Editor,
First of all my kudos to Salil Gewali for raising the genuine issue regarding violation of the sanctity of puja and spiritual celebrations through his letter — “Christmas not for unholy parties,” (ST Dec 31, 2022). I find the letter very through-provoking. I could not stop myself from writing to your column. Fully agreeing with Robert Lyngdoh and Rupesh Nath for their valuable feedback, I also want to put across my humble opinion. My firm belief is that if we do not raise our voices the situation will go from bad to worse.
Nowhere in any religious holy book can one can find anything at all that encourages negative activities in the name of celebrating a religious festival. The Bhagavad Gita strictly mentions that any type of sense gratification and God’s devotion cannot happen together. They are completely opposite phenomena like the “devil and God”, or “night and day.” Hence the Hindu scriptures prescribe during Durga Puja that a devotee should observe complete fasting without even taking solid food, except fruits and water. The purpose behind this is not to overburden the biological organs. This results in the purification of the mind and heart. Modern science also has proved now that occasional fasting increases the human immune system raising mental calmness and patience. Devotion to God’s through a pure mind and heart finally leads to awakening our consciousness. There is no bigger sin than to incorporate vulgarity and sense indulgences in any auspicious occasion. I have been observing this immoral development for over a decade and it is getting more worse with each year passing. I must confess that many of my Muslim and Christian friends put me in a difficult situation by asking questions about why during Hindu pujas, Hindus enjoy Bollywood dances and hold drinking parties. They are right because such rowdy parties often end up in brawls. Instead of peace and harmony, we witness violence during puja and police intervention. Is needed. Is it not shameful? All these facts have disturbed my mind for many years. Hope this letter with my viewpoints based on religious scriptures, will be read by our CPC members. Being a human being, one should be able to differentiate between sin and virtue. Puja organizers should not encourage any negative activities. Better, they do not organize the puja function if the organizers cannot impart values to the believers.
Hence my humble submission to the Central Puja Committee and religious leaders from other faiths is to completely ban immoral activities and entertainment during puja or during Christmas as requested by a previous writer Rupesh Nath and Robert Lyngdoh.
Yours etc.,
Suraj Biswa,
Shillong
Flights should stop serving alcohol
Editor,
This has reference to the incident of peeing by a passenger on a senior lady co-passenger in an Air India flight. It’s unfortunate that everyone is pointing towards the actions or inactions of the AI pilot and staff and raising issues of regulatory framework for controlling the unruly behaviour, but no one is raising questions about the root cause of the incident – which is alcoholism. Why should anyone in flights be allowed to drink alcohol in any class? What’s such a great need? Why can’t alcohol lovers restrain their urge for a few hours? Why should someone who doesn’t even like the smell of the alcohol, be made to suffer it by sitting next to a passenger who has an insatiable appetite for alcohol? Like smoking, a time has come when drinking alcohol should not be permitted on flights. India, being the land of Mahatma Gandhi, should take a lead in setting that example.
Yours etc.,
Anoop Kumar Srivastava
Via emai
Old pension scheme(OPS) vs New pension scheme (NPS)
Editor,
We may bear recall that pension systems had been first introduced by our British administrators way back in 1881 for the societal welfare of their employees and their respective families, enabling them to live a dignified life and thereby avoid a hand to mouth existence post retirement and having dedicated a creamy part of their youthful life serving the government. Evidently, it was after a prolonged gap of 123 years that the BJP government under AB Vajpayee had unreservedly dispensed with this serviceable package hitherto availed by the white collar personnel! The Vajpayee government postulated that pension funds contributed to the market under NPS would go a long way to pay rich dividends to the Government employees but such a pipe dream has now no takers among a large section of the latter given that Sensex while upping a two- digit fold between 2004 -2022, the cumulative financial returns percolating onto the employees have been far from expectations. This is amplified by the glaring fact that an employee drawing a basic scale of Rs 35,500 per month under NPS will receive a lamentable sum of around Rs 2,400 as pension! Contrasting this to his/her counterpart who retires under OPS and will earn a pension of Rs 15,200 per month or thereabouts.
Markedly, such gargantuan disparity has unleashed unprecedented dissatisfaction in the rank and file of the prospective employees. Incidentally, it also ironically connotes that a Grade lV staff like sweeper, mali, chawkidar etc. who superannuate in the process of 0PS can be in a much higher financial leverage than an officer retiring on NPS regime!
In short the NPS zeroes in on the fact that when the government employees retire all governmental liabilities towards such incumbents end up lock stock and barrel. It is reported that there is a pan India movement amongst the government employees against the NPS. Taking the instance of our state of Meghalaya, in my fortuitous correspondence with large section of employees, who have joined services after 31 March,2010, have stated that the axe of NPS mechanism will fall on them by mid 2030s onwards when they shall have attained superannuation . Thus, ending in a financial catastrophe of sorts. Virtually all the non-BJP ruled states have reverted to 0PS like Rajasthan, Chattisgarh, Punjab and counting.
As Meghalaya Assembly elections will be held sooner than later, some political experts have opined that if BJP, NPP and for that matter even the prominent regional parties capture power the restoration of OPS could become next to impossible as these political players are one of the components of the NEDA, overall remotely controlled by the Saffron government at the Centre.
Yours etc.,
Jerome K Diengdoh,
Via email