharp turn to the Left, choosing populism over economic reform.

“The victory in the 1965 war had made him very popular in his own right. During the brief period of his stewardship he had acquired his own popular political support that would, I believe, have given him added confidence to pursue an agenda of economic reform of the kind that was taken up only twenty-five years later, in 1991," wrote Dhar.

Ex IAS C P Srivastava arguably his closest and most trusted aide, wrote “Lal Bahadur Shastri Prime Minister of India 1964-66: A Life of Truth in Politics”

it is Srivastava's refusal to recognise that no mortal is perfect. He was, he records, "advised to disclose Mr Shastri's deficiencies alongside his achievements. I am afraid I could not discover any".

A great deal of immense importance in this book-most notably the hitherto unpublished details of Shastri's Tashkent conversations with Ayub and the then Soviet prime minister Alexei Kosygin - has seen the light of day.

At Tashkent, Pak President Ayub was desperate about getting some commitment from Shastri to "settle" the Kashmir dispute. To Shastri, Kashmir was "not negotiable". Ultimately, in a last ditch attempt, Ayub said: "Kashmir ke mamle mein kuchh aisa kar deejiye ke main apne mulk men munh dikhane ke qabil rahoon.

Shastri's reply was: "Sadar saheb, main bahut muafi chahta hoon ki main is mamle mein apki koi khidmat nahin kar sakta.

Srivastava has not confined himself to Shastri's years as a politician or freedom-fighter. There are fascinating details about Shastri the man, beginning with his childhood in a poor home and his privations as a struggling student. The lack of adequate nutrition weakened his physique and perhaps led to his early death. Shastri's wife belonged to a well-to-do family.

His only advice to her after marriage, according to Srivastava, was: "For your future happiness and contentment, you should look at those who are even less favoured by fortune than ourselves."

It is a pity that Shastri died prematurely without implementing most of his ideas on economic reforms, deregulation and decentralisation. But it is a national shame that nobody in India remembers Shastri for having dared to usher in those reforms at that time.

Nowhere in the annals of history of the world can one find a Prime Minister of a country and President of other country become pall bearers to the Prime Minister of a third country.

On 11 January 1966, Prime Minister Kosygin and Pakistan’s President Ayub Khan a war adversary of the day, who became a friend grieving pall bearer, carrying the coffin of Prime Minister Shastri on their shoulder to the gateway of the Soviet aircraft. Great tributes were paid to Shastriji.

“When he died his life sheet was spotlessly clean. He left no money, no house and no land. The only thing he left, apart from a shining reputation, was a small, outstanding loan from his bank.

He did leave an example which will continue to inspire, fortify and encourage all those of every community and creed who believe that the only foundation for national life must be dedication to truth and honesty. He never sought for himself any superlatives or fulsome praise.

Kuldip Nayyar after death of Nehru said, they are appointing LBS to keep PM’s seat WARM for Indira, but LBS turned out to be a Great Statesman, Leader & proved him wrong, but also lost his life.

On the morning of January 11, his secretaries found a note on his table, in which he had penned down lines by Urdu poet Saqib Lakhnavi.

“Zamana bade shauk se sunn raha tha

Humee so gaye dastaan kehte kehte”.

Did Lal Bahadur Shastri have a premonition of his own death?

According to the Prime Minister’s family, when his body arrived in Delhi, it had turned blue and had cuts. A lot of events that had transpired in Tashkent before his death lay the ground for further speculation. Shastri’s place of stay had been changed just twenty-four hours prior to his arrival.

His Lodging was quite far from where the rest of his party was put up. The lodging was devoid of medical arrangements and there was no telephone in the Prime Minister’s bedroom. He had returned to his dacha at 10 pm post attending Premier Kosygin’s farewell reception. His dinner had been prepared by Ambassador T.N Kaul’s cook Jan Mohammad and not Ram Nath, his personal servant.

At around 1.20 am Shastri came out of his room coughing and asking for “doctor sahib,” Dr. R.N Chugh. His assistants helped him to bed. However, before, Dr. Chugh could act; the Prime Minister had breathed his last.

Despite evidence of possible foul play, no post mortem had been conducted in Tashkent or Delhi.

The media was given little information. The Prime Minister’s personal diary was never recovered.

AND LEST WE FORGET, THAT HE WAS MURDERED & INDIRA GANDHI WAS BRIMMING WITH JOY WHEN LBS's BODY ARRIVED AT AIRPORT.

#VANDEMATARAM

(Forwarding shared post).

In India Today Magazine's September 2017 issue, Shyam Benegal gives the account of 1964 when the then prime minister Lal Bahadur Shastri visited Anand in Gujarat.

Shastri was keen to witness Amul's success first hand.

