A collegiate chess competition isnt a typical excuse for a college student to pull an all-nighter.

However, for one student on the University of Missouri chess team, competing at the recent 2020 U.S. Online Collegiate Rapid and Blitz Championship, his last round didnt finish until around 4 a.m. local time in India. As the global coronavirus pandemic has caused life adjustments for many people around the globe, Mizzous chess team has also adjusted to competing in virtual chess tournaments while five team members are at Mizzou and the others are overseas in their home countries.

Mizzous coach, Cristian Chirila, a Romanian grandmaster, said accommodating all of the different time zones for his players was not a huge undertaking because the team had already hosted many meetings and practices online.

Weve been able to continue practicing normally, more or less, Chirila said. Were lucky as chess players, in that regard.

An unprecedented season

Grigory Oparin, the captain of the Mizzou chess team, is earning a graduate degree in Spanish while regularly participating in online chess competitions. The continuous journey of improvement inspires Oparin to keep playing, even during a pandemic that has changed the way the sport looks. Playing chess online, using online platforms and video conference apps has its added challenges fatigue from focusing intensely on a computer screen, potential internet connection issues and even the necessity to make quick moves on the virtual chessboard with a computer mouse.

Playing chess online is just a completely different experience than playing over the board, Oparin said. When youre playing over the board, you see your opponents emotions and the way hes handling the pressure. You cant do that when youre playing online, just staring at your screen, moving some virtual pieces.

However, playing online has not been a barrier to the teams success.

Grigory Oparin competes next to teammate Chris Repka during the 2020 U.S. Online Collegiate Rapid and Blitz Championship.

At the virtual 2020 U.S. Online Collegiate Rapid and Blitz Championships, the team placed fourth overall out of 25 teams for the rapid championship and earned a bronze award for the blitz championship. In addition, Gulrukhbegim Tokhirjonova and Olga Badelka took silver and bronze awards, respectively, in the womens section.

Collegiate chess is becoming increasingly competitive. Some of the teams Mizzou competed against had more than twice as many players as Mizzou did including top-level grandmasters. Oparin, a grandmaster himself, earned a fourth place individual finish in the blitz championship.

Coach Chirila looks forward to the opportunity to physically see all of his team members face-to-face, especially as some of the new players could not travel to Mizzou due to the pandemic.

We all miss touching the chess pieces by hand, Chirila said.

Chirilas ultimate goal for the Mizzou chess team remains to win a national championship, whether over the board or on a computer screen.

Eric Stann is a research news strategist at the University of Missouris News Bureau.

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On Chess: Mizzou's Chess Team Proves Capable Of Winning Even In A Virtual Space - St. Louis Public Radio

FOOTBALL | GRAEME SOUNESS

Sunday November 22 2020, 12.01am, The Sunday Times

Football is facing the biggest crossroads since it was invented. The evidence is unequivocal heading a ball can lead to brain damage and dementia. Id be a dinosaur to suggest otherwise. If it can be proved that one person has dementia as a result of heading the ball, and it has been, then thats enough for me to accept we must do something to eliminate it.

What that is, I dont know yet, but I do know that it will change the game forever. Football will face a challenge to remain the worlds No 1 sport. The balancing act is to preserve the game we all love as much as possible while ensuring that nobody suffers brain damage playing it.

I have played with

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Outlawing heading would turn football into chess but game has to act to break dementia link - The Times

11/22/2020 Herman Grooten is an International Master, a renowned trainer and the author of several highly acclaimed books about chess training and chess strategy. In the second part of his new ChessBase show "Understanding before Moving" Herman explains how to find ways to improve the activity of your pieces. | Photo: Hans Hoornstra

ChessBase 16 - Mega package Edition 2021

Your key to fresh ideas, precise analyses and targeted training! Everyone uses ChessBase, from the World Champion to the amateur next door. It is the program of choice for anyone who loves the game and wants to know more about it. Start your personal success story with ChessBase and enjoy the game even more.

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Lots of books have been written about strategic thinking in chess. In general, quite abstract theories are sometimes put forward on how a club player can master this essential part of the game of chess. This often turns out to be disappointing in practice.

