communication – Page 44 – Take off with Natarajan

From Desk Jobs to Blue Skies and Brown Earth: How 6 People Quit Their Jobs to Take up Farming

April 3, 2016NatarajanLeave a comment

Whether it’s organic farming, livestock rearing or dairy farming, these people quit their comfortable, high paying jobs to go back to their roots and take up farming.

Many dream of quitting their jobs or taking a sabbatical to find a new calling, see the world, indulge in art or pass time with nature. To some, the practice of farming involves all of those and more. The smell of Earth, the moo of cows, the open skies, the excitement of the first rain, the delight in the first sprout – there lies a simple joy in farming. Here are a few stories of people who took the plunge and never regretted it:

The Milk Farming Collective that’s Not Amul

Akshayakalp head G N S Reddy

Source: Facebook

In Bengaluru, Shashi Kumar, Ranjith Mukundan, Venkatesh Sesasaye and Praveen Nale, all employed as software engineers, decided to quit their jobs in 2011. They teamed up with a group of dairy farming enthusiasts to form the Akshayakalpa Farms and Food Ltd, headed by G N S Reddy. At this farm, located in Hassan in Karnataka, the health of cows is of primary concern. Their health is electronically monitored daily, along with the milk production capability. Besides this, about 500 farmers have employment with a sure-shot chance of getting monetarily rewarded. The farm sells 4000 litres of milk daily, and has expanded to a farm in Mysore.

The Sabbatical that Got Them Closer to Nature

Slogging it out in the IT industry for nearly a decade had burnt out Santosh Singh. While he went on a sabbatical for two years, his brothers Rajesh and Sathish joined him. On their three-acre ancestral land in Haalenahalli, about 40 kilometres from Bengaluru, they set up Amrutha Dairy Farms with just three cows. In a short time, the farm expanded to accommodate 100 cows, backed by NABARD. Even though there was a drought that led to lower milk production, they stayed. Soon, they started rearing heifer (cows that haven’t borne calves) and launched the production of paneer and cheese in 2014.

Organic Farming for Healthier Living

Rajendra (left) and Rego (right), the organic farmers at Green Souls

Source: Facebook

Mumbai-based Sabita Rajendran and Julius Rego are part of a new breed of urban farmers who have taken up growing organic food as their true calling. In 2011, Rajendran quit her job in advertising, while Rego moved out of furniture dealership. Their need to avoid eating pesticide-laden food and chemically soiled water inspired them to start Green Souls in 2012, with an initial investment of just Rs 20,000. Along with vegetables and fruits, they also cultivate medicinal herbs and flowering plants, which they donate to the Tata Memorial Hospital.

Leading by Example

Instead of being an armchair critic and sympathiser, Anand from Mysore gave up his position as a software engineer and set up a farm where he practices organic farming. Besides his passion for all things green and healthy, he also felt deeply about making farmers live sustainably through farming. He purchased six acres of land in Shadanahalli, Mysore, and started organic farming. He then created various groups for farmers, and invited them to explore how and why it would be feasible to take up organic farming. Helping not just himself but also a large collective of organic farmers, he tries to open the market up to organic products.

The Tree Farming Couple

Nikki and Gaurav Chaudhary; Nikki was appreciated by World Congress on Agroforestry recently

Source: Facebook

Gaurav and Nikki Chaudhary realised that they earned more money and peace of mind through agroforestry than they would have in their corporate jobs. Gaurav is an economics post-graduate from Delhi School of Economics, and Nikki studied business economics from London. They were inspired by Gaurav’s father, Chaudhary Veerpal Singh, a farmer who toiled the Earth for many years to give his son an education. Gaurav, who had thought of going back to farming when he was in high school, raises poplar, eucalyptus and other plantations with his wife in Pilibhit, Uttar Pradesh. They also run the Progressive Dairy Farmers Association. Nikki recently got appreciated by the World Congress on Agroforestry for her blog post that detailed their journey. They believe that farming needs intelligence and professionalism to get successful.

The Cattle Farmer

T. Arumugam from Chennai worked with an NGO and was the first graduate in his family with five siblings. When he decided to get into the agriculture sector, everyone in his family had major misgivings, except his mother. To prove that he could make good out of it, he took up studying and attending training programmes first. He learnt the ropes from workshops and short courses provided by the MS Swaminathan Research Foundation (MSSRF) and the Tamil Nadu Agricultural University (TNAU). According to him, Indian youth should go back to farming, being a largely agrarian economy. That’s what drove him to take up rearing livestock and wheat farming.

