Monday Numbers

Numbers and words calculated to be of interest on a wet Monday evening...

50 millionaires: Roll Call publishes their annual list of the fifty richest members of Congress.

28 Democrats, 22 Republicans. Of the top ten wealthiest, 7 are Democrats, 3 are Republicans.

At over $188,000,000, John Kerry "... is the richest Member of Congress for the 13th time in the 15 years since his 1995 marriage to Teresa Heinz Kerry, widow of the late Sen. John Heinz (R-Pa.), the scion of the ketchup fortune."

60,000 words: 58 year-old John Basinger turned a regular workout routine on his treadmill into an opportunity to exercise his mind while exercising his body. After 3,000 hours spread out over nine years of running, he wound up memoring Milton's epic poem, Paradise Lost:

JB didn't use the mnemonic techniques favoured by memory champions, but neither, the researchers say, should we see his achievement as a 'demonstration of brute force, rote memorisation'. Rather it was clear that JB was 'deeply cognitively involved' in learning Milton's poem. JB explained:
'During the incessant repetition of Milton's words, I really began to listen to them, and every now and then as the whole poem began to take shape in my mind, an insight would come, an understanding, a delicious possibility. ... I think of the poem in various ways. As a cathedral I carry around in my mind, a place that I can enter and walk around at will. ... Whenever I finish a "Paradise Lost" performance I raise the poem and have it take a bow.'

23,000 religious prostitutes: The devadasi, an ancient Hindu tradition made illegal in India in 1988, serves as the subject of a documentary on one of the many forms of human trafficking still plaguing our long-suffering world:

Out of those she interviewed, nearly all cited economic need rather than religious tradition as the main reason behind their chosen path.
“Many devadasi are sold into the sex trade by their families,” she says. “The parents know that they’re not really giving their children to be religious servants, but they turn a blind eye.”
[...]
When the devadasi become older and can’t attract the same business, they end up trafficking, and taking girls from the small villages to big cities like Bangalore, where they set up brothels. Most of the girls chosen are illiterate agricultural workers, who go because they think they’ll make more money as devadasi than if they work on the land.”
Do any make their fortune? “A few can - a client might pay a few thousand pounds for a night with a virgin devadasi. But a lot of devadasi in their 30s or 40s are selling sex for about thirty or forty pence. The strange thing is that though they see themselves as superior to non-religious prostitutes - and even though they often dress to look different, with distinctive jewellery and clothes - I don’t think the clients see much difference.”

Thursday Theater

A reminder of sunnier and simpler times on this dismal Thursday morning, to serve as a backdrop for stories making entrances and exits in the spotlight of online news.

Charity: Provocative article on how the worlds of Christianity and socialism are built from different principles.

“Bertrand Russell, who, when asked why he did not give to charity, replied: ‘I’m afraid you’ve got it all wrong. We are Socialists. We don’t pretend to be Christians.’” Needless to say, that witty retort contains a whole theology and a philosophy that deserve to be spelled out. The logic of classic socialism makes Christianity not only superfluous—everyone has everything by rights—but impossible—no one has anything to give.

Russell is right, of course. In a socialist world, no charity can exist because there can be no need that is unfulfilled by the commonality’s duty. It is a world in which there can be no gratitude. I can thank someone for giving me what is really his. I cannot thank him for giving me what is by rights already mine. And if everything belongs to the community, how can I give it away? Or if I do give it away, how can it be anything but stealing from the commons on my part and receiving illicit booty on the receiver’s part?

Absurdity: Walter Williams latest column, "Fraud In Academia", is even more depressing than usual.

At Brown University, two-thirds of all letter grades given are A's. At Harvard, 50 percent of all grades were either A or A- (up from 22 percent in 1966); 91 percent of seniors graduated with honors. The Boston Globe called Harvard's grading practices "the laughing stock of the Ivy League." Eighty percent of the grades given at the University of Illinois are A's and B's. Fifty percent of students at Columbia University are on the Dean's list. At Stanford University, where F grades used to be banned, only 6 percent of student grades were as low as a C. ...

A recent survey of more than 30,000 first-year students revealed that nearly half spent more hours drinking than study. Another survey found that a third of students expected B's just for attending class, and 40 percent said they deserved a B for completing the assigned reading.

Redress: An update on the UK government's ingratitude towards its Gurkha veterans, which we've previously blogged about here and here. Actress Joanna Lumley, whose father fought alongside the Gurkhas in WWII, justifies my teenage crush on her in The New Avengers by steadfastly pushing the Gurkhas' residence rights in a private meeting with Prime Minister Gordon Brown.

"The meeting was extremely positive. He is wholly supportive of the Gurkha cause. He is going to come up with a new solution by the end of this month," Ms Lumley said.

The argument boils down to two sides. One: the Gurkhas should be allowed to live in the country they fought for. The other: We never promised you a rose garden.

Agony: Trial, or circus? Ajmal Amir Kasab, the Pakistani jihadist captured after the 26/11 murder rampage in Mumbai, India, that left 166 people dead last year, has been charged with waging war on India, along with over 80 other charges. His plea: not guilty (!). The start of the trial has been delayed due to Kasab's lawyer's insistence that the youthful terrorist should really be tried in juvenile court (!). This prompted the need to first establish through blood tests whether or not Ajmal Amir Kasab was a minor at the time of his terrorist acts. The verdict: he wasn't. Now Kasab is demanding perfume to sanitize the smell of his prison cell as well as the return of the blood money that was taken from him when he was captured. His "mental balance" also requires that he be allowed to go for an occasional stroll outside on nice days to relieve the stress of living in solitary confinement.

Tragedy: An 11-year old boy fell into the Potomac River while fishing, and was carried away by the strong current. His dad dove in to pull him to shore, but the river pulled the kid right out of his father's hands.

He looked back as the river carried him downstream and the distance between father and son grew. "I saw him two more times," he said. "Then he went under."

Nine long days later, the missing body has been found.

Sadly, there's more to the story. It was later discovered that Hau Nguyen, a fellow fisherman who happened to witness the event, dove in and risked his life to save the boy as well, but unlike the father, he was not able to escape the river. The body of the Good Samaritan was found Saturday, a tragedy that united both families in grief: [Hat Tip to Ann at Catholic Herald]

The incident has brought together two families -- one from Vietnam, one from Mexico. For much of last week, as police boats, helicopters and recovery dogs swept the river, groups of Hispanic construction workers, Vietnamese monks and the family and friends of both victims came to search the muddy banks and pray at the spot where the two had disappeared.

Nguyen's wife and Thanh Vo, her brother, said Nguyen was a strong swimmer who had grown up along a river in Vietnam and had jumped into the Chesapeake Bay to rescue a friend a few years ago. "He just loved the outdoors," Thanh Vo said. "If he saw someone needing help like that, he'd just jump in."
...Nguyen's widow said her husband was a "good man, a sweet man," who "you loved the first time you talked to him."

"When my son grows up, I want him to be like his dad," she said.

Godspeed to both families.

Major Horror! Hillary Under India's Thumb?

