Month: January 2023

Joseph of Cranganore was one among these Suriyani Christians who approached Cabral and travelled with him to Europe in 1501.

While preparing for his return from India, Pedro Alvarez Cabral was approached by an Indian with a strange request. “I am Joseph of Cranganoor, a merchant by profession,” he told Cabral, “Please take me to your land.” The Portuguese captain came to know that he was a Kerala Christian wanting to travel to the holy land. Joseph’s destination was not the Vatican or Jerusalem but Edessa in Syria, the sacred centre of the Suriyani Church. Joseph, probably unaware of the new sea route discovered by Vasco Da Gama, might have thought of getting a free ride to Hormuz, a major port on the earlier route. The Portuguese were aware of Christians’ existence in Kerala through the writings of travellers and the legend of St Thomas and Prester John. 

Walking on the streets of Kozhikode, the Portuguese sailors who landed in Kerala a few days back were confronted by an Alexandrian Jewish merchant who asked them, “Devil take you. What the hell are you doing here?” The Portuguese, perhaps trained by their captain Vasco Da Gama, had their answer ready: “We came looking for spices and Christians.” Soon they found that Arab merchants hoarded spices in vaults. They controlled the Samutiri, the local ruler. Most of the Christians resided in the southern region of the new-found land. When Cabral went to Kochi to “discover it”, some Christians showed up to discuss the spice business with the pale-looking new sailors in colourful dresses. The Portuguese weren’t convinced by their Christian credentials. The Portuguese travel record states: “In this country [gods own country], there are many Christians converted by St Thomas, whose apostolic life their priests follow with great devotion and strictness. They have churches where there is only the cross, and they celebrate mass with unleavened bread and wine made from raisins and water, as nothing else is available to them. All Christians go with their hair uncut and beard unshaved”. Indeed, the Kerala Christians or Suriyani [Syrian] Christians of the pre-colonial period had no similarity to the European Christians. First, they believed that nobody could be converted to Christianity as to be Christian, you have to be born to Christian parents, a practice followed even now. 

It is for sure that though the Portuguese were happy to see Christians in India, they were least pleased to realise that these Christians believed in what the Roman Church considered heresy. For the Portuguese, the true Christian accepted a true incarnation of Christ, the term “theotokos” for the Virgin Mother, but Suriyani Christians had no idea about this. These “self-claimed” Christians of Kerala did not use the Roman doctrine of the mass and had never heard of the Vatican or the Pope, let alone accepting the Pontifical authority. Their wedding ceremony resembled the Hindu, and churches looked like temples. Priests were happily married and used Suriyani [Aramaic] language for their services. Confused with these bearded characters who called themselves Christian, the Portuguese tried to convert them to Christianity again!

The legend of St. Thomas maintains that the Apostle landed near Musiris in 52 CE, converted a few families, and established seven churches. To quote Nicol Macnicol, “If it were possible to accept as historical the legend that is recorded in the apocryphal Acts of Judas Thomas (dated by Harnack in the 3rd Century CE), the Christian religion was first preached in India by the Apostle Thomas about 50 CE. Similarly, the Tradition preserved by the Syrian Christian Church in Travancore claims St. Thomas as its founder and dates arrival in India in the year 52 CE”. When one considers the trade route between East and West that might have passed through Jerusalem, an Apostle or Evangelist could have travelled East. St Jerome [342-420 CE] observes, “The Son of God was present to all places, with Thomas in India, Peter in Rome, Paul in Illyria…” 

Another literary reference from Britain points to the acceptance of St. Thomas as the Apostle of India. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle reads thus. “The Year 883, in the same year Singhelm and Athelstan conveyed to Rome the alms, which the King [King Alfred] had vowed to send hither, and also to India to St Thomas and St Bartholomew, when they sat down against the [Danish] army at London: and there, God be thanked, their prayer was very successful after that vow”. Andrian Fortescue provides us with further information about these alms as, “He [King Alfred] sent Singhelm, the Bishop of Shireburn with gifts. Singhelm came to Rome and then went on to the Malabar Coast. He made his offerings here and brought back from his long journey jewels and spices; strange to see an English Bishop in India in 883!!”  

