PANCHAAMRITAM 279
(pancha is five in
samskritam; amritam is nectar)
Amaavasya /
Kali Yugabda 5117 / Manmatha Aadi 29 (August 14, 2015)
ONE
No pilgrimage to the hill shrine of Lord Venkateswara at
Tirupati (Andhra Pradesh, Bharat), the world's richest Hindu temple is complete
without the laddu. The mouth-watering sweet is the most sought after prasad
after prayers to Lord Venkateswara. The Tirupati laddu, given away as 'prasad',
has entered its 300th year. Temple officials say the sacred offering was
introduced on August 2, 1715. According to the Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanam
(TTD), which manages the affairs of the hill shrine, about nine crore (90
million) laddus were given away to pilgrims in 2014.The normal price of a 300
gram laddu is Rs.25. As a privilege to pilgrims, two laddus are issued at a subsidized
rate of Rs.10 each.TTD had projected an income of Rs.190 crore from prasad sale.
Last year, about 18 lakh(1.8 million) laddus were sold in the first seven days
of Brahmotsavam, breaking all previous records. The authorities make elaborate
arrangements to ensure uninterrupted supply of laddus to the pilgrims. They
have the capacity to produce 3,00,000 laddus a day. Nearly 620 people,
including 270 cooks, work in the laddu and other prasad making units. The TTD
took up modernisation of the temple kitchen last year with the installation of
two escalator belts for laddus and boondi crates. The conveyor systems have the
capacity to transfer up to 8,00,000 laddus every day. The Office of the
Registrar of Patents, Trademarks and Geographical Indications awarded the
Geographical Indication (GI) status to the Tirupati laddu in 2014. (THE NEW
INDIAN EXPRESS, August 6, 2015).
TWO
For
a group of walkers in Anna University, Chennai, the morning of August 8 was no
less than a page out of a movie script. Around 6.30 a.m., they saw a woman and
a young girl asking people for directions. Curious, some of them approached the
duo to offer help. “R. Swathi, had scored 1,017 marks in her Plus Two. She came
with her mother Thangaponnu, a shepherd, from their hometown of Musiri in
Tiruchirapally (Tamilnadu, Bharat). “They were asked to come to Anna Arangam,
Tamil Nadu Agriculture University, Coimbatore, but they reached Anna University
Chennai by mistake,” said M. Saravanan, a former student of College of
Engineering, Guindy and a member of a walking group called Twalkers. Counselling
was to start at 8.30 a.m. in Coimbatore. Both mother and daughter had lost
hope. One of the walkers brought them breakfast, another went to book and print
out the flight tickets, while another was speaking to TNAU staff in Coimbatore.
Tickets were confirmed and Twalkers’ members decided to share the cost of Rs.
10,500. Some of the walkers, who are teaching at Anna University, spoke to TNAU
registrar C.R. Ananda Kumar, explained the problem and asked for extra time. “We
took off at 10.05 a.m., landed at 11.28 a.m. and in the next hour we had the
admission letter on our hands,” Swathi said. She will now pursue B.Tech. Biotechnology
at the Coimbatore campus. “It looks like a miracle now,” she says. The Twalkers
did not stop there. They called up Thangaponnu to confirm if they had secured
the admission. “It was very kind of them to do so. They came around like an
angel when we had lost hope,” Swathi said. After getting the seat and back in
their hometown in Musiri, the mother-daughter are now planning to visit Chennai
again. “We want to return the money they spent to buy our flight tickets. How
else can we say thank them?” Thangaponnu said. (Based on a report by Smt
Vipasha Sinha and Shri Karthik Madhavan
in THE HINDU, August 10, 2015).
