Source………www.earthsky.org
Natarajan
Message for the Day…” The history and traditions of Bharat are as pure, holy, sanctifying, curative and precious as the Ganges. The origins of both are cool, comforting, and spotless snows! “
Bharatiya Culture is the very basis of human progress. It will uplift humanity by promoting brotherhood, upholding righteousness, and saturating every thought, word and act with reverence and humility. This culture will stand unshaken so long as the Ganga flows; no attempt to suppress or destroy it can succeed. The history and traditions of Bharat are as pure, holy, sanctifying, curative and precious as the Ganges. The origins of both are cool, comforting, and spotless snows! When young men and women are not trained to live a good and godly life, teaching them various skills and tricks, only makes them a danger to themselves and to others. The habit of prayer will inculcate courage and confidence; it will provide the student with a vast new source of energy. Every effort must be made to introduce the students to the sweet experiences of meditation and Yoga, or to the joy of inquiry into one’s own reality!
Source…..http://media.radiosai.org/
Natarajan
The Hindi-Speaking Aussie who loves India …
Charles ‘Biharilal’ Thomson, is an Australian who speaks fluent Hindi learnt on the streets, trains and buses of India’s hinterland.
Biharilal tells Rediff.com‘s Archana Masih how India has bewitched him.
Photograph: Kind courtesy Charles Thomson/Facebook
Biharilal Thomson is a white Australian who speaks Hindi better than many Indians.
The first time he saw a non-white person was as a 10 year old. His mother had invited an Indian yogi from Bihar into their home in Australia and asked her son to share his room with the sadhu for a few weeks.
“I had only seen white Australians till then, not even native Aboriginals — and here was an Indian in a langoti in my room!” he exclaims in good humour, sitting in a film producer’s home in suburban Mumbai, wearing a kurta-pajama and a yellow stole.
In the two hour conversation, he only speaks Hindi, a language he learnt in the streets, trains and buses of Bihar where he had arrived at age 13 in December 1974.
He loved his new home on the banks of the Ganga so much that he did not return to Australia for the next 11 years. Accounts of his experiences in India’s rural underbelly in the 1970s-1980s, include encounters with dacoits on horseback on at least two railway journeys.
“I saw real sadhus, I saw real dacoits — and I thought I had reached an amazing place,” says Biharilal with a grin. His life experiences, he says are so unbelievable that he sometimes thinks it is like a film.
It also reveals an India of another time — one that was simpler, wilder, unfamiliar and distant from what it is today.
“India was friendly with the Soviet Union, and I came across Indians who were desperate to emigrate to the USA, Canada or UK — not to the USSR.”
“The other thing that was common was cycles. Only the DM (district magistrate) and SP (superintendent of police) had cars — and in the trains people sometimes travelled with their own cooks!”
After going back to Australia in 1985, he returned to formally work in India in 2011.
India has seen a giant leap ahead since, and he has spent nearly 16 years here, but one question posed to him that hasn’t changed over the years is — “Why did you come to India?”
“This is what I am routinely asked, especially by the youth. They ask ‘Why have you come here when we want to settle abroad?’,” says Biharilal, who applied for Indian citizenship in 2014 and hopes to hold an Indian passport soon.
“The other thing I am amazed with is this craze for English. Even if I speak to those who know Hindi in Hindi, they reply in English!”
“Why?”
His fluency in Hindi has fetched him invites to Hindi events by the Indian high commission in Australia, to symposia at Savitribai Phule Pune university and Delhi’s Hansraj College. He has anchored a few film festivals and done some acting roles.
It has also brought him an FM radio show that he hopes to receive a confirmation for by April.
“In independent India it will be the first time that an angrez will do a radio show in Hindi,” he says enthusiastically.
Not wanting to be boxed into roles of the typical gora speaking tooti-phooti Hindi, he refers to the accomplished actor Tom Alter.
“He is an asli Hindustani, I’m nakli, but because earlier directors made him speak broken Hindi like an angrez, people thought he was English.”
“People didn’t know he was Indian, a Padma Shri, who spoke fluent Hindi and Urdu.”
Biharilal works at Josh Talks, a media company that invites guests to share inspirational stories. His focus is on all regional languages and tier-2 cities.
He has also done a few acting roles in Hindi and Marathi television serials, and recently appeared in an airline commercial for Scoot, a budget airline owned by Singapore Airlines.
There are quirky benefits to a white man speaking Hindi too — like the number of wedding invitations he receives. Many wedding organisers in the Delhi area send him invitations only to have a foreigner on display!