"Bill Clinton Releases Donor List," by Chuck Bennett for the New York Post, December 18 (thanks to James):

Former President Bill Clinton released a list of donors to his private foundation this morning after resisting making the names of his Saudi Arabian and other foreign benefactors public for years.

The moves comes as Sen. Hillary Clinton prepares to become Secretary of State under President-elect Barack Obama and highlights the potential conflicts of interest she may face when sits down to negotiate with heads of state of foreign countries.

For instance, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia itself donated between $10 million to $25 million to the William J. Clinton Foundation, the nonprofit that manages his presidential library in Arkansas as well as donate to charities around the world.

Foreign governments directly donated at least $41 million.

In addition, Saudi businessman Nasser Al-Rashid gave between $1 million to $5 million, as did the organizations Friends of Saudi Arabia and the Dubai Foundation.

Other Middle Eastern government donors include Kuwait, Qatar, Brunei and Oman - all of whom gave between $1 million to $5 million. Norway donated $5 to $10 million while Italy and Jamaica gave between $50,000 to $100,000.

Also on the list are influential Indian politicians and businessmen which critics say could hurt a Secretary of State Clinton's perception of being an impartial arbiter between India and Pakistan.

The list also underscores ties between the Clintons and India, a connection that could complicate diplomatic perceptions of whether Hillary Clinton can be a neutral broker between India and neighbor Pakistan in a region where President-elect Barack Obama will face an early test of his foreign policy leadership. [...]

http://www.jihadwatch.org/archives/023985.php

I know you too dear reader will find this whole thing unbelievable. The thought of influence from India is too incredible. What will Obama do? Only he can save us. Hillary, how could you?

"Hope Is Our Only Treasure Now"

The British newspaper The Telegraph called attention this week to the surgical revisionism that has been taking place under the initiative of clergy determined to strike a more "inclusive" note through the songs sung in their church services during the Christmas season.

No more "king", "man", "son", "virgin"... and "Lord". God Rest Ye, Merry Gentle-folk, let no old lyrics bring dismay:

Enduring favourites such as Hark the Herald Angels Sing and God Rest Ye Merry, Gentlemen are being altered by clergy to make them more "modern and inclusive".
But churchgoers say there is no need to change the popular carols and complain that the result is a "festive car crash" if not everyone is singing from the same hymn sheet. It comes just a day after a Church of England vicar banned his congregation from singing O Little Town of Bethlehem because he believed its words do not reflect the suffering endured by modern residents of Jesus's birthplace. Another clergyman has rewritten the Twelve Days of Christmas to include Aids victims, drug addicts and hoodies.

The report relies heavily on the anecdotes accumulating at the Ship Of Fools website, where readers from around the world have been filling a forum thread with their experiences singing the new and improved carols:

"At our church, the people who really refused to sing these Abominations Unto the Lord were the younger ones. We felt insulted by the insinuation that old-fashioned words were too hard for us to understand. The over 70s sang the 'real' words as well – from memory. Meanwhile the 40 to 50-year-olds in the middle bravely soldiered on from some warped sense of duty and would have preferred to be singing the old words, too."...

"Nowadays there is a printed bulletin with the traditional words... A magnificent victory for people power."

So far, however, there isn't much to read in the Telegraph about the other ongoing War on Christmas, the one being fought, not with words, but with knives guns and bombs, where more than memories are being consumed in the flames of Orissa, India. I can't bring myself to post the photo of the disfigured young girl who may have almost lost her face but never her faith in the wake of an inferno of anti-Christian hatred:

Namrata Nayak is a 10-year-old Dalit from the village of Sahi Panchayat, near Raikia (district of Kandhamal, Orissa). Three months ago, at the outbreak of violence against the Christians, the little girl's face was disfigured by a bomb thrown by Hindu extremists. After 45 days in the hospital, she has healed, and is happy.
...
The little girl was disfigured on August 26. When she arrived in the hospital of Berahampur, she had lesions on 40% of her body. Now she is practically healed. "For me," Namrita tells AsiaNews, "Christmas is a time to thank the Baby Jesus who saved me from the fire and saved my face, which was disfigured and wounded. I am one of the few fortunate ones who escaped death, although I had to spend a long time in the hospital. I feel very loved by the people of India, and by so many people in the world who have seen my photo and have prayed for me.

"In Kandhamal, there is so much pain and suffering, and I don't know how long the special forces will protect us. But Christmas is a time of gratitude. I am afraid that my people will still be attacked, but this is our life. If God has saved me, he can save other Christians too."
...
"Christmas is also a time of forgiveness," says Namrata, "and we forgive the Hindu radicals who attacked us, who burned our homes. They were out of their minds, they do not know the love of Jesus. For this reason, I now want to study so that when I am older I can tell everyone how much Jesus loves us. This is my future. The world has seen my face destroyed by the fire, now it must come to know my smile full of love and peace. I want to dedicate my life to spreading the Gospel."
...
On the night of August 26, the Hindu radicals entered the house, breaking down the door and destroying and burning everything. The family of Harihar Das and Namrata and her sisters hid in a little bathroom. Before they left, the Hindu fanatics left a bomb in a dresser. After the attackers had gone, the occupants came out of the house, but little Namrata was curious and stayed behind to look at the damage. The bomb exploded, burning her face, while some of the shrapnel wounded her face, hands, and back.
...

Namrata's mother shows where her daughter seems to get her strength of character:

"My hope," she tells AsiaNews, "is that we can still have a future in Raikia. We possess nothing, and we could still leave, but in Sahi Panchayat we have some relatives, and our neighbors. If we leave, we will be wanderers.

"Christmas brings hope, hope is our only treasure now: we were poor, and now even the little we had has been destroyed. But Christmas means that Christ is born, and every birth means a new life. Jesus came down from heaven to save us from this misery, from the pain, from abandonment, from our homelessness. His power fills us with hope, love, and forgiveness."

With apologies to the sensitive ears of politically correct British clerics, I think we need a strong dose of the original lyrics to these old Carols this Christmas more than ever:

Hark the herald angels sing
"Glory to the newborn King!
Peace on earth and mercy mild
God and sinners reconciled"
Joyful, all ye nations rise
Join the triumph of the skies
With the angelic host proclaim:
"Christ is born in Bethlehem"
Hark! The herald angels sing
"Glory to the newborn King!"

Christ by highest heav'n adored
Christ the everlasting Lord!
Late in time behold Him come
Offspring of a Virgin's womb
Veiled in flesh the Godhead see
Hail the incarnate Deity
Pleased as man with man to dwell
Jesus, our Emmanuel
Hark! The herald angels sing
"Glory to the newborn King!"

Hail the heav'n-born Prince of Peace!
Hail the Son of Righteousness!
Light and life to all He brings
Ris'n with healing in His wings
Mild He lays His glory by
Born that man no more may die
Born to raise the sons of earth
Born to give them second birth
Hark! The herald angels sing
"Glory to the newborn King!"

[Written by Charles Wesley, brother of John Wesley, founder of the Methodist church, in 1739.]