Source……Neeti Vijaykumar in http://www.the betterindia.com

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Captain of India’s Blind Cricket Team on His Love for the Game, His Team and More…

April 3, 2016NatarajanLeave a comment

For these men in blue, vision impairment could never act as a hurdle in their path towards fulfilling their dreams – their inspiring passion for the game of cricket and their desire to be a part of it. The Indian Blind Cricket team has been making the country proud for years now.

The team won the Blind World Cup in 2014 by beating Pakistan in the finals. In 2012, India won the first T20 world cup in Bengaluru, and is the only blind team in the world to have won all three championships – T20, ODI and Asian championship.

Formed in 1998, it is managed by the Cricket Association for the Blind in India (CABI), which is associated with the World Blind Council. Here, Captain Ajay Kumar Reddy talks about his love for cricket, his team, and how ordinary citizens can help them in their game:

Q: Tell us about how you developed a love for cricket and how you started playing the game?

Ajay Kumar Reddy

A: I used to enjoy cricket and had the desire to play as well. But it was not possible because of my vision. When I joined blind school, I came to know that cricket is played by the visually impaired too. Soon, I developed my skills with the desire to play at a higher level. After watching my performance, the sports teacher encouraged me to train and also coached me. I concentrated on my performance thereafter.

Q: How does the team come together and train? How often do you train?

A: Every player practices in his own state and they come together for a coaching camp at a particular venue only before an international match.

Q: Which match has been your most memorable one?

A: The ODI final at Cape Town in December 2014. India needed 141 runs in 11 overs against Pakistan in the finals. After the loss of five wickets, Prakash and I formed a partnership, ending the match in a win.

Q: Can you share some interesting anecdotes about any of your team members?

A: The vice-captain, Prakash Jayaramaiah sits on my shoulders in sheer joy when we get a wicket – so we do have a bit of fun in those terms.

Q: Are there are any special requirements for training or preparing for the matches?

A: We need a turf wicket and a ground covered with grass which is not always available. Training kits are also required.

Q: If a visually impaired person wants to pursue cricket, how should she/he go about doing so?

A: They should start from the grass root level, which is at school or district levels, and thereafter state and zonal levels. This is easier if they study in schools for the blind where they can showcase their talent to reach the higher league. There are associations in each and every state as well, which can be approached if they wish to play cricket.

Q: How do you think ordinary citizens can help the team, besides just supporting it in matches?

A: They can act as volunteers, help with providing cricketing gear, or through individual donations.

Source….www.thebetterindia.com

Natarajan

This College Student Is Taking Thousands of Beggars off the Streets and into Dignified Lives…

April 3, 2016NatarajanLeave a comment

Swati Bondia has created a powerful story of social entrepreneurship. At the age of 18, she started a handicrafts business that helped over 1000 people from the streets start leading dignified lives.

Five years ago, at a busy traffic signal where Bangaloreans waited impatiently for the light to turn green, a little girl went begging frantically from one vehicle to another, racing against the time the red signal gave her. As serendipity would have it, she stretched her hand towards Swati Bondia, an 18-year-old college girl. Swati refused to give her money. In a reaction that was totally unexpected, the child started crying. As heads turned and eyes rolled, Swati was left flustered. She quickly got down from the auto, took the girl aside and tried to pacify her.

She bought her food and clothes but the girl insisted, “Didi, I don’t want all this, I want a ten rupee note. If I don’t get money, my mother will beat me up.”

Swati gasped. She was now terribly angry with the child’s mother and couldn’t control her desire to confront her and question her cruelty. Swati asked the girl to take her to her mother. Her mind was crowded with questions that she would ask of her.

But she was in for her second shock of the day. Where she expected to see an exploitative mother, she saw the face of a helpless migrant woman who lived on the streets with her children and an alcoholic husband. The family had travelled all the way from Rajasthan looking for work. But no one was ready to trust them and give them jobs. Begging, then, became the family’s only option.

Call it teenage impulsiveness if you will, but Swati was overcome by a strong feeling to help. She promised the family she would find work for them.

For the next couple of days, Swati went around looking for jobs for the migrant family. This hunt made her realise what such families go through in finding their footing.

