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When
Mahatma
Gandhi
mediated
a debate
over
whether
Vedic
Hindus
ate beef
By Guest Author

Posted on October
23, 2015

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Right
from its
ban in
Maharashtra,
Haryana
to the
Dadri
lynching,
Beef has
become
the hot

TO TOP

topic in
India.
The
beef
over
Beef has
made
Sahitya
Akademi
recipients
return
their
prestigious
awards,
with
everyone
citing
the
rising
intolerance
in India
under
BJP
government.

While
news
channels
were
actively
fanning
communal
tensions
by
bringing
in the
religious
angle to
the
Dadri

TO TOP

incident,
it also
projected
this
lynching
as the
rst of
its kind
ever in
India.
This
rst of
its kind
projection
stimulated
me to do
a search
of
similar
events
that
could
have
happened
before
this.
Initial
search
in
Google
news
with
custom
date
ranges
did not
bring
manysearch
results
and the

TO TOP

search
could
only
take me
as far as
2000.
Also, I
tried
with
only
English
keywords
and not
Hindi, so
I could
have
missed
out any
such
events
in
regional
newspapers.

Then, I
turned
over to
Google
Books,
to nd
out
whether
murders
related
to cow
slaughter
had ever
happened
in India.
Via that

TO TOP

search, I
got a
chance
to read
some
excerpts
from a
book
called
Beast
and Man
of India
written
by a
J.L.Kipling
(father
of
Rudyard
Kipling).
A
chapter
was
devoted
to cow
& bull
and how
it nds
its high
place in
agrarian
India.
But, in
the
search
results,
something
else
caught
my eye
a

TO TOP

screenshot
of page
331
(Volume
9) of an
old
magazine
called
Young
India
edited
by none
other
than the
famous
Gandhiji.
Unable
to
browse
through
the
excerpt
there, as
Google
had not
taken
snippets
of the
book, I
tried to
nd an
alternate
online
source
for
reading
Young
India.
Thankfully,
some

TO TOP

really
good
guys at
Gandhi
Heritage
Portal
had kept
14
volumes
of
Young
India
magazine
in their
website.
After
browsing
through
every
edition
of
Volume
9, I
zeroed
in on
that
particular
page,
which
was a
part of
Young
India
published
on
September
29,
1927.

Nearly,
TO TOP

88 years
before,
Gandhiji
had
been a
kind-of-
mediator
for a
discussion
over
whether
the
Vedic
Hindus
really
ate beef
or not.
Gandhiji
starts
the
particular
column
titled
Cow
sacri ce
in
Vedas,
by
mentioning
how C.
V.
Vaidya
had
earlier
written
in a
previous
edition
of the
same

TO TOP

magazine(Volume
9, June
2 1927,
Page
179),
about
the
methods
to
protect
cow. In
that
article,
while
Vaidya
was
listing
the
different
steps
needed
for cow
protection,
it was
mentioned
that
cow
was
slaughtered
during
the
Vedic
period.
This had
caught
the
attention
of
S.D.Satwalekar,
who had

TO TOP

written
a
rebuttal
of
Vadiyas
claims in
a letter
to
Gandhiji.

Satwalekar
in his
letter,
uses
three
verses
from
Charaka
Samhita,
to
highlight
how a
Prishadra
tried to
slaughter
cow and
people
who ate
beef
suffered
from
dysentery.
He
argues

TO TOP

that it
had
happened,
but it
was not
a
respectable
practice.

Satwalekar
then
continues
to
mention
about
punishment
in Vedas
for cow
slaughter
and
argues
that
how can
such
practise
be
prevalent
when it
was
sure to
be
awarded
with
death.
He then
explains
how
Cow

TO TOP

was an
untouched
animal
in Vedic
period,
by
explaining
the
etymology
of its
three
Vedic
names,
Adhanya
(one
which is
not
slaughtered),
Ahi
(one
which
may not
be
killed)
and
Aditi
(one
which
may not
be
hacked
to
pieces).

TO TOP

Then, he
mentions
a single-
line
mantra
and
another
four-line
mantra
to
corroborate
his claim
that
cows
were
not
slaughtered
in Vedic
period.
He
concludes
his reply
by
stating
that
wise
and
thoughtful
never
killed
cow and
therefore,
it
cannot
be
regarded
as an
approved

TO TOP

practice.

Satwalekar
reply is
followed
by
Vaidyas
reply,
where
he
brie y
states
that cow
slaughter
would
had
been
considered
sinful,
yet it
was
done for
sacri cial
purposes
and
Aryans
in their
hoary
days
had
eaten
beef,
which
Aryans
of later
periods
had

TO TOP

considered
a
heinous
sin.
After
Vaidyas
reply,
Satwalekar
again
comes
back
with six
points
to
support
his
earlier
claim.
Below
are
those
six
points.