He requested Verghese Kurien to let him stay incognito in one of the villages for the night. Kurien got a fright. How could he let the prime minister stay overnight in a village without security or any support mechanism? Shastri insisted and, without his security detail's knowledge, was taken close to a village and left there for the night.

He walked into the village and introduced himself as a traveller who had lost his way. A family in the village invited Shastri to stay with them. He took the opportunity to talk to them about their lives and how they had been affected by the cooperative.

By the time Kurien came to pick him up the next morning, the prime minister was not only convinced about the Anand pattern of cooperatives but put his full might behind Kurien to set up the National Dairy Development Board in Anand to help replicate the movement across the country – The Story behind THE WHITE REVOLUTION.

In his book, Patriots and Partisans, RAMACHANDRA GUHA Writes

“Had Shastri continued as prime minister until the end of the 1960s, the economic history of India would have turned out very differently. In the 1950s, under the direction of the state, India had nurtured a robust domestic industry. It was now time to allow for the free play of market forces.

In speeches made in 1965, Shastri clearly indicated that he would like to open up the market to enterprise and free competition. Sadly, he died soon afterwards. Instead of trusting to the energy of the private sector, Indira Gandhi strengthened the control of the state over the economy.

Had fate given Shastri longer innings as prime minister, the Indian economy could have been more robust and resilient, but he was also a pragmatic reformer.

He would have freed the processes of production from state control and also initiated welfare measures to ameliorate poverty. As a man of vision and integrity, he would have also sought to improve the performance of India’s public institutions.

Had Shastri lived for another five or ten years it is highly unlikely that Indira Gandhi would ever have become prime minister and it is certain that her son would have never occupied that office.

Had Shastri been given another five years on earth, there would have been no Nehru-Gandhi dynasty. Had Shastri lived another five years, Sanjay Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi would almost certainly have been still alive. Sanjay Gandhi would have been a failed entrepreneur and Rajiv Gandhi, a recently retired airline pilot with a passion for photography.

Finally, had Shastri live another five years, Sonia Gandhi would still be a devoted and loving housewife and Rahul Gandhi, a middle-level manager in a private sector company.”

Infact Guha in Oct 2016 argued quite convincingly that in spite of his many achievements, Shastri did not get his due either from the nation or from the Congress party, which he had served for his entire life.

(What Guha writes in book is usually far more sensible than his tweets)

Lal Bahadur Shastri – The 5.4 Ft Liitle Man Who Braved The Giants. His-Story UNRAVELS……

To start with his family name was Verma and that Shastri was actually a title accorded to him when he passed the “Shastri” degree examination in the first division in 1925.

Young Shastri was attracted to the Indian National Congress which was spearheading the nationalist movement. He came under the influence of two tall leaders who sometimes didn’t see eye to eye with each other, Purushottam Das Tandon and Jawaharlal Nehru.

(Irony isn’t it, 1 was Khattar Hindu & the other Namesake Hindu)

Will Recollect 2 Incidents Here About LBS Which Makes You Think….. Is This Possible?

C P Srivastava recollects that as a young IAS officer in Lucknow he met Shastri who went out of his way to make him feel comfortable, something that most politicians in India would not do. A couple of years later, he was at the Lucknow railway station waiting to receive his family when on the adjoining platform Shastri alighted from the train. He was then the Union Minister for Railways and Transport.  Though he saw Shastri, the author didn’t want to disturb him when he was surrounded by his aides and other railway officials. Much to his astonishment, Shastri walked up to him and said, “How are you, Srivastava saheb? You have not recognised me. I am Lal Bahadur.”!!

The other charming story I have read about him has been recounted by journalist Kuldip Nayar in his autobiography, Beyond the Lines. Nayar was press secretary to Shastri when the latter was home minister. The two were travelling by car. The car halted at a railway crossing. It was a hot day, and Shastri spotted a man selling sugar-cane juice. He got out, walked over to the shop, bought two glasses of juice and paid the man, who had no idea that the little man he had just served was perhaps the second most important person in Indian politics.

In his first broadcast as Prime Minister on June 11, 1964,  LBS said:

“There comes a time in the life of every nation when it stands at the crossroads of history and must choose which way to go. But for us, there need be no difficulty or hesitation, no looking to right or left. Our way is straight and clear—the building up of a secular mixed-economy democracy at home with freedom and prosperity, and the maintenance of world peace and friendship with select nations.”

After Nehru, Morarji Desai was the senior most in the cabinet & naturally Morarji wanted to become PM, but Congress President Kamraj had other plans, Kamaraj and his allies sought to stop Desai’s bid and “support the man who was least likely to divide and most likely to unite the party.”

