I am back from a pilgrimage. Its a pilgrimage of different kind which is to be felt by heart, without seeing any image or idol of a God or Goddess. I am talking about Cellular jail. Cellular jail of Port Blair in the Andamans is closely associated with the freedom struggle of India. After the first mutiny of in 1857, the British rulers found new usage for these Islands and thereby started the agonizing story of the massive and awesome cellular jail. The patriots who raised their voice against the British rule, were sent to this jail. Thousands of languished for years in solitary confinement in its cells and many perished thus giving Andamans the notorious sobriquet of “Kalapani” or the black water.

To day the cellular jail s the National Memorial, a tribute to those who dared to raise their voices against the British. That’s why the visit to the Cellular jail is a pilgrimage for every Indian.The freedom what we are enjoying today is the result of the sacrifices of those who suffered for years in the solitary confinement in its small cells.

To read more about Andaman Islands, open the page ‘My India’.

1. One of the cells (above), 2. Cellular Jail complex,  3. Cellular Jail at night

VIPER ISLAND :

Viper Island, named after the shipwreck event of a British trading ship named “Viper” in 19th century, is located near Port Blair. The ruins of an olden discarded jail, built by British in 1867, with yellow colored bricks and the gallows are seen in this Island. The Island was considered as the place of penal settlement for the freedom fighters of India. This Island was part of the great Indian independence history and had witnessed the inhuman sufferings and sacrifices of Indian nationals involved in freedom struggle.

Viper Island is accessible by harbor cruise originating from Phoenix Bay Jetty in Port Blair.  This place is visited by number of tourists enroute to Portblair from  North Bay Island to find the ruins of the jail and a Gallows there. The Guide  escorted us addressed the visitors to remind the sacrifices of the freedom fighters. Listen what he said to young generation of today.

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In a rare gesture to Indians worldwide as much as to showcase his — and America’s — multicultural affections, US President Barack Obama on Wednesday lit a ceremonial Diwali lamp at the White House to “symbolize victory of light over darkness”. Although it was the Bush administration that began celebrating Diwali in the White House in 2003, Obama became the first President to personally grace the ceremony.

Deepavali is the celebration of the Light over darkness,  goodness over evil, knowledge over ignorance. Lights are lit on the auspicious day of Deepavali not just decorate the homes but also to communicate this profound truth about life. Light the lamp of wisdom and love in every heart and bring a radiant smile on every face.

On this auspicious occassion, Laxmi, the goddess of wealth is also worshiped. In this festival, sweet is distributed which symbolises the dispelling of the bitterness of the past and renewal friendship.

Wish you all a very happy Diwali. May Diwali bring all happiness, prosperity in your life in the year ahead.

In a recent climate conference, experts said that a rise of at least two meters in the world’s sea levels is now almost unstoppable. The crux of the sea level issue is that it starts very slowly but once it gets going it is practically unstoppable,” said Stefan Rahmstorf, a scientist at Germany’s Potsdam Institute and a widely recognised sea level expert. There is no way I can see to stop this rise, even if we have gone to zero emissions. Most scientists expect at least 2 degrees Celsius warming as a result of man-made greenhouse gas emissions, and probably more. The world warmed 0.7-0.8 degrees last century. Rahmstorf estimated that if the world limited warming to 1.5 degrees then it would still see two meters sea level rise over centuries, which would see some island nations disappear. His best guess was a one metre rise this century, assuming three degrees warming, and up to five metres over the next 300 years. “There is nothing we can do to stop this unless we manage to cool the planet. That would require extracting the carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. There is no way of doing this on the sufficient scale known today,” he said.

From the above, we can understand what is the fate of this planet and our future generations, if we do not act seriously and that should start now.

This post has been written for the “Blog Action day” campaign. UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown’s is also concerned about the climate change which has been expressed in his Blog.

US President Barack Obama won the Nobel Peace Prize on Friday for giving the world “hope for a better future” and striving for nuclear disarmament. The decision to award one of the world’s top accolades to a president less than nine months into his first term, who has yet to score a major foreign policy success, came as a major surprise.

The Norwegian Nobel Committee praised Obama for “his extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples.” The first African-American to hold his country’s highest office, Obama has called for disarmament and worked to restart the stalled Middle East peace process since taking office in January 2009.

Obama himself put the award in perspective while admitting he was both surprised and humbled by it. He said he did not feel he deserved to be in the company of so many great transformative figures of peace . “I do not view it as recognition of my own accomplishment, rather as an affirmation of American leadership of all nations,” Obama said in a brief media appearance at the White House Rose Garden, seeking to deflect some of the criticism for what many across the world feel is an award he is yet to earn and has come too early. I

t reminds us that Obama’s idol Mahatma Gandhi who was most deserved candidate for this prize ,was denied  by the then imperialist Nobel committee. Gandhi was nominated in 1937, 1938, 1939, 1947 and finally a few days before his assassination in January 1948. The omission has been publicly regretted by later members of the Nobel Committee, though the committee never came out with the reasons for not awarding the prize to the most deserving candidate of the century. So the criticism /reactions for awarding the peace prize  of 2009 to Barack Obama, who has not done anything towards peace except dreaming ,are well justified. It is like awarding a Olympic medal before stepping into the track.