Terror Attacks In India, Again

My God, here we go again: there's been yet another large-scale terrorist attack in India. Mumbai was hit by seven simultaneous (and particularly cold-blooded) attacks; this time the butcher's bill starts at 80 dead and 250 injured. The tactics used are quite different from the recent terror bombings in Delhi, Assam, and the numerous other attacks that have taken place in India over the last year or so, maybe due to the wave of arrests of potential suspects that took place in the aftermath of those previous serial bombings. No more sneaking around planting remote control bombs in crowded markets or parks, this time the terrorists are simply showing up in person and shooting at people:

Armed with AK-47 rifles and grenades, a couple of terrorists entered the passenger hall of CST [Chhatrapathi Shivaji Terminus railway station] and opened fire and threw grenades, Mumbai General Railway Police Commissioner A K Sharma said.

Three persons were killed in a bomb explosion in a taxi on Mazegaon dockyard road and an equal number were gunned down at Taj Hotel.
...

The lobby of the Oberoi hotel was on fire and the hotel evacuated, eyewitnesses said.
...
Commandoes were rushed to the CST which wore a deserted look and train services suspended. The NSG commandos were on standby and national disaster response force unit is being rushed to Mumbai, the Ministry of Home Affairs officials said.

Some people were injured in the firing in Oberoi hotel, and taken to a nearby hospital in police vans and ambulance. Firing was also reported in Taj hotel.

Firing was reported at Colaba, Nariman Point and near Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminal, formerly Victoria Terminus and it was still continuing.
...

Godspeed to the families in India forced to endure carnage and murderous deviancy on such a scale that it becomes a weekly occurance. A friend of mine over there told me in a recent email that she has given up reading the daily newspaper, it had become too traumatizing to learn of such massacres at such a frequency. Godspeed especially to her, to find the courage to continue to live in hope...

India Assam Bombings: Whose Blood Is On The Street

"I looked back, ran to the shop and found my brother lying in a pool of blood. He was dead among seven others."

The aftermath of the October 30 serial bombings in the north-eastern Indian state of Assam brings with it stories from survivors, victims and families of those blown to bits by islamist terrorists. Of the thirteen explosions, one took the life of 32-year old Ajay Das on the eve of finalizing his wedding date:

His grieving family said Titon, as Ajay was fondly called, had dropped out of school at a tender age to help his father and elder brother in their family business in Kokrajhar town. After years of hard work, the Das family had just begun to lead a comfortable life and was planning to marry off Titon. But Thursday's terror attack dashed all their hopes.

Parents of younger children were panic-stricken when their frantic calls to elementary schools went unanswered; were their children safe? Had schools been targeted? Would they be? After the first bomb went off in Ganeshguri at 11:15 am, no parent could know how many more would explode before school was set to send students home later in the afternoon.

"With cellphone networks jammed, I was getting desperate with every passing minute," said Sonali Burman, mother of a kindergarten student. "I called up the school, but the lines were clogged."

...
Sudhin Paul, a businessman, was terror struck when he learnt that an explosion had rocked Panbazaar area — his daughter studies in a school there.
"My wife was the first to react. She took my scooter and rushed to the school," he said. School and college authorities were desperate to keep campuses free from the tension and chaos outside.

As police and other emergency responders arrived to offer assistance to the survivors of the 13 bombs that went off over a 45-minute period, they faced a crowd that unleashed all their pent up frustrations with their government's inability to keep them safe:

[A]ngry protesters hurled bricks and stones at policemen, screaming against the administration's security failure. "We want justice. The Tarun Gogoi government has failed to protect us," the crowd shouted every time they rushed in to confront the police.

"Why not? We have lost our near and dear ones," a young engineering student from Lichubagan area said. The blast had killed six persons from his locality.
Police fired tear gas and rubber bullets to disperse the mobs. The smell of the gas, however, was not strong enough to cover the stench of burnt flesh that lingered in the area. Pieces of human flesh covered with flies still lay littered in the area.

As the days go on we'll learn more tragic details about the men and women, the children and the aged, whose lives were cut short from timed bombs hidden in automobiles, motorcycles, bikes and rickshaws, bombs hidden by monsters masquerading as civilized human beings.

As yet, circumstances make it difficult for the media to report such biographical details to any great degree:

Some victims were charred to death in their vehicles, and clouds of black smoke towered over Guwahati as the streets filled with the screams of the injured and the dying.

Many of the dead were literally torn apart and vehicles in the target zone were turned to charred heaps of metal.

More Bombings In India; 77 Dead

More carnage in India, as several bombs went off Thursday across the north-eastern Indian state of Assam, killing 66 people outright, with another 11 dying from their wounds during the night. Indian media place the total number of wounded at a ghastly 450.

13 explosions rocked the districts of Guwahati, Kokrajhar, Bongaigaon and Barpeta. Six bombs were set off in Guwahati alone, causing so many casualties that hospital driveways "turned slushy with blood as a stream of victims were brought in."

The descriptions of the aftermath of the bombings sound like reports from a battlefield... which, in a sense, they are:

Black smoke billowed from the deputy commissioner's office housing the district courts, which bore the brunt of the attacks in Guwahati, as vehicles, including a number of cars, turned into mangled heaps of metal. ...

"Bodies of the many of the dead were charred beyond recognition. The blast sites were stewn with severed limbs and blood of the victims.

India has seen many terrorist bombings this year alone (64 blasts in the last six months), but this week's explosions were followed by an ominous response from the citizens of the cities under attack: they vented their frustration in a riot:

People poured into the streets of Guwahati immediately after the blasts inspite of the curfew, and attacked policemen shouting slogans against the administration for ‘‘failing to protect the city’’. Several fire engines and police vehicles were burned. Police, who were themselves left shell-shocked by the blasts, struggled to rein in the mobs. They had to fire in the air at some places to disperse the crowds.

A television station received a message from a group calling itself the "Islamic Security Force-Indian Mujahideen (ISF-IM)" on Friday, bragging about their successful slaughter, while warning of future slaughters to come:

"We, ISF-IM, take the responsibility of yesterday blast. We warn all of Assam and India for situation like this in future. We thank all our holy members and partners. AAamin" .

Godspeed to the grieving families of India... when will these massacres end??

For reports on some of the other recent attacks in India, please read our previous posts on India's war on terror:

The early September bombings in Delhi, and the email from hell taking responsibility for the destruction, as well as the price paid in blood for the butcher's bill.

Then there were the bombings in late September in Delhi, smaller in scale but no less horrible.

9-Year Old Terror Bombing Victim Killed For His Kindness

Two deaths and over twenty wounded: the latest butcher's bill from today's bomb attack in India. Once again, India's capital city of Delhi was targeted for terror, this time on a much smaller scale than the last horrific attack two weeks ago.