Kamraj knew that the world’s eyes were upon India and whether this nascent democracy could transition from Nehru and keep his vision alive. (As Modi’s ministers are singing his bhajan, those days too, it was the same)

Thus we had our First Accidental Prime Minister

#LalBahadurShastri.

He inherited a Government that was slowly recovering from the defeat handed out to India by the Chinese in 1962, shattering Nehru’s long held dictum of ” Hindi Chini Bhai Bhai” or ” India & China Are Always Friends”.  The economy was in a mess and there was a massive scarcity of food grain.

“A Man Who In 18 Months Made A Mark Not As A Puppet, But A Leader Worthy Of Respect And Admiration.”

"Unlike Nehru, Shastri did not harbour any ideological hostility towards the Jana Sangh and the RSS. He used to often invite Shri Guruji for consultation on national issues." – L K Advani in his Autobiography.

At a time when our country was at war, our second Prime Minister, Lal Bahadur Shastri decided to cut across party lines and invited RSS Sarsanghchalak Guruji MS Golwalkar, to an All-Party Meet.

The purpose of the invitation was to task the Delhi Police with more strategic activities and relieve them of their routine duties which were then taken over by RSS workers. (Dr. Harish Chandra Barthwal in his book, The Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh: An Introduction)

Barthwal even goes further to claim that upon Shastri's request, RSS workers also provided food and other essential supplies to soldiers deployed on the war front.

The year was 1965 and the Indian subcontinent was going through a turbulent time due to an all-out war with Pakistan. The severity of the seventeen day Indo-Pak war of 1965 can be summed up by the statement that it was the largest engagement of armoured vehicles and the largest tank battle since World War II.  After Pakistani forces attempted to infiltrate the Indian part of Kashmir, Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri retaliated by launching a military assault against the infiltration.

With President S Radhakrishnan and Prime Minister Shastri at the helm of the Indian Armed Forces, LBS in Loksabha made this speech before the war…

“In the utilization of our limited resources, we have always given primacy to plans and projects for economic development. It would, therefore, be obvious for anyone who is prepared to look at things objectively that India can have no possible interest in provoking border incidents or in building up an atmosphere of strife… In these circumstances, the duty of Government is quite clear, and this duty will be discharged fully and effectively… We would prefer to live in poverty for as long as necessary, but we shall not allow our freedom to be subverted,”

The infiltration bid was foiled and India emerged victorious with an upper hand at the time of the UN-initiated cease-fire on 23 September 1965. While many stories of bravery and nationalism during that time of war have come to light over the years, this one that is also worth taking note of is perhaps the least known.

The public memory of LBS, Bharat’s PM after the death of Jawarhalal Nehru, is almost anecdotal.

Shastri, whose 19-month prime ministership was hemmed between Nehru and Indira Gandhi, has, without doubt, not got the space he deserved in public memory.

From calming the violent anti-Hindi agitation that erupted across the southern states to taking the first steps in resolving India’s biggest food shortage by promoting the Green Revolution (and convincing people to voluntarily give up one meal so that the food saved could be distributed to the affected populace) and the White Revolution (Amul cooperative), LBS also oversaw India’s first major shift away from Nehru’s socialist economic policies based on central planning.

Verghese Kurien, the chairman and founder of Amul, was named the chairman of NDDB by the then Prime Minister of India Lal Bahadur Shastri. Operation Flood was based on the experimental pattern set up by Kurien.

Shastri was way ahead of his times as far as economic policy goes. His pragmatism would have helped put us on the path of high growth at least two decades earlier.

The US ambassador to India during that time Chester Bowles said “Shastri was an extra ordinary man.’ He divided the Indian leaders into Adams and Jacksonians. The Adams were the ones educated in UK/USA. These people according to him were not thoroughly Indian. They had one foot in Asia and one foot in Europe. Bright and charming people.  Shastri was a Jacksonian, he had roots in India. He had never been out of India until after he became Prime Minister. There were many of these, and Chester Bowles concludes by saying that he had more faith in the Jacksonians for the future.

‘In the four decades in parliament ‘- Prime Minister Atul Bihari Vajpayee

Compared Prime Minister Nehru and Prime Minister Shastri.

“Nehru with regal up bringing on the one hand and Shastri who fought his way through abject poverty”.

A barrister who had acquired western education and imbibed western culture at Cambridge University on the one hand and Lal bahadur Shastri who obtained his ‘Shastri’ degree at Kashi Vidya Peath on the other.

I G Patel, who was working in the finance ministry at that time, has recounted in one of his essays how the decision to devalue the currency had been taken in principle and conveyed informally to the International Monetary Fund (IMF) when Shastri was the prime minister.

