CONVERSATIONS

‘God is not for sale’  08.09.2019

President of Shri Ram Chandra Mission and advocate of Heartfulness Meditation DAAJI KAMLESH PATEL tells PRITI AGRAWAL that we need to approach God with love and not greed

How can a seeker differentiate between a genuine spiritual master and someone who is faking it?

God is not for sale. People try to sell the name of God in various ways. There are people who ask money for God-realisation and that’s really funny.There is no ‘paid’ spirituality, it is only greed.There is no need to renounce anything for spirituality.Renouncing must happen naturally. Renunciation is basically non-attachment with your belongings.

One should approach God with love, not with greed to fulfil desires. It does not mean that we should not have any desire to do our duties, which is our dharma towards our family and work.You should perform all your duties in Divine consciousness and submit the result of karma to God.What we do and think repetitively, if we do not offer to God, then it forms an impression.Slowly it hardens and permeates our subconscious and settles down in our causal body, Atman.The same seed we carry with our atman, called samskara, we carry it forward life after life. Every day, we should offer a prayer to God, asking for forgiveness for our wrong deeds and thoughts.

We always talk about our actions and their results, but forget about our inactions. If you are not fully prepared for your exams, then your inaction will haunt you even in your dreams. So the inaction towards your studies troubles you.The consequences of inaction are more painful than performing action.These impressions form by inaction,because you deliberately did not do something.When we deliberately do or don’t do anything then we have different levels of samskara.When I do something casually, I can erase it through yogic practices, but when knowingly or deliberately I do something, it is not easily erased.

You focus a great deal on Heartfulness Meditation.

How does this help strengthen the mind?

Today’s young generation needs wise direction, and in order to inculcate any action, the heart has to be purified first to give correct signals to the mind. Sometimes you feel that this is the right thing to do, but you don’t have the courage to do it. Through Heartfulness Meditation, you receive wisdom to do the right thing,and also inner courage to follow your heart’s feelings.Your brain follows only heart signals. Once we correct the heart, everything gets corrected automatically.

Patanjali describes the fundamental requirements for a spiritual seeker — viveka,power to discriminate between right or wrong, between cause and effect.This viveka comes from the heart only. Sahaj Samadhi has four levels of consciousness — waking, dreaming, dreamless sleep and turiya state.The beauty of the turiya state is that you are in a sleep-like state but yet fully awake.You are relaxed,poised, at peace and you are fully aware of what is happening around you. In this state, the mind has merged with its source, the heart, although some thoughts and senses are still somewhat active.

Most spiritual masters talk about living in the moment — how can this be achieved?

When you always follow your heart, you will be in the now. If you practise the heartful way of meditation, you can be here in your heart and at the same moment, you can do so many things. For instance, a child learning to ride a bicycle, starts with a four-wheel cycle, and slowly tries to master the art of riding.Then, after sufficient practice, he will ride it with two wheels. Initially, you have to support him, but after some days of practise, he becomes perfect and starts taking the bicycle to school and market without any support and guidance.Although riding is not his main activity as he may sing and also observe things around while cycling. Now he is not conscious of his bicycle, now it has become his second nature. If a child can be trained, why not an adult be trained to paddle heart-consciousness, and do things with heartful feelings all the time? You can be busy with what you are doing and at the same time, connect with the inner Self.

Can you describe the state of enlightenment?

The state of being enlightened is when you become one with the Divine.When there is some discrimination between devotee and deity, between a water drop and the ocean, then there is a sense of separateness. When a raindrop falls into the ocean, is there a water drop left to speak about its nature and how it feels to become the ocean? Similarly, when a devotee merges in a deity, there is no devotee left to talk about it, but he is retained at some level to teach others.You feel the nectar or bliss in yourself all the time.