“I get so many invitations for chief guest. In the marriage season, I’ll be booked,” he laughs.
“People want a gora who speaks Hindi to show at their weddings.”
The move from Australia to India may have been a continental shift, but for Charles ‘Biharilal’ Thompson, it was like coming home.
It was a life introduced to him by his mother, a ballerina and an early convert to yoga, who came to learn at the Bihar School of Yoga in Munger in 1972.
“At that time only 1% of the world travelled by aeroplane,” says Biharilal, who is often recognised as ‘Biharilal Autowale Babu’ after a show on Zee TV where he covered the 2017 Delhi municipal election in a colourful autorickshaw.
He also covered the UP assembly election last year for WION, Zee’s English news channel.
“We used to fly to the Gold Coast to visit my grandparents every year. I made my father promise that he would send me to India instead, if I stood 1st or 2nd in school.”
He stood 2nd and travelled to Calcutta, he says, taking a train to Jamalpur and then a bus to Munger.
“I was shocked to see the poverty in Calcutta, but hearing ‘garam chai‘ by tea vendors in the train was like music,” he remembers.
Eight weeks later, his father returned to take him home.
“I told him I wanted to stay for one more year,” he says over a cup of tea.
“But I stayed for 11.”
blob:https://ishare.rediff.com/d8239350-f845-46f6-86e1-762bd67d53b5
He has now spent 16 years in India — first at the Bihar School of Yoga in Munger, then working in a financial tech start up Eko India, and currently in the entertainment industry.
At the famed yoga school in Munger, he says he learnt yoga and managed the library. He helped in the institute’s office work which would take him to Patna and Delhi.
It was on one these travels that he found himself in the middle of a dacoity.
He had bought a third class ticket and boarded a train from Jamalpur to Patna in Bihar. The TT saw his ticket and upgraded him to first class. Along the way, dacoits came riding alongside the train, detached the first class compartment and started looting passengers.
When they reached his coupe, he held out his hands, and said, “Ruko, ruko! (stop, stop!)”
The dacoits stopped.
“I was a young boy and did not know very good Hindi at that time, so I just managed to ask a dacoit if he had any videshifriend?”
The dacoit said ‘No’ and Biharilal told him that he would be his friend.
“He smiled and did not take anything from me.”
Caught in another dacoity on a railway platform — this time on a dark railway platform surrounded by crop fields — his saffron clothes came to his rescue.
“When they came to me, I just sprang up and started chanting Bum, Bum Bole-Bum, Bum Bole and they said, ‘Yeh toh Ganga jal wala aadmi hai‘ and let me go,” he chuckles.
India was very different then, he says. Yoga institutes were very austere and drew only the most committed.
He remembers the first function he organised which had a generator as backup for electricity failure. When the lights went off and the generator was switched on — the crowd left the sammelan and rushed to get a first glimpse of a generator at the back.
At fifty-seven, Biharilal has seen the arc of India’s history from Indira Gandhi’s Emergency to her assassination to the post liberalisation. He has travelled widely, even taken his mother to the Kumbh Mela.
In between, he returned to Australia and ran a Thai vegetarian restaurant but kept coming back to India.
“I started coming back in the late 80s, but visas were very difficult. Till the Modi Sarkar came, getting a visa to India was not easy. Sushma Swaraj is doing a good job,” he says.
In 2009, a startup started by Biharis, Eko India, offered him a job and he moved to India.
But it was a chance encounter with an Indian student at a Sydney swimming pool that opened the door to acting.
Shashank Ketkar, now a popular television actor, had got talking to him by the pool hearing his Hindi and came to eat at his Thai restaurant.
Few years later, Biharilal would visit him on the sets of his show whenever he was in Mumbai. His kurta-pajama style of dressing and fluency in Hindi caught the eyes of the director and led to small roles. He also got to play an angrez in a Marathi film Shashank Ketkar was acting in.
“I went to Kohlapur and shot a scene where I was seated on a horse in 40 degrees heat. I loved it. I thought I had become Shah Rukh Khan!”
He has also acted in a Hindi suspense thriller that will release this year.
Every day, he receives a large number of messages on Facebook and makes it a point to at least say ‘Ram, Ram’ or ‘Namaste’ to them.
“I feel the whole of Hindustan is made for me. Yeh kamal ka desh hai, yaha aapko sab kuch mil jayega (this is a great country, there is nothing you can’t find here),” he says, adjusting the famous Australian Akubra hat he is wearing and steps into the hot Mumbai sun.