The bomb exploded at a crowded flower market at Mehrauli, south Delhi, early Saturday afternoon:

Mukesh Hans, owner of a paint and hardware shop that was right next to where the blast happened, was sitting in his shop at 2 pm. "There was a deafening sound and everything became dark. I came out and saw complete chaos with injured people on the street and blood everywhere. There were at least 12 persons being sent to the hospital by the local people. As I stepped out I also saw the body of a girl who was in her schooldress,'' he said.

For one family, the bombing brought about the epitome of terror; imagine their hopeless despair upon hearing that their child could have lived if only he had been raised to be as heartless as the demons whose bomb took his life:

According to eyewitnesses, the electronic goods market was packed with shoppers when a black Pulsar motorbike went through the narrow lane intent on its deadly business. It had two helmeted riders, who dropped the polythene bag with its deadly payload in the middle of the road, in front of a shop, Anisha Electronics.

Out on an errand, the nine-year-old boy, Santosh, thought the men had unknowingly dropped the bag. In a heartbreaking act of kindness to strangers, Santosh rushed to pick it up, running after them as he shouted for them to stop. It was then that white smoke began to pour out of the bag. The little boy dropped it, but too late to save his own life.

The young child was in the market in the first place because he was running an errand for his older brother:

... "My brother's head exploded with the bomb. The poor child didn't even have a chance because the explosion took place right next to him." Bumbum, a rickshaw-puller by day, runs an omelette-and-tea stall at night. He had sent Santosh to Sarai market to pick up a crate of eggs for the evening's business. "Before he left, we were joking about how many eggs he could carry, and within minutes, we heard he had died," said a sobbing Bumbum.
...
Rekha Devi, his grandmother could not even speak — she just howled and beat her chest. "My poor child, he did not deserve to die like this. May God take care of his soul."

How does a family get over an event such as this? I guess you never really "get over it" at all, you just commit to renewing the love you have for those who remain, and one day enough new affection can arrive to raise you out of the living death that is a life lived without hope.

Easier said than done... which is why it pays to strive to find each and any example of sacrificial love, however small, that falls within your orbit. Sometimes, the reasons to renew our hope can be found in the very shadow of the evil that caused our despair in the first place, such as the courageous passersby who helped the blast victims:

Standing in blood-stained clothes, some of them even waited till after the police reached to see if their assistance was still required and then, just quietly walked away.

... [While the rest of the people ran away from the spot fearing the possibility of another blast, having a fresh memory of the recent series in Karol Bagh and Connaught Place, [Tilak Raj and Sanjay Sherawat] ran towards the centre of all action and helped the local shopkeepers in moving the bodies.
...
"The scene was horrific. Initially, we thought around three to four dead bodies were lying around, but the police is saying only one child died. There was blood all around and we got plenty on our clothes as we carried the injured to the vehicles. The local shopkeepers acted immediately and got their cars ready. We then drove the injured to the hospital,'' said Sherawat.

Godspeed to the good people of India in their time of grief.

"My Hands Are Trembling..."

The violence against Christians in the Indian state of Orissa grows in intensity; now the mobs have taken to attacking the police who try to shield Christians from further assault, burning police headquarters inbetween their torching of churches.


The police and state authorities seem completely incapable of maintaining any kind of order in that region. Yet, lawlessness is not an isolated occurence in India these days.


This week Noida [the "New Okhla Industrial Development Area"] saw a shocking story of absolute anarchy, right in the shadow of the nation's capital city of Delhi: an overwhelmed police force did little to contain an enraged mob of 200 former factory workers as they launched an attack on the plant that had employed them:

According to Graziano employees, the sacked workers rushed into the premises around 12:20 pm when the gates were opened to let in a car. "They smashed each one of the approximately 20 cars inside the compound. Hearing the commotion, our CEO, Lalit Kishore Chaudhary, came out to the building entrance. He was abused while trying to reason with the protesters. And, when he objected, they beat him to death with a hammer," said production supervisor, Udaivir.

... The violence left at least 50 executives and workers of the unit injured. Of the 44 staffers taken to hospital, 34 of them were yet to be discharged until Monday night. Of these, 10 executives of the company remained in the intensive care unit.
...
The unit also sustained heavy damage in the vandalism that followed. Five Italian technical consultants, who were visiting the unit, barely managed to escape injuries. Some of them had to plead with the raiders to spare them.
...
Shockingly, despite several Graziano officials phoning up a number of Noida police officials about the violence, only two police constables arrived at the spot after an hour. And, even at 3:30 pm, as the unit's security personnel and some other employees shut themselves up in the unit, only about half a dozen Provincial Armed Constabulary personnel were posted outside. And, there was no officer with them. Which meant that, in case of an emergency, there was nobody there to order any action. And, this was the state of affairs with the district reserve police lines being located half a kilometre away.
...
The bloodstained hammer, which was allegedly used to kill Chaudhary, was found lying in the premises, and had surprisingly not been seized by the police as evidence.
...
In the company guesthouse, visiting Italian technical consultant, Forettii Gatii, told TOI , "I just locked my room's door from inside. And I prayed they would not break in. See, my hands are trembling even three hours later."

Echoes From Delhi Terror Bombings

Aftershocks continue to last week's terror bombings in India's capital city Delhi. The five bombs took the lives of almost 30 individuals, some of whose stories we blogged about here. The grisly handiwork of the savages belonging to the Indian Mujahedeen have left almost a hundred others injured, as the islamists' devil's brew of ammonium nitrate, gun powder, ball bearings and nails has shattered lives irrespective of economic, religious or ethnic backgrounds.

This week the Indian press has been introducing its readers to some of the tragic stories of the targeted citizens of Delhi. "For some survivors of Saturday's blasts, perhaps the last sound they clearly heard was that of the bomb going off":

Take 27-year-old Avdesh Sahaney, a parking attendant on Barakhamba Road, who has lost most of the hearing in his left ear. Sahaney's eardrum was perforated as a result of the blasts.

"I had gone to drink water at one of the pavement stalls when the blast occurred. I remember a loud sound, after which I lost consciousness. I came back to my senses in the hospital," he says.

Doctors treating Sahaney are keeping him under observation, hoping his ear heals on its own. "If not, we will have to operate," said Dr Sidhu, head of ENT and additional MS at RML hospital. "This is a common condition in most blast cases. The velocity with which the air hits the eardrum can cause serious - sometimes irreversible - damage," he adds.

Another victim, 26-year-old Renu also suffered blast-induced hearing loss but the doctors are optimistic about her recovery. Hearing loss is one of the most common ailments to afflict blast victims. As the condition of patients at RML stabilizes, the ENT department screens them in the audio room for possible hearing disorders, informs Dr Sidhu.

The Indian government has pledged compensation up to 500,000 rupees [$21,000 Cdn dollars..?] for the terror attack's many victims, but the likelyhood of people actually getting the money is another story:

Most people would treat it as another mundane affair. Yet, it's a simple bank account which has emerged as a major stumbling block for the hapless residents of Gali number 42 in Beadonpura.