Dr. Venkatraman Ramakrishnan

Nobel prize for Chemistry 2009 was declared on Wednesday in Stockholm. Indian born, US citizen,  Dr. Venkatraman Ramakrishnan won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry and the same he shared with  Thomas A Steitz of US and Ada E Yonath from Israel.  Royal Swedish Academy said that Nobel Prize was awarded to them” for studies of the structure and function of the Ribosome”. One of the core processes in life. Ribosomes generated protein, which regulate chemistry in all living organisms. Modern researches for the development of antibiotic are based on their work.

When the country was celebrating Durga Puja by worshiping Devi Durga, the symbol of women power, a young Muslim girl in a remote Jammu village turned to be “ Durga” and killed a dreaded Lashkar terrorist on Sunday. Exhibiting astonishing courage, Rukhsana Kausar confronted a group of Lashkar terrorists who had barged into their home late Sunday night. The brave girl snatched an AK-47 from one of the terrorists, and shot one to death, injured another and send the others running for their lives. Rukshana was trained by the village defence committee how to fire an assault rifle. The training helped her for the courageous act.  She said “I pushed a terrorist into the wall. I hit him with the butt of the gun and then fired several times.” It is reported that the deceased militant was identified as commander Osama, of Pakistani origin.

After bidding adieu to Maa, our waiting for her homecoming next year has started now.

Wish you all a very happy Vijaya Dashami

There is a proverb in Bengali that in twelve seasons, there are 13 festivals (Baro Maase tero parbon). A page named festival (Go to page ‘Festival)has been introduced in this blog, just to give you a glimpses of those “thirteen” festivals.   Festive season is  on in full swing and greatest festival of Bengal, Durga Puja, has began. In fact has already started from the day of Mahalaya on 18th September with the invocation of Goddess Durga. This will last for Five days from 24ay Sep 2009 (Shashthi)  to  28th Sep 2009 (Dashami).   The idols of Goddess Durga are made by the artisans based on the theme of the puja / pandal and as a whole takes the shape of Art Exihibition due to competetions and every puja committee tries to be the best. 

To read about Durga Puja, go to my another post “Durga Puja”.

Wish you a very Happy Durga Puja,

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Like every year, this year too Durga Puja is at our doorstep. All around atmoshphere in the nature and everywhere reminds us the festival. Today is Mahalaya. Seven days before Durga Puja, “Mahalaya”, an auspicious occasion, is observed. This auspicious occasion heralds the coming of Maa Durga and begins the festivity to welcome her on this earth. It’s a kind of invitation (or we should say invocation) to the mother goddess to descend on earth and thats why we chant saying – ‘Jago, Maa Jago’. Invocation of Mother Durga is done through the chanting of mantras, singing devotional songs and scriptural verses from “Chandi”. Since early 1930s, the early morning Radio program ”Mahishasura Mardini” of Akashbani Kolkata on the Mahalaya day became a part of Bengali culture and the tradition is still continuing and nothing could change its originality as well as its popularity.

The story line goes like this : due to increasing cruelty of the demon king Mahishasura against the gods, the Gods pleaded Vishnu to annihilate the demon. The Trinity of Brahma, Vishnu and Maheswara (Shiva) come together to create a powerful female form with 10 arms – Maa Durga or Mahamaya, the Mother of the Universe, who embodies the primeval source of all power. The Gods then bestow upon this supreme creation their individual blessings and weapons. Armed like a warrior, the goddess rides a lion to battle with the Mahishasura. After a fierce combat the Durga is able to slay the asura king with her trident. Heaven and earth rejoice at her victory.

Another seven days to go to start the festival.  To read more about the festival, please go to my another post named : Durga Puja

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They are in hurry. No use of waiting for Green Signal

While driving on the city roads, I have experienced that the Calcuttans are in the habits of violating traffic rules and they take their life in their hands while crossing the roads. Every time you may not be that lucky, some time you may be caught and then it takes a shape of an accident. Many times I experienced such violation of traffic rules by the pedestrians just in front of my car, which made me to write this post.

People of Kolkata are in the habits of simply walk across the street without bothering the moving traffic simply raising a hand at the oncoming speedy vehicles, expecting them to stop. That way Kolkata is a paradise of jaywalkers.

Many times ladies, maid servants with school kids in tow, simply walk across the roads when the traffic is on the move, raising a hand to the moving vehicles. This is the trend in Kolkata and this type of violation practices by the students, young, olds, literates, illiterates all section of people violate rules and happily take their life into risk while crossing the roads. This violations often take into a ugly shape of accidents and all public sympathy go to the victims though the accident occurred due to their faults and violation of traffic rules.

Following Zebra lines but they too are in hurry

Another type of violation of traffic rules  by the pedestrians has come to my notice that in the busy crossing like Gariahat more where a group of people just jumps to the road in front of the moving vehicles and forced them to stop despite the signal is Green.

People of Kolkata think themselves as most intelligent which make them try to go shortcut everywhere. They not only cross the roads by raising one hand to the moving vehicles (like a traffic police) but also they are in the habit of standing in the middle of the roads for boarding a bus. Private buses oblige them which makes the people more in-disciplined and both (buses and passengers) don’t bother to stand in the Bus stand. Drivers of the State owned buses some times try to teach them a lesson by just not picking them up, but due to the private buses the practice continues and they are beyond correction because of the culture of the private buses. Only way out to stop these violations is to make the law more stringent and enforce them strictly with heavy penalties/fines.

(Picture : Times of India)