Archana Masih / Rediff.com
Source…..www.rediff.com
Natarajan
A Tribute to a Genius – Stephen Hawking…
Stephen Hawking, the world-renowned theoretical physicist and cosmologist, has passed away at the age of 76, leaving a scientific legacy behind him that will undoubtedly be remembered for many centuries to come.
Hawking was born on January 8th, 1942 in Oxford, the United Kingdom to two Oxford University graduates, Frank and Isobel. He had two younger sisters, Philippa and Mary, as well as an adopted brother named Edward.
The family moved to St. Alban’s, Hertfordshire, where they were considered to be both highly intelligent and somewhat eccentric by the locals. They lived frugally in a large, messy house and got around in a converted London taxi cab.
Following his primary and secondary school education, Hawking began his university education as an undergraduate at University College, Oxford in 1959. He was just 17 years old. Although the world only pictures him as a man confined to a wheelchair due to debilitating motor neuron disease that he was diagnosed with aged just 22, Hawking actually gained a reputation as being something of a daredevil during his university years.
He was the coxswain of a rowing crew at the University College Boat Club, and became notorious for steering his crew on risky courses, inevitably leading to a string of damaged rowing boats. He left University College with a Bachelor of Arts in natural science in 1962 prior to starting to work on his doctorate.
His diagnosis with a rare form of motor neuron disease occurred at that time, and it led to him becoming deeply depressed. Nevertheless, he was encouraged to continue his studies by his supervisor, Dennis William Sciama, and was eventually able to demonstrate that Einstein’s general theory of relativity implies space and time would have a beginning in the Big Bang and end in black holes.
During his graduate years at Cambridge, Hawking fell in love with his first wife, Jane Wilde, with whom he had three children. The marriage would end some 30 years later after the marriage succumbed to the pressures of Hawking’s fame, ideological differences and the difficulties surrounding caring for him in light of his disability.
Despite beginning to use crutches in the early 1960s, he long fought off having to use a wheelchair, but when he finally couldn’t do so any longer, he gained notoriety for wild driving on the streets of Cambridge. He also used to run over students’ toes intentionally and would even spin himself on the dancefloor at college parties.
Together with Roger Penrose, Hawking had his first major breakthrough in 1970. They were able to use mathematics to show that a singularity, a region of infinite curvature in space-time, was the point from which the big bang emanated.
After he realized that he was wrong in his argument about black holes being able to radiate, Hawking was in a Cambridge pub with his students when he suddenly turned up his voice synthesizer to full volume and bellowed that he was conceding defeat. Anyone who studied under his tuition or knew him personally knew him for his wicked sense of humor.
Hawking was elected to the Royal Society in 1974 aged just 32 after the series of radical discoveries he made during his early career, and would become the Lucasian professor of mathematics at Cambridge. The latter is often thought as the UK’s most distinguished academic chair and was once held by Isaac Newton.
His 1988 book, A Brief History of Time, catapulted Hawking to international stardom. It sold over 10 million copies and was translated into no less than 40 different languages. It was around that time that his marriage would begin to break down, but he would go on to remarry in the mid-1990s.
During his lifetime, he won the Albert Einstein Award, the Wolf Prize, the Copley Medal and the Fundamental Physics Prize, however, the Nobel Prize for Physics eluded him. He also returned to the White House (he had also visited during the Clinton administration) to receive the Presidential Medal of Freedom from Barack Obama.
His life has also been immortalized on screen, not least thanks to the multiple award-winning movie, the Theory of Everything. He also lent his voice and know-how to various documentaries over the years.
Perhaps it’s not surprising to know that Hawking was not a religious man, and dismissed the comforts of religious belief. With that being said, he had once told an interviewee that he wasn’t afraid of death, but he added that he wasn’t in any hurry to die due to how much work he had left to do. The great cosmologist is survived by his three children from his first marriage, together with his three grandchildren.
Watch Stephen Hawking being interviewed by Charlie Rose:
Source……..www.ba-ba mail.com
natarajan
Message for the Day…” Do not ask another which country or state you belong to, or which caste or creed you profess. See your favourite form of God in that ‘other person’; as a matter of fact, he or she is not ‘other’ at all – it is the Lord’s image, as much as you are.”
The important qualification for seva (service) is a pure heart, uncontaminated by conceit, greed, envy, hatred or competition. Along with this, we need faith in God as the spring of vitality, virtue, and justice. Seva is the worship you offer to the God in the heart of everyone. Do not ask another which country or state you belong to, or which caste or creed you profess. See your favourite form of God in that ‘other person’; as a matter of fact, he or she is not ‘other’ at all – it is the Lord’s image, as much as you are. You are not helping ‘one individual’; you are adoring Me, in them. God is before you in that form; so, what room is there for the ego in you to raise its hood? Duty is God; Work is worship. Even the tiniest work is a flower placed at the Feet of God. Approach everyone you serve with a heart filled with the treasure of Love!
