Well, nothing much. A few of my recent plans backfired. Here’s a bulletted list of what happened in past few months.
And here’s a bulleted list of what I’m planning for next few months
Hmmm… Let’s see…
From: God
To: People_of_Earth
Date: 10/06/2008
Subject: stop
knock it off, all of you
seriously, what the hell?
–
God
In a secular state like India, what stand should government take in religious education? What should be their stand towards conversion and mixed marriages?
Well, the Left Government of Kerala had taken a clear stand on this, and it has attracted a lot of hue, cry and protest from various religious and social organizations. Even though there are a very few religious organizations supporting the government’s stand, their influence on the overall religious communities of Kerala is almost null.
For the uninitiated, here’s some background to this:
The State Education Council of Kerala has introduced a new class book for class 7 Social Studies. One particular section in the text book is titled “Mathamillatha Jeevan” (verbatim English translation: A life with out religion or Jeevan, who has no religion – Jeevan (life), being pratogonist’s name.
Here’s the verbatim translation of the above page.
Headmaster began to fill in the application form for a student, in presence of his parents.
“What is your name? ”
“Jeevan”
“Your father’s name?”
“Anvar Rasheed”
“And your mother’s?”
“Lakshmi Devi”
Headmaster heads towards the parents.
“What should I enter for child’s religion?”
“Nothing. Leave it blank.”
“And caste”
“Leave that too.”
“What if he wants a religion when he grows up?”
“In that case, let him choose the religion he wants.”
So what do you think? Is promotion of a selecting the religion for himself (how improbable it may be), whenever he is capable of doing that, really a threat to religious beliefs? Does that affect the secular system in place in any way? Will it make the society better, or worse?
How does this affect a 7th class student, who doesn’t even know what does it means if he is a Hindu, Muslim or Christian. Does that matter to him while selecting his friends?
In fact, an ideal education society should be able to provide unbiased view about all religions, and allows someone to take decisions on. Let this be the first step towards this. This step towards a secular education came 60 years after being a secular state. Better late than never.
In all it’s probability, government will be forced to withdraw the text books. If not, the very next government in power might remove it as well. So, people who take a blind stand against this, Kya Aap Saatvi Pass se Tez Hai?
A few links:
Cong wants class 7 textbook to be withdrawn in Kerala
Muslim students burn school textbook copies in Kerala
Muslim bodies seek recall of textbook
Kerala Left accused of textbook atheism
mukt is derived from the word mukti, meaning the experience of being free from bondage.
Composed of a body of individuals who love Free/Open Source Software (FOSS), the mukt.in team organizes series of events to promote the same. mukt.in v2 is scheduld to held on Aug 1 – 3 in Hyderabad.
It aims to collaborate skill levels from complete novice to expert; collaborate to share knowledge and experiences.
mukt.in first started in 2007, Aug 24,25,26th. It featured discussions, speeches, presentations, and intense interactions.
For more info and regsitration: http://www.mukt.in/
In early 2003, A major fire in Film and Television Institute (FTTI), Pune destroyed hundreds of original negatives and prints of very rare black-and-white golden classics films of 1950’s. This happened once, and this may happen again.
Well, why do we need to be old fashioned in this. I do agree to the point of having the original negatives and prints of movies, but why can’t we have a digital backup of the same also? Why can’t we convert the archive into digital formats and store it in some server, or may be multiple mirror servers.
According to Handbook of Indian Copyright Law, Any film will be released from it’s copyright and belongs to public domain after 60 years from its first release. So that essentially means that any movie released before Mar 31, 1948 has been released from its copyright and belongs to public domain.
I’ve done a quick search on p2p/torrent networks for the movie Raja Harishchandra, released in 1913, but didn’t fetch me any results. I can see many classic Hollywood movies available for public domain.
Reason being the digital format of the movie is not available for the public domain. Let alone being it available for public domain, there’s no digital format of that movie at all!
Converting the film archive in FTTI to digital format holds helpful for at least two reasons.
- Save the movies from any chance of destruction in future, as may people/servers will be having copies.
- Makes the availability of copyright-released movies for public domain, as Internet is the easiest medium to share any media.
And this definitely ensures the visibility of Indian classics outside the country too. I’ve many friends outside India who want to see classic Indian movies, which are available nowhere.
