TRINIDAD, October 23, 2004: Sanatan Dharma Maha Sabha Secretary General Satnarayan Maharaj has accused the Ministry of Education of attempting to convert non-Christian pupils through a national school singing competition. The preliminaries of the Caroni Education Division singing competition began yesterday at several venues in Central Trinidad. It is being sponsored by the Royal Bank of Trinidad and Tobago. Bank official said they had no part to do in choosing the songs to be sung. Maharaj said one week before the competition, a SDMS Hindu school principal alerted him to the words in one of the songs listed for the competition. He said the SDMS Board of Education objected to one of the lines was said “…So give your heart to Jesus…” and the fact that it was a “Christian” song. Maharaj said after his objections, the lyrics were altered to “So give your love at Christmas…” which were still not acceptable. He said: “It is still a Christian song in a national song competition.” He added: “So we instructed our schools not to participate. They are using the competition to convert the children. This should be a secular event, why couldn’t they create a suitable song to all? “Why create a Christmas song for the competition? If the Ministry of Education wanted to have a competition on religions, why did they not include a religious song from all groups, why pick on a Christian song?” Maharaj said Hindu schools had previously taken part in the competition, “but this is the first time we have a problem with the lyrics.”

PORT BLAIR, ANDAMANS, October 27, 2004: Under the British raj, the islands of Andaman and Nicobar began as a colony for convicts. Many of today’s islanders are descendants of those very convicts. But interestingly the old penal colony has left behind a very homogenous society, where caste, creed and communal tension find absolutely no space. The serene island was once the hostile kalapaani. The first political prisoners of the Sepoy Mutiny were brought here and well into the 20th century the flow of prisoners continued. But the British allowed some of the prisoners to live and work outside the jails on the island. Thrown together, those single men and women were soon overtaken by a desire to marry. Given the limitations, caste, religion and language barriers broke down paving the way for inter-caste marriages. “People just did not give importance to who I am, where I came from, who my ancestors were. People in those times simply got married,” said Meshak, resident.



Threatened by an impending Japanese invasion of the islands in 1942, the British offered to take the Indian prisoners back to the mainland. But a majority of them refused as they knew their families would never accept their marriage. The caste-less roots of Andaman society were firmly planted and even today, there are several families with Muslims, Hindus and Christians all part of the same unit. “I was born in a Muslim family and my husband is a Pandit. We liked each other, he asked his parents, I asked my mother and brothers, they all agreed and we got married,” said Bishnu Pada Ray, resident. These islanders are completely immune to the communal fissures emerging on the mainland and inter-caste marriages that began as a necessity are today a way of life and they would like to keep it that way.

LONDON, ENGLAND, October 27, 2004: In an indirect move to curb forced marriages within the Asian community in Britain, the country’s Foreign and Home Offices have decided to raise the minimum age for such marriages from 16 to 18. This tough approach is not aimed at arranged marriages per se, but more against such relationships being promoted and encouraged within the Pakistani and Bangladeshi communities. The measures, to be announced on Wednesday, coincide with a Commons debate on domestic violence laws, reports The Telegraph . Ministers in charge of these two offices are also considering making it a criminal offence to arrange a forced marriage. The Home Office is amending immigration law to increase the minimum age for marriage entry clearance outside the EU from 16 to 18. Immigration rules were changed earlier this year to prevent under-18s sponsoring a husband or wife to come to Britain from outside the European Union. However, the new immigration rules will apply to all non-EU marriages, whether forced, arranged or mutually agreed. An additional entry clearance officer is to be posted to Islamabad in Pakistan to help girls who find themselves in difficulties.

TIRUPATI, INDIA, October 28, 2004: A majority of the speakers at a meeting here supported the demolition of the 1000-pillar mantap and said that the structure had no connection with the temple and had no Agama Shastra (religious texts dealing with temple construction) importance. However, one of the speakers at Wednesday’s meeting, a former deputy executive officer of the TTD, pointed out that since 1933, the TTD Board had passed a resolution on the preservation of the structures around the temple. E. Guravaiah, the former TTD deputy executive officer, said that the 1000-pillar mantap, with a number of namams (the religious symbol of the Vaishnavites) should be considered a religious place. The mantap should not be seen as a mere structure. Every namam engraved on the pillar was a temple by itself, he added. Kiran Kumar, an archaeologist, did not oppose the TTD taking up developmental works for the convenience of the devotees. Tirupati Urban Development Authority chairman and TTD Board member B. Karunakar Reddy, who organized and chaired the meeting, questioned those who were objecting now while remaining silent during the demolition. It may be noted that the government had constituted a three-member committee to go into the demolition of the 1000-pillar mantap. The committee held discussions with the TTD officials and agama pandits including the Sri Venkateswara temple Chief Priest Dr. A. V. Ramana Dikshitulu.

NEW YORK, NEW YORK, October 27, 2004: (HPI note: This Newsday article updates the situation with the Flushing temple.)



For the thousands of faithful who worship in Flushing at the country’s oldest Hindu temple, it is considered a sanctuary. But in recent months, the Ganesha Temple, named after the Hindu elephant-headed Deity, has become the focus of an increasingly heated legal battle over its governance. The struggle has centered on a state court’s decision to restructure the temple’s leadership by creating a voting membership and forcing an election for a new board of trustees. A self-perpetuating board of 11 trustees now runs the temple, which was completed in 1977 by the Hindu Temple Society of North America. For the past three years, however, a group of 28 temple-goers seeking a voice in the temple’s management has used the state courts to push for a more democratic style of governance. On Sept. 15, the temple’s trustees were handed their latest legal defeat when a federal judge deferred jurisdiction to the state courts. The decision clears the way for an earlier ruling by State Supreme Court Justice Joseph Golia in Queens, who last year appointed an outside referee, Anthony Piacentini, to oversee the election of a new board of trustees.



The current legal wrangling in Flushing, however, is an external fissure in a deeper power struggle. The temple, an impressive gray granite structure tucked along a residential block in Queens, generates as much as $3 million a year in donations from some 21,000 devotees and runs dozens of educational and social programs. “The temple is built through the sacrifices of many,” said Krishnan Chittur, an attorney for the temple-goers seeking the elections. “Right now it’s literally a personal property.”



Chief among the complaints of the temple-goers, who include a former chief priest, is the temple’s reluctance to make its financial dealings fully transparent. “Members don’t have a clue on the financial status of the temple,” Chittur said. The temple’s trustees have authority over all of the temple’s affairs, from preparing for regular religious festivals and running the temple’s various programs to the hiring of priests and other staff. Temple president Uma Mysorekar said the temple maintains internal and external accountants who audit their books and present the temple’s financial statements to worshippers once a year.



So far, the state court has largely sided against the temple’s trustees. In a June 10 ruling, Justice Golia called the temple’s current board “illegitimate” and a “caretaker” regime until a new board can be elected. Under the state court ’s ruling, the temple will now essentially be required to create a congregation, opening membership to all of the 21,000 individuals on its mailing list who are over 18 years of age and willing to pay a token membership fee. The temple has appealed both the federal and state court rulings, but barring any reprieve, the election of a new board of trustees could take place before the end of this year.