Strong players often have the right orientation in a certain position quite quickly and then the question is of course how they do that. This episode looks very specifically at how a player can improve the activity of his pieces and possibly disrupt that of the opponent.

To do this, we first look at which side of the board the battle scene is located on. To determine which pieces are already active and which can still be improved, we use colors just to show the difference between the white and the black army. It is not surprising that in this game increasing activity leads to a ruthless attack. Have a look at this diagram for yourself.

At which side of the board do you think both players are looking now? And which pieces of White are already doing something there? Which pieces should preferably be activated even more? And how can White combine his plan of attack with increasing his own activity? In this episode, we look at how the white player manages to bring all his pieces into play to make his attack work at full speed.

This week's show (for Premium Members only)

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Understanding before Moving 2: How to improve the activity of my pieces - Chessbase News

Neighbors please be mindful of social distancing guidelines while you do your part to slow the spread of the new coronavirus. See the latest guidance from the CDC here.

This post was contributed by a community member. The views expressed here are the author's own.

While located in Fremont, Any location is welcome!

Who are we? - Our School 😉

Please take thought of our offered activity in a cost that is affordable to the families therein giving all students some fun and learning and perhaps the new ones to CHESS an opportunity to learn and see to further their skills within the sport and or not ... never know till try.

Age's are from K ~ 6th Grade

~ Register Here ~

Worry not if they not even know what a pawn is, as we have taught such to now a level in months to playing mini tournaments in our class all online.

We use the software ChessKid.Com and are organized to which have many students in current and the factor of them interacting is just as important as the sport itself

So join us and try it out it will be fun (to keep safe and fun, all students "must" register. Join the day, two or three ...

All regular Chess classes this coming week and private 1-1 Chess classes are closed for break as to bring about this Chess Camp 😉

Here is one of our student in learning 😉

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Who are we? - Our School 😉

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Local Event: Thanksgiving Chess Camp For The Little Ones ~ Keep Em Active 😉 - Patch.com

Genius Gary Kasparov has given valiant help to the Netflix miniseries.

It even convinces chess fans.

There are sports that generally make for good fictional stories. This is the case of boxing, for example, which has already given us classics from Rocky to The Angry Bull. And then there are others, like football, who have been less generous in this regard. Chess fell more into the latter category. But that seems to have changed.

Gambito de Dama, the Netflix miniseries that debuted less than a month ago and has been at the top of the platform ever since, is proof that this ancient sport, in which games can last for days , is fertile ground for stories and tension.

Part of the credit is the care with which, even though it was a fictional story, it was linked to reality, to the Soviet domination of chess during the Cold War. Another part of the credit is in the cast, especially the talented Anna Taylor-Joy whom NiT talked about at length in a recent article.

Still, all of this might be insufficient if it didnt work when placing the pieces on the board. There had to be something real about the game itself, through the seven episodes that make up the mini-series.

The brilliant Garry Kasparov.

To keep things running smoothly, creators Scott Frank and Allan Scott have relied on help from those who understand the subject. One of those helpers came from Bruce Pandolfini, an instructor and former chess player who had previously consulted on the book of the same name that inspired the series. But theres a reason the games we see on screen are even more believable than the ones in the book: Garry Kasparov.

Kasparov is the Russian talent who, when he doesnt stand out as one of the uncomfortable voices of Vladimir Putin, is dedicated to making history in the chess world. Kasparov was the youngest player to become a world chess champion in 1985, when he was 22. It wasnt until 2002 that 18-year-old compatriot Ponomariov broke the record. For almost 20 years, from the first title to the abandonment of high competition in 2005, Kasparov was number one in the world rankings.

He was also the representative of humanity in a classic game against Deep Blue, a supercomputer designed to beat the best chess minds in the world. In 1996, the computer won one game, but Kasparov won the game, winning three and drawing two more. The following year, another dispute, with the Deep Blue software update, and even so there was balance, with the computer to tie the dispute in its favor to the sixth game.