Source……http://media.radiosai.org
Natarajan
Message for the Day….” Who are the True Friends …?”
While in this transient world you have a sore need of someone of your kind to whom you can communicate your feelings, share your discoveries, depressions, moments of bliss and sorrow. Someone who can be by your side while trekking the hard road to truth and peace, encouraging and enthusing you towards the goal. Friends who can confer real counsel, comfort and consolation are precious gifts, rarely found today. Friendship must bind two hearts and affect both beneficially, whatever may happen to either – loss or gain, pain or pleasure. Each must correct the other, for each knows that they come from sympathy and love. Each must be vigilant that the other does not slide from the ideal, cultivate habits that are deleterious, or hide thoughts and plans that are evil. The honour of each is in the safekeeping of the other. Each trusts the other and places reliance on the other’s watchful love. Only those deserve the name ‘friends’, who help in uplifting life, cleansing ideals, elevating emotions and strengthening resolves.
Source::::: http://media.radiosai.org/
Natarajan
Phenomenal domestic growth fuels India’s aircraft demand…
India’s exponential rise in both passenger and freight traffic means the country will need 1,750 new aircraft over the next 20 years, according to estimates from Airbus.
With air traffic growth driven by a fast expanding economy, rising wealth and urbanisation, and government-backed regional connectivity programmes, India will require 1,320 new single-aisle aircraft and 430 widebody aircraft over the next two decades.
That’s according to European aircraft manufacturer Airbus in its latest India Market Forecast. It said the total value of the aircraft would be $255bn.
The report predicted that by 2036, Indians will each make four times as many flights as today. As a result, traffic serving the Indian market is forecast to grow 8.1 percent per year over the next 20 years, almost twice as fast as the world average of 4.4 percent.
Domestic Indian traffic is expected to grow five-and-half times over by 2036, reaching the same level as US domestic traffic today.
According to figures from OAG Schedules, domestic air capacity in India rose from 74.2 million available seats in 2008 to 143.2 million in 2017. In the last calendar year alone, domestic capacity increased by 13.8 percent after adding more than 17 million available seats.
The domestic growth comes as India’s government pushes its regional connectivity scheme (RCS), also known as UDAN, which aims to make air travel affordable and widespread.
The programme seeks to develop new and enhance the existing regional airports, as well as connecting more than 100 underserved and unserved airports in smaller towns.
Source…..David Casey in https://www.routesonline.com
Natarajan
Her Small Act Of Kindness Went Viral. Now, She Has A College Scholarship…!
A young restaurant worker in Texas who spent the past year saving up for college is now one step closer to her dream – all thanks to a small act of kindness she performed. Evoni Williams, 18, went viral earlier this month for helping an elderly customer at the Waffle House Texas eat his food. A picture of Evoni, an employee of the Waffle House, cutting up food for a customer who was unable to do so himself, was clicked by another customer and shared on Facebook. The picture went viral with thousands of shares and even earned Evoni a scholarship to the Texas Southern University.
The incident took place on March 3 at La Marque in Texas, USA, when Adrian Charpentier came into the restaurant. He had recently undergone surgery, which made it difficult for him to cut his food, reports the Daily Mail. Evoni cut up his food for him, and her small act of kindness was captured on camera:
I don’t know her name but I heard this elderly man tell her his hands don’t work too good. He was also on oxygen and struggling to breathe. 
😔 Without hesitation, she took his plate and began cutting up his ham. This may seem small but to him, I’m sure it was huge. I’m thankful to have seen this act of kindness and caring at the start of my day while everything in this world seems so negative. If we could all be like this waitress & take time to offer a helping hand….
🤝 #wafflehouse#kindness #givingback #offerlove #bekind #goodnews
As the post gained attention, praise started pouring in for the teenager. “She’s an angel,” wrote one person. “That was very kind and sweet,” said another.
It eventually caught the eye of Texas Southern University, and they decided to present Evoni with a $16,000 scholarship. “Her act of kindness went viral on social media, and today Texas Southern University returned that act of kindness by surprising Evoni Williams with a scholarship,” they said.
Not only this, she was also honoured by the mayor of La Marque, Bobby Hocking.
It just came from the heart,” Evoni said to ABC 7 about her now-famous act.
Source….www.ndtv.com
Natarajan
Australians Rescued A Giant Spider. The Rest Of The World Wonders Why….?
