Ram Sethu & DMK Chief

Here is a nice article by Gurumurthy In The New Indian Express, Chennai:

“Sethu critics are anti-national says MK.” This is how a newspaper front-paged Dr M Karunanidhi’s address at a public meeting in Chennai held in defense of the Sethu Samudram Project. The Chief Minister said that “those opposing the Sethu Samudram Ship Canal Project in the name of God, religion, epic and mythology are anti-national,” added the report.

His speech was widely reported yesterday (May 17). A related news item titled “Top Hindu leaders plan Sethu stir” also appeared the same day. Who are the Hindu leaders? Not Ashok Singhal and Pravin Togadia.

They are Shankaracharyas of Puri, Dwaraka, Badrinath and Sringeri, four high seats of spirituality in India. These Hindu seers have decided on a nationwide agitation against the Sethu Samudram Project, said the print medium report. The Shankaracharyas will never come on the streets to agitate. What is it that drives these noble souls to cross their limits of tolerance?

It is the Sethu Samudram project _ in the cause of which Dr MK addressed the public on May 16 _ that agitates them. Sethu, a Sanskrit word, means ‘bridge’. The seers believe, with long standing tradition to support that belief, that the Sethu is the one built for Sri Rama to cross the ocean from the mainland that is now India to go to Sri Lanka. The Rama Sethu is a land link between India and Sri Lanka even now.

The NASA satellite has captured on its camera this link millions of years old. There is a lot of historical evidence to say that centuries ago people used to walk on Rama Sethu. This ancient bridge is in danger of being broken and dismantled if the Sethu Samudram Project is implemented.

The project is intended to create a shipping route along the sea coast of India from the Bay of Bengal to the Arabian Sea without having to go around Sri Lanka. The advocates of the project say this makes eminent commercial sense. There is political opposition to the project, from Jayalalithaa and AIADMK to Advani and BJP. The VHP and RSS have also strongly opposed the project. Their opposition may be viewed as mobilisational. But the objection of the seers is founded on faith which a secular state is bound to respect.

These seers are pained that after the project is implemented, as Swami Dayanada Saraswati has said, there will be only Samudram and no Sethu, even though the project is named Sethu Samudram project! Political opposition to the Sethu Samudram project may be dismissed as motivated. But can the government ignore the voice of men of high spiritual standing like the Shankaracharyas who have no political motive at all? Can the government dismiss the concerns of the Hindu Dharma Acharya Sabha representing almost the entire Hindu religious spectrum which has no political agenda at all?

The government is questioning the beliefs of these seers and millions of faithfuls about the Rama Sethu. Dr MK says that the opposition is in the name of God, religion, epic and mythology. This logic is dangerous. That he would never have said it had the issue concerned Muslims or Christians is besides the point. A secular state should never make its relation with faith of the majority or a minority so adversarial.

Again the opposition to the project is not just an issue of faith. Experts like S Badrinarayanan, Retd Director General of Geological Survey of India, and V Srinivasan, consultant geologist, have said that the Rama Sethu is not a natural formation but man made. There is trans-religious opposition to the project. Eminent, secular intellectuals like Justice VR Krishna Iyer and Justice KT Thomas have also voiced concern about the project from the geo-political and security view point.

Dr Tad Murthy of Canada, one of world’s most respected tsunami experts, has said that Kerala which was saved by the Rama Sethu from the killer tsunami of 2004, will be exposed to tsunamis in future. This is not an exhaustive list of those outside the religious and political spectrum who are against the project. Why even the Prime Minister’s Office yes, the Dr Manmohan Singh’s office has raised 16 queries which were answered by the Tuticorin Port Trust two days after yes after commencement of the project, so as to make it a fait accompli!

Would Dr MK say that these experts and intellectuals who are against the Sethu Samudram project are also anti-nationals? Does he also accuse that the Sankaracharyas of Puri, Dwaraka, Badrinath and Sringeri as anti-nationals? In fact those concerned at the destruction of the Rama Sethu do not oppose the Sethu Samudram Project itself. They only want the Sethu canal constructed with the ancient Sethu the bridge intact. It is possible, say experts. This is what the government needs to examine. And that is precisely what it is unwilling to do.

An eminent leader like Dr MK, who just celebrated 50 years of legislative service, should have avoided using such abusive language against men of high standing in science and religion. On the other hand, he should order a review of the project in the light of the reasoned opposition to it. A government that does not listen to wise counsel invariably faces mobs on the streets.

http://www.ambimama.com/2007/05/23/ram-hanuman-sethu-bridge-is-real-says-nasa-and-karunanidhi-does-not-listen-to-science-facts-or-seers/