They have already lost 11 people in Saturday's bomb blasts and as the realisation seeps in that life must go on, their efforts to get the Rs 5 lakh compensation money, which was announced within hours of the blasts, are hit by the lack of a bank account. ...
There is more to the problem. Even to open a new bank account these people — most of them daily wage earners — would need to furnish a number of documents like residence proof etc, which again nearly all of them do not possess.
...
The handful of families who have some valid documents have been handed account payee checks. Says Ram Singh, a relative of Ganga Prasad who died, "I have no clue what to do with this piece of paper now. We do not have a bank account. Can you help us encash this?"

Unfortunately, Delhi residents are still waiting for the compensation they were promised by Indian politicians from the last terror bombing that struck Delhi back on August 29, 2005; the two explosions that day murdered 62 people and injured a further 210 others. Some of the victims of the 2005 islamist bombs were witnesses to the second attack last weekend:

Reliving the horror of 2005 Diwali blasts and the subsequent tale of government insensitivity to his pains, Vinod Poddar, who lost his right leg, said: "A compensation of Rs 1 lakh doesn't come anywhere near what I need. Those who survive need more assistance as we have to live with the disability forever." He had tears in his eyes when he saw pictures of victims being taken to hospitals on Saturday. Poddar's daughter Diksha, who is in Class IX, was also seriously injured and has to undergo more surgery. ...

Many 29/10 victims say they are yet to fully come to terms with the tragedy. "I still feel scared even sitting at home. I couldn't sleep for days after returning from Safdarjung hospital. Blast victims need counselling," says George Mathew, a businessman.

The preening politicians are being criticized for using the slaughter as a backdrop for photo ops:

...[A]ngry residents blocked traffic on the road. Said an angry Banwari Devi: "It's been for three days that we have been waiting for some relief from the government. Yet, the administration has no qualms to make profits from the same parking lot that on Saturday altered our lives."

Added Kanhaiya, another protester: "We have complained innumerable times about the lack of security in the market and unaccounted vehicles being parked here. Yet, even today, no extra security has been put in place."

Meanwhile, the victims refused to entertain the stream of political leaders who visited the street. "They are here only to play divisive politics. They are not really concerned about our well-being. If they really cared, they would have brought food and other relief," said Prakash, Simran's maternal uncle.
...

At the local level, Delhi law enforcement has had to wrestle with deciding on the lesser of evils in a city that produces over 5,000 tons of garbage a day:

Delhi police have solved the problem of how to prevent terror attacks. They have turned all the public garbage bins upside down and tied them together in pairs so that they are completely unusable, even by terrorists.

Which means Delhi’s streets are now a stinking mess, with polythene bags, stale food, wrappers and plastic bottles scattered all across them.

... All the bins had been overturned today at Central Park in Connaught Place and Barakhamba Road, their rotting contents emptied just under them. Fresh waste lay strewn all around, with tourists busy clicking the bins and garbage on their cellphone cameras.

“I went to the Janpath market yesterday. The twin garbage bins in the middle of the market have been turned upside down and the litter is scattered everywhere. The stench is terrible,” student Sanjay Singh said. ...

Frustration with governmental inefficiency in combating the islamist terror threat is mounting. The state of affairs is positively scandalous:

Security measures have failed to deliver. It’s shocking that most closed-circuit cameras installed in sensitive areas do not work. Intelligence gathering is in a mess. Clearly, a focused and coordinated approach to matters of security is missing.

And it sounds like things will have to get much worse before they begin to get better..:

Political scientist Imtiaz Ahmed also feels that while the Indian state is pretty strong, its willingness to take effective measures against terrorism has been weak. "The state's overall attitude towards incidents such as the Saturday Delhi bomb blasts is that it does not seriously affect the country's integrity or security. True, it jeopardizes public security. But then the outlook is: we can live with it. In fact, rather than act against it, the state is simply hoping that terrorism will subside. Management of terrorism is not a very high priority in the state's scheme of things."

Meanwhile life goes on, and from the echoes of suffering an occasional cry of joy rings out with rare good news:

On Friday, she knew her husband had work in Karol Bagh and would not be back till Saturday evening. The blasts followed, and then no word from Mukesh Kumar.

A frantic Rani went from hospital to hospital, searching for her husband and fearing the worst.

What she did not know was that 36-year-old Mukesh, after completing his work, decided to stay back at a friend's place so that he could shop for his daughter's birthday. But then changed plans and went to a relative's house in Nangloi.

Rani's misery ended on Monday night, when Mukesh called to say he was alive and well.

"I had gone to Karol Bagh and from there I left for Nangloi on Saturday morning and stayed over at a relative's house as I wasn't well. My phone fell on the road and stopped working..."

Rani, however, was unapologetic. "He saw his picture in the news channels and papers and got angry with me. But I am just happy that he came back," she said.

Putting Faces On Numbers In Delhi Bombings

The numbers vary from source to source; as the calendar moves along the numbers will change ever more. But some things will not change: the five bombs (out of the nine planted) that tore through busy Delhi markets and parks during weekend religious festivals made no differentiation between men and women, young and old, rich and poor. For many families, loved ones went out to fulfill some mundane chore, or a lark at the park, and then never came home.

It's easy to just think in terms of numbers; how many attacks, how many casualties from the attacks. But these numbers represent lives. These people have names, faces, and stories.

Here are some of the stories of those in the wrong place at the wrong time, suffering at the hands of people who are now said to be putting Mumbai in the crosshairs of their next homicidal attack.
It’s likely that 25-year old Kamlesh will never forget this day of death. The terror bombings claimed no less than 10 members of her family: her husband Ashok, 30, his brothers Harichand, 35, Archant 50, Ganga Kishen, 40, their wives Saroj, 30, Rama, 40, and children Kusum, 2 and Raju, 4.

Sometimes it's the lack of any news at all that causes the most despair. This seems to be the case for the wife and brother of 25-year old Raju:

[He] was standing outside his house in Karol Bagh when the bomb went off. Since then, no one has seen him.
His grief-stricken wife Yashoda has now been hospitalised, Raju's brother Shyam told IANS.
"The police say they have no information about my brother and that we ourselves should visit every hospital to check out."

One young man was blown to bits for having decided to do a favor for his beloved mother:

Subroto Mondal's wish to buy a new mobile phone for his mother proved fatal for the young man, as he perished in the blast at New Delhi's Gaffar Market minutes after he bought it Saturday.
...
"When he came here the last time, his mother told him she had lost her mobile. Then he promised her that he will get her a new set. Yesterday (Saturday) he bought the new instrument to fulfil his promise. But god is indeed cruel," said his brother-in-law Haren Hazra.

Gloom descended at Subroto's residence and the village Sunday as the news of his death came like a bolt from the blue.

"It never crossed our minds that he could be among the victims. Because he did not live in that area. So, when one of his cousins called up from Delhi Sunday morning to give the news we found it difficult to believe,' Hazra said, as Subroto's parents looked inconsolable.

"He was a very good boy, We all loved him," said a neighbour, wiping her tears.

I can't imagine the guilt that the mother must now feel... nor can I easily put myself in the place of young Shishir Jain:

It was a birthday party that 21-year-old Shishir Jain will never forget. While he was busy clicking photographs of friends during his classmate's birthday celebrations at the Central Park here Saturday evening, a bomb explosion left him critically injured.

