Source: www.sundaytimes.lk JAFFNA, SRI LANKA, August 16, 2009: Jaffna’s annual Nallur festival is a major religious and social event which draws devotees from the far corners of the world to this famous Hindu temple in northern Sri Lanka. Rain or shine, even through the dreadful war years, the Nallur festival has been held every year without a break. Although attendance…
Source: belizenews.com WASHINGTON, DC, USA, June 12, 2009: President Barack Obama has chosen Indian-American businessman Vinai Thummalapally as the new United States Ambassador to Belize. The two are long-time friends, having been college roommates in 1980. Vinai attended Obama’s wedding in 1982 and was in Illinois in 2007 when Obama announced that he was running for President. Originally from Hyderabad…
Source: www.thaindian.com DHAKA, BANGLADESH, August 13, 2009: Bangladesh’s Hindu community celebrated Janmashtami on Thursday, marking the birth of Lord Krishna with functions organised in the national capital and other parts of the country. It is a public holiday and President Zillur Rahman will host a reception for leaders of the community at the president’s house Banga Bhaban. Different socio-cultural and…
Source: www.ptinews.com WASHINGTON, DC, USA, August 12, 2009: Appointed by the US President Barack Obama as a member of a faith-based advisory council of the White House, Anju Bhargava, a banker and a Hindu priest, hopes to remove the ignorance about Hinduism and spread the “real meaning” of the rituals associated with the religion. Forty two-year-old Bhargava, president of the…
Source: www.hindu.com CHENNAI, INDIA, August 6, 2009: The Tamil Nadu Pollution Control Board has requested the public to use only Ganesha statues made of raw clay during Vinayaka Chathurthi festival on August 23. The recent trend of immersing Ganeshas made with plaster-of-Paris, chemicals and paints has resulted in pollution of the water bodies. While the Board’s powers only apply to…
Source: news.bbc.co.uk RAWALPINDI, INDIA, August 11, 2009: For the last five decades, 80-year-old Indu Mitha has been teaching the beautiful and deeply religious Bharatanatyam dance to Pakistanis. Dance, it seems, can cross cultural and religious boundaries. Teaching traditional Indian dance in Pakistan required a delicate balancing act, which she successfully performed along her dance steps. Dance was considered “haraam” –…
Source: www.scribd.com KAUAI, HAWAII, August 16, 2009: In our effort to improve the teaching of Hindu and Indian history, Hinduism Today magazine has posted on the free site, scribd.com, a series of history books used in India. Clicking on the URL above will take you to the page where each can be read, or downloaded as a PDF file. They…
Source: www.hinduismtoday.com Culture without religion is tourism. Anonymous
Source: news.bbc.co.uk INDIA, August 14, 2009: The US Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) decision to put India on a list of states which failed to protect religious minorities is “regrettable”, India’s foreign ministry says. The US Commission on International Religious Freedom says India was added to the list because of a “disturbing increase” in religious violence. Other countries on…
Source: newsweek.washingtonpost.com WASHINGTON, DC, USA, August 14, 2009 (By Aseem Shukla): [HPI note: this summary, edited for brevity, tries to bring you the most important points of this issue. We encourage you to read the original at source above.] This week, the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) placed India on its “watch list.” By this designation, India,…