The moment was historic and worth documentaries, but Kasparov himself admits that few works of fiction can convey the mannerisms, detail, tactical changes, and the tension experienced in a high-level chess tournament.

Kasparov agreed to advise the creators of Damas Gambito and ended up recreating games while also giving advice on how things go in a big tournament. The result is something Kasparov himself is proud of as a spectator. In a recent interview with Slate, Kasparov pointed out how he came to discover little-known genius games to model the movements of pieces on the miniseries set.

Damas Gambito has already become one of the Netflix hits of the year. For Slate, Kasparov admits hes doing everything he can to promote the sport. Recently on his Facebook he shared a report which showed another successful move, now off the board. Since the series launched, research on how to play chess has skyrocketed nearly 300% online. There are new fans for this painting because of the miniseries. With luck, a new super-talent appears, influenced by the miniseries, the story of which would make another great on-screen story.

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How Dama's Gambito nailed the chess world re:Jerusalem - re:Jerusalem

The unstoppable force meets the immovable object.

That phrase might be the best way to describe Sundays game between the Green Bay Packers and the Indianapolis Colts.

The matchup between the Packers offense and the Colts defense in particular will be fun to watch. Green Bays offense hasnt faced a challenge quite like the Colts defense and vice versa:Indianapolis hasnt seen anything quite like the Green Bay offense.

Something has to give. Both teams are nearly identical in DVOA with Green Bay 7th and the Colts 5th. The Packers will be looking to avoid a repeat of their loss to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and it will be interesting to watch how the team responds to any adversity and punches thrown their way early. If theres been one disturbing trend of Matt LaFleurs tenure, its that his teams often fold when they go down multiple scores early. That cant happen if they want to beat the Colts.

Meanwhile the Colts are looking to separate themselves from the Tennessee Titans in the AFC South after the Titans got off to a fast start. The defense was mentioned above as being stout but what Philip Rivers has brought to the offense cant be overlooked. Rivers has started feeling more comfortable in head coach Frank Reichs scheme and the veteran quarterback is showing he still has what it takes.

Sunday should be a very exciting matchup and should be a good barometer for the Packers as they prepare for a playoff run.

Now for todays curds.

Packers confident they can make some noise against Colts top-ranked defensePackersNews.com

The Colts are solid at all three levels of the defense and like LaFleurs offense, they tend to keep things simple and do those simple things really really well. Its worked so far.

Good on good: Colts defense a big test for Packers offense, and vice versaPackers.com

For the Packers, Sundays game represents a chance for LaFleur to correct some errors. The ill-advised receiver screens against Jacksonville wont work against the speedier Colts defense. Thankfully the game is indoors so weather wont play a role in that decision.

David Bakhtiaris mega-contract means tough 2021 decisions, cuts for PackersESPN

Stop me if if youve heard this before: the Packers have some big decisions to make even with David Bakhtiari and Kenny Clark now under contract for the long haul.

Saints expected to start Taysom Hill at QB vs. FalconsNFL.com

If youre going to pay Taysom Hill the kind of money the Saints are, you have to see if he can be your post-Drew Brees QB1. Sunday will provide the first real extended look at Hill as a traditional passer.

Puerto Rico Policeman Accused Of Robbing Home Depot While In UniformHuffington Post

Officers uniforms have their names on them in most places so this had to have been surprising on multiple levels.

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Packers will have an interesting chess match against the Colts defense - Acme Packing Company

By Mohammed Shafeeq

Hyderabad, Nov 19 (SocialNews.XYZ) Hip hop and Urdu don't go together so also hip hop and Sufism but an Urdu hip-hop band has come out with an album with strange fusion of rap music with the Sufi message and in mostly Urdu lyrics.

As Hyderabad's Thug Unit is all set to release its album 'Resurrection 040', the duo behind it shared with IANS their experiences and the motivation behind the unique experiment.

Comprising 12 tracks and representing a variety of elements, the album is set to be released on Friday on Apple Music. Mostly in Urdu, the tracks also have English and West Indian flavor with Jamaican lingo.