It is still a mystery whether the Apostle Thomas himself or the descendants of the Church he established in Edessa had come to India. Another tradition proposes that 400 Christians belonging to seven clans from Baghdad, Nineveh and Jerusalem migrated to Kerala in 345 CE to escape the persecution of the Sassanid Emperor of Persia. “A merchant called Thomas Cannaneo or Thomas of Jerusalem drew the attention of the Edessan Church to this neglected outpost and caused to succour to be sent to it in the year 345”. In 522 CE an Alexandrian Monk, namely Cosmas Indicopleustes mentions a Christian Church in the port town of Kollam [Kalliana according to Cosmas ] in south Kerala. He also put on the record a Christian Bishop consecrated in Persia. Interestingly he is the first traveller who refers to the Suriyani Christians of Kerala. 

Joseph of Cranganore was one among these Suriyani Christians who approached Cabral and travelled with him to Europe in 1501. Joseph of Malabar, as he is known in some Portuguese documents, was no novice in foreign travel. We get to know he had travelled to Antioch in connection with the appointment of the Bishop of Malabar. Joseph has travelled further from Lisbon to Rome and got presented himself before the Pope.

In that case, he is definitely the first Indian who saw the Pieta of Michelangelo!!

Dr Jayaram Poduval

Department of Art History& Aesthetics

The Maharaja Sayajirao University of Baroda

Gujarat

jpoduval@gmail.com

newindianexpress.com

At the event, professor David Wilkins of the Harvard Law School will also have a conversation with the CJI.

Chief Justice of India D.Y. Chandrachud has been selected for the “Award for Global Leadership” by the Harvard Law School Center in recognition of his lifetime service to the legal profession in the country and around the world.

The award will be presented to him at an online event on January 11.

Chandrachud obtained an LLM degree and a Doctorate in Juridical Sciences (SJD) from the Harvard Law School in the United States.

At the event, professor David Wilkins of the Harvard Law School will also have a conversation with the CJI.

Justice Chandrachud, who was part of the apex court benches that delivered several landmark verdicts, including the Ayodhya land dispute case, was sworn in as the 50th CJI on November 9, 2022.

thehindu.com

India’s sales volume is expected to rise further with the inclusion of pending fourth-quarter sales figures for commercial vehicles.

India eclipsed Japan in auto sales last year, according to the latest industry data, making it the third-largest auto market for the first time, Nikkei Asia reported on Friday.

India’s sales of new vehicles totalled at least 4.25 million units, based on preliminary results, topping the 4.2 million sold in Japan. New vehicles delivered in India totalled 4.13 million between January and November 2022, according to the Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers. Adding December’s sales volume reported on Sunday by Maruti Suzuki, India’s largest carmaker, brings the total to roughly 4.25 million units.

India’s sales volume is expected to rise further with the inclusion of pending fourth-quarter sales figures for commercial vehicles, along with year-end results yet to be released by Tata Motors and other automakers, according to Nikkei Asia.

In 2021, China continued to lead the global auto market, with 26.27 million vehicles sold. The U.S. remained second at 15.4 million vehicles, followed by Japan at 4.44 million units. Nikkei Asia said India’s auto market has fluctuated in recent years. Roughly 4.4 million vehicles were sold in 2018, but volume dipped below 4 million units in 2019, due primarily to the credit crunch that hit the nonbank sector that year. When the Covid pandemic triggered a countrywide lockdown in 2020, vehicle sales plummeted further below the 3-million-unit mark. Sales recovered in 2021 to approach 4 million units, but the shortage of automotive chips weighed on growth.

Vehicles powered by gasoline, including hybrid vehicles, accounted for most of the new autos sold in India last year, Nikkei Asia said, adding that electric vehicles hardly have a presence. Autos for the Indian market are seen as having fewer semiconductors than those sold in advanced economies. According to Nikkei Asia, the easing of the automotive chip crunch in 2022 provided a springboard for recovery.

Along with Maruti Suzuki, Tata Motors and other Indian automakers saw sales growth last year. India is home to 1.4 billion people, and its population is expected to outstrip China sometime this year and continue growing until the early 2060s. Incomes are rising as well. Only 8.5% of Indian households owned a passenger vehicle in 2021, according to British research firm Euromonitor, meaning there is plenty of room for sales growth.

The government has started offering subsidies for EVs amid a trade deficit resulting from petroleum imports. In Japan, 4,201,321 vehicles were sold last year, down 5.6% from 2021, according to data from the Japan Automobile Dealers Association and the Japan Light Motor Vehicle and Motorcycle Association. Nikkei Asia said the omicron epidemic and the lockdowns in China greatly undercut production, leaving automakers unable to meet demand.