Indeed, Shastri had taken an equally bold step before intimating the IMF about his government’s decision to devalue the currency. His finance minister, T T Krishnamachari, was not comfortable with the idea of devaluation. As Medha M Kudaisya notes in her biography of G D Birla, the only man that stood in the way of India agreeing to removing government controls on imports and industrial activities and devaluing the currency was Krishnamachari.

For Shastri, the state of the Indian economy after the ravages of the war had left the country with no option other than agreeing to the IMF-World Bank prescriptions for economic liberalisation and currency devaluation. So, Shastri used a clever tactic to remove Krishnamachari as the finance minister.

 

For Krishnamachari, this was the second time in his political career that he had to step down as the finance minister. Once under Nehru’s prime ministership, he had to resign after the Mundhra scandal broke out. Now, under Shastri, there were allegations of malfeasance against Krishnamachari’s son. Shastri refused to clear him of those charges until investigations were completed and he wanted his finance minister to step down till the inquiry to be conducted by a Supreme Court judge gave him a clean chit. Krishnamachari took it as an insult and offered his resignation, which Shastri promptly accepted and appointed Sachin Chowdhury as the new finance minister.

 

Shastri did not live long after that. His successor, Indira Gandhi, retained Chowdhury as the finance minister and agreed to implement the decision on devaluing the currency taken by Shastri. It is, of course, a different matter that she did not fulfil the other part of the commitment to dismantle the control and permit raj.

 

Shastri’s reformist credentials were also evident from his economic team. All his team members – S Bhoothalingham, Dharma Vira, I G Patel and L K Jha – believed in the urgent need to unshackle the economy and go in for reforms to realise the potential of the Indian economy by modernising agriculture and allowing the private sector to operate with relative freedom from controls.

Winds of change were also felt in some decisions of the government under Shastri. In August 1965, the prime minister announced in Parliament that government controls over economic activity would be reconsidered. Soon thereafter, regulations for sectors such as steel and cement were relaxed.

P.N. Dhar, a close adviser to Indira Gandhi wrote in Indira Gandhi, the ‘Emergency’ And Indian Democracy, that,

“Lal Bahadur Shastri, the unassuming prime minister who had succeeded Nehru, seemed an unlikely person to face up to the (economic) situation, but in his own quiet way he did initiate a series of steps which would have not only brought the economy out of the existing crisis but possibly put it on a high-growth path in the long run.

He wore no ideological blinkers; he saw facts as they were in all their starkness. Chronic food shortages made him shift investment from basic industries to agriculture. Roaring black markets persuaded him to make a relative shift from controls to incentives, and the glaring inefficiency of the public sector made him accept a larger role for the private sector and foreign investment.

He also took measures to shift the locus of economic decision-making from the Planning Commission to the ministries and from the Centre to the states. These measures reduced the influence of the Planning Commission—which had developed a rigid, almost doctrinaire outlook on economic policies—and at the same time decentralized decision-making."

What’s more, Shastri even ordered a review of all major public sector projects which had not taken off by then. As Kudaisya writes in The Life and Times of GD Birla, Shastri even tried to decentralise governance by shifting decision-making on projects from the Planning Commission to different economic ministries. A national planning council was set up that reduced the scope and role of the Planning Commission.

Shastri was trying to generate fresh thinking on our development strategy at around the same time that many other Asian countries were fundamentally reorienting their development strategy, embracing export promotion rather than import substitution. For example, India and South Korea had around the same level of average incomes in 1964; then South Korea pulled ahead and there is now a yawning gap between the two countries. There is thus good reason to speculate whether things would have turned out differently had Shastri been blessed with a longer life.

What happened subsequently is well known. Indira Gandhi responded to the economic crisis with a sharp turn to the Left, choosing populism over economic reform.

“The victory in the 1965 war had made him very popular in his own right. During the brief period of his stewardship he had acquired his own popular political support that would, I believe, have given him added confidence to pursue an agenda of economic reform of the kind that was taken up only twenty-five years later, in 1991," wrote Dhar.

Ex IAS C P Srivastava arguably his closest and most trusted aide, wrote “Lal Bahadur Shastri Prime Minister of India 1964-66: A Life of Truth in Politics”

it is Srivastava's refusal to recognise that no mortal is perfect. He was, he records, "advised to disclose Mr Shastri's deficiencies alongside his achievements. I am afraid I could not discover any".

A great deal of immense importance in this book-most notably the hitherto unpublished details of Shastri's Tashkent conversations with Ayub and the then Soviet prime minister Alexei Kosygin - has seen the light of day.

At Tashkent, Pak President Ayub was desperate about getting some commitment from Shastri to "settle" the Kashmir dispute. To Shastri, Kashmir was "not negotiable". Ultimately, in a last ditch attempt, Ayub said: "Kashmir ke mamle mein kuchh aisa kar deejiye ke main apne mulk men munh dikhane ke qabil rahoon.