Mudassir Ahmed and Syed Irshad, who go with stage names 'Mo Boucher' and 'Irish Boi' respectively, told IANS that for the first time message of sufism has been conveyed to people through the medium of hip hop.

People so far used to listen to qawwalis to known something about the message of Sufism but the Hyderabadi rappers with this album are adding a totally different medium.

"This is not philosophical Sufism like reading of books but it is actual practical journey. This has come out of our own experience," said Mudassir, who stopped writing poetry and composing music in 2012 for his spiritual journey and is making a comeback to the world of hip hop with his old friend.

"In 2014, I started to have spiritual yearning. I stopped writing and making music asking questions what is purpose of life. I started reflecting what I want to do with my life," said Mudassir, who read books include Bhagavad Gita and Vedas.

"I realised Sufism suits me on a personal level. I connected with the Sufi message. I spent 5-6 years with a Sufi master and learnt the Sufi traditions."

They said the main purpose of the album is to give good content to hip hop listeners. "What they mostly get is rubbish stuff like, sex, drugs and partying. Hip hop is not just that. It is reflection of ourselves," he said

Mudassir and Irrshad are confident that they will be able to change to hip hop scene in the country. "Hip hop is about poetry on any subject chosen and what we are seeing. We have put our own personal experience in the form of poetry," said Irrshad.

The musicians say that their fourth album, the first commercial one, has given them satisfaction. "Hip hop is a representation of yourself. You have to use it with responsibility because young people are listening to it. What they listen at this age is going to stay with them. We have a huge responsibility as to what content we are giving," said Mudassir, who started writing poetry when was 14.

He pointed out that one of the tracks in the album is on the current political atmosphere in India and the political shift that has happened in last 5-6 years, especially the last two years.

"As Indians while we were growing up it was different but now you have a completely different situation. There is more hate now and that is what motivated us to write a song about it," he said.

The album features pertinently named tracks Rubaroo (face to face), Raahe Rast (straight path), Suroor e Ishq, (exhilaration of love), Pardafash (unmasked), Azmaish (test), Atishbazi (fireworks), Bossman, Bus'em (Bust Them), Hate Monger, Intro, Kun (Be) featuring Rebel of Khan Artists and Original Rajah (Original Ruler).

The musical ensemble portrays Sufism-inspired self-reflection, community evils and voice against power establishments. Music for the album is produced by seasoned Grammy-nominated and multi-platinum producers including Buck Wild, making the duo the first from Telangana and perhaps from India to work with US-based Grammy nominated producers.

Thugs Unit inked a deal with Apple Music earlier this month. "We are happy that Bobin James Editor and Artists Relations Lead at Apple Music personally listened to our music tracks and liked them enough to honour us by featuring on a platform so robust like Apple Music", they said.

Source: IANS

Gopi Adusumilli is a Programmer. He is the editor of SocialNews.XYZ and President of AGK Fire Inc.

He enjoys designing websites, developing mobile applications and publishing news articles on current events from various authenticated news sources.

When it comes to writing he likes to write about current world politics and Indian Movies. His future plans include developing SocialNews.XYZ into a News website that has no bias or judgment towards any.

He can be reached at gopi@socialnews.xyz

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Spreading the message of Sufism through hip hop - Social News XYZ

This past weekend was Diwali, the Hindu New Year. I associate Diwali with being at home among family, with rows upon rows of traditional lamps, and with the triumph of good over evil. But Diwalis beauty can feel ephemeral. The dancing firelight eventually vanishes. The epic Ramayana, from which some stories of the triumph of good originates, doesnt end so happily after all. The semesters work comes crashing back after a weekend of cooking, cleaning, and family worship, and its like you had only been folded into a world of your own foolish construction.

