Posted on 02 March 2010
(Professor Narendra Nayak has been traveling into the rural areas of India, promoting rationalism on the ground for over 30 years. His rationalism tours include demonstrations and training sessions for young rationalists in schools and colleges across the country. He is the successor of Basava Premanand, the world famous skeptic and rationalist, in his role as the president of the Federation of Indian Rationalist Associations)
This is a brief account of some of my visits to the tribal areas of Madhya Pradesh. It is neither a chronicle of events, nor a comprehensive report of our work there. It is a write-up about some of the incidents that have taken place in the region, which I can recall. We have been working in this area for quite some time now.
Itarsi, a town in the state of Madhya Pradesh, is an important railway junction that connects the Northern, Southern, Eastern and Western parts of India. During my train journeys I would take what are known as a ‘break journeys’ in this town, while on my way to other places by rail. The prominent Indian rationalist, Premanand and I have been there together quite a few times. Read the full story
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Posted on 19 February 2010
Reaching out to the younger generation is our priority number one. All our efforts are to reach out to this generation. The older generations with their fixed mindsets they are either with us or against us. Some fence sitters may need a push or pull from us to come our way. But, most of the times it is preaching to the converted or nonconvertible! Read the full story
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Posted on 27 January 2010
Indian Skeptic is the magazine that reports on the Rationalism Movement in India. This movement is spearheaded by the Federation of Indian Rationalist Associations (FIRA), under its president Professor Narendra Nayak. The magazine was founded and for many years published by eminent rationalist and debunker Basava Premanand, along with with Prof Nayak. That original Indian Skeptic was retired after Premanand’s death. Recently, a new avatar of Indian Skeptic was born at the 2009 National level FIRA conference. The magazine still deals with issues concerning rationalists and skeptics of supernatural claims, particularly in India. The editor and publisher of the new Indian Skeptic magazine is T.V. Manoj. Read the full story
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Posted on 01 January 2010
(This article was first published in the Souvenir brought out commemorating the 7th National Conference of Federation of Indian Rationalist Associations held in Chennai on 26 & 27 December 2009)
What is Rationalism?
In Epistemology (the branch of philosophy studying the nature, sources and limits of knowledge) “Rationalism” is “the theory that reason rather than experience is the foundation of certainty in knowledge”. Those who accept rationalism in this epistemological sense assert that knowledge is gained a priori (prior to experience) and is often contrasted with Empiricism which is “the theory that all knowledge is based on experience derived from the senses”. Read the full story
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Posted on 07 December 2009
As our movement grows in terms of involvement of people as well as increase in the number of organisations, we face new challenges and changes in the older ones. If we are to survive and progress as a movement we have to face up to these and modify our strategies accordingly, failing which we shall be consigned to the dustbins of history. We as a movement have always risen up to these and I am sure that we will too in the future. But, what we have to remember is that we should have a very clear strategy and plan to face these and get over them. Read the full story
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Posted on 15 November 2009
These challenges were released to the Nepal press on the occasion of a press conference at Kathmandu on the 25th of October and the same are applicable to those in India too! Read the full story
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Posted on 11 November 2009
In my previous article I described Hinduism as Obsessive Compulsive Religion, and that its practices are rooted in the antiquated belief system of Brahmanism, the prevalent religion of India three thousand years ago. This explains why India has more gods, more mindless rituals, more bizarre superstitions and more fraudulent “holy men” than the rest of the world put together and why there is the pernicious caste system. The reality is that today more than ever before, highly educated people in India have fallen prey to the relics of Brahmanism such as superstitions, Yajnas, Poojas and Abhishekas dedicated to their personal gods. More than ever before, there is such frenzy in India to build huge ornate temples, some of which are covered with gold. More than ever before, today millions of Hindus are thronging to temples and donating their life-savings to them. And more than ever before religious frauds are thriving in India and abroad. Read the full story
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Posted on 14 October 2009
This article is a response to Pankaj Kulkarni’s article, Why Should Rationalists Have all the Fun?, in which he discusses monetizing the rationalism movement. Pankaj suggests that the non-profit model of promoting rationalism is inferior to profit-based initiatives in achieving progress in this area. I disagree. However, I wish to make it clear at the outset that I am not denying the value in harnessing the profit motive. I recognize that this motive for profit has been one of the fundamental driving forces behind innovation in technology and culture. I have immense respect for Pankaj’s thinking in this regard. However, I don’t think that the instinct for short-term financial gain should/will drive the future of the rationalist movement. I also disagree that the non-profit movement is not as effective in general as the for-profit industry. I present my reasons in this article. Read the full story
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Posted on 09 September 2009
This post is for making better use of people who are similar to me, for furthering the promotion of rational thinking. ‘X is similar to me’ is defined by the following qualities:
- X is a rational thinker.
- X would like to contribute to promotion of rational thinking (in cash, kind, time, effort etc.)
- Contributing towards promotion of rational thinking is way down in X’s list of priorities.
Let me provide an example – myself. I try to promote rational thinking in my circle of influence, in small ways – at work, at home, and among friends and relatives. For example, at work, I have championed the campaign to do away with forced religious holidays. As a result, now we don’t have compulsory holidays for Christmas, Diwali, Bakrid etc. Only the state holidays (Gandhi Jayanti, Independence day, Republic day and a few other secular holidays) are mandatory. The earlier compulsory holidays are now added to the employee’s vacation, so they can take them whenever they wish. Read the full story
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Posted on 09 July 2009
Update: This is the sixth part in the series. Here are links to all the parts of Narandra Nayak’s rationalism tour of India: Intro, Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4 and Part 5.
After having two training programs,organized by NCSTC at Uttarakasi and Hardwar (please see- A Nastik in Devabhoomi) I went to Bangalore from Delhi. There we had a training program under the aegis of the Bangalore Vicharvadi Sangha at the Ashoka Shishu Vihar, Bangalore. The participants in this series conducted from the 16th to 21st of April, numbered around 25. Their ages were from 14 to 70! We had students and retired senior specialist doctors as well as housewives and some affected by black magic too! There were the members of the Bangalore orgnization - A.S.Nataraj, Manoj, Subba Rao and others who were ready to provide services to the participants as well as take the training themselves. At the end it was the younger generation which stole ththe show, two young girls and the youngest boy put up a wonderful performance of what they had learned!
Since after this the greatest of the Indian shows - the general elections - had begun, and we were busy with our challenges to the astrologers, I had a break from the constant traveling. During this time we had the interesting encounters with the chelas of Ashwini which have been already reported in detail.
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