Under
the guidance of the founder convenor and the Patron Shri B. Premanand
& the President of FIRA Prof. Narendra Nayak , MANS & B.J.S.College
Pune organized FIRA’s Sixth National Conference on April 27th &
28th 2007 in Pune which was attended by around 400 delegates from all
over the country.
On the
first day in the inaugural function Dr. G. Vijayam was the chief guest.
While addressing the delegates he said “we can bring the social change
in the society by using the medium of education and not by force”.
The theme of the conference was explained by Prof. Narendra Nayak the
president of FIRA. One of the point he made in his speech was that in
future we will have to launch a nationwide awareness campaign against
modern spiritual godmen promoting pseudo sciences like Pranayam, Vaastu,
Astrology alternative medicine etc. Dr. Narendra Dabholkar in his introductory
speech expressed his feelings against the media, education system and
government departments for not promoting scientific temper which is
one of the fundamental duty as per the constitution of India. Mr. N.
D. Patil in his presidential address expressed his disappointment against
the government of Maharashtra for adopting delaying tactics for passing
‘Anti-superstition Act of Maharashtra’bill which is pending in the
assembly since long. Dr. Rajendra Kankariya proposed vote of thanks.
First
session of the conference was addressed by Dr. Jayant Naralikar, eminent
scientist. He spoke on scientific temperament in his usual lucid humorous
style followed by interesting question answer session with the delegates.
Second
session of the first day found FIRA member associations presenting reports
of the activities carried out by their organisations in the past, their
activities at present & their plans for the future for promoting
rationalism. In the same session FIRA’s executive committee for the
next three years was elected with Prof. Narendra Nayak as the president.
Third session of the day ended with wonderful presentation of so called
miracles by few participants.
Saturday
28th
April, the first session was on the role of media, government and education
on promotion of rationalism. The resource persons were Mr. Anand Agashe,
senior journalist of daily Sakal, Mr. Sameeran Valvekar, director, EMRC,
University of Pune and Dr. D. D. Bandisthe, Ex-Professor of Philosophy,
Indore. Anand Agashe advised not to expect much from media for promoting
rationalism as media has become totally commercial and instead the activists
should try alternate mediums for promoting rationalism like mobiles
and internet. Mr. Sameeran also spoke on the same lines adding that
the channels are running by exploiting the sentiments of the viewers
& thus it has become a big business in the name of entertainment.
Dr. Bandisthe appealed to the delegates not to get disheartened by what
is going on in the country, but to carry on their mission of promoting
rationalism consistently with a positive approach.
Next session
on the second day was on secularism. Dr. K. Veermani, President, Dravida
Kazhagam Tamil Nadu could not attend so his speech was read by his representative.
One of the points made in his speech was there was no place for religion
in primitive man’s life, religions came later on in human culture
& thus hampering the progress of human
being. The other resource person was Dr. Yeshwant Sumant Prof. Dept.
of Politics, University of Pune. One interesting point he made in his
speech was about different ideas of secularism in the Indian politics
on which he spoke in detail. He divides those ideas in four models:
1. Pandit
Nehru and secularism,
2. Thought
process of Barrister Jinnah and Savarkar,
3. Indira
Gandhi’s model of secularism,
4. Mahatma
Gandhi’s views.
Third
session of the day was on modern spiritual godmen. This was presided
by founder convenor & Patron of FIRA Mr. B. Premanand, who in spite
of his serious illness attended this conference, which was very inspiring
for the delegates and also expressed his views.While addressing the
delegates he made an interesting observation, he said after Satya Saibaba,
no godmen have dared to claim themselves as avatars of god. And this
is the victory of consistent campaign against Satya Saibaba started
by him. In that session he was felicitated by Maharashtra Andhashraddha
Nirmulan Samiti on behalf of FIRA. Dr. D. B. Parikh, former VC of South
Gujarat University, spoke in detail about the reasons which attract
people to these godmen. Dr. Narendra Nayak also gave a PowerPoint presentation
with explanation on modern day godmen.
Fourth
session of the day, In this session Dr. Rajendra Kankariya expressed
his views about anti-superstition act of Maharashtra bill which is pending
in the assembly. FIRA’s executives announced that they will try to
implement this type of bill in all the states of India through their
affiliated organizations.
In the
next session Mr. U. Kalanathan, National Secretary, briefed the delegates
about ‘the Separation of Religion from Politics’ bill which was
presented to the MPs and which FIRA is trying to get it made into a
law.
Valedictory
function,
Dr. Shriram
Lagoo, senior rationalist and eminent cine-artist, and Dr. Narendra
Jadhav VC of Pune University were the chief guests. Mr. P. C. Nahar,
President, BJS, felicitated the newly elected executive members of FIRA
and welcomed the chief guests. Dr. Rajendra Kankariya narrated in brief
the things discussed in the two days conference.
Dr. Lagoo
in his speech appealed to the delegates to completely eradicate the
concept of god from their minds. Dr. Jadhav spoke about the importance
of educational fields for promoting rationalism and we should try to
use that medium. He said that constitution should be introduced as a
part of educational curriculum. In his presidential address Dr. Narendra
Nayak said that we are forced to challenge these godmen because they
claim that they have supernatural powers and he feels that there is
nothing wrong in exposing them. Mr. Premanand was felicitated by MANS
by offering him Scroll Of Honour.
Mr. Kalanathan proposed
the vote of thanks.
We thank
Dr. Kankariya and his team for excellent arrangements made for the delegates
in spite of power and water shortage.
R.G.RAO alias SOMU
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