This year, Diwali reminds me of my father, who underwent major back surgery about this time last year. The surgery was successful and my father is healthy. But for every year leading up to it, my father, a natural and skilled athlete, an intrinsically brave man, was perpetually in pain. I have vague memories of this fact, when he was a little bit more irritable after a long day of performing procedures as an indefatigable physician, or when he did not want to eat dinner at the dining table and instead watched TV from the couch. Still, it was only after I read about ankylosing spondylitis, the autoimmune arthritic condition that my dad has, on an organizations website that I realized the degree to which people with this condition feel pain: Bad days felt like grizzly bear claws and teeth ripping through my connective tissue and joints. And, I struggle to keep my mind positive and just want to cry which on occasion I do. For a time, I hardly believed that my father felt this kind of pain, because if I am having the least bit of discomfort, he is the first to advise ibuprofen. It is as if the fact that he has suffered from chronic pain means nothing for how others should learn to bear it, too.

A few weeks before the surgery, my mother called me and told me exuberantly that my father had finally signed up to take theological exams at the temple. These exams are meant to teach scripture of this particular Hindu tradition and ways of understanding the world and our place in it. Theyre open to anyone and are purely for spiritual discovery and fulfillment. My mom had been urging my dad to take them for years, since, in her view, without the positive pressure of an exam, its tough to find time to read anything at all. After eleven years of taking the same exams, I can say with confidence that Ive found this to be true. But my father always resisted, brushing it off jokingly as unnecessary, citing his busy work schedule as a valid reason not to do it.

Hes finally decided to do it! my mother was smiling at me from behind the screen. From behind her, out of the frame, my father called back, Dont get your hopes up too high! I was shocked; I couldnt be sure that his decision wasnt just a brief, noncommittal comment to assuage my mother.

There are times when I resent the added burden of studying for this exam, when my friends on campus are stressed about spring semester midterms, and I am stressed about all of those things plus the fact that I am miserably underprepared for an exam one that is supposed to tell me how to salvage the fate of my soul after death. The kicker is that having read by now thousands of pages on the subject, I still look at my father and think, here is a person who wastes no time drowning in theoretical faith. For him, faith is nothing like leaping off the edge, or a blinding firework, beautiful but short-lived. He is a person who enacts those theories and concepts that I only memorize. He is a person who is put to the test not once a year by pen and paper, but by nature. The word faithful has a longitudinal connotation, after all.

Diwali reminds me of my father because its not always jubilant and loud. Sometimes, like in the pandemic when we will not visit family members, it is quiet. Its less like a firework and more like an image I cherish from the Bhagavad Gita: a lamp in a windless place. It is still and warm; it is transparent and yet substantial.

Six years ago, I stood in the winding line of a ride called Leap of Faith at a resort in the Bahamas. From the railing, I could see him, sitting in a reclining chair surrounded by our shoes and towels. While the anxiety preceding a near-vertical slide into a shark tank rose, none of us mourned the absence of the lone family member who sat near the edge of the pool reading. Thats because it happens every time. My dad always spearheads vacation planning, hurtling headlong into the logistics for every excursion, and then sits out when the moment to lie on the salt-encrusted surfboard, to buckle into a humongous roller coaster arrives.

It was me, my brother and mom and cousins, and aunt and uncle, who leapt off the edge that day and came up sputtering at the end of the slide with chlorine in our eyes and noses. But it was my father, that day and every day, who gave faith a new meaning, steady and quiet, performing nothing, and needing no occasion but normalcy to find good in the dark. This Diwali, when the last light dissolves, I remember this.

Pranati P. Parikh 21 is a joint Religion and Comparative Literature concentrator in Adams House. Her column appears on alternate Wednesdays.

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Light Without Wind | Opinion - Harvard Crimson

The perils of Indian economy are products of directionless economic policies of Modi government. It is led by ignorant leadership and arrogance of Hindutva politics based on exclusionary ideology, which is inspired by European Nazism and fascism. There is a method madness in the reactionary politics of BJP and RSS. It intends to convert multicultural India into a monolithic India based on Hindutva. It is a reactionary political outlook shaped by national and global capitalist classes. These forces have unrestricted access to national treasury and natural resources in India under Modi led government. From deregulation, demonetisation, GST to pandemic lockdowns, Modi government did everything to dismantle both supply and demand side of the Indian economy. The collapse of two primary pillars of economy led to the growth of unemployment and declining purchasing power of the masses. The consumption and consumer demands declined immediately, which shocked Indian economy and pushed it to undeclared recession for the first time in Indian economic history. Modi government is doing everything to protect corporate interests, when people are trying to find ways to survive with hunger, homelessness, unemployment and Coronavirus pandemic. Indian economic predicaments are inherent within exclusionary Hindutva politics. The economic recovery, growth and development in India depends on social, religious, and political inclusive culture, where citizens are equal shareholders of economic opportunities.