"We were having fun at the Central Park and Shishir asked for a final group photo before we leave for the hostel. As he moved back to focus the camera, a blast took place leaving him injured," Shishir's friend Prashant told IANS.

Shishir, a mechanical engineering student at the Jamia Millia Islamia, suffered injuries as a splinter from an exploding bomb pierced his spinal cord. Some of his friends too received minor injuries.

How haunted will his life be for him, if he ever gets out of the hospital?

Finally, the tragic news awaiting an expectant mother, who now has lost the father of her second child:

Till Saturday, Balbir Singh had the ideal family: two sons, a daughter-in-law expecting her second child in a week's time, a four-year-old grandchild and a younger son who had got married just six months ago. On Sunday though, Singh looked like a shell as he waited to claim the body of his elder son Tejinder at the LNJP mortuary.

Standing alone in a corner, Singh seemed to be divorced from the rest of relatives waiting to claim Tejinder's body as the police asked for details. Said Sunny, Singh's nephew, "My bhabhi is expected to deliver next week. We haven't told her about Tejinder yet. How can we, when even uncle is still to get over the shock?"...

For 36-year-old Tejinder, one of the first victims of the Ghaffar Market blast, the day had started routinely. "My cousin works in an electronics shop and was on the way to another shop with his friend when the bombs exploded. He and his friend, Manmeet, were both taken to Jeevan Mala hospital, where he was declared dead in only a few hours. His condition was so bad that doctors told us that survival was not possible. His face and torso were badly injured, and both his arms were broken," added Sunny. Tejinder's friend Manmeet fared better, and is being treated for severe head injuries in the same hospital, he added.

The immediate concern for the family though is breaking the news to Tejinder's wife. "We don't want to jeopardise her health by breaking the news right now," said Pankaj, a neighbour.

Even after all this bad news, dare I end on a positive note. As many of these terrible stories as there are, the number of them would have been higher still, were it not for the alert initiative and public spirit of two quick-thinking heroes:

Located at the bottom of the urban social pyramid, ragpickers are the smelly boys in tattered clothes whom everyone quickly passes by. Even street dogs, sub-consciously aware of their lowly status and often confusing them for thieves, chase them in shabby bylanes.

On Monday, one such ragpicker and a roadside vendor will be treated as heroes. Reason: their timely action saved dozens of lives in the Saturday bomb blast. Ragpicker Krishna and cloth seller Kundan detected live bombs and alerted the police.

Police point out that if the live bombs had not been detected in time, the death toll from the blasts would have been close to 100. ...

[For our other posts on the Delhi bombings, see
Another Terror Attack In India, and
Delhi Terrorists' Email From Hell.]

Delhi Terrorists' Email From Hell: "An Eye For An Eye..."

“An eye for an eye...”, boasted the subject heading in the fateful 13-page email received by India news media agencies, an email strongly suspected of being sent by the bomb-maker himself, claiming credit and justification for the latest terror bombings of markets and parks throughout the Indian capital city of Delhi. The body count from that act of "vengeance" stands today at 30 dead and a hundred wounded.

Portions of the email are appearing piecemeal in the Indian press. The message, expressed over and over again, is revenge:

"Eye for An Eye, The Dust Will Never Settle Down"… "To dreadfully terrorise you this time, by the Will and Help of Almighty Allah, we are about to devastate your very first metropolitan centre, your most strategic ‘hindutva hub, your green zone -- yes! It's your own capital".
…
“With this message, we once again declare that our intense, accurate and successive attacks like the one you will see exactly 5 minutes from now, Inshallah, will continue to punish you even before your earlier wounds have healed.”
...
"This accurately planned deadly strike is just another reaction to all those pre-and post-26 July harassments imposed by your ATS and police on the innocent Muslims."
...
"Your oppression will always be revenged Inshallah though after years to come. Never assume that we have forgotten the demolition of Babri Masjid and by Allah we can never forget it! It is that grave mistake of yours which will make you taste humiliation for generations to come."

The suspected author is Abdul Subhan Usman Qureshi, a 32-year old computer whiz-kid from Mumbai diffidently referred to as the "teckie jihadi" by the Indian press, a knick-name partially earned through the complex steps he takes to hide his tracks whenever he posts messages such as this latest hateful screed.

Abdul Subhan is said to be the bomb-making expert as well as the criminal mastermind behind several of the terror bombings that have ripped India in recent times. So far scattered "footsoldiers" from his group, the Indian Mujahideen, have been caught but the leader remains at large.

The lengthy email itself is sparingly quoted; most of the media is instead providing a summary of its contents:

The latest email from Abdul Subhan, who uses his alias "al-Arbi", which has the theme of revenge running through it, reads similar to the previous ones in many ways -- references to scriptures to justify the attack on non-believers, warnings of more attacks against those behind "injustice and oppression" inflicted upon Muslims all over the country, boasts of capacity and reach to strike anywhere and warnings to cops, media and judiciary.
…
…[T]here is no let-up in the effort to intimidate the cops, the media and the judiciary by warning them of retaliation. If anything, the warnings have become more ominous. There is no regret either for the previous atrocities, with the IM even threatening to repeat the barbarity it committed by attacking hospitals in Ahmedabad.
Yet, it is different in some crucial ways. To begin with, in comparison to the emails that preceded the blasts in courts in towns of UP, Jaipur and Ahmedabad, the latest one is thin on references to scriptures -- a factor which could be attributed to the imprisonment of Mufti Bashar, the Azamgarh cleric who provided the religious input for the drafts sent by Subhan till he was arrested for Ahemdabad blasts.

Reading the rage-filled words of this message from hell makes me feel like I’ve fallen down a hole so deep there’s no longer any light getting through. It’s the same spiritual void we can all fall into if we lose sight of the moral difference between justice and vengeance… And with the frequency of their barbaric attacks against us, it’s a pit that we are increasingly likely to topple into.

An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth… we’ve all heard the expression over the years. But rarely do we ever see it in its proper context; it isn’t supposed to be a prodding to bear a grudge over past crimes, it was supposed to teach us to restrain our natural urge to indulge in cruelty, by restricting our options regarding how we are to act towards those who do us harm. Through temperance of our natural capacity for evil we were supposed to arrive at a balanced and disciplined form of deferred retaliation, called justice, a different concept than vengeance. Deferring cruelty is no easy matter, even with trivial offenses made against us; it’s all the more challenging a task when we see our friends and neighbors maimed and blown to bits by unrepentant psychopaths, as just happened in Delhi.

Anyone who’s ever carried a grudge knows the awful truth: revenge doesn’t fill the hole, it doesn’t reassemble what’s been broken, it doesn’t return what’s been taken… it just makes bad situations worse. Revenge is an idea based on a lie, a presumption that there can be such a thing as "pure" victory. The folly that is human experience includes the paradox that in victory there is somehow defeat; we don’t need classic Greek history to teach us of Pyrrhic Victories, each of us can probably look within their own lives to find examples of how winning turned out to include losing. What’s harder to observe is the equal truth that defeat can contain triumph.