Follow Kamlesh Patel at

speakingtree.in

WHEN A RAINDROP FALLS INTO THE OCEAN, IS THERE A WATER DROP LEFT TO SPEAK ABOUT ITS NATURE AND HOW IT FEELS TO BECOME THE OCEAN? LIKEWISE, WHEN A DEVOTEE MERGES IN A DEITY, THERE IS NO DEVOTEE LEFT TO TALK ABOUT IT

3-year-old mobile addict avoids loo, wets bed

Priyangi.Agarwal@timesgroup.com

Bareilly:08.09.2019

Imagine a threeyear-old addicted to mobile phone being counselled. When a woman brought her three-year-old son to Mann Kaksh, counselling centre at Bareilly district hospital, she complained that her child was suffering from bed-wetting (enuresis) and needed help. Later, though, it turned out that he was not going to the loo because he didn’t want to leave the phone for a few minutes.

And the toddler, who spent around eight hours daily watching ‘Doraemon’ and ‘Motu Patlu’, is not alone. In an eye-opener for parents, Mann Kaksh has received 39 cases of children addicted to mobile phones in two months — most of them belonging to age group of 10 to 18 years, growing up in a virtual world of social media and video games.

Dr Ashish Kumar, psychiatrist at district hospital, told STOI, “In majority of the cases, it came to light that parents provide mobile to their children at an early age to keep the kids busy so that their own work is not affected. This later becomes a cause of addiction and bad behaviour among children.”

On the three-year-old boy’s counselling, Khush Ada, clinical psychologist at Mann Kaksh, said, “In the case of three-year-old addicted to phone, his mother would handover mobile to her child while performing household chores”.

Most parents who visit the counselling centre complain of study-related problems and headache among children. However, after going through case history, they learn that the root cause is mobile addiction.

“Children spend hours on their phones browsing social media sites and playing games. They start living in a virtual world and ignoring studies and sleep. If a phone is taken away from them, they become agitated,” added Ada.

CMO Dr Vineet Shukla said, “Parents should restrict use of phones among children. To keep kids engaged, parents should make them play in the open.”

Dr Kumar said, “Many young people end up spending hours on phones to cope up with anxiety and depression. The long hours on mobile disturb their sleep.”

Govt relaxes NEET PG courses cut-off

Sushmi.Dey@timesgroup.com

New Delhi:08.09.2019

In an attempt to address the large number of vacant seats in super speciality medical courses, the health ministry has approved relaxing of the eligibility cut-off for NEET PG for 2019-20.

With this, the qualifying marks for super speciality in cardiothoracic and vascular surgery, cardiology and pediatric surgery has been reduced to 20th percentile, whereas that for other PG courses it has been brought down to 40th percentile. At present, the cut-off is 50th percentile.

“The Board of Governors reviewed the proposal in terms of the vacant seats and the number of additional eligible candidates to be provided for filing the vacancies in Super Speciality Courses. In principle it was decided that the reduction in percentile should provide at least double the number of vacant seats,” a letter from BoG secretary general R K Vats to health ministry said.

For full report, www.toi.in

9 states, including TN, execute MV Act in toto
Some Others Mull Ways To Ease Penalties
Dipak.Dash@timesgroup.com

New Delhi:08.09.2019

At least nine states and Union territories including Karnataka, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Odisha, Bihar, Jharkhand and Haryana have implemented the amended Motor Vehicles Act in totality by notifying the compoundable offences while the rest are buying time working out ways to see if they can soften the blow somewhat for violators.

While the states seem to be in a fix over whether the local government can notify lower fines for the compoundable offences. There are 24 compoundable offences under the revised MV Act, which means in these cases the offender can pay the fine on the spot and doesn’t need to go to court to deposit it. But most of the states have not yet notified the designated officers who can compound the offences on the spot.

“We are waiting see what our neighbouring states are doing and how much compounding fee they are notifying for the offences. This will help us work on parity,” Madhya Pradesh transport commissioner Shailendra Srivastava told TOI while refuting reports of MP not implementing the amended Motor Vehicle Act.

Even the West Bengal government is watching the response to enforcement of the central law. “There is no mandatory requirement to issue a notification.

