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Harmeet Singh

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  1. Caste system and its hatred is a result of racism that happened as fair skinned people met the Black people of Indian subcontinent known as Untouchables or Dalits during various invasions. The fair skinned Aryans occupied the upper spots and made Blacks as Shuras(slaves) and 5th ones known as the outcasts or untouchables. Watch this video
  2. Dear mandeepraina, You can read Gandhi's own words of contempt against Guru Gobind Singh in Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi published by the Indian Government here at http://www.gandhiserve.org/cwmg/VOL031.PDF Go to page 142 Here he has to say On Guru Gobind Singh, the 10th Sikh Guru, along with George Washington, Garibaldi and Lenin “By test of the theory of non-violence, I do not hesitate to say that it is highly likely that had I lived as their contemporary and in the respective countries, I would have called every one of them a misguided patriot, even though a successful and brave warriors” Guru Gobind Singh was neither an Indian patriot nor a misguided person. Gandhi was using his racial politics to ridicule Guru Gobind Singh. You may think Gandhi was not a bad person but this assertion is generally given by those people who haven't been victims of his racial politics or are not aware of facts on Gandhi. The Dalits and Sikhs have been direct victims of Gandhi's racial and ethnic politics. When Mohammad Ali Jinnah in 1946 wanted to form a coalition government with Congress in United India, Gandhi refused to accept the demand of Jinnah which would have given Muslims a electoral representation within a united India. Jinnah therefore had to restore to the demand of Pakistan. A mere acceptance by Gandhi of the Muslim demand would have prevented millions of people from massacres and uprooting. This Mahatma could have considered the value of humans more than a demand raised by Jinnah but alas, he cared less about Punjab for Sikhs over having a Hindu dominated India and Hindu dominated Indian parliament.
  3. Please read the following article The Malaise of Jat Consciousness Jattpuna within Sikhs http://worldsikhnews.com/13%20August%20200...nsciousness.htm The Jat’s democratic or fraternal spirit has been confined mainly to his own community. He has never brooked any non-Jat in the village as the owner of land. This shows a congenital lack of democratic spirit. His self-esteem, a distinct feature of his character, is offset by his yearnings gained through Manu’s influence. He revels in denigrating and humiliating low caste people. His behaviour, in general, makes him no different from the arrogant members of the so-called swarna castes.
  4. This video starts with the practice of Untouchability amongst Hindus and then shows the practice of Apartheid in the Sikh Gurudwaras. How Sikhs have different places to stand in the same Gurudwaras depending upon their caste and the violence against the Sikhs. It also shows how Sikhs are living in the state of denial when they say there is no apartheid in Gurudwaras. This whole series is an eye opener and spine chilling for Sikhs. Please watch Part 6 and 7. Whole Series: http://www.youtube.com/results?search_quer...mp;search_type= Part 6 Part 7
  5. KTS Tulsi http://in.rediff.com/news/2004/dec/01inter.htm No Need Of Sikh Marriage Act: Tulsi http://www.sikhsangat.org/news/publish/asi...si_120907.shtml
  6. The reason why many eulogize Bhagat Singh is because they want Sikhs to identify themselves with being like Bhagat Singh i.e. to say being an Indian first than Sikh. Didn't Bhagat Singh cut his hair for his "desh"?How was this action as per Sikhi, he was a Desh Bhagat. He was an Atheist,Arya samajist and a Marxist. Is that Sikhi? Rest of what you want to assume lies on wobbly imagination without any basis of facts. He may have been a shaheed but not for Sikhs. It is almost like saying just because Buta Singh died for his Muslim love, Sikhs should consider him a great Shaheed of Love.
  7. I don't think Bhagat Singh can be a Shaheed. His actions were not influenced by Sikhi but by Marxism.
  8. This issue is being singled out due to anti-Muslim feeling of some Sikhs. I don't see them having there placards when Sikhs girls marry Hindu guys. I along with many have seen Sikh families willing marrying there girls in Hindu households. I think some people are over reacting to this situation in UK. Of course preying nature of these Muslim men is an issue but lets also understand that we should not sideline this issue as a single entity. It is a part of wider phenomenon of illiteracy about Sikhi amongst Sikhs that is hurting them from all sides.
  9. The post has very strong points indeed. What we can clearly see is- there was no active participation of Gurus in celebrating Diwali. Gurus celebrated whole life not a DAY. I don't see any spiritual significance of lighting up Darbar Sahib and Homes along with all the festivities including Mathaiya and other stuff. It can't be a Sikh concept. It more looks like a "Rangeen Tamasha" other than the point of Gurbani that asks for Soch and Vichaar
  10. Why do we give so much attention to such folks after all there motive in the end is to make us feel desperate. Just let them show their own desperation