Companies and households simply refused to give jobs to migrants, unwilling to take the risk of trusting total strangers whose identities they couldn’t trace.

Disappointed, Swati decided to go back to the family and apologise that she had failed to find them work. However, when she walked into their shelter, she saw a different scene altogether. The alcoholic husband had shaved and tidied himself. The children had not gone to beg. The mother was beaming with hope that their life was about to change. Looking at them, Swati could not bring herself to say that she had not succeeded.

She decided she would be the one to create jobs for them.

She sat down with them to find out what they could do. The family knew the art of making handicrafts so Swati decided to give handicraft making a try. She bought them some raw material for Rs 250 and they made beautiful crafts from it. Now it was time to be back at the busy signal.

They displayed their wares on the pavement and behold, they made sales of Rs. 750 that day. Swati says it was the proudest day for all of them.

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Encouraged by their achievement and now confident of themselves, the family started making more handicrafts. Swati took their products beyond the traffic signals of Bangalore, under the banner of Om Shanti Traders. She sold their handicraft items as corporate and hospitality gifts. The takers for the products grew and so did the number of families that became part of Om Shanti Traders. Seeing the change she had brought to the life of the first family she helped, more and more street dwellers wanted to become part of Swati’s organization.

Today, the little girl who cried at the signal goes to school.

One thousand individuals who would otherwise be begging on the streets are able to earn up to Rs. 10,000 per month and lead dignified lives. Swati grew the business to set up a factory and provide accommodation facilities for these families. When families sign up with Om Shanti Traders, Swati insists they commit to sending their girl children to school; she funds this initiative herself. She notes that the boys have been a difficult lot to keep in school but is trying to ensure that happens as well.

All the while that she was changing the lives of street people, Swati continued to lead her life as a college student as well. She completed her BBM and MBA, efficiently juggling her studies with her social enterprise. Swati has now started her new entrepreneurial venture, which provides virtual exhibition services. Her company, Enrich Expo, provides scholarships to children from 12 different villages, each village getting Rs. 20 lakh. As she builds one entrepreneurial venture after another, she says she wants to eventually realize her vision of bridging the gap between the privileged and the underprivileged.

Source….Ranjini Sivaswamy in http://www.the betterindia.com

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“I’d Given up on Returning to India After 18 Years Abroad. But This Year Something Changed.”

April 3, 2016NatarajanLeave a comment

From dreaming about returning to India one day after she had to shift to the US with her family, to reaching a stage where she could no longer find that cherished connection with her country, to falling in love with it all over again – this is the story of Jessica Sinha and how Kolkata showed her a different India.

I was 10 when I moved to the U.S. and have lived abroad for over 18 years now. Leaving was the most difficult thing for me to do every time I visited India in the first eight years of moving to the U.S. I would bite my lip hoping the pain would hold back the tears. My last memory of India would be of the last song that played on the radio before we arrived at Indira Gandhi International Airport. Each year I vowed – I’ll be back someday, I’ll live here eventually. With no plans of when, where, and how, I continued to dream about it.

But after those first eight years, it never felt the same again. My relatives grew distant. Their excitement on seeing us dwindled every year. I found myself struggling with the basic things – showering, going to the bathroom, shopping, getting to places on my own, taking the bus, etc. Even my Indian looks and perfect Hindi couldn’t help hide the fact that I had no clue about anything in India. I was just a guest to my relatives now – a guest who visited once a year.

I grew up and started feeling unsafe in my country, cringing every time I read another news article about another rape case. Every trip from then on was the same. We would arrive in Delhi, go home, stay home. Then we would take the car and driver, visit relatives and family friends, and come back home again. We went to the mall once in a while, but the charm of India that I was delighted about once…it remained only in my heart. Everything and everyone I connected with, seemed to have almost never existed and my dream of moving to India started fading, right in front of my eyes.

This month I went back to India, Kolkata this time, with my Bengali husband for our first India trip after marriage. And something changed in the 14 days I spent there. A fire that I thought was long put out, sparked again. I saw a different country:

kolkata3

Mornings here begin with the sweet cooing of the Koyal. This city wakes up later than many others, but by 7-8 am, I can hear elderly neighbours chattering, gargling, or fighting a cough. The kitchen stoves come alive and the scraping of metal palta against the kadais marks the beginning of a new day. The smell of mouth-watering spices slowly fills the corridors of the building and escapes into the alleys.

