Tattva

Sunil, one of the many victims of the Bhopal tragedy, sits back and reminesces.

Dec. 2, 1984 is coming to a close, routine checks are being done at the Union Carbide India Limited (UCIL) pesticide plant in the city of Bhopal, Madhya Pradesh.  The personnel are hardly qualified to carry out the checks, products of cost-cutting moves by the Union Carbide Corporation (UCC) based in the United States.  The plant uses the gas methyl-isocyanate (MIC) as part of the production process, this gas is highly toxic and reacts strongly to liquid water.  The MIC is supposed to be stored in drums, but it is instead stored in large tanks.  The tanks have alarms that warn of any leaking or other failures, these alarms had not worked since 1980.

There are several pipe leaks on the facility, something which is ignored by the higher up when it’s reported.  Several key safeguards are offline.  At about 10:00 PM, water enters one of these tanks.  The reaction is immediate, the poisonous chemicals begin to escape from the tanks and into the surrounding air.  The scrubbers, that were supposed to remove some of these harmful chemicals, have not been functioning for several months. Read the rest of this entry »

Part 2/2 of a first person account of the Epic 62-day struggle to get a land grant for the Lord Amar Nath (Shiva) Shrine located near Jammu city, India. Read Part 1 in the December 2009 edition.

As we reached a large square, and we began to think that we would arrive at the rally grounds shortly, we heard gunshots, and in seconds after that, our eyes began to burn and tears flowed profusely. We realized that we were being tear-gassed by the authorities in the hope of dissipating the peoples’ movement. Read the rest of this entry »

Vishwa Mangal Gou Gram Yatra was conceived by many sadhus, sants, and Hindu-minded organizations, including Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS). Some of the aims of the yatra include banning cow slaughter, declaring the cow as a national animal, and educating people about the usefulness of the cow. Read the rest of this entry »

Electricity does not touch the small/marginal and medium-sized landholder, as the cultivation is deprived of an assured irrigation source. Thus, those who are cultivating cash crops that require irrigated water have to perforce rely on the rainfall that is fickle at the best of times. A technology named ‘Anaerobic Digestion’ has immense potential for improving the quality of life in rural India. Read the rest of this entry »

Part 1/2 of a first person account of the Epic 62-day struggle to get a land grant for the Lord Amar Nath (Shiva) Shrine located near Jammu city, India.

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Refugee camps

The population in Bhutan mainly consists of two communities: the Drukpas and the Lhotshampas. Bhutanese rulers forced the Lhotshampas, minority ethnic Nepalis from Southern Bhutan, to adhere to unusual regulations in order to create a homogenous culture across the nation. The unfair treatment included compelling them to wear traditional clothing, stripping them of their citizenship, and forcing them into exile. Nepali language classes and Hindu schools were also terminated with the intention that this would put an end to their customs and beliefs. In 1985, conflict between these two communities resulted in a mass exodus of Lhotshampas to Nepal. These Bhutanese refugees in Nepal were considered “illegal immigrants” despite their Nepali origins. Until 1994, more than 110,000 Lhotshampas took refuge in seven United Nations-administered camps in Nepal living in very poor conditions. Initially, the refugee population aided in developing an infrastructure prioritizing education and the standard of living, however, as more and more refugees sought shelter in these camps, the situation gradually worsened. Donations from around the world decreased and the educated youth found jobs outside of the camps. The camps would not serve as a permanent solution to the growing number of Bhutanese refugees in Nepal. Read the rest of this entry »

Ekal Vidyalaya is an organization that initiates, supports, and runs non-formal one-teacher schools (popularly known as Ekal Vidyalayas) in tribal villages all over India. With the participation of numerous non-profit trusts and organizations, this program has now become the greatest non-governmental education movement in the country.

Mr. Mihir Vaidya, Vice President of Ekal Vidyala, North-west America, spoke to University of Washington students about the organization.

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Yet another year has passed by. Like every year, this one too was very happening. With the amount of news we read each day, we very often miss the key details. Here is a review of the most defining events of 2008. Of course, the selection was difficult and several events missed the final cut.

January

·         Jindal Becomes Governor of Louisiana (Jan. 15): Republican Bobby Jindal takes office as governor of Louisiana, becoming the first elected Indian-American governor of the United States. At age 36, he’s also the youngest governor in the nation.

·         Bush Proposes $145 Billion Stimulus Package (Jan. 18): Responding to a crisis in the housing market and rising oil prices, president says a combination of tax cuts for individuals and businesses will “provide a shot in the arm” to the economy. The Bush administration and the House hash out a $146 billion stimulus package Read the rest of this entry »

(Editor’s Note: All opinions expressed by authors in posts and comments are solely their own and do not reflect any policy or opinions of Tattva magazine, website, Hindu YUVA, Hindu Swayamsevak Sangh, or any of their officials or affiliates.)

The 2008 presidential election is considered one of the most important in US history. There are several reasons for this – (1) Barack Obama is the first African American to be nominated as the Presidential candidate representing the Democratic ticket,  (2) Hillary Clinton was the first woman to run for the office of the President, (3) The US economy is at its worst since the Great Depression, (4) The Republican Vice Presidential candidate for the first time is a woman and (5) the American citizens have long been estranged from the ongoing war against terror in Iraq and Afghanistan.

In this article, I aim to represent bipartisan views about the two presidential candidates and how mainstream America perceives them. Read the rest of this entry »

News about the turmoil in the financial system has occupied the headlines for the past few weeks. America is facing the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression and it is getting worse by the day. So far, as a result of a rapid succession of events, the Investment Banking business in the US has come to an end, the world’s largest Insurance company needed a bailout and several commercial banks have filed for Bankruptcy. The day I am writing this article (29th Sep), the Dow Jones Industrials Index had the biggest fall in its history and just a day earlier, Washington Mutual was the largest bank to fail in the nation’s history. When we are inundated with such news on a daily basis, we are distracted by the details and miss the big picture. In this article, I attempt to describe the financial crisis in simple terms and outline a plan to brace ourselves for the future. In an attempt to make the article understood by majority of the audience, I have abstracted out the details and minimized the use of finance jargon. I hope everyone, from novices to finance pundits find some useful information from what follows. Read the rest of this entry »