We will frame rules but there is a six-month-period at hand. The penalties in the Act mention the maximum amount.

The state has powers to frame rules that grade the penalty into sections with lower fines for initial offence,” a transport department official said. Interestingly, BJP-ruled Goa is unlikely to enforce the law till December.

Car driver fined for not wearing helmet

Anuja.Jaiswal@timesgroup.com

Agra:08.09.2019

If you are driving a car in Aligarh, don’t forget to wear a helmet. Surprised? The traffic police recently fined a city-based businessman ₹500 for this purpose.

Peeved by the challan, Piyush Varshney chose an innovative way to express his anger. He reached the traffic police office on Saturday, wearing a helmet inside his car. “I was unaware that I had been issued an e-challan for not wearing a helmet in a car. I came to know last night, when I saw a message sent by traffic police on my mobile phone,” he said.

Traffic police sent a message to the owner of Maruti SCross that a challan has been issued against vehicle number ‘UP 81 CE 3375’ for a traffic violation of not wearing a helmet and directed the driver to pay ₹500. Piyush told TOI that his car is registered in his father’s name, Suresh Chandra Gupta. Showing a copy of the challan, Piyush said, according to this, if the car owner doesn’t pay the fine, legal proceedings would be initiated against him.

Aligarh traffic SP Azizul Haque said he has received a complaint.

“Sometimes such errors occur while feeding numbers to issue e-challans,” he said. Haque added there are provisions in the software to correct mistakes and it can be cancelled too, if found incorrect. “We have corrected many such mistakes earlier too,” he claimed.

Expect good rain from next week & after Sept 15: Experts

TIMES NEWS NETWORK

Chennai:08.09.2019

The city may have experienced dry weather for the last two days, but going by the weatherman’s forecast, there could be light to moderate rain in some parts for the next two days.

According to the Regional Meteorological Centre, Chennai, “The sky condition is likely to be generally cloudy. Light to moderate rain is likely to occur in some areas during evening or night.”

Days are cloudy but also a lot warmer. On Saturday, temperature rose to 36.1°C in Nungamakkam and 36°C in Meenambakkam, about 1.6°C and 1.3°C above normal.

Experts said good spells of rain could be expected beginning next week and after September 15, when the southwest monsoon may reach the break period season and eventually begin withdrawing.

If the city’s water crisis eased in the last few weeks, it’s because of the effect of the southwest monsoon that brought convective rain in excess of 21% to the city between June 1 and September 7.

Weather blogger Pradeep John said the rain this season improved groundwater levels.

“With great rains in August, the groundwater has improved in the city except for north Chennai regions of Madhavaram and Thiru-vi-ka Nagar where the rains were less. With good spells of rains expected in city from 9th to 17th September, we can expect further improvement of groundwater.”

Inquiry committee submits report in revaluation scam
Ragu.Raman@timesgroup.com

Chennai 08.09.2019

An in-house inquiry panel formed by Anna University to examine the revaluation scam and procurement of marksheets has completed its inquiry and submitted reports to the university for further action, sources said. Directorate of Vigilance and Anti-Corruption (DVAC) had uncovered the revaluation scam wherein candidates’ marks were inflated and students with single digit marks got more than 75 marks after revaluation. Three faculty members, including former controller of examinations, G V Uma, were suspended.

Along with the DVAC’s inquiry, the university formed an internal inquiry panel. “The committee found evidence for 12 cases against the former controller of examinations,” a committee member told TOI.

In one case, using the 15 marks rule, a candidate who scored just seven got 75 marks after revaluation. “The first evaluation awarded seven marks and in revaluation he was awarded 45 marks. As the difference was more than 15 marks, another revaluation was needed. In the second revaluation, 75 marks were awarded,” the member added. The final score was 75 as the difference between the first and second revaluation was less than the difference between first evaluation and revaluation. That is, 45 and 75 are closer than 7 and 48. “The rule was misused,” the member said. Further, there was another case related to purchase of ₹62crore worth marksheets with added security features.