Someone blows a long note on the conch shell over the sound of bells and muffles of Bengali prayers.

kolkata1

I walk up to the roof and get a glimpse of the sun. The buildings, painted yellow or light blue or pink sometimes, bear brown-black streaks from past rains. Some rooftops have bent clotheslines holding long saris that flow in the cool morning breeze. Somehow, the unfolded sari speaks to me. It floats freely like a kite, but is held safely by the clothesline.

With the distant sound of koyals, I sweep into a daydream where every single day in India feels as this moment does.

kolkata2

Back inside the flat, my mother-in-law brings out tea for the three of us, herself, my husband, and I; and we all decide to sit in the balcony. The balconies, windows, doors, any openings into the flat, are all protected by grills. There is something about the grills that’s uniquely classic and nostalgic. I think back to my childhood in Delhi – every night the community watchman would walk around the block, blowing his whistle loud and clear as he ran his baton across the park fence.

I look out into the streets and though it is mostly empty at this time, I know that the morning has already begun in many homes. Every balcony is a window into a different life. I look across to the building on the right and find an elderly man sitting in his balcony with a cup of chai and his parrot. In another window there’s a woman pulling down the dry clothes from the clothesline, hung the day before.

A sip of my tea. I wonder if my mother-in-law sees what I see. On days when she’s feeling hot, tired, and wants to take a break, does she look out like I do? Does she see the different lives as I do? And in those quiet tranquil moments when she does, does the world outside beckon to her? Does she see the ever turning wheels of time in Kolkata? Does she savour the endless festivities of every day? Even if a dispirited heart was to look out this balcony, it would find peace in knowing that it is not alone.

I’m not sure how the rest of India has fared since 1997, but Kolkata seems to be stalled in a time and place, which I dreamed about in my thoughts. It remains culturally rich and enticing. There is no confused blend of the western influences and eastern culture. I heard no heart-wrenching stories, saw no soul-searching individuals. I saw no street corners engulfed in conversations of unfulfilled ambitions. I saw hope in a newly-wed couple’s humble home, gratification in the everyday affairs, modesty of character, and a satisfaction with life as it is.

– Jessica Sinha

Source…..www.the betterindia.com

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Breakthrough by Indian Scientists in the US Checks Effectiveness of Cancer Treatment Within Hours…

April 3, 2016NatarajanLeave a comment

Thanks to the development of nano-technology, it will now be possible to measure how effective a round of cancer therapy is, within hours of the treatment. This project has been kick-started by a group of Indian scientists from Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and Harvard Medical School.

The development is a major breakthrough because it will be possible to prevent the side-effects of chemotherapy right from the start in case the treatment plan is not working for the patient, and will help prevent long agonizing months of waiting.

Picture for representation only. Source: Sadasiv Swain/Flickr

“We have developed a nano-technology, which first delivers an anticancer drug specifically to the tumour, and if the tumour starts dying or regressing, it then starts lighting up the tumour in real time,” Shiladitya Sengupta, a principal investigator at MIT’s Brigham and Women’s Hospital (BWH), told PTI.

The breakthrough was published online in ‘The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.’ One of the authors of the paper is Ashish Kulkarni, who hails from a tiny village in the state of Maharashtra. Kulkarni pursued his Ph.D. in chemistry from the University of Cincinnati. “Our long-term goal is to find a way to monitor outcomes very early so that we don’t give a chemotherapy drug to patients who are not responding to it,” he said.

Most of the team members are Indian researchers except for one. This development will help keep track of the effectiveness of immunotherapy, which signals significant progress.

Source: www.dfhcc.harvard.edu

Current tracking methods, which are based on the measurements of the size or the metabolic state of the tumour, don’t always manage to detect the effectiveness of the treatment.

Source….Boshika Gupta in http://www.the betterindia.com

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Did You Know There’s a Museum Where You Can See the Amazing Gifts given to the Presidents of India?

April 3, 2016NatarajanLeave a comment

The President of India receives gifts from foreign heads of state when they visit India. These gifts then become the property of the Government. Earlier, these gifts used to be on display in the Gift Gallery of the Rashtrapati Bhavan. Shri Pranab Mukherjee, the current President, decided it would be better to have a separate museum for the gifts and other precious memorabilia, and shifted the collection out of the gallery. Learn more about this recently established museum within the Rashtrapati Bhavan premises.