What do
I incur
from
this
exchange
of
letter?
There is
a
possibility
that
people
ate beef

TO TOP

in Vedic
age, as
claimed
by
Vaidya.
There is
also a
possibility
that
people
neither
touched
beef not
slaughtered
cow,
even for
sacri ces.
If
someone
who is
an
expert
in
Sanskrit
and had
read
through
all the
Vedas,
can
bring
some
more
verses
that
support
or
oppose
the
claims

TO TOP

here, to
the
table,
then it
can
enrich
our
debate
with
more
facts
and
proofs.
Until
then, let
me
consider
that I
am just
sharing
it here,
because
I
chanced
upon
this
article in
Gandhijis
magazineand
found it
interesting
that the
same
topic
had
been
discussed
nearly a
century
ago.

TO TOP

@manithan34

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ITEMS: BEEF,
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SLAUGHTER,
COWS,
HINDUISM,
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RELIGIONS,
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OPINIONS

But
Rajdeep
Sardesai
you are
wrong.
Again
By bwoyblunder

Posted on October
22, 2015

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Dear Rajdeep Sardesai

Before I come to your latest

blog, I want totalk about your
Facebook post from 14th
October 2015. One of the
issues you raised there was
your problem with labels.

TO TOP

You said: it is so easy to label

someone with a differing
opinion and that you resent
the use of labels. Yet, your
latest blog starts with the
words The pseudo-patriots.
Isnt this a label, on someone
who has a differing opinion? I,
on the other hand, have no
issues with labels and hence I
call you a two-faced
hypocrite.

Coming to todayspost, you

have chosen a convenient
straw-man of pitting Dadri
againstMoodbidri. Like a one-
on-one encounter where one
event has to win, and the
other must suffer an
ignominious defeat. In your
highly bi-polar world, only one
can exist and the other must
perish. Unfortunately, the
point was never that and it
never will be. What the
ordinary man on the street is
sayingrepeatedly (and why
you had to write
yourapologetic and defensive
blog) is: Yes Dadri was an
extremely heinous incident. We
all condemn it. Now can we hear
at least a part condemnation for
Moodbidri?. No-one is saying
Moodbidri is the counterpart
of Dadri in all chhatees gun, It
is you who has purposely
made the debate so, for your
own convenience.

TO TOP

While Dadri was in the media

spotlight right from day one,
Moodbidri was relegated to
regional media and in the
back-pages of national media.
It came into national medias
focus almost 10 days after the
event, that too after
consistent pressure from
social media. This is the
problem. The role of the
media is to report news in an
impartial manner. A business
news outlet would, for
example, report news about
an Ambani and also news
about a Wipro. The intensity
and the focus would be
proportionate to the
respective news but yes, they
would certainly report it. But
no, our secular mainstream
media nds zero value in
reporting all news
proportionately.

Instead self-appointed
thekedaars of secular and
liberal values likeyou, go on to
play judge, jury and
executioner all rolled into one.
Sitting in your plush of ces,
you like to decide which news
item was apolitical war and
which news item was
threatening the Idea of India.
Which is why you have given
elaborate justi cations for
ignoring Moodbidri and also
the context of the murder of

TO TOP

Prashant Poojary, as if to say,

since this is the context, the
murder is not important.

You start of by saying hes a

Bajrang Dal activist and
Bajrang Dal hasself-
admittedly used violence as a
weapon against minorities. You
now invoke Babu Bajrangi.
You are ready to sacri ce
Prashantat the altar of
secularism for the crimes of a
Babu Bajrangi in Gujarat (who
incidentally is already paying for
his crimes by serving a life term,
as prescribed by courts, not
some kangaroo court in a TV
studio). Why should Prashant
be judged via the prism of
Babu Bajrangi? Should I judge
you from the prism of a Tarun
Tejpal?

You then say Prashant is

accused of intimidation and
violence in the region while
ghting the beef ma a. FYI
Rajdeep, cow slaughter is
banned in Karnataka and even
bull slaughter is governed by
strict rules. It is entirely
possible that Prashant was
helping in upholding the law,
just as it is possible that he
was doing so, using illegal
means.
Importantly, when he was
hacked to death, he was an
accused. If he was eventually
proven guilty he would have

TO TOP

gotten his just desserts from

the court. He did not deserve
to bemurdered on the street
in any circumstance. To your
credit, you echoed similar
sentiments. Unfortunately,
there was a but:.

He didnt deserve to
die under any
circumstance but
there is a political
context to his death
as there would be in
Bengal when
Trinamool workers
clash with CPI M.