  11. I am unable to install Gurmukhi fonts on win Vista. Can someone help?
  12. http://www.khalistan-affairs.org/home/pres...june7,2007.aspx Divide and rule’ subversive anti-Sikh activities of Indian diplomatic missions condemned June 07, 2007 Washington DC, Friday, June 07 2007: In a Press Statement issued here today, Dr. Amarjit Singh, Director of the Washington-based Khalistan Affairs Center, condemned the subversive activities of Indian diplomatic missions abroad in general and the Indian Consulate General in Vancouver (BC) in particular, for spreading dezinformatsiya which maligns the peaceful, law-abiding diaspora Sikh communities and the independent Punjabi print media located abroad. The statement mentioned a recent episode in Canada, which stands out, in which, one Umendra Singh, planted a mischievous story on the website of VANCOUVER 24 HOURS, on 04 June, 2007, falsely claiming that a commentary published in the Surrey-based Punjab Guardian had called for the destruction of a 16th century Hindu temple in Amritsar. Within a few hours the false story went round the world. The VANCOUVER 24 HOURS reporter did not realize two facts. Firstly, that there is no 16th century Hindu temple in Amritsar. Secondly, Sikhs respect ALL religions and are not in the Temple or Mosque or Church destroying business. Demolishing mosques, like the 16th century Babri, comes in the domain of the Indian right wing, Neo-Nazi, fascist, Hindutawa elements. Dr. Amarjit Singh’s statement concluded by reproducing a protest letter written to the management of VANCOUVER 24 HOURS which is appended below:
  13. Durgiana Mandir must be preserved as an important piece of history of copycating. PS The temple was built in 1920s not in 16th century.
  14. This would be a brilliant excuse by Apologists for softness on cruelty.
  15. "Mother" Teresa's work was based essentially to convert people to the faith of Catholicism.
  16. Raju and Warrior, I didn't post this to start a controversy but to understand how people have enacted the false figures like Gandhi as cultural icons. Otherwise people who have reservations for cruelity can go ahead and consider people like Gandhi responsible for our plight today as Saviours. Our Gurus have always said us NOT to attach ourselves with people and consider them "Holier than thou". Like we see today happening.
  17. GB Singh author of the book Gandhi: Behind the Mask of Divinity Must see, Some language be careful http://www.videosift.com/video/Penn-Teller...-and-Dalai-Lama http://www.dissidentvoice.org/Articles9/Parenti_Tibet.htm Throughout the ages there has prevailed a distressing symbiosis between religion and violence. The histories of Christianity, Judaism, Hinduism, and Islam are heavily laced with internecine vendettas, inquisitions, and wars. Again and again, religionists have claimed a divine mandate to terrorize and massacre heretics, infidels, and other sinners. Some people have argued that Buddhism is different, that it stands in marked contrast to the chronic violence of other religions. To be sure, as practiced by many in the United States, Buddhism is more a "spiritual" and psychological discipline than a theology in the usual sense. It offers meditative techniques and self-treatments that are said to promote "enlightenment" and harmony within oneself. But like any other belief system, Buddhism must be judged not only by its teachings but by the actual behavior of its proponents. Buddhist Exceptionalism? A glance at history reveals that Buddhist organizations have not been free of the violent pursuits so characteristic of religious groups throughout the ages. In Tibet, from the early seventeenth century well into the eighteenth, competing Buddhist sects engaged in armed hostilities and summary executions. [1] In the twentieth century, from Thailand to Burma to Korea to Japan, Buddhists have clashed with each other and with non-Buddhists. In Sri Lanka, huge battles in the name of Buddhism are part of Sinhalese history. [2] Just a few years ago in South Korea, thousands of monks of the Chogye Buddhist order---reputedly devoted to a meditative search for spiritual enlightenment---fought each other with fists, rocks, fire-bombs, and clubs, in pitched battles that went on for weeks. They were vying for control of the order, the largest in South Korea, with its annual budget of $9.2 million, its additional millions of dollars in property, and the privilege of appointing 1,700 monks to various duties. The brawls partly destroyed the main Buddhist sanctuaries and left dozens of monks injured, some seriously. Both warring factions claimed public support. In fact, Korean citizens appeared to disdain both sides, feeling that no matter what clique of monks took control of an order, it would use worshippers' donations to amass wealth, including houses and expensive cars. According to one news report, the mêlée within the Chogye Buddhist order (much of it carried on Korean television) "shatter[ed] the image of Buddhist Enlightenment." [3] But many present-day Buddhists in the United States would argue that none of this applies to the Dalai Lama and the Tibet he presided over before the Chinese crackdown in 1959. The Dalai Lama's Tibet, they believe, was a spiritually oriented kingdom, free from the egotistical lifestyles, empty materialism, pointless pursuits, and corrupting vices that beset modern industrialized society. Western news media, and a slew of travel books, novels, and Hollywood films have portrayed the Tibetan theocracy as a veritable Shangri-La and the Dalai Lama as a wise saint, "the greatest living human," as actor Richard Gere gushed. [4] The Dalai Lama himself lent support to this idealized image of Tibet with statements such as: "Tibetan civilization has a long and rich history. The pervasive influence of Buddhism and the rigors of life amid the wide open spaces of an unspoiled environment resulted in a society dedicated to peace and harmony. We enjoyed freedom and contentment." [5] In fact, Tibet's history reads a little differently. In the thirteenth century, Emperor Kublai Khan created the first Grand Lama, who was to preside over all the other lamas as might a pope over his bishops. Several centuries later, the Emperor of China sent an army into Tibet to support the Grand Lama, an ambitious 25-year-old man, who then gave himself the title of Dalai (Ocean) Lama, ruler of all Tibet. Here is quite a historical irony: the first Dalai Lama was installed by a Chinese army. To elevate his authority beyond worldly challenge, the first Dalai Lama seized monasteries that did not belong