Shri Pranab Mukherjee, the 13th President of India, was instrumental in shifting the gifts given to the President of India from the Rashtrapati Bhavan gift gallery to a special museum. The Rashtrapati Bhavan museum was inaugurated on July 25, 2014.

An old horse stable, which had not been in use for many years, was converted into a museum to house these precious items.

An old horse stable was turned into the Rashtrapati Bhavan Museum

Since 1950, when Shri Rajendra Prasad became the first President of India, our Presidents have received almost 11,000 gifts from various parts of the world. These gifts are stored in what was once called the Tosh Khana, a storage space within the Rashtrapati Bhavan premises.

The gifts used to be put on display for visitors in the Gift Gallery within the Rashtrapati Bhavan, on a rotational basis.

Believed to be the first gift to the President of India from the Emperor and Empress of Japan

“The layout of the present museum is indeed very interesting. Each cubicle or stall where a single horse would have been housed at some point of time, has been decorated with gifts and is marked as an enclave. All in all, there are 22 such enclaves, which are little gift galleries. One portion of the museum is called the Arms Gallery. It was here that in times of yore the food for the horses used to be stored. The coach house is the most important part of the museum. Earlier, this was where the coaches used to be kept. Now there are two coaches here and of course there is a lot more to see,” says Roshan Kumar Singh, an in-house volunteer guide at the Rashtrapati Bhavan.

The first eleven enclaves have on display gift items like the statue of Saraswati received recently from West Bengal and the golden dagger with precious stones presented to Shri KR Narayanan by the King of Morocco.

There is also an elephant tusk with the story of Lord Krishna carved on one side and the story of Lord Rama carved on the other.

A recent gift – the statue of Saraswati from West Bengal

One of the enclaves has gifts received from various military institutions, the President’s Standard being one of them. In the enclave that has silver plaques received by various presidents, there is a silver cigar box with gold clasps with the initials of Dr Zakir Hussein engraved on it.

“An acrylic horse was presented to Smt. Prathibha Patil to commemorate Ashwamedha 2007 in Nashik,” continues Roshan.

An acrylic horse

Two of the enclaves have replicas of temples placed in them – temples like the Uttara Malai temple and the Golden Temple. There is also a picture of the Sleeping Buddha of Dushanbe.

There is one enclave that displays various postal stamps issued by the Government of India and released by the various Presidents of India.

Replica of the Uttara Malai temple

“The Arms Gallery, which comes right after this, depicts the British Sikh War on one side and the Afghan British Battle on the other. In the next section, various important rooms of the President’s Palace are painted on the wall and old furniture used by the British as well as the earlier Presidents is on display,” says Roshan.

Replicas of the crowns worn by King George V and Queen Mary during the Delhi Durbar are placed in another gallery.

The British Sikh Battle, as depicted in the Arms Gallery

Another enclave has commemorative coins issued by the Government of India and seven ancient coins have been gifted by the Reserve Bank of India. The Blue Gallery has the original telegram sent by Harry S Truman, the President of the United States, to the First President of the Union of India. A beautiful sundial presented by the people of Uttaranchal to President APJ Abdul Kalam is displayed here too.

There are pieces of rocks from Mount Everest and the moon on display as well.

A beautiful sundial

The last section of the Rashtrapati Bhavan Museum is the Coach House. There is a Hunting Coach and the Victoria Coach of British times on display here. This portion of the museum tells the story of Delhi through the ages. There are ancient pictures of Old Delhi, which give a true perspective of how the city used to be.

Models of all thirteen Presidents can be seen as well.

Finally, there is a small section dedicated to the Father of the Nation, Mahatma Gandhi. There are a couple of pictures of him, a khadi cloth made by him, his charkha, and also some flower petals strewn over him before his body was cremated.

“Very soon, the second phase of the museum will come up right across from this building. This is going to be a lot larger and will hopefully be able to house all the other gifts of the Presidents that are presently in the storage facility,” adds Roshan.

To book a visit to the Rashtrapati Bhavan Museum, log onto the official website of the Rashtrapati Bhavan –www.presidentofindia.nic.in. The museum is open on Friday, Saturday and Sunday from 9 am to 4 pm. Entry to the Museum is from Gate no. 30, on Mother Teresa Crescent Road.