THREE
When
the floods in Neel Dhara along the Ganga river downstream from Hardwar
destroyed 26 lakh trees in June 2013, it made a Kerala-based priest who lives
in the Himalayas decide to restoring the lost flora. Swami Samvidanandan, who
is originally from Kochi (Kerala, Bharat), moved to Rishikesh to study Sanskrit
in 1996. Samvidanandan started a campaign to plant and conserve trees. “The
uprooted trees included species such as eucalyptus, gulmohar, debdaru,
radhachura, banyan, peepal, rain, neem and several fruit-bearing trees such as
jackfruit, mango, banana, coconut and cashew. How many years will it take to
restore the lost forests? This thought made me venture into restoring the
woods,” says Samvidanandan. Through Tree Trip, he aims to plant saplings
specially grown in the nurseries of Green Vein, an NGO started by Samvidanandan
in 2013 in Uttarakhand. More than six lakh trees have been planted and are
maintained by the NGO. The Billion Trees project initiated by Green Vein plans
to take up extensive afforestation programmes throughout India. The project
will cover 30 states and one billion saplings. Under the project, nurseries
will be set up in each state that will provide saplings for afforestation
programmes. Active community participation is the key objective, in partnership
with the government. The programme will also try to create wildlife cover for
animals by ensuring sufficient forest space, provision of water facilities, and
fruit orchards for fauna like monkeys. (Based on a feature story by Smt Anupama
Mili in THE NEW INDIAN EXPRESS, July 25, 2015).
FOUR
At
village Chirdi in Udhampur district (Jammu-Kashmir, Bharat) two heavily-armed
terrorists believed to be from Pakistan, had ambushed a convoy of BSF personnel
and opened fire in which two constables and a militant were killed while
another terrorist was caught alive in a manner identical to the nabbing of
26/11 Mumbai attacker Ajmal Kasab. Recognising the brave act of two civilians,
who nabbed an armed Lashkar-e-Toiba terrorist Mohammad Naved alias Mohammad
Usman the Jammu & Kashmir Police recruited the duo on Tuesday. The J&K
police have issued an appointment order for Rakesh Sharma as constable and
recommended the government for relaxation of qualification bar in favour of
Vikramjeet for his appointment as follower in the police force. Furthermore, in
recognition of their rare display of courage, the state police have also
recommended to the state government names of Rakesh and Vikramjeet for the
prestigious Shaurya Chakra Award. Rakesh Kumar and Vikramjeet, along with three
other youth, were held hostage by Pakistani terrorist while he was fleeing from
the spot of terror attack. They fought with the terrorist and captured him with
the help of a few VDC members. The Deputy chief minister had earlier raised the
matter with Chief Minister Mufti Mohmmad Sayeed, who directed state Home Secretary
to ensure that the duo are awarded. (ZEE NEWS, August 11, 2015).
FIVE
Ambassador Idriss Raoua
Ouedraogo of Burkina Faso (a western African country) had finished his
three-year tenure in India and was to have left. But the noted yoga teacher was
asked to stay back in Delhi for the International Yoga Day (June 21, 2015),
which he did happily. In recognition of his expertise, Idriss, a Muslim who has
been practicing yoga for 27 long years, was invited as the chief guest at the
foundation day ceremony of the Yoga University of India on June 21. For Idriss,
the 35 asanas performed as part of the International Yoga Day yoga protocol at
Rajpath were "simple". "The yoga protocol was simple. I do all
the yoga exercises, I do pranayama (breathing exercises), I do mudras, all the
asanas," Idriss said, adding that he was a yoga teacher. "I teach
yoga to around 100 teachers," said the envoy, who has founded the Himalayan
Yoga Meditation Centre in Burkina Faso. Idriss said there were seven yoga
centres in the small landlocked nation of over 1.8 crore. He has written books
on yoga, is known as Yogi Idriss in his country. The Yoga Meditation Centre of
Burkina Faso now has a branch in neighbouring Benin too. Idriss was taught yoga
by Swami Veda Bharati and by B.K.S. Iyengar, one of the pioneers of modern
yoga. (Based on a report by Smt
Ranjana Narayan, IANS, June
21, 2015).
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