to his sect, and is believed to have destroyed Buddhist writings that conflicted with his claim to divinity. [6] The Dalai Lama who succeeded him pursued a sybaritic life, enjoying many mistresses, partying with friends, writing erotic poetry, and acting in other ways that might seem unfitting for an incarnate deity. For this he was "disappeared" by his priests. Within 170 years, despite their recognized status as gods, five Dalai Lamas were murdered by their high priests or other nonviolent Buddhist courtiers. [7] Shangri-La (for Lords and Lamas) Religions have had a close relationship not only with violence but with economic exploitation. Indeed, it is often the economic exploitation that necessitates the violence. Such was the case with the Tibetan theocracy. Until 1959, when the Dalai Lama last presided over Tibet, most of the arable land was still organized into religious or secular manorial estates worked by serfs. Even a writer like Pradyumna Karan, sympathetic to the old order, admits that "a great deal of real estate belonged to the monasteries, and most of them amassed great riches. . . . In addition, individual monks and lamas were able to accumulate great wealth through active participation in trade, commerce, and money lending." [8] Drepung monastery was one of the biggest landowners in the world, with its 185 manors, 25,000 serfs, 300 great pastures, and 16,000 herdsmen. The wealth of the monasteries went to the higher-ranking lamas, many of them scions of aristocratic families, while most of the lower clergy were as poor as the peasant class from which they sprang. This class-determined economic inequality within the Tibetan clergy closely parallels that of the Christian clergy in medieval Europe. Along with the upper clergy, secular leaders did well. A notable example was the commander-in-chief of the Tibetan army, who owned 4,000 square kilometers of land and 3,500 serfs. He also was a member of the Dalai Lama's lay Cabinet. [9] Old Tibet has been misrepresented by some of its Western admirers as "a nation that required no police force because its people voluntarily observed the laws of karma." [10] In fact, it had a professional army, albeit a small one, that served as a gendarmerie for the landlords to keep order and catch runaway serfs. [11] Young Tibetan boys were regularly taken from their families and brought into the monasteries to be trained as monks. Once there, they became bonded for life. Tashì-Tsering, a monk, reports that it was common practice for peasant children to be sexually mistreated in the monasteries. He himself was a victim of repeated childhood rape not long after he was taken into the monastery at age nine. [12] The monastic estates also conscripted peasant children for lifelong servitude as domestics, dance performers, and soldiers. In Old Tibet there were small numbers of farmers who subsisted as a kind of free peasantry, and perhaps an additional 10,000 people who composed the "middle-class" families of merchants, shopkeepers, and small traders. Thousands of others were beggars. A small minority were slaves, usually domestic servants, who owned nothing. Their offspring were born into slavery. [13] In 1953, the greater part of the rural population---some 700,000 of an estimated total population of 1,250,000---were serfs. Tied to the land, they were allotted only a small parcel to grow their own food. Serfs and other peasants generally went without schooling or medical care. They spent most of their time laboring for the monasteries and individual high-ranking lamas, or for a secular aristocracy that numbered not more than 200 families. In effect, they were owned by their masters who told them what crops to grow and what animals to raise. They could not get married without the consent of their lord or lama. A serf might easily be separated from his family should the owner send him to work in a distant location. Serfs could be sold by their masters, or subjected to torture and death. [14] A Tibetan lord would often take his pick of females in the serf population, if we are to believe one 22-year old woman, herself a runaway serf: "All pretty serf girls were usually taken by the owner as house servants and used as he wished." They "were just slaves without rights." [15] Serfs needed permission to go anywhere. Landowners had legal authority to capture and forcibly bring back those who tried to flee. A 24-year old runaway serf, interviewed by Anna Louise Strong, welcomed the Chinese intervention as a "liberation." During his time as a serf he claims he was not much different from a draft animal, subjected to incessant toil, hunger, and cold, unable to read or write, and knowing nothing at all. He tells of his attempts to flee: The first time [the landlord's men] caught me running away, I was very small, and they only cuffed me and cursed me. The second time they beat me up. The third time I was already fifteen and they gave me fifty heavy lashes, with two men sitting on me, one on my head and one on my feet. Blood came then from my nose and mouth. The overseer said: "This is only blood from the nose; maybe you take heavier sticks and bring some blood from the brain." They beat then with heavier sticks and poured alcohol and water with caustic soda on the wounds to make more pain. I passed out for two hours. [16] In addition to being under a lifetime bond to work the lord's land---or the monastery's land---without pay, the serfs were obliged to repair the lord's houses, transport his crops, and collect his firewood. They were also expected to provide carrying animals and transportation on demand. "It was an efficient system of economic exploitation that guaranteed to the country's religious and secular elites a permanent and secure labor force to cultivate their land holdings without burdening them either with any direct day-to-day responsibility for the serf's subsistence and without the need to compete for labor in a market context." [17] The common people labored under the twin burdens of the corvée (forced unpaid labor on behalf of the lord) and onerous tithes. They were taxed upon getting married, taxed for the birth of each child, and for every death in the family. They were taxed for planting a new tree in their yard, for keeping domestic or barnyard animals, for owning a flower pot, or putting a bell on an animal. There were taxes for religious festivals, for singing, dancing, drumming, and bell ringing. People were taxed for being sent to prison and upon being released. Even beggars were taxed. Those who could not find work were taxed for being unemployed, and