'An FIR was registered against a former Delhi University professor Ashok Vohra, on Tuesday night, for allegedly hurting religious sentiments of Hindus during his speech at the Mohan Lal Sukhadia (MLS) University in Udaipur. On Tuesday evening several right-wing groups blocked the highway at Udaipur to pressurise the police into filing an FIR against the professor.
'Wendy Doniger's The Hindus: An Alternative History is back, and how. Without any cuts, barely 20 months after it was withdrawn - not banned - from the market by its original publishers Penguin India.
'V.P. Rajeena, a journalist based in Kozhikode, has become the target of organised online abuse, after she shared her personal experiences of studying in a madrasa in her younger days. Facebook closed down her profile on Wednesday after mass reporting by her detractors. On Sunday, Rajeena put up a post in the social network on alleged instances of immoral conduct of madrasa instructors, which she claimed to have witnessed. The post touched a raw nerve and set off a torrent of abuses and open threats on her Facebook page and in her message box.
'Liberal, rebellious and progressive to the core, Ismat Chughtai (1915-1991), enfant terrible of Urdu literature, fought parochialism all her life. She led from the front and lived by her own principles. One of her daughters was married to a Hindu while the other was married to a Parsi. She didn't consume beef, not because of the Hindutva diktat, but to respect the sentiments of her Hindu grandson. And when she died she was cremated at Chandanwadi because she had willed so.
'HRD minister Smriti Irani recommended over 5,000 requests for admission to the Central government-run Kendriya Vidyalaya chain of schools in the current academic year, a more than four-fold jump from quota levels of her predecessors. Of the admissions recommended by the minister, some 3,000 were finally effected after the others apparently opted out on some account or the other... The KVS administration is said to be looking into why only 3,000 of the 5,000-odd admissions recommended by the minister materialised. The HRD ministry did not respond to emailed queries on the matter...
The leader: 12 December is the 143rd birth anniversary of Hindutva ideologue BS Moonje. He was the mentor of KB Hedgewar and helped him shape the RSS.
The outfit: Moonje founded the Central Hindu Miltary Education Society which runs the Bhonsala Military School in Nashik. The School was named in connection with the 2008 Malegaon blasts.
More in the story: What is the BJP's view of Moonje? Why associating with Moonje's outfit can harm the BJP? What was Moonje's association with Benito Mussolini?
'Delhi University’s Sanskrit department and the RSS-backed Shiksha Sanskriti Utthan Nyas (SSUN) will be holding a seminar on November 24 to discuss the Human Resource Development (HRD) Ministry’s ‘New Education Policy-2015’. The seminar, whose final report will be sent to HRD minister Smriti Irani, will also have educationist Dinanath Batra delivering the keynote lecture on changes required in education.
'RSS ideologue and Haryana government's school and higher education consultant Dina Nath Batra says he not only wants to 'saffronize' education in the state but in the entire country. He was in Chandigarh on Friday to co-chair the first state-level consultative meeting on the new education policy for Haryana. Chief minister Manohar Lal Khattar chaired the meeting which was attended by a range of people, from vice-chancellors of universities to teachers.
With the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) being the fountainhead of Hindutva, and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government being strongly influenced by the RSS, we may ask: “Are we moving towards a Hindu religious autocracy which would move the country away from rationality and reason and, thus, democracy?” Unfortunately, it seems so. In any rational and reasonable society as in a democracy, dissent is accepted as a norm and reasoned dissent is encouraged.
'The Centre has directed IIT Delhi to host a five-day science festival that the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh-linked body Vijnana Bharati will organise from December 4. The science and technology department has asked the IIT to provide the venue and other help for the India International Science Festival, likely to be attended by over 4,000 scientists and students and inaugurated by Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Kshitij Gupta, officiating director of the IIT, said the government had picked Vijnana Bharati as the main organiser.