AUSTRALIA: For the past day, people around the world at least the ones who can get past a certain spider video without screaming “kill it with fire!” have been engaged in a rigorous debate about whether Andrea Gofton is one of the most compassionate Australians on her continent, or simply insane.
This month, her community has endured its worst flooding in almost a decade nearly 20 inches since March 1
Homes and roads are flooded; students on a field trip to Echo Creek Adventure Park got more creek and more adventure than they were expecting; and towns have been declared a “disaster area.” Still, all things considered, the waterlogged population has escaped mostly unscathed.
At least the humans. It is a tough time to be an air-breathing animal in northeast Australia. Dens and burrows are flooded. Food sources are underwater and water-adept predators, particularly crocodiles, sharks and snakes, are riding newly-created waterways in search of unsuspecting prey.
But Gofton’s ethical dilemma came in the form of a not-so-tiny spider found clinging precariously to a tree branch: A giant Australian tarantula called the bird-eating spider.
It is, of course, almost instinctual for humans to want to save animals, even when they don’t do a particularly good job of it.
But there are some things about the spider that Gofton encountered that people need to know before deciding to reject the offer from #TeamKillItWithFire.
It is huge: The spider can grow to be the size of a man’s hand, a two-inch body with six-inch legs. That is bigger than some chihuahuas.
It has giant, venomous fangs. The tarantula’s fangs are nearly half an inch long, about a sixth the size of its body. The Queensland Museum says the tarantulas “can be quite aggressive if mishandled” and that the bite is “quickly fatal to dogs and cats,” but rarely causes serious illness in humans.
It has a deadly, if inaccurate nickname.Scientists have pointed out that the name “bird-eating” spider is, technically, a misnomer. The giant Australian tarantula only occasionally eats birds. Instead, it feasts on lizards, frogs and other spiders, a correction that is not at all reassuring.
It is standing right behind you. Okay. That one is technically a lie, but not as much as you think.
It hisses. Although some have said it’s more of a bark. Either way, the sound is nature’s way of saying “Don’t save me from this raging river, Andrea.”
But some people don’t listen.
Gofton and her friend Andrew Giliberto encountered the arachnid outside a SPAR Supermarket in the town of Halifax. The creature’s legs were intertwined over a flimsy branch, which was the only thing stopping it from being swept away by the water below, according to 9News Australia.
One of the Aussies filmed, while another put a hand close to the spider, apparently to see if it would latch on. It didn’t. So they snapped the branch that it was on and carried it to a nearby avocado tree, where they set it free.
They’ve spent the subsequent 24 hours going back and forth with ardent supporters of spider-cide, arguing that their actions were heartwarming, not horrendous.
Clearly, critics argued, Gofton had not gotten the message that giant spiders are notour friends.
“Nope nope, just nope,” one woman wrote on a post about the spider-save on a community Facebook group about the floods. “The tree has gotta be burnt, with a flame thrower.”
A short time later, Gofton replied: “I’m glad there are decent people out there, the negativity about an animal is beyond ridiculous.”
Of course the spider is the one who’s having the last laugh (hiss? bark?). It’s now safely weathering out what remains of the storm in the avocado tree outside the neighborhood supermarket.
That means some unsuspecting shopper may be in for a surprise, especially if the rescued spider is female.
Another fun fact about the giant Australian tarantula: Females can lay 50 eggs at a time.
Source…….www.ndtv.com
Natarajan
Message for the Day…” “The study of Bhaja Govindam and the inspiration derived from them will promote discrimination and detachment, and thus, prepare the mind for the vision of the Supreme.”
When Adi Shankara was residing at Varanasi with his pupils, he came across a scholar, who was immersed in complicated rules of grammar. When asked why he had taken up this intensive study, he replied that it would easily fetch him a few pieces of silver. “If I am designed a pandit, I can go to the home of some big zamindars(landlords), and hope to receive alms and offerings from them for the upkeep of my large family,” he said. Shankara then advised him appropriately and charged him with self-confidence and courage. Returning to his hermitage, Shankara wrote a verse summarising the advice he gave the poor scholar thus: Bhaja Govindam, bhaja Govindam, bhaja Govindam, moodha mate. Samprapte sannihithe kale, nahi nahi rakshati dukrun karane (Praise God, Praise God, Praise God, you foolish mind! When death approaches, rules of grammar cannot save you). The study of these verses and the inspiration derived from them will promote discrimination and detachment, and thus, prepare the mind for the vision of the Supreme.
Source:::::: http://media.radiosai.org
Natarajan
Take off with Natarajan 