if they traveled to another village in search of work, they paid a passage tax. When people could not pay, the monasteries lent them money at 20 to 50 percent interest. Some debts were handed down from father to son to grandson. Debtors who could not meet their obligations risked being placed into slavery for as long as the monastery demanded, sometimes for the rest of their lives. [18] The theocracy's religious teachings buttressed its class order. The poor and afflicted were taught that they had brought their troubles upon themselves because of their foolish and wicked ways in previous lives. Hence they had to accept the misery of their present existence as an atonement and in anticipation that their lot would improve upon being reborn. The rich and powerful of course treated their good fortune as a reward for--and tangible evidence of-virtue in past and present lives. Torture and Mutilation in Shanghri-La In the Dalai Lama's Tibet, torture and mutilation---including eye gouging, the pulling out of tongues, hamstringing, and amputation of arms and legs--were favored punishments inflicted upon thieves, runaway serfs, and other "criminals." Journeying through Tibet in the 1960s, Stuart and Roma Gelder interviewed a former serf, Tsereh Wang Tuei, who had stolen two sheep belonging to a monastery. For this he had both his eyes gouged out and his hand mutilated beyond use. He explains that he no longer is a Buddhist: "When a holy lama told them to blind me I thought there was no good in religion." [19] Some Western visitors to Old Tibet remarked on the number of amputees to be seen. Since it was against Buddhist teachings to take human life, some offenders were severely lashed and then "left to God" in the freezing night to die. "The parallels between Tibet and medieval Europe are striking," concludes Tom Grunfeld in his book on Tibet. [20] Some monasteries had their own private prisons, reports Anna Louise Strong. In 1959, she visited an exhibition of torture equipment that had been used by the Tibetan overlords. There were handcuffs of all sizes, including small ones for children, and instruments for cutting off noses and ears, and breaking off hands. For gouging out eyes, there was a special stone cap with two holes in it that was pressed down over the head so that the eyes bulged out through the holes and could be more readily torn out. There were instruments for slicing off kneecaps and heels, or hamstringing legs. There were hot brands, whips, and special implements for disembowling. [21] The exhibition presented photographs and testimonies of victims who had been blinded or crippled or suffered amputations for thievery. There was the shepherd whose master owed him a reimbursement in yuan and wheat but refused to pay. So he took one of the master's cows; for this he had his hands severed. Another herdsman, who opposed having his wife taken from him by his lord, had his hands broken off. There were pictures of Communist activists with noses and upper lips cut off, and a woman who was raped and then had her nose sliced away. [22] Theocratic despotism had been the rule for generations. An English visitor to Tibet in 1895, Dr. A. L. Waddell, wrote that the Tibetan people were under the "intolerable tyranny of monks" and the devil superstitions they had fashioned to terrorize the people. In 1904 Perceval Landon described the Dalai Lama's rule as "an engine of oppression" and "a barrier to all human improvement." At about that time, another English traveler, Captain W.F.T. O'Connor, observed that "the great landowners and the priests . . . exercise each in their own dominion a despotic power from which there is no appeal," while the people are "oppressed by the most monstrous growth of monasticism and priest-craft the world has ever seen." Tibetan rulers, like those of Europe during the Middle Ages, "forged innumerable weapons of servitude, invented degrading legends and stimulated a spirit of superstition" among the common people. [23] In 1937, another visitor, Spencer Chapman, wrote, "The Lamaist monk does not spend his time in ministering to the people or educating them, nor do laymen take part in or even attend the monastery services. The beggar beside the road is nothing to the monk. Knowledge is the jealously guarded prerogative of the monasteries and is used to increase their influence and wealth." [24] Occupation and Revolt The Chinese Communists occupied Tibet in 1951, claiming suzerainty over that country. The 1951 treaty provided for ostensible self-government under the Dalai Lama's rule but gave China military control and exclusive right to conduct foreign relations. The Chinese were also granted a direct role in internal administration "to promote social reforms." At first, they moved slowly, relying mostly on persuasion in an attempt to effect change. Among the earliest reforms they wrought was to reduce usurious interest rates, and build some hospitals and roads. Mao Zedung and his Communist cadres did not simply want to occupy Tibet. They desired the Dalai Lama's cooperation in transforming Tibet's feudal economy in accordance with socialist goals. Even Melvyn Goldstein, who is sympathetic to the Dalai Lama and the cause of Tibetan independence, allows that "contrary to popular belief in the West," the Chinese "pursued a policy of moderation." They took care to show respect for Tibetan culture and religion" and "allowed the old feudal and monastic systems to continue unchanged. Between 1951 and 1959, not only was no aristocratic or monastic property confiscated, but feudal lords were permitted to exercise continued judicial authority over their hereditarily bound peasants." [25] As late as 1957, Mao Zedung was trying to salvage his gradualist policy. He reduced the number of Chinese cadre and troops in Tibet and promised the Dalai Lama in writing that China would not implement land reforms in Tibet for the next six years or even longer if conditions were not yet ripe. [26] Nevertheless, Chinese rule over Tibet greatly discomforted the lords and lamas. What bothered them most was not that the intruders were Chinese. They had seen Chinese come and go over the centuries and had enjoyed good relations with Generalissimo and his reactionary Kuomintang rule in China. [27] Indeed the approval of the Kuomintang government was needed to validate the choice of the present-day Dalai Lama and Panchen Lama. When the young Dalai Lama was installed in Lhasa, it was with an armed escort of Chiang Kaishek's troops and an attending Chinese minister, in accordance with centuries-old tradition. [28] What