Hindu God 1, Scientists 0
An Army of Monkeys? Puhleese!
Report on Hindu god Ram withdrawnHindu hardliners say the project will destroy what they say is a bridge built by Ram and his army of monkeys.
Scientists and archaeologists say the Ram Setu (Lord Ram's bridge) - or Adam's Bridge as it is sometimes called - is a natural formation of sand and stones.
In their report submitted to the court, the government and the Archaeological Survey of India questioned the belief, saying it was solely based on the Hindu mythological epic Ramayana.
They said there was no scientific evidence to prove that the events described in Ramayana ever took place or that the characters depicted in the epic were real.
Hindu activists say the bridge was built by Lord Ram's monkey army to travel to Sri Lanka and has religious significance.
Why does anyone want to destroy the bridge? To boost the economic and industrial development in the region of course!The canal project proposes to link the Palk Strait with the Gulf of Mannar between India and Sri Lanka by dredging a canal through the shallow sea.
This is expected to provide a continuous navigable sea route around the Indian peninsula.
Once complete, the canal will reduce the travel time for ships by hundreds of miles and is expected to boost the economic and industrial development of the region.
Some people will believe anything won't they?
It's amazing what people will fight over. A naturally occurring bridge, or a stretch of land between the Mediterranean sea and Jordan, or invitro fertilization, or stem cell research……
2 comments:
In fact, they were BLUE monkeys -- and I'm not sure why. But I do know the Ramayan tells that the Lord Ram made an alliance with the Monkey King in some war or another.
There is one thing about the Ramayan -- it is the only 'sacred-text' that was -- or could be -- made into a (delightfully cheesy) television serial. Unfortunately, when I first saw it on one of the tv shows that is aimed towards the NYC Indian community, it wasn't subtitled. But it is now, and apparently all the episodes, or many of them, are available on youTube. You might check them out, especially if you have young children -- say 5 to 8. They'll probably get a kick out of the story and the costumes.
As for the ability to fight over absurdities, much of the late 80s and 90s in India there was a running battle over a Mosque built at Ayodhya, the supposed 'birthplace' of Ram. In fact, it gave birth to the current form of Hindu Nationalism and even lead to the rise of the BJP, a political party that gave at least lip service to a (much milder) form of Nationalism and elected at least one Prime Minister. (To everyone's surprise, the PM, Vajpayee, turned out much better than his party until a scandal brought him down.)
Every twelve years the largest religious festival on earth takes place in India. At the last such festival the attendance was 70 million people, and a film was made about the festival titled, "Shortcut to Nirvana."
Post a Comment