Source…..Aparna Menon in http://www.the betterindia.com

Natarajan

படித்து ரசித்தது …”ஓட்டை கம்பளி …”!!!

April 3, 2016NatarajanLeave a comment

ஒரு கட்டுரையில், கி.வா.ஜ., எழுதியது:

கவிதை, சங்கீதம் மற்றும் நாடகம் போன்ற கலைகள் எதுவானாலும், ரசிகர்கள் இருந்தால் தான், கலைஞர்கள் மகிழ்ந்து, மேலும் தம் திறமையை காட்டுவர். கலைஞர் உள்ளம் வெறும் பணத்துக்கோ, கொடைக்கோ மகிழாது.
மாடு தன் காதை மட்டும் ஆட்டுவதைப் போன்று ஆட்டுவது, கோகர்ண வித்தை; யானை தன் காது நுனியை மட்டும் ஆட்டும்; அதைப் போன்று செய்வது கஜகர்ண வித்தை. ஒரு வித்தையாடி, இந்த வித்தைகளை எல்லாம் செய்வதுடன், மாடு மாதிரி குரல் எழுப்புவான்; யானை மாதிரி பிளிறுவான். பலவகை விலங்குகளைப் போல நடிப்பான்.
ஒருநாள், ஓர் வித்தைகாட்டி, அரசன் ஒருவனின் சபைக்கு வந்து, தன் வித்தைகளை காட்டத் துவங்கினான்; எல்லாரும் பார்த்து மகிழ்ந்தனர். ஒவ்வொரு வித்தை முடிந்தவுடன், அதற்கேற்ப பரிசை அளித்து வந்தான் அரசன். இந்நிலையில், பார்வையாளர் கூட்டத்தில், பசு மேய்க்கும் இடையன் ஒருவன், கோலை ஊன்றி, ஓட்டை கம்பளியை தலைமேல் போட்டு, வித்தைகளை கவனித்தவாறு இருந்தான்.
பசுமாடு மாதிரி நடிக்க துவங்கினான் கலைஞன். வால் போன்ற ஒன்றை, பின்னால் செருகி, அதை ஆட்டினான்; காதை தனியே ஆட்டினான். வேடிக்கை பார்த்த இடையன், வித்தைக்காரன் அருகில் வந்து என்னவோ செய்தான். அடுத்த நிமிடம், தான் போர்த்தியிருந்த ஓட்டை கம்பளியை, அவன் மேல் போட்டு விட்டுப் போய் விட்டான்.
வித்தைகள் எல்லாம் முடிந்தன. வித்தைக்காரன் முதலில் அந்தக் கம்பளியை எடுத்து மடித்து, கண்ணில் ஒற்றி, பெட்டிக்குள் வைத்தான். அதை பார்த்த அரசனுக்கு கோபம் வந்து, ‘என்னை நீ அவமதித்து விட்டாய்…. இடையன் போட்ட கம்பளிக்கு கொடுத்த மரியாதையை, நான் வழங்கிய பரிசுகளுக்கு கொடுக்கவில்லையே… அந்த ஓட்டை கம்பளி உனக்கு பெரிதாக போய் விட்டதா…’ என்று கேட்டான்.
‘அரசே… அந்த கம்பளி கொடுத்தவர், எதை பார்த்து ரசித்தார், தெரியுமா?’ என்றான் வித்தைக்காரன்.
‘நீ மாடு மாதிரி நடந்ததையும், காதை ஆட்டினதையும் பார்த்திருப்பான்; அவனுக்கு மாடு தானே தெரியும்…’ என்றான் அரசன்.
வித்தைக்காரன் நிதானமாக, ‘அரசே… அவர் என் நடிப்பில் ஒரு நுட்பத்தை கண்டு மகிழ்ந்தார். நான் மாடாக நடித்த போது, ஒரு சிறு பருக்கை கல்லை எடுத்து, என் மேல் போட்டார். அந்த இடத்தை மட்டும், நான் சுழித்துக் காட்டினேன். அதன் அருமையை உணர்ந்து, அந்த கம்பளியை அளித்தார். ஓட்டம் அறிந்து வழங்கியதால், அதை பெரிதாக கருதுகிறேன்…’ என்றான்.