Shastri's reply was: "Sadar saheb, main bahut muafi chahta hoon ki main is mamle mein apki koi khidmat nahin kar sakta.

Srivastava has not confined himself to Shastri's years as a politician or freedom-fighter. There are fascinating details about Shastri the man, beginning with his childhood in a poor home and his privations as a struggling student. The lack of adequate nutrition weakened his physique and perhaps led to his early death. Shastri's wife belonged to a well-to-do family.

His only advice to her after marriage, according to Srivastava, was: "For your future happiness and contentment, you should look at those who are even less favoured by fortune than ourselves."

It is a pity that Shastri died prematurely without implementing most of his ideas on economic reforms, deregulation and decentralisation. But it is a national shame that nobody in India remembers Shastri for having dared to usher in those reforms at that time.

Nowhere in the annals of history of the world can one find a Prime Minister of a country and President of other country become pall bearers to the Prime Minister of a third country.

On 11 January 1966, Prime Minister Kosygin and Pakistan’s President Ayub Khan a war adversary of the day, who became a friend grieving pall bearer, carrying the coffin of Prime Minister Shastri on their shoulder to the gateway of the Soviet aircraft. Great tributes were paid to Shastriji.

“When he died his life sheet was spotlessly clean. He left no money, no house and no land. The only thing he left, apart from a shining reputation, was a small, outstanding loan from his bank.

He did leave an example which will continue to inspire, fortify and encourage all those of every community and creed who believe that the only foundation for national life must be dedication to truth and honesty. He never sought for himself any superlatives or fulsome praise.

Kuldip Nayyar after death of Nehru said, they are appointing LBS to keep PM’s seat WARM for Indira, but LBS turned out to be a Great Statesman, Leader & proved him wrong, but also lost his life.

On the morning of January 11, his secretaries found a note on his table, in which he had penned down lines by Urdu poet Saqib Lakhnavi.

“Zamana bade shauk se sunn raha tha

Humee so gaye dastaan kehte kehte”.

Did Lal Bahadur Shastri have a premonition of his own death?

According to the Prime Minister’s family, when his body arrived in Delhi, it had turned blue and had cuts. A lot of events that had transpired in Tashkent before his death lay the ground for further speculation. Shastri’s place of stay had been changed just twenty-four hours prior to his arrival.

His Lodging was quite far from where the rest of his party was put up. The lodging was devoid of medical arrangements and there was no telephone in the Prime Minister’s bedroom. He had returned to his dacha at 10 pm post attending Premier Kosygin’s farewell reception. His dinner had been prepared by Ambassador T.N Kaul’s cook Jan Mohammad and not Ram Nath, his personal servant.

At around 1.20 am Shastri came out of his room coughing and asking for “doctor sahib,” Dr. R.N Chugh. His assistants helped him to bed. However, before, Dr. Chugh could act; the Prime Minister had breathed his last.

Despite evidence of possible foul play, no post mortem had been conducted in Tashkent or Delhi.

The media was given little information. The Prime Minister’s personal diary was never recovered.

AND LEST WE FORGET, THAT HE WAS MURDERED & INDIRA GANDHI WAS BRIMMING WITH JOY WHEN LBS's BODY ARRIVED AT AIRPORT.

#VANDEMATARAM

(Forwarding shared post)

 

Daughters- No longer a              पराया धन!

Happy Daughter's Day!

It's daughter's day, just now I'm told. That leaves me wondering, how is it that there's not a single post on FB that could wake me up to write a post dedicated to the day!

Father's day, mother's , teacher's and all such days never pass off like this kind of a damp squib. But why?

While taking my usual  hour - long evening walk, I tried googling the inbuilt search engine atop the head. This took me down the memory lane when in India daughters were virtual outcastes, deemed (rather than either regarded or respected as) something in Hindi whereof I'm unable to choose an exact English equivalent . So, I cite the specific Hindi term , which is of course so much sugar coated in respectability that it stayput any adverse discussion. 

That term is पराया धन!

Intrinsic in this nomenclature is the cultural exclusion to the parental  family which daughters learnt to grow with until changes began to take shape in the seventees , so to say.

Even the Hindu Succession law maintained tacit exclusion until 1937 whereafter some cosmetic changes brought some succour for daughters who ultimately found some stable respectability for the first time with amendment introduced for the first time as late as in 1956, but that was incomplete though in tune with the slow paced social evolutions. 

However by the turn of the century, daughters made their way into every professional spheres and quite consistent with their evolution, the 2005 amendment came as a final word for them, making them an all purpose equivalent of a Son!