Hindutva exclusionary politics is trying to hide all its failures and constantly diverting public attention. The advocates of Hindutva glorify mythological Hindu past and blame all previous governments for all ills of Indian society today. The current problems are products of past deeds. It is a perfect Hindutva recipe that derives its philosophical legitimacy from the Karma theory of the Bhagavad Gita. The current problems are products of Hindutva economic policies, which are geared towards upholding the interests of corporates in India. It is evident in the rise of corporate wealth and decline of per capita income of the working Indians. Hindutva uses neoliberal dispossession to mobilise the masses and consolidates its Brahmanical social and cultural order. At the same time, Hindutva politics accelerates neoliberal economic policies that dispossess the masses. This political and economic contradictions are integral to Hindutva politics. The mainstream mass medias are playing a central role in hiding these contradictions by promoting Hindutva agenda of dispossession and disenfranchisement of majority of Indian citizens; Muslims, religious minorities, lower caste, tribals, women and working classes. Hindutva exclusionary ideology is not only depriving Muslims from their citizenship rights but also accelerating deprivation of lower caste, women and working-class population from participating in economic opportunities by privatising national resources.

Hindutva politics is opposed to the idea of India as an inclusive, constitutional, liberal and secular democracy. It follows mythological theocracy, which is opposed to very foundation of scientific and modern India of 21st century. The Indian economic perils are products of such a reactionary and medieval ideology of Hindutva. It is shaping India with its Hindutva shock therapy based on prohibitions, controls, and commands over everyday lives of people. Hindutva discourse is trying to dominate every aspects of Indian life from food habits, dress patterns, education, health to reproductive rights. These regressive outlooks are fundamentally opposed to economic growth and development in India. Because social, political, economic religious, and cultural marginalisation weakens citizens, families, societies, states and institutions to mobilise internal resources of India. The centralisation of power by Hindutva forces further diminish the abilities of local and provincial governments to mobilise local resources. The availability, accessibility and distribution of goods and services depend on production, demand and supply. Hindutva politics destroys every economic foundations of the country by creating social and religious conflicts and violently supressing political opposition and democratic decentralisation processes.

Hindutva model of economic and political governance of Modi government is based on multiple forms of exclusionary practices that hinder economic growth and development in India. Hindutvas innate hatred for Muslims is the first form exclusion, which diminishes more than fourteen percentage of Indian population and their abilities to contribute to their individual lives and to the national economy. Hindutva politics considers women only as mothers, sisters and wives who can be prayed inside the house. Such a patriarchal approach discourages civic and economic participation for nearly forty-eight percentage of Indian women population. The apartheid Hindutva ideology believes in caste hierarchy, which disables social and economic abilities of nearly twenty five percent of lower caste and tribal population. It means eighty-seven percentage of Indian population are living under the conditions of structural barriers that does not allow them to grow and be the shareholders of national life. The processes of marginalisation, denials of citizenship rights and lack of participation creates social, political and economic conditions of institutionalised deprivation, which gives power to Hindutva forces. Therefore, crisis crime, dominance, and deprivation are four weapons of Hindutva politics in India.

Hindutva exclusionary politics creates conditions of deprivation trap, which breeds unemployment, poverty, debt, destitution, marginalisation, illiteracy and illness. These outcomes are dangerous and weakening of India and Indians both in short run and long run. Social coexistence, peace and inclusive cultures are foundations of economic growth and development. But the idea of inclusive culture and peace are alien ideals and antithetical to Hindutva politics. Therefore, Hindutva ideology is a hinderance to economic growth and development in India.