Japan’s auto sales peaked in 1990 at 7.77 million units, meaning sales have tumbled by nearly half from the all-time high, according to Nikkei Asia. And the country’s declining population offers little prospect for a significant recovery in sales in the foreseeable future. According to Nikkei Asia, China surged past Japan to become the second-largest auto market in 2006. In 2009, China overtook the U.S. to become the world’s largest market.

thehindu.com

The Sri Lankan government in May last year declared a debt default on over $51 billion in the foreign loan – a first in the country’s history.

India has handed 75 passenger buses to Sri Lanka as part of its assistance towards strengthening public transport infrastructure in the cash-strapped country.

As part of its ‘Neighbourhood First’ policy, India has extended multi-pronged assistance to Sri Lanka to help the country tide over its worst economic and humanitarian crisis since its independence from Great Britain in 1948.

“Supporting mobility and accessibility in Sri Lanka, High Commissioner handed over 75 buses for use by Transport Board. 500 buses are being supplied to Sri Lanka through Indian assistance towards strengthening public transport infrastructure,” the Indian High Commission said in a statement.

In a similar move, India handed 125 SUVs to the Sri Lanka Police under a line of credit in December to support the island nation and help it address the serious mobility restriction issues faced by the police, due to the non-availability of vehicles.

The Sri Lankan government in May last year declared a debt default on over $51 billion in the foreign loan – a first in the country’s history.

Extending a much-needed lifeline to a neighbour in need, India gave financial assistance of nearly $4 billion to Colombo during the year.  

In January, India announced a $900 million loan to Sri Lanka to build up its depleted foreign reserves as the financial crisis began to unfold.

Later, it offered a $500 million credit line to Sri Lanka to fund the country’s fuel purchases. The credit line was later expanded to $700 million due to the sheer gravity of the situation.

The Indian credit lines since early 2022 have been in use to import essentials and fuel after street protests erupted due to severe shortages of essentials.

thehindu.com

This will be India’s largest single unit of women peacekeepers in a U.N. mission since the deployment of the first-ever all women’s contingent in Liberia in 2007.

India is set to deploy an all-woman platoon of peacekeepers as part of a battalion to the United Nations Interim Security Force in Abyei (on the border between South Sudan and Sudan), which will be India’s largest single unit of women peacekeepers in a U.N. mission since the deployment of the first-ever all women’s contingent in Liberia in 2007, according to India’s Permanent Mission to the United Nations in New York.

India is one of the largest troop-contributing nations to the U.N. peacekeeping missions.

“Proud to see this. India has a tradition of active participation in U.N. peacekeeping missions. The participation by our Nari Shakti is even more gladdening,” Prime Minister Narendra Modi said on Twitter.

Explained | What is the U.N. Peacekeeping mission?

The Indian contingent, comprising of two officers and 25 other ranks, will form part of an engagement platoon and specialise in community outreach, though they will be performing extensive security-related tasks as well, the Indian mission said in a statement. “Their presence will be especially welcome in Abyei, where a recent spurt in violence has triggered a spate of challenging humanitarian concerns for women and children in the conflict zone,” the statement added.

The team will provide relief and assistance to women and children in one of the most challenging terrain conditions under the U.N. flag, the Indian Army said on social media.

Women peacekeepers are highly regarded in peacekeeping missions throughout the world for their ability to reach out and connect with women and children in local populations, especially victims of sexual violence in conflict zones, the statement said.

thehindu.com

Science enthusiasts around the world love to process the raw images taken by The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA)’s spacecraft on various missions.

Science enthusiasts around the world love to process the raw images taken by The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA)’s spacecraft on various missions. It’s a passion for many. Some of their processed works even get recognition by the US space agency. Navaneeth Krishnan, a native of Angamaly won the recognition when NASA published four images of its Jupiter Missionthat he processed. 

An editor at the Kerala State Institute of Children’s Literature, Thiruvananthapuram, Navaneeth recently processed the image of the Northern Cyclones on Jupiter taken from JunoCam, the public engagement camera aboard NASA’s Juno spacecraft. NASA also gave credit to Navaneeth for enhancing the colour and contrast of the image.

“NASA’s Juno spacecraft has been making rotations around Jupiter and providing raw images for years. It is the Southwest Research Institute that publishes these raw images which are further processed by various citizen scientists. Every time an image is published by NASA, scores of people from across the globe download it as part of the public engagement project and process it. This is the fourth time that NASA is publishing an image that I processed. I am extremely happy that NASA is recognising my efforts,” says Navaneeth.  

The latest image he worked on a cyclone on the northernmost region of Jupiter, perched near the gas giant’s north pole, was taken on September 29, 2022. While publishing the image in December, NASA said, “Jupiter has eight circumpolar cyclones, and four are visible in this image, framing the northernmost cyclone. 