What does this but mean? Is

being killed undera political
context a lesser crime? Like
@bhak_sala remarked on
Twitter, it seems even a
convicted terrorist like Yakub
Memon got more sympathy
and mileage than an accused
(of much smaller crimes)
likePrashant.You wouldnt
want to hear this but in
other circumstances, yet you
casually throw this but here.
This inability to condemn
Prashants death without a
rider has exposed your
hypocrisy even more. Thanks,
the nation will remember this
but.
And in all this glossing over,
you chose very smartly to
ignore another murderin
Moodbidri. That of 60year

TO TOP

old Vaman Poojary, the key

eyewitness in Prashants
murder. And I know why your
moral compass forced you
to turn a blind secular eye to
this gruesome murder.
Because you couldnt paint
him with the same brush of
Babu Bajrangi, drawing a false
sense of complicity. There was
no context, no political war,
no scope for a but to butt in.
You knew you would lose the
game and hence you didnt
play it. And that also has
exposed you once again.

And now I come to why you

wrote your blog. Because you
were stung, ashamed and
exposed on social media and
to an extent on National
media, because Anupam Kher
took you on. It was solely
because of the relentless
pressure of social media that
your hand was forced and you
had to speak about Moodbidri
on your show. And you
couldnt tolerate that. You
couldnt tolerate the fact that
lakhs of ordinary people had
challenged you sitting in your
ivory tower and forced you
into talking about something
which you considered only a
political war.

I foresee more such blogs

TO TOP

from you though. You have

been thoroughly exposed on
social media multiple times.
You have lost your cool on
New York streets, getting into
st ghts with people who
had a differing opinion (At
least you did not label them
then). The Supreme Court has
chided your ilk (including you)
for allowing a liar like Sanjiv
Bhatt to play the media card
(To be honest I do not know
whether it was he who used
you or vice versa).

You had learnt to push such

public humiliation under the
carpet of abusive Bhakts by
playing the victim card every
single time. But now the stage
has moved on toyour home,
which is so aptly called the
idiot box. Celebrities are
now coming toyour show and
easily demolishingthe
carefully crafted faade of
decades. Social media users
are now pressurising you. You
are no longer in total control,
the control is slipping. And
you dont like it one bit.

The game is changing

Rajdeep. And like the earlier
game, which you did not play,
its better you sit out this one
too.

@bwoyblunder
TO TOP

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RELATED ITEMS: DADRI,

FEATURED, HINDUISM,
INTOLERANCE, KILLING,
MOODBIDRI, MURDER, POLITICS,
PROPAGANDA, RAJDEEP
SARDESAI

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 REPORTS

Ashok
TO TOP

Chakradhar
hits out at
award
returnees,
asks them
to see
through
TRP game
and politics
By OpIndia Staff
Posted on October 21, 2015

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Renowned Hindi poet and

author Ashok Chakradhar has
hit out at those returning
Sahitya Akademi awards to
protest against alleged rising
intolerance in the country. In a
Facebook post, especially
aimed at his colleague and one
of the award returnees
Munawwar Rana, Mr.
Chakradhar has questioned
the wisdom of those who are
taking this route to protest
against the claimed issues of
tolerance and free speech.

TO TOP

Ashok Chakradhar wonders

why Munawwar Rana, who
himself had declared that
those returning awards were
tired people who had given
up faith on their writing,
suddenly did the same a few
days later.

Ashok Chakradhar with Munawwar

Rana (photo credit: Facebook post by
Mr. Chakradhar)

Chakradhar suspects that

there was mix of political and
communal pressure on Rana,
which forced him to go back
on his own conviction and
return his Sahitya Akademi
award. In his post, Chakradhar
claims that minds of Muslims
have been poisoned into
believing that they are not
safe in India, and this aspect
might have forced Rana to
return the award.

Ashok Chakradhar reminds

Munawwar Rana what Rana
had replied when someone in
Pakistan had asked him if he, a
Muslim, felt safe in Hindu
majority India. Then Rana had
said that he had nothing to
fear because 70 crore Hindus

TO TOP

were ready to defend him.

Chakradhar asks Rana why he

has suddenly lost faith on
those 70 crore Hindus and
had become afraid of just 70
odd hate mongers.

Ashok Chakradhar then

makes a public appeal to
Munawwar Rana to not let
this discourse of fear become
the fear of one community. He
reminds everyone that it is the
duty of poets and writers to
make sure that there is peace
and brotherhood in the
country even if some people
were indulged in hate
mongering.

Mr. Chakradhar says that

poets and writers should
neither get overwhelmed by
any fear nor let anyone else
get overwhelmed by it. Fear
should be resisted, not
exaggerated, he says. Divisive
politics has to be fought with
pen, not by getting consumed
by it or by being paranoid, he
further says.

Chakradhar also indirectly

blames the media for
exaggerating events and
creating an atmosphere of
fear in the country. He says
that poets and writers should
make common people aware
of this game of TRP. Perhaps

TO TOP

that is the reason this

statement by Ashok
Chakradhar has not made
headlines yet in the
mainstream media.

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RANA, SAHITYA AKADEMI
AWARD, SENSATIONALISM, TRPS

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