The Hindutva politics led Modi can neither be reformed nor can be revised. The only alternative is to defeat it ideologically and politically till it becomes qualitatively and quantitatively irrelevant and illegal in India. Hindutva is Indian version of Nazism and fascism. It is detrimental to India, Indians and humanity. India and Indians will suffer social and economic underdevelopment as long as Hindutva rules the country. The institutionalisation of Hindutva discrimination destroys all potentials and conditions for economic growth and development. The struggle against Hindutva is struggle against caste, gender and religious based discrimination in India. The united struggle against Hindutva politics must develop radical narratives based on social, political and cultural integration, inclusive economic and development policies for peace and prosperity for the masses. These are essential conditions of sustainable economic growth and secular development of society in India.

*Bhabani Shankar Nayak, Coventry University, UK

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Hindutva Hindrance To Economic Growth And Development In India - OpEd - Eurasia Review

Professor Brij Maharaj

Monday marks the 160th anniversary of the arrival of Indian indentured labourers in South Africa and the 110th anniversary of the official recognition of the festival of Diwali in South Africa (1910).

It is also the 108th anniversary of the SA Hindu Maha Sabha established in 1912.

Historically, indentured Hindus (with fellow Muslims and Christians of Indian origin) in South Africa struggled against discrimination, poverty, lack of education as well as political and civic representation, and religious and cultural marginalisation.

The indentured built temples which provided comfort and encouraged communal worship observing birth, marriage and death ceremonies, and celebrating festivals.

Apartheid not only suppressed political freedom but also stifled religious choices in favour of a narrow Christian Calvinist agenda.

South African Hindus have come a long way from the era of memory, oral tradition (and distortions) in religious rituals and practices.

Tamaso ma jyothir gamaya lead us from darkness to light is an important concept in Hinduism, and is the essence of Diwali.

Dispelling darkness and illuminating truth, honesty, integrity, morality, righteousness with Divine radiance the ultimate triumph of good over evil are messages which permeates all faiths.

There are many explanations about the significance of Diwali, and the most well-known is the celebration of Lord Ramas return after his banishment and exile.

The Ramayan is one of the most popular scriptures among Hindus in the indentured diaspora because of this theme of exile and return.

The indentured laboured in the belief that like Lord Rama, they would overcome adversity in the colonies, and triumphantly return to India from exile.

The message that we must all work positively to build inclusive communities of love, justice and peace, where the dignity and equal worth of every human being is emphasised especially important in South Africa.

This is partly because of its complex colonial history, and also, because of the betrayal of the non-racial struggle, 26 years into democracy, the country remains as divided, polarised and corrupt as in the apartheid era, and minority groups increasingly feel threatened and marginalised in the land of their birth.

When South Africans (including Hindus and those of Indian descent) seek inspiration and enlightenment, they inevitably turn to the voice and words of Nelson Mandela, and his views on Diwali are apposite:

"The Hindu faith is as much a part of South Africa as any other religion

Justice, truth, integrity, humility, freedom, are values that the Hindu scriptures, like the scriptures of most other religions, espouse

At this time of Diwali and as I light this sacred lamp I am aware of how this lamp symbolises the triumph of: Enlightenment over blind faith; prosperity over poverty; knowledge of ignorance; good health and well-being over disease and ill health; freedom over bondage.

As we celebrate the triumph of radiance and righteousness over darkness and evil, it is appropriate to reflect on how we can illuminate the lives of those around us who are less fortunate, regardless of race or religion.

Scriptures compel all Hindus to engage in some form of charity (daan) and social upliftment, according to ability, selflessly, without expectation of reward (Nishkhaam Karma).

Some give money, while others offer time and labour in support of worthy causes.

According to the Bhagavad Gita (17.20) charity that is given as a matter of duty, desiring nothing in return, to a deserving candidate at the right place and time, is sattvic.

So as we celebrate Deepavali let us do it with purpose and meaningfulness beyond the crass conspicuous consumption in which the elite indulge.

Let it not be just for the day.

Rather, the spirit of Diwali must guide us through the year to ensure that righteousness and justice triumphs in our homes, communities and country, as well as in the world at large.

The Independent on Saturday

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Diwali a celebration of light and hope - Independent Online