Ganeshotsav-A nightmare.

Hindus celebrated Ganeshotsav last month. The festival of joy,blessings and celebrations, not to mention the festival of polluting sea and rivers,endangering sea life,traffic congestion,illegal road blocks, intoxication of paints and noise pollution.

Lord Ganesh is known as the Vighnaharta-Vanquisher of obstacles, on the other hand, the devotees think that it is okay to create obstacles for others to celebrate the festival of their Vighnaharta lord. What an irony!

The Mumbai High Court, has ruled that you don't have the right to worship idols in public places while the Supreme Court guidelines say that loudspeakers should not be played after 10pm. But still you can see pandals blocking roads everywhere-in Mumbai, 49 roads are completely closed, 55 are opened for one-way traffic and 99 are marked as no-parking zones  and these are just official numbers. For the city already having much traffic issues, festivals like Ganeshotsav are simply nightmares not to mention, devotees creating nuisance with loudspeakers after 10 and even after midnight. Public simply don't give a damn to any laws here, they simply make fun of it. They don't even care about silence zones and hospitals. Because in India, everything is fair in the name of God! No rules or laws apply when it comes to God.

Traditionally, clay was used to make Ganesh idols. Over the years however, plaster of Paris (POP), which is lighter and cheaper, has become the favoured material. POP contains gypsum,lime,sulphate and other harmful chemicals. The dyes used to colour these idols contain mercury, arsenic, lead, and carbon. Plastic and thermocol accessories are used to decorate these idols which are hazardous for the sea, rivers and even for marine creatures. Also throwing flowers, leaves along with plastic bags worsens the situation.

There is a solution to this environmental hazard. People need to avoid the use of idols made from POP. Always go for those made of unbaked natural clay, natural fibre, or even recycled paper. Today, many volunteer organisations make and sell these eco-friendly idols and encourage people to use them. But devotees want their idols to be big and fancy (to compete with others-no words to describe how stupid is that!) so they don't use eco-friendly idols. Again not caring about environment and the world we live in. Did Lord Ganesha (assuming he existed) tell you to pollute environment and put others and the world in danger in order to compete or to show off? The behavior and mentality of the devotees is completely pathetic and foolish ofcourse! As I live in a riverside I can see remains of Ganesha idols drifting ashore the Tapi river for days after immersion. So after they bid adieu to their holy ganesh idols, devotees left them to be disposed of like garbage! And then these same hypocrites file various cases related to disrespect of God!

The problems don't end here. Releasing drinking water from dams for Lord Ganesha idols' immersion is another major problem.The matter is more serious in view of the dying rivers in Pune and the storage levels of various dams and reservoirs which could create a war-like water shortage situation affecting general public, agriculture, industry and animals at large and on the other hand in Pune, around 0.1 tmc water, equivalent to four days' supply for the entire Pune city, is released on 2 major days.No discharge of water from the dam, meant for drinking purposes, should be permitted for immersions.People should make use of the artificial immersion sites created by the authorities for the religious activities. This will prevent wastage of scarce drinking water in such critical times. But once again, very few follow this. On the contrary, a spiritual organization Sanatan Sanstha, on its website and Facebook page, said, ‘Because of the regular prayers offered to the Ganesh idol, the idol turns pure, and hence when this idol is immersed in the water body, the water becomes pure too. Because of the flowing water in the water body, the purity of the idol also flows to several places.’ This is absolutely disgusting even on the theistic level.

Faith should always be practised in peaceful and non-disruptive manner. If you are celebrating or doing a gathering and preaching, do it in a manner which does not effect the lives of others and most importantly does not harm the world we live in.

Kill bloggers, prove your faith!

2 days ago I received a notification from my TOI app ”Another secular blogger hacked to death in Bangladesh-fourth this year”

I was numb for a moment, a little inevitable anger as that was the fourth time in this year when I was about to read how an innocent blogger was killed by bunch of  blind fool religious clowns.40 years old Niloy Chakrabarty Neel was known for his atheistic views and killed by assailants with machetes inside his fifth-floor flat at North Gorhan in the capital Dhaka.

It all actually started in 2013,when a fundamentalists group published a list of 84 intellectuals and free thinkers to be “reduced to silence” and since then total nine of them have been killed, four of them in the past six months.No critic of fanatic Islam is safe in Bangladesh. The moment you start voicing your opinion and in case they are critical of Islam, your life is in danger.

This is exactly what  happens when your belief system is based on zero evidence and has to rely on faith. People who come along and question it, scary the bejesus out of them, and because of this fear, which they can not manage, they resort to base instinct of killing the problem. Mohammad the prophet of  Islam, did this exact same thing, those who questioned his rules and belief system, he had them killed in barbaric manners. So anyone saying that these killers are not true Muslims, they are just religious fanatics who chose the wrong path, are mistaken, they are devote followers of Islam and Mohammed.

Quran (2:191)
And slay them wherever ye find them, and drive them out of the places whence they drove you out, for persecution is worse than slaughter. And fight not with them at the Inviolable Place of Worship until they first attack you there, but if they attack you (there) then slay them. Such is the reward of disbelievers.

The cowardice of religion is shown in the way it responds to criticism. These radicals just can’t think beyond what they’re taught or what they believe in. They can’t think beyond what they are. They’ve apparently taken the law and order in their hands in following their religion! Recently ISIS executed 19 women because of their refusal to participate in the practice of sexual Jihad. I say it’s time when we have to realize that killing is not a sin and filthy pigs like these need to be killed.

Whom to blame in the end?
Some say as always that it has nothing to do with religion..it’s just bunch of followers choosing the wrong path. This is what I hear and read every time when something like this happens.”Religions and gods have nothing to do with these evil things. Religion is all about peace.” I seriously pity those who are still living in this delusion..

But we all know religions can never exist peacefully and in the end we will all come to realize that religions are the root of all evils.. Obviously some of  us have already realized and we call ourselves atheists but I think in some nations, it is dangerous now to call yourself an atheist. And you thought coming out as gay for you was hard? Try being an atheist!

But no matter how hard it is, no matter how dangerous it is, we are atheists by our choice and we will not fall back. We will not wait for something to happen, we won’t do candle marches because it’s worthless! If they think they are above law and order or anything in the name of humanity and ethics, there has to be someone to show them the right way, to educate their brainwashed minds if possible! We atheist have to do this job because we are the sympathizers of the better world of tomorrow.

Humans can be killed, not their ideas! These types of  incidents will only strengthen the growth of atheism in the world! “Break one, thousand will rise” Youth need to realize this. You need to realize this! You all are brainwashed! You have to understand what religions and these delusions of god have been causing in this world. At this rate we will never find peace and there will be never ending news of  killings of innocent bloggers and women on television. And to all religious extremists, with all these killings, you only keep justifying our theory: "Religions are the root of all evils".

Sad to see the voices of truth and sanity being muzzled. We will not let your spirit die.
Thank you,
Niloy.