really bothered the Tibetan lords and lamas was that these latest Chinese were Communists. It would be only a matter of time, they were sure, before the Communists started imposing their egalitarian and collectivist solutions upon the highly privileged theocracy. In 1956-57, armed Tibetan bands ambushed convoys of the Chinese Peoples Liberation Army (PLA). The uprising received extensive material support from the CIA, including arms, supplies, and military training for Tibetan commando units. It is a matter of public knowledge that the CIA set up support camps in Nepal, carried out numerous airlifts, and conducted guerrilla operations inside Tibet. [29] Meanwhile in the United States, the American Society for a Free Asia, a CIA front, energetically publicized the cause of Tibetan resistance. The Dalai Lama's eldest brother, Thubtan Norbu, played an active role in that group. Many of the Tibetan commandos and agents whom the CIA dropped into the country were chiefs of aristocratic clans or the sons of chiefs. Ninety percent of them were never heard from again, according to a report from the CIA itself. [30] The small and thinly spread PLA garrisons in Tibet could not have captured them all. The PLA must have received support from Tibetans who did not sympathize with the uprising. This suggests that the resistance had a rather narrow base within Tibet. "Many lamas and lay members of the elite and much of the Tibetan army joined the uprising, but in the main the populace did not, assuring its failure," writes Hugh Deane. [31] In their book on Tibet, Ginsburg and Mathos reach a similar conclusion: "The Tibetan insurgents never succeeded in mustering into their ranks even a large fraction of the population at hand, to say nothing of a majority. As far as can be ascertained, the great bulk of the common people of Lhasa and of the adjoining countryside failed to join in the fighting against the Chinese both when it first began and as it progressed." [32] Eventually the resistance crumbled. The Communists Overthrow Feudalism Whatever wrongs and new oppressions introduced by the Chinese in Tibet after 1959, they did abolish slavery and the serfdom system of unpaid labor. They eliminated the many crushing taxes, started work projects, and greatly reduced unemployment and beggary. They built the only hospitals that exist in the country, and established secular education, thereby breaking the educational monopoly of the monasteries. They constructed running water and electrical systems in Lhasa. They also put an end to floggings, mutilations, and amputations as a form of criminal punishment. [33] The Chinese also expropriated the landed estates and reorganized the peasants into hundreds of communes. Heinrich Harrer wrote a bestseller about his experiences in Tibet that was made into a popular Hollywood movie. (It was later revealed that Harrer had been a sergeant in Hitler's SS. [34]) He proudly reports that the Tibetans who resisted the Chinese and "who gallantly defended their independence . . . were predominantly nobles, semi-nobles and lamas; they were punished by being made to perform the lowliest tasks, such as laboring on roads and bridges. They were further humiliated by being made to clean up the city before the tourists arrived." They also had to live in a camp originally reserved for beggars and vagrants. [35] By 1961, hundreds of thousands of acres formerly owned by the lords and lamas had been distributed to tenant farmers and landless peasants. In pastoral areas, herds that were once owned by nobility were turned over to collectives of poor shepherds. Improvements were made in the breeding of livestock, and new varieties of vegetables and new strains of wheat and barley were introduced, along with irrigation improvements, all of which led to an increase in agrarian production. [36] Many peasants remained as religious as ever, giving alms to the clergy. But people were no longer compelled to pay tributes or make gifts to the monasteries and lords. The many monks who had been conscripted into the religious orders as children were now free to renounce the monastic life, and thousands did, especially the younger ones. The remaining clergy lived on modest government stipends, and extra income earned by officiating at prayer services, weddings, and funerals. [37] The charges made by the Dalai Lama himself about Chinese mass sterilization and forced deportation of Tibetans have remained unsupported by any evidence. Both the Dalai Lama and his advisor and youngest brother, Tendzin Choegyal, claimed that "more than 1.2 million Tibetans are dead as a result of the Chinese occupation." [38] No matter how often stated, that figure is puzzling. The official 1953 census---six years before the Chinese crackdown---recorded the entire population of Tibet at 1,274,000. Other estimates varied from one to three million. [39] Other census counts put the ethnic Tibetan population within the country at about two million. If the Chinese killed 1.2 million in the early 1960s then whole cities and huge portions of the countryside, indeed almost all of Tibet, would have been depopulated, transformed into a killing field dotted with death camps and mass graves---of which we have seen no evidence. The Chinese military force in Tibet was not big enough to round up, hunt down, and exterminate that many people even if it had spent all its time doing nothing else. Chinese authorities do admit to "mistakes" in the past, particularly during the 1966-76 Cultural Revolution when religious persecution reached a high tide in both China and Tibet. After the uprising in the late 1950s, thousands of Tibetans were incarcerated. During the Great Leap Forward, forced collectivization and grain farming was imposed on the peasantry, sometimes with disastrous effect. In the late 1970s, China began relaxing controls over Tibet "and tried to undo some of the damage wrought during the previous two decades." [40] In 1980, the Chinese government initiated reforms reportedly designed to grant Tibet a greater degree of self-rule and self-administration. Tibetans would now be allowed to cultivate private plots, sell their harvest surpluses, decide for themselves what crops to grow, and keep yaks and sheep. Communication with the outside world was again permitted, and frontier controls were eased to permit Tibetans to visit exiled relatives in India and Nepal. [41] Elites, Émigrés, and CIA Money For the Tibetan upper class lamas and lords, the Communist intervention was a calamity. Most of them fled abroad, as did the Dalai Lama himself, who was assisted in