In gaining there can be loss, while in giving away there can be gains… isn’t this the whole idea behind sacrificial love?

When we are told to “Love Our Neighbor”, this guiding principle is not meant to replace the Ten Commandments, granting license for murder, pillage and violence to be committed against us. It is meant to moderate how we respond to the eternal flaws of human character that plague us century after century. Do we really win by becoming indistinguishable from those whose barbaric behavior wounds us so deeply, spiritually as well as physically? As an absolute, we could kill them all and be done with it, but what shadow would shroud such a victorious achievement, what price would be paid by such a dark triumph? To save our skins we must not sacrifice our souls… for giving in to the animal half of our inner nature, the part of us attuned to the material world around us, this surrender is surely more “humiliating” than to turn our backs on our other, spiritual, half, the part of our nature demanding we raise ourselves up to the light whenever we inevitably fall into our individual pits of anger and despair.

The fall itself is not humiliating; it is really what we choose to do once in the pit, that shames us... and can ultimately place such weights upon us that we remain condemned to lurk there, in the darkest of nights.

It’s a fitting irony that the perpetrator of these vengeful attacks worships a moon as the sign summarizing his understanding of his belief system. The light of the moon is reflected light, needing something much grander than itself in order to shine. Honesty and self-awareness of its smallness would reconcile it to accept a secondary but still supportive role; yet if it succumbs to vanity it will strive to eclipse the light of its larger neighbor… and through such petty actions, its small size is made all the more apparent.

I pray that he, and others in similar holes, may one day see The Light.

Another Terror Attack In India

More awful news... at least 20 people have been killed, and almost a hundred more injured, in a series of five bombings in Delhi, India. Given the grim anniversary that hangs over us this week, one can't resist making comparisons between our situation in North America and that of India.

The US has not suffered a terrorist attack since 9/11. India, however, has lost 1,193 people since that date to islamist terror attacks. (Not counting the terrorism inflicted by other religious groups...)

This latest horror seems to have been committed by a group calling themselves the Indian Mujahideen, which is said to be a front for the "Students Islamic Movement of India" (SIMI).

SIMI took responsibility for the nine explosions in Jaipur last May, as well as the sixteen bombs set off in Ahmedabad later in July. The islamic group was also implicated in a similar attack that saw nine bombs rip through Bangalore the same week as the Ahmedabad slaughter.

I have many friends working in India, and since the carnage of the bombings in Mumbai back in 2006 I've despatched so many emails at the news of each latest attack when I've seen them in the headlines, it's getting to the point that they now proactively email me every month or so, essentially to reassure me that they weren't killed in the latest massacre.

We "talk" about the public mood over there, and what is being done about the ongoing bloodshed. The answer remains the same: not much. They always point with a resigned helplessness to the general inefficiency of a government riddled with corruption and other problems. "We just learn to get used to it", as one friend put it in her last letter to me... an attitude echoed in the Indian media's own reporting of this latest islamic attack: "It has become nauseatingly familiar...."

The Wall Street Journal account of this week's bombings in Delhi goes into specific detail about the additional challenges that exist in stopping these bloody attacks:

Indian police, however, have had severe difficulties in bringing successful cases against alleged SIMI members in part because confessions to police in India aren't admissible in court as they are in many other countries. Indian intelligence gathering rarely is of a quality that passes evidentiary scrutiny in court. And witnesses for the prosecution frequently renege on their testimony because of the time -- often more than a decade -- it takes for cases to be heard.

Because of that reality, this is what happened this week in Delhi:

The first blast took place at Ghaffar Market at 6.10 pm. Soon after that, two explosions rocked Connaught Place, one at Barakambha Road near Gopaldas Building at 6.30 pm and the other near the Metro station at the Central Park at 6.31 pm. Almost simultaneously, a blast hit M-block market in Greater Kailash-I near McDonald's and seven minutes later another bomb went off near Prince Pan Corner in the same market.

In the shadow of such a long trail of monstrous evil, the search for any light of hope seems futile. Maybe we should settle for the consolation that not all the bombs planted in this vile scheme went off as planned. Three of them were located, somehow, and defused... including one secreted at the Children's Park at India Gate, here:

Try as I might, I just cannot imagine the mind of a man that would delight in setting off bombs in a place like that. And maybe a similar failure of imagination can supply the initiative India seems to struggle for, that we all struggle for: the will to renew their collective efforts to do what is necessary to truly live in peace, not the false peace of the willfully blind, but the tragic peace of the adult who summons the patient discipline to honestly perceive what is really going on before their very eyes.

We must not let ourselves become apathetic to slaughter, lest we become no different than those who have declared war on us.

Godspeed to the families of India, may they find the resolve to see themselves through their latest nightmare, and live to see better days.

Excruciating Suffering

Four Franciscan monks were savagely attacked by feral thugs invading their San Columbano Belmonte monastery near Turin, Italy, last week.

Three of the monks, aged 86, 81, and 76, were tied and gagged, then punched, kicked and beaten with clubs. Another, 48 year-old Father Sergio Baldin, suffered head injuries that left him in a coma, as well as "serious respiratory problems" resulting from having choked on the food he had been eating when the assault began. He heroically put himself in the way of the rabid fury that had been directed at his older Brothers, according to one of the other monks:

"Father Sergio (Baldin) came to my aid. He put himself in front of me to try and defend me, but he too was knocked down without mercy. They hit him until he stopped crying out. Then they beat Father Salvatore and Father Martin as well. It was terrible."

In the Indian state of Orissa, violence against Christians has reached frightful proportions. Earlier last week a mission in Orissa was torched by a bloodthirsty mob of 700 maniacs:

The mob chanting anti-Christian slogans when reached Padampur in Bargarh district, attacked the orphanage where Fr Edward lived. Ms Rajni, a 20 year old student who lived in the orphanage and was also working as an auxiliary nurse in the orphanage confronted them. When Fr Sequeira arrived at the spot the mob locked him and Rajni into separate rooms, and ordered the children to vacate the orphanage. The mob then ransacked Fr Sequeira's room, poured petrol on him, Rajni and set the orphanage on fire. "I was engulfed in flames, I could hear the cries of Rajni and the mob was cheering and shouting through the windows," recalls Fr Sequeira.

"When I started to suffocate I found a crack on the wall that was damaged in the attack and kept my nose there to breath some air. All the while I could hear the cries of Rajni from the next room where she was writhing in agony. After sometime, there was silence and I thought she must have managed to escape from the room," recalled Fr Sequeira. Unknown to Fr Edward, the girl was burnt alive and had breathed her last.
People from the neighborhood who heard the cries of children rushed to the rescue, broke the walls and brought him to safety. That is when the mob attacked him again outside the orphanage and was beaten up mercilessly till he became unconscious.