Source….www.dinamalar.com

Natarajan

படித்து நெகிழ்ந்தது …” மே /பா காமராஜர் தலைவர் சத்திய மூர்த்தி பவன் “

April 3, 2016NatarajanLeave a comment

எட்டயாபுரம், பா.நா.கணபதி எழுதிய, ‘நினைவுகள்’ நூலிலிருந்து:

ஒரு முதிய காங்கிரஸ் தியாகி, சென்னை அரசு மருத்துவமனையில் சிகிச்சைக்காக சேரும்போது, தன் பெயருடன், மே/பா. காமராஜர், தலைவர், சத்தியமூர்த்திபவன், சென்னை என, பதிவேட்டில் எழுதி கொள்ளும்படி கூறினார்.
ஒருநாள், அம்முதியவர் திடீரென்று இறந்து விட்டார். அவர் தந்த முகவரிப்படி காமராஜருக்கு தகவல் தரப்பட்டது. அதைக் கேட்டு அதிர்ந்து போனார் காமராஜர். ஏன் என்றால், இறந்தவர் யார் என்றே அவருக்கு தெரியாது.
‘இறந்தவர் காங்கிரஸ் தியாகி; என் முகவரியை தந்திருக்கிறார். அவருக்கு என்னிடம் அவ்வளவு நம்பிக்கை! தியாகியின் இறுதி சடங்கை நல்ல முறையில் செய்ய வேண்டும்…’ என்ற கடமையுணர்வு அவரது உள்ளத்தில் மேலிட்டது.
மருத்துவமனை சென்று, இறந்தவரின் உடலை பெற்று, நல்லடக்கம் செய்யும்படி, செயலர் வி.எஸ். வெங்கட்ராமனிடம் தெரிவித்தார். அன்று, தன் வழக்கமான நிகழ்ச்சிகளை ரத்து செய்தவர், செயலற்றவராக, ஈஸி சேரில் சாய்ந்து விட்டார்.
சடலம், மூலகொத்தளம் சென்றடைந்து, எரியூட்டும் சமயம் அங்கு சென்ற காமராஜர், ‘இந்த தியாகி யாரோ… வீடு, வாசல், மனைவி, மக்கள் எல்லாவற்றையும் துறந்து, காங்கிரசில் சேர்ந்து பல அவஸ்தைகள் பட்டும் கூட, அக்கட்சியிடம் நம்பிக்கை இழக்காத இவர், மரணம் அடையும் முன், காங்., அலுவலக விலாசமே தந்துள்ளார். இவருக்கு நாம் எல்லாருமே கொள்ளி போடுவோம்…’ என்று, நா தழுதழுக்க கூறிய வார்த்தைகள், அனைவரையும் கண்ணீர் விட செய்தன.
ஒரு எளிய தியாகிக்காக, தியாக சீலரான காமராஜர் சிந்திய கண்ணீர், தூய்மையான அன்பின் வெளிப்பாடாக விளங்கியது.

Source….www.dinamalar.com

Natarajan

Message for the Day…” Pain is a part of Life and must be accepted at any cost …Pleasure s an interval between two pains …’

April 3, 2016NatarajanLeave a comment

The life of Prahlada is a testament of real devotion to God. Though severely tortured by his father, Hiranyakashipu, Prahlada stood firm as a rock, steadfast in his devotion to Vishnu. At a tender age, Prahlada planted God firmly in his heart and withstood every storm and stress. Physical afflictions had no effect on him and did not reduce his devotion. The mind steeped in the Love of God is beyond any shock and strain like the chloroformed patient who is oblivious of the incisions made by the surgical instruments. Only Love of this kind can ultimately be victorious. But today, the devotion of the people wavers with every trying circumstance. When our wishes are fulfilled, we install many photographs for worship; and when our wishes are not fulfilled, we throw out the photographs. Pain is a part of life and must be accepted at any cost. Pleasure is an interval between two pains.

Sathya Sai Baba

Image of the Day…” 40000 feet over Greenland ” !!!

April 2, 2016NatarajanLeave a comment

A clear day over one of the world’s two great ice sheets.

A science mission called the Oceans Melting Greenland field campaign is flying NASA’s G-III aircraft at about 40,000 feet over Greenland. On a clear day, this altitude also provides a stunning perspective of one of the world’s two great ice sheets (the other is Antarctica). The flight Saturday, March 26, 2016, over the northeast coastline was one of those clear days. Read more about this image. Image via NASA.

Source…..www.earthsky.org

Natarajan