his flight by the CIA. Some discovered to their horror that they would have to work for a living. Those feudal elites who remained in Tibet and decided to cooperate with the new regime faced difficult adjustments. Consider the following: In 1959, Anna Louise Strong visited the Central Institute of National Minorities in Beijing which trained various ethnic minorities for the civil service or prepared them for entrance into agricultural and medical schools. Of the 900 Tibetan students attending, most were runaway serfs and slaves. But about 100 were from privileged Tibetan families, sent by their parents so that they might win favorable posts in the new administration. The class divide between these two groups of students was all too evident. As the institute's director noted: Those from noble families at first consider that in all ways they are superior. They resent having to carry their own suitcases, make their own beds, look after their own room. This, they think, is the task of slaves; they are insulted because we expect them to do this. Some never accept it but go home; others accept it at last. The serfs at first fear the others and cannot sit at ease in the same room. In the next stage they have less fear but still feel separate and cannot mix. Only after some time and considerable discussion do they reach the stage in which they mix easily as fellow students, criticizing and helping each other. [42] The émigrés' plight won fulsome play in the West and substantial support from U.S. agencies dedicated to making the world safe for economic inequality. Throughout the 1960s the Tibetan exile community secretly pocketed $1.7 million a year from the CIA, according to documents released by the State Department in 1998. Once this fact was publicized, the Dalai Lama's organization itself issued a statement admitting that it had received millions of dollars from the CIA during the 1960s to send armed squads of exiles into Tibet to undermine the Maoist revolution. The Dalai Lama's annual share was $186,000, making him a paid agent of the CIA. Indian intelligence also financed him and other Tibetan exiles. [43] He has refused to say whether he or his brothers worked with the CIA. The agency has also declined to comment. [44] While presenting himself as a defender of human rights, and having won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1989, the Dalai Lama continued to associate with and be advised by aristocratic émigrés and other reactionaries during his exile. In 1995, the Raleigh, N.C. News & Observer carried a frontpage color photograph of the Dalai Lama being embraced by the reactionary Republican senator Jesse Helms, under the headline "Buddhist Captivates Hero of Religious Right." [45] In April 1999, along with Margaret Thatcher, Pope John Paul II, and the first George Bush, the Dalai Lama called upon the British government to release Augusto Pinochet, the former fascist dictator of Chile and a longtime CIA client who had been apprehended while visiting England. He urged that Pinochet be allowed to return to his homeland rather than be forced to go to Spain where he was wanted by a Spanish jurist to stand trial for crimes against humanity. Today, mostly through the National Endowment for Democracy and other conduits that are more respectable-sounding than the CIA, the US Congress continues to allocate an annual $2 million to Tibetans in India, with additional millions for "democracy activities" within the Tibetan exile community. The Dalai Lama also gets money from financier George Soros, who now runs the CIA-created Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and other institutes. [46] The Question of Culture We are told that when the Dalai Lama ruled Tibet, the people lived in contented symbiosis with their monastic and secular lords, in a social order sustained by a deeply spiritual, nonviolent culture. The peasantry's profound connection to the existing system of sacred belief supposedly gave them a tranquil stability, inspired by humane and pacific religious teachings. One is reminded of the idealized imagery of feudal Europe presented by latter-day conservative Catholics such as G. K. Chesterton and Hilaire Belloc. For them, medieval Christendom was a world of contented peasants living in deep spiritual bond with their Church, under the protection of their lords. [47] Again we are invited to accept a particular culture on its own terms, which means accepting it as presented by its favored class, by those at the top who profited most from it. The Shangri-La image of Tibet bears no more resemblance to historic reality than does the romanticized image of medieval Europe. It might be said that we denizens of the modern secular world cannot grasp the equations of happiness and pain, contentment and custom, that characterize more "spiritual" and "traditional" societies. This may be true, and it may explain why some of us idealize such societies. But still, a gouged eye is a gouged eye; a flogging is a flogging; and the grinding exploitation of serfs and slaves is still a brutal class injustice whatever its cultural embellishments. There is a difference between a spiritual bond and human bondage, even when both exist side by side. To be sure, there is much about the Chinese intervention that is to be deplored. In the 1990s, the Han, the largest ethnic group comprising over 95 percent of China's vast population, began moving in substantial numbers into Tibet and various western provinces. [48] These resettlements have had an effect on the indigenous cultures of western China and Tibet. On the streets of Lhasa and Shigatse, signs of Chinese preeminence are readily visible. Chinese run the factories and many of the shops and vending stalls. Tall office buildings and large shopping centers have been built with funds that might have been better spent on water treatment plants and housing. Chinese cadres in Tibet too often adopted a supremacist attitude toward the indigenous population. Some viewed their Tibetan neighbors as backward and lazy, in need of economic development and "patriotic education." During the 1990s Tibetan government employees suspected of harboring nationalist sympathies were purged from office, and campaigns were launched to discredit the Dalai Lama. Individual Tibetans reportedly were subjected to arrest, imprisonment, and forced labor for attempting to flee the country, and for carrying out separatist activities and engaging in political "subversion." Some arrestees were held in administrative detention without adequate food, water, and blankets, subjected to