Vedic workshop of Kozhikode. I wish it was not held in Bharatam.

Namaskaram, Dr. Bhattathiripad.

I came to know of your Vedic Workshop yesterday.

http://www.ivw2014.org/Contacts.html

I heard it from a person who is an authority both on technology and on the Vedas, having studied them since he was a little boy, from some of the best authorities. With his scientific and technical credentials, and his lifelong dedication, his understanding of the Vedas in my view surpasses that of anyone else whom I have met. He is also a teacher of mine over the past four decades, from the time when I was privileged to study under him in a truly world-leading institution. However, he has no other role in what I discuss below.

It was good to see a Workshop on our ancient sources of wisdom, being conducted in the land where the rituals of the Vedic times have been conducted without a break for many millennia.

I see that this is the Sixth Workshop of this kind - and that the last five were conducted at Harvard University. Perhaps there is a reason that Harvard chose not to host this, but that is just a wild guess on my part. Anyway, I am sure the name of Harvard University brought great pride to local organizers, and unquestioning acceptance, understandably so, based on the reputation of many of the colleges at that great University. I do not know if the Department of Sanskrit, or of Linguistics, is one of those. 

When I saw the list of organizers, memories of events from the USA came flooding back. In particular, of what became known as the California Donkey Trials. These were two court cases which ended with major settlements having to be paid by the California State Board of Education (i.e., the taxpayers of California) to Hindu/ Indian-American parents and children who suffered from the atrocities allegedly committed by the Board in gross violation of their own guidelines if not the law, under the (mis)guidance, and alleged deep malice, of  certain entities associated with major universities. As I recall, one case was filed by the Hindu American Foundation, an entity organized by professionals in the USA, in the State Court of California. The other was filed by a group of young parents who were trying to get a fair education for their children. This was in the United States Federal court, alleging gross violation of Civil Rights.

In both cases, the rich and powerful legal entities representing the State of California, after 1 year in one case and 3 years in the other of foot-dragging and desperate attempts to avoid the issues, chose to settle at the last minute, seeing the writing on the wall from what the Justices had already pronounced. In each case, the cost to the taxpayers ran into the millions of dollars, yet it did not come anywhere close to properly atoning for the gross injustice perpetrated against the children of California. Predictably, the entities responsible for misguiding the Board declared "victory", just as Ayub Khan, Yahya Khan and Pervez Musharraf declared victories in 1965, 1971 and 1999.

You can read more here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_textbook_controversy_over_Hindu_history

This article is quiet on the precise contents of the settlement statements, the depositions of the entities who had to come clean on their actions, or the statements of the justices which convinced the Board to settle before the cases came to trial. However I have seen some of those, and since I have no special access, so can you, I am sure, if you are so interested. 

These cases, and the extreme demonstration of arrogance which preceded and led to them, no doubt earned well-deserved "fame" for some of the entities, just as the nation led by Ayub and Yahya and Pervez has achieved today. I suspect that it would have been exceedingly difficult to find entities in the USA who would want or agree to organize a Workshop with such names on them, in 2014.

However, I note that they have succeeded in finding people who are either unaware of these events, or are aware and unaffected.

In either event, my best wishes to you for a Workshop which tries to find Truth, though I wish I could be more  optimistic about that outcome.

My own role in this controversy was quite limited. For one thing I do not live in California or Massachusetts. But I was profoundly disturbed as a decent human being, and  as a teacher and researcher by profession,  by what I saw being done in the name of a great university, under the claim of "scholarship". This compelled me to write and post the article that I have linked below. This was back in 2006 when citizen outrage was just starting.

I am writing this email now to assuage my own conscience: that I tried my best to inform the organizers of this Workshop of what they were supporting, and make them aware while there was still time, to guide it, and the resulting reputation of their own esteemed organizations, as they see fit. I am sorry that this comes at the last minute: I was made aware of the Workshop, and had a chance to browse its antecedents, only yesterday afternoon.

If the Board in California had opened their minds for a moment and put their arrogance on hold for a moment in 2006, long enough to read, listen and think, they could at least have saved themselves the utter disgrace, if not the great expense, that they imposed on the taxpayers of California. The settlements paid directly to the HAF and CAPEEM, while substantial, were small compared to the huge expenses incurred by the Board and the employers of those who allegedly (and very obviously) misguided the Board. No doubt there were internal repercussions.  The Board members who participated in these events have long-since been removed from the Board, I believe.

Perhaps you might also choose to read in time, one can only hope. In any event, here is my humble contribution, it is of course nowhere near the deep standards of scholarship that are no doubt prerequisite for the deliberations at your Workshop.

Satyam Eva Jayate.

http://narayanankomerath.wordpress.com/2013/04/05/scholarship-of-equine-posteriors-harvardappa-style-november-2006/

Of course, my article was just a ripple compared to what became eventually a tsunami of citizen outrage. I am sure you can find deeply academic treatises on the various issues, written about these events by others who are far more qualified than I am to write on the Vedas. All it will take is a few minutes on Google Search, which is a standard part of the due diligence that precedes all research and scholarship.

They however, share, and in most cases exceed, the outrage and dismay that I felt when I saw the arrogance of these entities, and the damage that they had been doing, and continue to try to do, to our children.

That, unfortunately, may be what this Workshop too will remind all those people - more support to undermine our children's education, this time coming from deep within the land where the knowledge of the Vedas have been preserved throughout the millennia. But I have already said enough. My deep apologies for the disturbance that I may have caused. 

Respectfully submitted

narayanan