Sisters and Brothers of America,

It fills my heart with joy unspeakable to rise in response to the warm and cordial welcome which you have given us. I thank you in the name of the most ancient order of monks in the world; I thank you in the name of the mother of religions, and I thank you in the name of millions and millions of Hindu people of all classes and sects.

My thanks, also, to some of the speakers on this platform who, referring to the delegates from the Orient, have told you that these men from far-off nations may well claim the honor of bearing to different lands the idea of toleration. I am proud to belong to a religion which has taught the world both tolerance and universal acceptance. We believe not only in universal toleration, but we accept all religions as true. I am proud to belong to a nation which has sheltered the persecuted and the refugees of all religions and all nations of the earth. I am proud to tell you that we have gathered in our bosom the purest remnant of the Israelites, who came to Southern India and took refuge with us in the very year in which their holy temple was shattered to pieces by Roman tyranny. I am proud to belong to the religion which has sheltered and is still fostering the remnant of the grand Zoroastrian nation. I will quote to you, brethren, a few lines from a hymn which I remember to have repeated from my earliest boyhood, which is every day repeated by millions of human beings: “As the different streams having their sources in different paths which men take through different tendencies, various though they appear, crooked or straight, all lead to Thee.”

With violence in Jammu region refusing to die down, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh will be chairing an all-party meeting soon as the Centre on Monday rushed two top bureaucrats to the state to assess the situation.

The Centre decided to rope in all the parties to find a national consensus to the problem that emerged over the land allocation to Sri Amarnath Shrine Borad, a body overlooking the conduct of pilgrimage to the holy cave shrine.


The violence in Jammu region, which has started assuming a communal dimension, was reviewed at a high level meeting on Monday, which was chaired by Union Home Minister Shivraj Patil.

Top leaders of all political parties will be invited to the meeting, which is most likely to be held on August 6, official sources said.

In the meeting, the Centre will brief the leaders of the political parties about the steps being taken by the Centre and would seek their cooperation in maintaining communal harmony in the state as well as in the country.

Apart from the national political parties, all regional parties, including National Conference and People’s Democratic Party, will be invited to attend the meeting.

In the meantime, the Centre has rushed Union Home Secretary Madhukar Gupta and Defence Secretary Vijay Singh to violence-hit Jammu after the state government sought Centre’s intervention in smooth passage of goods-laden trucks through Punjab.

There were reports that some activists of Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) were stopping trucks, carrying essential supplies to the Kashmir valley, in Punjab, the sources said.

The Centre on Monday rushed Union Home Secretary Madhukar Gupta and Defence Secretary Vijay Singh to violence-hit Jammu, which continued to be tense over the Amarnath land row that claimed two more lives today.

During their visit, Gupta and Singh interacted with officials of the Jammu and Kashmir government and the Army and took on the spot assessment of the volatile situation in the state which is witnessing unrest over the land controversy, sources said.

The decision to send two top officials came after Prime Minister Manmohan Singh called Union Home Minister Shivraj Patil to his residence late on Sunday night, after his return from Colombo.

Patil also convened a meeting at his residence today during which the government reviewed the situation in the sensitive border state, currently under Governor’s rule.


The steps being taken by the local authorities also figured in the meeting that also decided to provide all assistant required by the state government.

The meeting was attended by Gupta, Special Secretary (Internal Security) M L Kumawat besides others.

The Home Minister had spoken to Leader of Opposition L K Advani and Bharatiya Janata Party leader Arun Jaitley, who was in Jammu, seeking the opposition party’s help in bringing peace into the region.

Congress president Sonia Gandhi too had spoken to BJP president Rajnath Singh seeking support of the opposition to calm down the aggravating situation in Jammu.


Meanwhile, two local television channels taken off air by authorities were today permitted to resume broadcast by the Jammu and Kashmr High Court, which also lifted the ban on SMS messages.

JK Channel and Take-i Channel were asked to stop broadcasting on the ground that their news reports were inciting violence in the curfew-bound areas.

A division bench of justices J P Singh and Sunil Hali stayed an order of Jammu district magistrate and permitted their broadcast till the next hearing on August 8.

The court also lifted a restriction placed by the administration banning SMS services. Its response followed a public interest litigation filed by the Bar Association of Jammu.

Source Rediff India

Kathmandu, Aug 4 (PTI) Indigenous ethnic organizations in Nepal today revived the anti-Hindi protest triggered by Vice President Parmananda Jha taking oath of office in Hindi, with normal life disrupted across 22 districts in the Terai plains bordering India.


Normal life across 22 districts in the southern Terai region was affected following a general strike call by the Tharuhat Struggle Committee, an association of Tharu community, in protest against newly elected vice president’s decision to take the oath of office in Hindi on July 23.

The Tharuhat Struggle Committee affiliated eight other organisations also expressed solidarity with the one-day strike. The protesters claimed that Jha had “disrespected” the interim constitution by the taking oath in foreign language.


Protesters blocked traffic and held demonstrations disrupting normal life across the Terai districts, including Morang, Sunsari, Siraha, Dang, Rupandehi and Rautahat, the Kantipur online said today.

The protest revived the language row that had calmed down following the Vice Presidents statement on July 29 apologising for unwittingly hurting the sentiments of non-Hindi speaking people.

Jha is a member of the ethnic Mahadhesi community that dominates the southern plains bordering India, and for whom Hindi is the most common language.

Nepal’s Supreme Court had issued notice to the Vice President and the Prime Minister’s office on a petition filed by Nepali lawyer Bal Krishna Neupane demanding the oath be invalidated. PTI

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