threats, beatings, and other mistreatment. [49] Chinese family planning regulations that allow a three-child limit for Tibetan families have been enforced irregularly and vary by district. If a couple goes over the limit, the excess children can be denied subsidized daycare, health care, housing, and education. Meanwhile, Tibetan history, culture, and religion are slighted in schools. Teaching materials, though translated into Tibetan, focus on Chinese history and culture. [50] Still, the new order has its supporters. A 1999 story in the Washington Post notes that the Dalai Lama continues to be revered in Tibet, but [F]ew Tibetans would welcome a return of the corrupt aristocratic clans that fled with him in 1959 and that comprise the bulk of his advisers. Many Tibetan farmers, for example, have no interest in surrendering the land they gained during China's land reform to the clans. Tibet's former slaves say they, too, don't want their former masters to return to power. "I've already lived that life once before," said Wangchuk, a 67-year-old former slave who was wearing his best clothes for his yearly pilgrimage to Shigatse, one of the holiest sites of Tibetan Buddhism. He said he worshipped the Dalai Lama, but added, "I may not be free under Chinese communism, but I am better off than when I was a slave." [51] To support the Chinese overthrow of the Dalai Lama's feudal theocracy is not to applaud everything about Chinese rule in Tibet. This point is seldom understood by today's Shangri-La adherents in the West. The converse is also true. To denounce the Chinese occupation does not mean we have to romanticize the former feudal régime. One common complaint among Buddhist proselytes in the West is that Tibet's religious culture is being destroyed by the Chinese authorities. This does seem to be the case. But what I am questioning here is the supposedly admirable and pristinely spiritual nature of that pre-invasion culture. In short, we can advocate religious freedom and independence for Tibet without having to embrace the mythology of a Paradise Lost. Finally, it should be noted that the criticism posed herein is not intended as a personal attack on the Dalai Lama. He appears to be a nice enough individual, who speaks often of peace, love, and nonviolence. In 1994, in an interview with Melvyn Goldstein, he went on record as having been since his youth in favor of building schools, "machines," and roads in his country. He claims that he thought the corvée and certain taxes imposed on the peasants "were extremely bad." And he disliked the way people were saddled with old debts sometimes passed down from generation to generation. [52] Furthermore, he reportedly has established "a government-in-exile" featuring a written constitution, a representative assembly, and other democratic essentials. [53] Like many erstwhile rulers, the Dalai Lama sounds much better out of power than in power. Keep in mind that it took a Chinese occupation and almost forty years of exile for him to propose democracy for Tibet and to criticize the oppressive feudal autocracy of which he himself was the apotheosis. But his criticism of the old order comes far too late for ordinary Tibetans. Many of them want him back in their country, but it appears that relatively few want a return to the social order he represented. In a book published in 1996, the Dalai Lama proffered a remarkable statement that must have sent shudders through the exile community. It reads in part as follows: Of all the modern economic theories, the economic system of Marxism is founded on moral principles, while capitalism is concerned only with gain and profitability. Marxism is concerned with the distribution of wealth on an equal basis and the equitable utilization of the means of production. It is also concerned with the fate of the working classes-that is the majority---as well as with the fate of those who are underprivileged and in need, and Marxism cares about the victims of minority-imposed exploitation. For those reasons the system appeals to me, and it seems fair. . . . The failure of the regime in the Soviet Union was, for me not the failure of Marxism but the failure of totalitarianism. For this reason I think of myself as half-Marxist, half-Buddhist. [54] And more recently in 2001, while visiting California, he remarked that "Tibet, materially, is very, very backward. Spiritually it is quite rich. But spirituality can't fill our stomachs." [55] Here is a message that should be heeded by the affluent well-fed Buddhist proselytes in the West who cannot be bothered with material considerations as they romanticize feudal Tibet. Buddhism and the Dalai Lama aside, what I have tried to challenge is the Tibet myth, the Paradise Lost image of a social order that was little more than a despotic retrograde theocracy of serfdom and poverty, so damaging to the human spirit, where vast wealth was accumulated by a favored few who lived high and mighty off the blood, sweat, and tears of the many. For most of the Tibetan aristocrats in exile, that is the world to which they fervently desire to return. It is a long way from Shangri-La. Michael Parenti is a noted author and political commentator. Among his widely read books are The Terrorism Trap, Democracy For the Few, History as Mystery, and Against Empire. His latest book is The Assassination of Julius Caesar: A People's History of Ancient Rome (New Press, 2003). This article first appeared on Michael's website: www.michaelparenti.o
  18. Militant ji, I think you still didnt get me. You still didn't answer my question. Let me reiterate what I asked. If Gursikhs are better than Sikhs- we should be Gursikhs and not Sikhs. Am I Right? - Secondly, I asked was to provide me evidence from Gubani where it says that Gursikhs are better than Sikhs or it tells that Gursikhs are different from Sikhs. You have here provided me a quote from Gurbani where it says " Please give me Sikhs of Guru to we sinners" It doesn't says give us gursikhs and not Sikhs. Rather it support the assertion that Guru is asking for sikhs. Gur Ka Sikh bikaar te hatte (Ang 286) Satgu Sikh ko naam dhan deye (Ang 286) Gur ka Sikh vadhbhagi haI ( Ang 286) O Nanak, with the fullness of His heart, the True Guru mends His Sikh. Is that being less or different than Gursikh?
  19. Ok so that means we should not be Sikh but rather Gursikhs. Am I right? Any quotes from Gurbani that say "Gursikhs" are different from Sikhs?
  20. Great Words written! Militant, Can you tell me what is the difference between a Gursikh and a Sikh? Are Gursikhs supposed to be better than Sikhs?