The Catholic Bishops' Conference of India has issued a list of several dozen Christian (Protestant and Catholic) churches, convents, hostels, as well as the hundreds of houses and other buildings burned during the spiralling wave of barbaric anti-Christian attacks. Over 25,000 Catholic schools in India have shut their doors in protest of "...the incapacity of the central government to stop violence at a time when anti-Christian sentiment is growing and the faithful are tortured and killed," said CBCI Chairman Osvaldo Cardinal Gracias.

The CBCI listed several deaths from the anti-christian violence so far, but another Indian Christian group, the Global Council of Indian Christians (GCIC), claims that the death toll is much higher:

"We have received authentic information that the death toll is 100", says Dr Sajan George, national president of the GCIC, "and more butchered bodies and burnt corpes are being found". The Christian activist is also calling for the resignation of the entire government of Orissa, which is incapable of stopping the massacres against the Christian community. He provides an example: "In Bakingia, two families of seven Christians - Daniel Naik and Michael Naik and their families - were tortured and killed, their bodies were found with their heads pulped and smashed, they were recognised by their clothes. Bakingia is about 8 kilometers from Raikia police station".

This past week I received the monthly prayer focus from The Barnabus Fund, from where I first encountered the news of the persecutions in Orissa; their official site doesn't seem to have incorporated these latest updates yet, so I will quote directly from their e-mail, concerning yet another wave of brutality, in Angola, Africa:

Muslim extremists recently attacked the Christian community in the town of Andulo. In an horrific incident, the school-age daughter of a deacon at one of the churches was decapitated. Forty believers were assaulted or tortured, and one of them needed 20 stitches in his head. The mob burned three church buildings. They also went to believers’ houses to intimidate them and damaged or destroyed items of property. ...

When pain and torment grows unbearable, we say the agony is "excruciating". The root of that word makes it fitting to use as a description of the horrors endured by those like Father Sequeira; excruciating comes from the latin, excruciatus, past participle of excruciare, from ex- + cruciare to crucify, from cruc-, crux cross.

"The pain from the crucified one".

In the face of the rising tide of such suffering, it is hard to feel any hope for the future. How to keep faith when the world seems filled with evil triumphant over good? Fr. Edward Sequeira had devoted 25 years of his life as a missionary in India, and was managing a leper colony as well as an orphanage when he was beset upon by the crazed mob that tried to burn him to death for his good deeds. As hard as it is to contemplate the pain his scarred physical body will bear from the building's flames, it is harder still to imagine the searing damage done to the soul within. As he told his brother, upon awakening in the hospital:

"...cries of Rajni and the guilt of helplessness of saving her will always haunt me."

It must fall upon the shoulders of those of us so far spared such excruciating suffering, to pick up our own cross and follow in their footsteps, carrying forward the news that there can still be some good found in the world... good of our own making.

More proof India is a cutting-edge society

Headline: Now, a terror suspect who holds human rights degree (HT: Nicholas P. who is watching the latest in Russian imperialism closely.)

The silent tsunami: one Indian woman killed every 7 minutes

Over 77,000 women die every year in India from complications arising from pregnancy, according to a new report issued by the Registrar General of India.

From the Middle East Times:

Some 301 women in 100,000 births die each year due to "pregnancy-related complications" despite the government's goal of bringing the mortality rate below 100, said the registrar general.
"In other words, one woman is dying every seven minutes due to complications related to pregnancy and childbirth," said the body, which records births and deaths.
Rundown maternity services and near-absent mother-and-childcare centers and rural health facilities contributed to the huge death rate of mothers, the body said.
…
Federal ministry officials blamed the states for not doing enough to improve maternal healthcare.
"The national target is to keep the mortality rate to below 100 per live births but laxities by states in upgrading their [health] facilities is making it difficult," said an unnamed government official quoted by the Press Trust of India.

The mention of mortality rates relating to the figure of 100,000, is called the Maternal Mortality Ratio (MMR): a measure of the risk of death directly related to the pregnancy once a woman has become pregnant. It is usually measured in terms of maternal deaths per 100,000 live births.

Last month an article in India's Hindustan Times offered more background on the tragedy aggrieving their nation:

...
"The real concern for the high MMR in India is not lack of resources but failure in the system," said Aparajita Gogoi, national coordinator of the White Ribbon Alliance (WRA) that works on issues concerning safe motherhood.
…
Promoting accountability is another factor that, when looked into seriously, brought down the number of maternal deaths in China from 1,500 per 100,000 live births to less than 200 in the year 2000.
"Accountability is very important. No one is held responsible when a mother dies ... most of the times it's not even registered. It's very important to keep a tab of the health of a pregnant woman"[, Gogoi said.]
…
One of the reasons for the high MMR in India [is] the ratio of the population to the number of skilled medical staff available. Although 70 per cent of the population resides in rural areas, only 20-30 per cent medical aid is available to them while the ratio is the opposite in urban areas.
Non-functional health centres, scarcity of blood banks, inadequate number of specialists like gynaecologists and anaesthetists in rural areas and the poor condition of the transport system are some of the bottlenecks of the problem.
"Seventy per cent of the national budget allocated for health support goes back unutilised. The system is not delivering end results and that's where the problem lies," stated Hamid El-Bashir, Madhya Pradesh state representative of UNICEF.
"These deaths are completely preventable and that is the greatest tragedy. It is a silent tsunami," remarked Gogoi.

I think it is horrible that these deaths are so numerous. What is to be done about it?
Getting the right equipment, getting the right access to specialists with the right training, all this and more will come with getting the right system in place to ensure these other things are done right. Note the complaint about “laxity”; beyond the medical knowledge, even beyond the money, must come a belief: a belief in the sanctity of life. Good health, long lives, fruitful families: 3 virtues that the west, with its science, with its engine for wealth, and especially its sanctification of life, have triumphantly raised to unprecedented standards. Surely these are the real, palbable, noble goals of globalization, this is what the west tries to share with those less advanced than ourselves... not just McDonalds or Starbucks, but ultrasounds and emergency wards and pre-natal care. And the system that developed these things in the first place.
Good roads to ensure safe and speedy travel, plentiful sources of energy to ensure adequate facilities at either end of these roads, hygenic conditions and modernized techniques developed over decades of patient study. This is what globalization, westernization, can bring to rural India. Look what it did for rural Tennessee. Do the anti-globalists regret the TVA?

Maybe the masked anti-globalists who self-righteously protest against progress and modernization, maybe they can sleep untroubled by these grim MMR statistics, happy that witchdoctors and shamans are dancing around campfires in vain attempts to ward off evil spirits, while mothers' lives are torn from them during what is supposed to be a celebration of life, their sons and daughters dying before seeing their first sunrise.

Is it really that outrageous to look forward to the day where western civilization’s system of beliefs, along with the sciences of gynecology, obstetrics and other related fields that developed from that system, can finally be spread, not just to India, but globally: allowing Somalia (with an MMR of 1,600 deaths per 100,000), or Rwanda (at the bottom of the list with a tragic MMR of 2,300 lost souls per 100,000) to come that much closer to Canada’s MMR of 6 out of 100,000.

Doesn't this masked fellow want the same?