A small anticyclone (which spins counterclockwise) has wedged its way in just above the northernmost cyclone. The image was acquired on Juno’s 45th pass of Jupiter from an altitude of 17,248 miles and shows features as small as 11.6 miles across. Citizen scientist Navaneeth Krishnan S processed the images to enhance the colour and contrast.” 

Navaneeth has completed his PG in Physics and has always been passionate about astrophysics. 
“I use Photoshop and other softwares like G’MIC-QT and GIMP to process the raw images. So far, I have processed 300 images, of which four images have been published. Processing these can contribute to more discoveries in future,” says Navaneeth.

The frst image processed by Navaneeth that got published was one of Jupiter’s South temperate belt and the Great Red Spot. The second was of Europa taken on September 29 in 2022 at an altitude of around 1,500km. An image of a storm titled ‘Oval BA’ in Jupiter was also processed by him and published by the agency.  

There is no monetary aspect involved in this process in which many space enthusiasts participate.  Navaneeth is also part of the Aastro Kerala Organisation along with many science enthusiasts of all ages, from children to adults.

newindianexpress.com

Chouhan serves as an officer Corps in the Corps of Electronics and Mechanical Engineers.

Captain Shiva Chouhan, an officer from the Corps of Electronics and Mechanical Engineers, became the first woman officer to be operationally deployed at Kumar Post in the Siachen Glacier, which is located at an altitude of 15,632 feet.

“Capt. Shiva Chouhan of Fire and Fury Sappers became the first woman officer to be operationally deployed in Kumar Post, post completion of arduous training, at the highest battlefield of the world Siachen,” the Army’s Leh-based 14 Corps said on Twitter.

Capt. Chouhan from Rajasthan is a Bengal Sapper Officer commissioned in May 2021. She got inducted to the Siachen Glacier on January 2. The team of Sappers led by her will be responsible for numerous combat engineering tasks and will be deployed at the post for a duration of three months, the Army said, adding she had undergone a month’s training at the Siachen Battle School along with other personnel.

She has done her schooling from Udaipur and holds a bachelor’s degree in Civil Engineering from NJR Institute of Technology, Udaipur.

Kumar Post and ‘Operation Meghdoot’

Kumar Post is named after late Colonel Narinder ‘Bull’ Kumar (retd.), who was instrumental in the Indian Army launching ‘Operation Meghdoot’ and securing the dominating heights of Siachen Glacier in 1984.

On April 13, 1984, India launched ‘Operation Meghdoot’ to capture the 76.4 km-long glacier on the Saltoro ridge. A platoon of 4 Kumaon Regiment led by then Captain Sanjay Kulkarni planted the Indian flag at Bilafond La. The operation on the world’s highest battlefield continues till date, making it the longest continuing operation of its kind in the world. In his honour, the battalion headquarters on the glacier has been named ‘Kumar Post’.

thehindu.com

Guyana President Mohamed Irfaan Ali and renowned Canadian scientist Dr Vaikuntam Iyer Lakshmanan are among 27 recipients of the 2023 Pravasi Bharatiya Samman Award — the highest honour conferred on overseas Indians.

The award will be conferred by President Droupadi Murmu as part of the Pravasi Bharatiya Divas Convention, which will be held from January 8-10 in Indore.

Born to an Indo-Guyanese Muslim family, Ali took oath as Presiden in August 2020.

He will also be the chief guest at the 17th Pravasi Bharatiya Divas Convention.

Polish businessman from Goa Amit Kailash Chandra Lath, 45, who helped in the evacuation of Indian students from Ukraine into Poland when war with Russia broke out, is also a recipient of the award.

Scientist and innovator Dr Vaikuntam Iyer Lakshmanan, who moved to Canada in 1974, channeled his passion for community service through supporting organizations like Indo-Canada Chamber of Commerce and Canada-India Business Council.

He has sponsored clean drinking water systems and a mobile hospital in rural India, and received the Lifetime Achievement Award from Indo-Canadian Chamber of Commerce in 2019.

Among other recipients are FedEx Corporation CEO Rajesh Subramaniam, Australian economist Chennupati Jagadish, and Israel-based chef Reena Vinod Pushkarna.

“A Jury-cum-Awards Committee, with Vice-President as the Chairman and External Affairs Minister as the Vice-Chair and other distinguished members from various walks of life considered the nominations… and unanimously selected the awardees,” a Ministry of External Affairs statement read.

daijiworld.com