  21. Jayd, Is khurasan a nation also? More on Khurasan at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khorasan Khurasan is also mentioned in the same context as Hindustan, in a subcontinental reference. Hindustan was not a National identity.Don't view it from today's paradigm.
  22. Dear Jayd and Raju, Was the reason for the Indian Empires "a common shared cultural or religious values"? Nations and Nationalism existing today are Euro-centric concepts based on common ethnicity(race, language and comon history). It originated in the 18th century and certainly there were no nation-states before. Don't worry about Hindufying the history as there was nothing known as "Hindu" in India back then. It was actually M.K gandhi who first started the idea of India existing as a political unity. He was the first to use nation with India. Remember he is known as the father of India. Certainly, a child can't be born before the father.
  23. http://www.akalidalamritsar.com/punjab/Kat...ngal_part2.html Very different of the Indian Media
  24. This is an excellent piece of research done on Gandhi and his racism against Black people. Order it today from Amazon or other book sites. Tell your freinds, it is must read and would shock the most fanatic amongst the Gandhophiles By Col. G.B Singh DESCRIPTION "Years of dedicated research on Gandhi convinced me that our hero was fundamentally a racist. In this book, I present the facts. The evidence presented here is not a matter of speculation or distorted interpretation. Much of the irrefutable evidence lay buried beneath a mountain of Gandhi's own writings - in his own words, which I have uncovered" - G.B. Singh Mohandas K. Gandhi (1869-1948) is regarded as one of the greatest leaders of the twentieth century. In addition to being hailed as the leader of India's movement toward independence from British colonial rule using the methods of nonviolent resistance (Satyagraha), his popularity crosses all the boundaries of political, religious, ethical, moral, spiritual, social, and national systems. In fact, he is seen as so ventral to human rights that various societies, both Eastern and Western, have come to view him as an icon of nonviolence, rather than as a fallible human. However, from a historical perspective, it is important to look beyond these icons to gain an objective viewpoint of a person's life. Only in this informed manner can we reach our own conclusions about the meaning of a person's contributions to society. Unfortunately, the body of literature about Gandhi is of such immense proportion that to wade through it to find the real Gandhi - the man in his own words, as well as in the words of those closest to him - is an almost impossible task. However, Col. G.B. Singh has undertaken just such a task. His research into Gandhi's beliefs started in 1983 after the release of the film GANDHI. He recognized that the popular image of Gandhi is, more often than not, misrepresented and misleading. The Gandhi legend has been presented as if it were the truth and treated as an unquestioned fact. In an unending expansion of Gandhian literature, the reality behind the "mask" of divinity has been so skillfully submerged as not to allow critical evaluation. Gandhi lived in South Africa from 1893 to 1914, where he designed and perfected his techniques of Satyagraha. But to date, no one has asked the critical question about the genesis of Satyagraha, and only a handful of scholars have delved into the murky areas of Gandhi's "relationship" with black people. Similarly, only a few scholars have cast a critical eye on Gandhi's life in India from 1915 to his death in 1948. During this time he gained worldwide prestige, and yet nobody asked. What personal attitudes did his politics belie regarding the British, other whites, and India's own Untouchables? Did Gandhi truly believe in abolishing the caste system, as the rest of the world has been led to believe? GANDHI: BEHIND THE MASK OF DIVINITY is the first investigative book to analyze the Mahatma's own writings. Readers will find particularly interesting the case of William Francis Doherty, a white American whose murder at the hands of Gandhi's followers was subsequently covered up by Gandhi himself. What does this say about Gandhi the man, and what does it mean for our modern understanding of his beliefs? Why are the followers of "nonviolent" Gandhi bent upon manufacturing weapons of mass destruction, in addition to building huge military and paramilitary forces? The post-September 11 world is radically different, and it compels us to critically investigate India's politics, its leaders, and their brand of ideology - starting with the ideas of the man who led India to modern statehood. FROM THE INTRODUCTION "Over the years I have discussed Gandhi with many Americans, both formally and informally....What continues to irk me is the amount of Gandhi "propaganda material" that has flooded our libraries and bookstores. For an unsuspecting Westerner, the reading of Gandhi as he is portrayed on these shelves can bring about the intended result. That is understandable. This book is an attempt to close the gap between the popularized Gandhi and the historical Gandhi. This book will incite readers to be more open-minded and to seek to validate the "truths" presented. My hope is that it will provoke honest, healthy, and open dialogue and foster more critical scrutiny about him.... Years of dedicated research on Gandhi convinced me that our hero was fundamentally a racist. In this book, I present the facts. The evidence presented here is not a matter of speculation or distorted interpretation. Much of the irrefutable evidence lay buried beneath a mountain of Gandhi's own writings - in his own words, which I have uncovered - comments that will be difficult to dispute once they are read. In this book you will read the evidence in its entirety. My primary intention is to untangle the web that Gandhi weaved - and his followers are still weaving - for many years. Only through a methodical probing can we expose Gandhi's campaign of deception: the lies, the propaganda, the misinformation, the half-truths, and the efforts to hide behind religion. Where Gandhi left off, his followers have picked up, and they continue their own sophisticated campaigns, both in India and abroad. This book should not be looked upon as another Gandhi biography. Rather, it should provide a standard by which to weigh the Gandhian literature for accuracy and objectivity. Also this book, though narrowly focused, should stand as a guide alerting us to how thoroughly the Gandhi propagandists and others have succeeded in deceiving us." - G.B. Singh
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