The import of what I have cryptically presented is not to discuss details, but only to say that it's not enough to say or forget to say, Happy Daughter's day.  Idea is to call upon the daughters for stock taking. 

Just don't feel content about the milestones you have crossed. Look back, to check if you have more to put in, but without being oblivious of what traditions predicate for you as a daughter.

Happy Daughter's Day!

S.181(4) Cr.P.C holds the key to the jurisdiction issue accosting the Sushant Case.

It reads as below:-

"Any offence of criminal misappropriation or of criminal breach of trust may be inquired into or tried by a Court within whose local jurisdiction the offence was committed or any part of the property which is the subject of the offence was received or retained, or was required to be returned or accounted for, by the accused person".

It is the tail-end portion which states , jurisdiction would lie within the territory where (the misappropriated) property,..............' or was required to be returned or accounted for, by the accused person'.

In order to attract the above proviso, it has to be argued that the accused persons are alleged to have committed acts of misappropriation, including illegal fund transfer aggregating 15-17 Crores of rupees besides removing vital documents hearing property rights. These are liable to be returned or accounted for. Obvious question corollary thereto would be, 'accountable or returnable to whom and where'? Answer is obvious. To the legal heirs or successors recognised by the law. Which would drag the jurisdiction to Patna where the bereaved family of the deceased victim of the offence resides!

Million dollar question never the less outstands whether this legal angle is or isn't within the cognizance of the too many legal wizards cooking the broth who have so far dwelt only on a flimsy line, that Rhea Chakravarti had designedly distanced Sushant from the family with criminal conspiracy to pursue the whole game plan. 

Well, you can't build a massive edifice on a foundation which may not endure small load of a cottage!

SUSHANT CASE

JURISDICTION-A  MAJOR BOTTLENECK !

Territorial Jurisdiction may prove a major bottleneck in the just registered criminal  case in the mysterious death of Sushant Singh Rajput.

Actor  Sushant Singh Rajput Case got a new twist the other day, following institution of a new criminal case, against Actress Rhia Chakravarti, founded on a First Information Report lodged with the Rajiv Nagar P.S ,a Patna based police station , by Actor's  bereaved father.

The police has not only instituted a case against the said named accused under Sections 341, 342, 380, 406, 420, 306, 506 and 120B of the Indian Penal Code., but has also despatched it's inquiring officers to Mumbai for investigation. 

The case had hitherto hovered around a hunt against the Bollywood Mafia, leaving the  media, besides ordinary onlookers, in an anxious wait for the day when the Bollywood Mafia veil might be lifted ,to the full public view.

This new case has come as a fireworks, turning popular public attention from one half baked narrative to altogether a new script, which may have the effect of washing out all that stood built in the public estimation, against the alleged Mafia angle. The supposed Mafia may thus stand acquitted clean without having to go for a trial even in people's  court, not to speak of the law court. 

Territirial Jurisdiction

When an offence has been committed at a particular place, usually the court in whose jurisdiction the crime has been committed has the jurisdiction to inquire into and try that case.

It is worth taking a bird's eye view on the Jurisdiction of the Criminal Courts as provided in the Code of Criminal Procedure (Cr.P.C).

Section 177 – Only the Court under whose territorial jurisdiction the offence has been committed  has the jurisdiction  to inquire into and try the case.

Section 178 - Where the offence has been committed in more than one place or  the p.o (place occurance) is uncertain , having been committed in several places, partly  in one local area and the rest in another area, comprising  of several acts, committed in different local areas, then such offence may be inquired into or tried by a Court having jurisdiction over any of such local area. This particular section possibly holds the clue for the Patna Police to have taken up the cudgel in the matter . But on which factual score? That is a million dollar question which is bound to accost higher echelons.

Further noteworthy is Section 179. An act is an offence because of anything which has been done and as a consequence which has ensued, the said offence may be inquired into or tried by a court of competent jurisdiction.  Even this provision jokes promise in favour of Patna jurisdiction.

Additionally ,Section 180 deals with the place of trial when the act committed is an offence because it is related to some other offence. According to it the offence which has been committed first has to be inquired into or tried, when two acts are done in connection with each other and both are offences, by the court under whose jurisdiction either of the act has been committed. In all such provisions, the emphasis is always on the place where the offence has been committed, to find the jurisdiction.

One more section 181 also is there which outlines  conditions in case of certain offences. According to section 181(1), the trial can also be commenced where the accused is found, besides the place where the offence was committed. Section 181(1) talks about the offences, when not committed in a single place. It deals with the following cases.

Thug, or murder committed while performing the act of thug, dacoity, or dacoity with murder etc- where the offence is committed or where the accused is found.

Kidnapping or abduction of a person- the place from where the person was kidnapped/ abducted or where the person was concealed or conveyed or detained.  

Theft, extortion or robbery – the Court where the offence has been committed or where the stolen property is possessed, received or delivered, has the jurisdiction to try such a case.

Criminal misappropriation or criminal breach of trust- where the offence has been committed or where any part of the property which is the subject matter of the offence has been received or retained, required to be returned or accounted for, by the accused.

But the above section deals with offences when the offender is travelling, as evident from the nature of the offences as specified under this section.

Section 182 deals with offences committed by letters etc. Under this section, if any offence includes cheating, if the victim has been deceived by means of letters or telecommunication messages, it shall be looked into by the Court under whose local jurisdiction such letters or messages have been sent or received; and under the  local jurisdiction of the Court in which the property has been delivered by the person deceived or has been received by the accused person.

Sushant Case.

In the instant case it has been alleged that the accused had designedly  committed acts which caused Sushant's getting cut off from his Patna based family. With intent to gaining full control over Sushant , the main accused in concert with her family, practised drug abuse on the victim and completely impoverished him through illegal fund transfers of 15-17 Crores , from Sushant's bank accounts.

As of now, only a hairline thread has been conjured up to address the jurisdiction issue. It is a factual assertion  that, the whole criminal act was founded on the illegal restraint applied on  Sushant's person which could not have been made possible without attaining his distancing from his Patna based near and dear ones. It is this very component of alleged offence which has been conceived in the whole frame of the new prosecution narrative which may or may not sustain the jurisdiction issue.

Self awareness is not a small idea of mundane value.
How easy is it to pronounce, translate and cite its equivalent nomenclature, 'infinity'? Infinity can not either be perceived or conceived within a finite frame of mind.
Likewise, the term 'awareness' in its ordinary usage has finite connotation. But if one introspects for a while, its unending streams may become apparent.
Why not test it for yourself , as seeing is believing. Try it.
Speak to yourself . Honestly. Without an element of self deception. Answer for yourself , what is precisely elicited hereafter.
Right now, are you aware?
You may shoot back, but aware of what?
Answer is, aware of what 'is' , as 'is', where 'is' .
Absurd . Isn't it? Seems absurd?
That is so, which is proof that you are not aware.
Arn't you aware of your age? name ? residence ? and like things which matter and which can't escape your ready reckoning . Why? Because these data accompany you like your shadow, during conscious state . Isn't it?
Now state , what is proof that you are conscious and alive. Your simple assertion to that effect is subjective. What is not verifiable is subjective.
Pat would come your answer, no, no, the fact that I am conscious and alive is very much verifiable by even a lay man.
You would readily show what? Your respiration , your beating heart and your power of cognition to receive and outpour sensory data.
Now, state frankly, whether you are involuntarily aware and conscious of these.
Does your awareness normally and naturally focus these material involuntary functions that never cease until life survives ? And the cessation of which proclaims abatement of life?
That explains the tip of that iceberg which we humans foolishly think of being in command, though the position is just the other way around. One which commands is the awareness and the one which is commanded is we humans.
Once understood, this scheme of command may enable one to size up that infinite reality which we call by different names, God being one.

OMKAR

It is not a scientific approach to cite Vedas or Puranas while interpreting any objective observations that hint at resolution of any mystery. However it not an unscientific approach either to avoid connecting available inputs with those which the revered mythological texts complement or supplement or contradict. This is a legal theory which is called 'relevancy' in the law of evidence.
As a TV Channel broadcast said, NASA has recorded the sound that the Solar holocaust has been constantly producing at a wave length which scientists found impossible to  capture by or for recording. It took long effort to devise such recording which ,once done, amazed the scientists, in that the sound is a subtle Om chanting which forms substratum of the Indian spiritual system .
Leave aside the Tantrik or Yogic literatures that value Omkar as the unstruck sound recognised as the fundamental constituent of creation. Simply conceive the primary character of sound. It is an energy. It must be an effect of something struck. Try to locate any sound that your senses may pick up. Can you certify it to be unstruck, caused by no collision or friction or whatever? Clapping, for instance, is the result of  your palms coming together. Dont allow the palms to join, and then try to produce the sound you generate by clapping. Can you? No? That is to say that sound we hear has to be struck, by whatever means.
Now let us do some observation, leaving aside any belief or faith systems which an honest scientific observation would prohibit.
Simply collect and consolidate your attention and focus it on your natural breath, ensuring simply that you dont interfere with its natural rhythm. Do it for a minute or two. There is an ongoing natural friction that the natural breath is generating. Dont presume it, just observe and find out. Dont import any external definitions, just observe and find out whether the friction occasioned by your involuntary inhalation and exhalation is soundless. If you really find it is soundless, you have to further explore whether your hearing sense has been over powered by the external noise or may be you have to sharpen your sense of hearing so that the sound emerging from the closest arena does not escape reception.
Once you begin to pick it up, do nothing save and except picking it up in its existing form, without giving it a name, colour , meaning or definition. Let the mind define it by reflection. Give it a free hand.
Once you succeed, the exercise would lead to a discovery that would let you exclaim in wonder - Great!

Quarantine.
This is not a new term but is not in general use in routine life. Hence, it is new to the general masses, not at least to a Raj Yoga practitioner who is conversant with the term,'Pratyahar' which is step -one in the practice of meditation.
In practice, to quarantine the mind for a brief moment is pratyahar, or sense withdrawal which ushers the practitioner into the stage of concentration or Dharna and then into meditation.
The stage preceding pratyahar is pranayama. This term has, of late, gained popularity . It is now widely followed as breathing exercises in its different variants, namely Anulom Velom, kapal bhati , bhramari, etc.
What is essential to be understood is that these practices, in fact, target expansion of the breathing channel whereby the breathing rate slows down and automatic external and internal retentions in between inhalations and exhalations expand. That's called Kewal Kumbhak or involuntary retention of breath.
In the present context, it is this very retention stamina and slow breathing rate which is material. An adept in slow breathing with ability to hold the breath may negotiate with apprehended infective conditions as and when accosted.
It is for you to appreciate it's relevance like I do, wondering whether it is or is not redundant to put on mask even where not needed, such as while taking walk,  and like things. 

Limbic system-3

(Teach a kid the table of two twos are 5. Let it go down the memory data base. And then say two twos are 4, you will receive a negative nod in response) .

Pinhole camera!
Remember?
If you have not forgotten, we read this in a physics class in the school, depicting how the image of a palm tree is registered inverted on the pin hole camera screen like which we have ratina with eyes like pin hole. Likewise our ratima registers all images in inverted mode but we don't have any inverted perception due to the autocorrect feature that's inbuilt in the human brain.
Our Physics teacher mentioned Limbic System in this regard, though in only lighter vein, telling us humans without ulti khopdi would have been cursed with inverted vision of all that we see straight rather than inverse. In the next breath , he clarified , human brain had been gifted with an exceptional device which inverted the inverted image formed on the ratina. That's why we see every thing  normally. 
However, this exceptional feature respecting the ocular system, was unavailable for the general cognitive  system of the brain. That means, bodies which carried ulti khopdi over their shoulders would be doomed. 
The ulti khopdi angle he connected with the mischief which the Limbic system in humans often played. 
What he said didn't seem relevant until it's relevance surfaced recently via face book posts and comments . 
Isn't it?
Want more clarification?
No issues. Wait!
(More to follow)

Limbic system-2

(Limbic system-1........... ...The limbic system is the portion of the brain that deals with three keyfunctions: emotions, memories and arousal (or stimulation. ... )

In simple words, the limbic system has two important roles to play in the material sense under discussion.
One is to store inputs as data in the memory of human mind. And the other is to compare any incoming data with its existing data base, to yield an involuntary response by way of 'yes', 'no', 'i don't know' or 'is it?' or likes of these.
Your spontaneous nod to anything seen,read or heard, whether in agreement or disagreement or astonishment or whatever, is engineered by the limbic system.
Teach a kid the table of two twos are 5. Let it go down the memory data base. And then say two twos are 4, you will receive a negative nod in response .
This may seem too much of an exaggeration where data corrections are feasible by scientific reasoning or athithmatical logic. Difficulty occurs where logic system gets dwarfed by belief systems.
(More to follow)

Limbic System-1

The brainstem (or brain stem) is the posterior part of the brain, continuous with the spinal cord. In the humanbrain the brainstem includes the midbrain, the pons and medulla oblongata of the hindbrain.
The brain stem sits above the spinal cord and has many connections between them. The brain stem, the most primitive part of the brain, is made up of the medulla, pons,cerebellum, midbrain, hypothalamusand thalamus. The cerebral cortex,limbic system and basal ganglia make up the forebrain.
The primary structures within the limbic system include the amygdala, hippocampus, thalamus, hypothalamus, basal ganglia, and cingulate gyrus.
The amygdala is the emotion center of the brain,
 while the hippocampus plays an essential role in the formation of new memories about past experiences.
The limbic system is a set of structures in the brain that controls emotion, memories and arousal. It contains regions that detect fear,control bodily functions and perceive sensory information (among other things).
The limbic system is the portion of the brain that deals with three keyfunctions: emotions, memories and arousal (or stimulation). ...
The thalamus is located within the brainstem and is part of the pathway of information into the cerebrum, which is the section of the brain that is responsible for thinking and movement.
(More to follow)