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From: Bhamy Shenoy <bhamysuman@hotmail.com>
Date: Thu, Mar 20, 2008 at 5:15 PM
Subject: Rejoinder
by AOL to my article published in Houston
To: Vikram Muthanna <vikrammuthanna@hotmail.com>
Cc: Star of Mysore Editor <voice@starofmysore.com>
Dear Vikram,
You may
remember India Herald from Houston. They had published
my article on
AOL and just recently they sent the following rejoinder. It is interesting
that they sent an official rejoinder to US based news paper, but not
to India based one like Star of Mysore which has far more readership.
You will see my comments in italics.
Regards
Bhamy
Letter:
Art of Living sets record straight
Dear Sir or Madam,
We are
writing to express our disappointment to see that your newspaper has
published Dr Bhamy Shenoy’s extremely biased view of the All India
NGO Summit for Protection of Environment and Access to Social Justice
hosted by the Art of Living Foundation. More than 500 delegates from
civil society organizations all over India attended the conference and
this letter was one participant’s distorted viewpoint.
We would
like to address some of the baseless allegations that Mr. Shenoy has
leveled against us. Mr. Shenoy alleges that the conference was a failure.
Quite contrarily, we have received very positive feedback and testimonials
from several delegates and many of them have already expressed their
keenness to work with the Art of Living to implement the agenda set
by the conference. (I do not expect any different reaction from
devotees and admirers of AOL)
Mr. Shenoy
claims that Dr. Ananth Nadkarni, Vice President, The Tata Council for
Community Initiatives, left the conference after the inauguration. In
reality, Dr. Nadkarni stayed for all the three days of the conference
and TCCI is working out the modalities to partner with the Art of Living
Foundation in rural development. (It was Dr. Nadakarni who was using
the choicest words to express his total disappointment. He was complaining
because of his heart problem, it would be
difficult for him to go up and down the campus. After a lot of complaint
and paying more he succeeded in getting a single room. He told me that
he had called his office to come and collect him early and he would
not stay for the whole conference. Did he change his mind? I do not
know.) Dr Pachauri, noble laureate who was scheduled to speak at
the conference could not come and had sent a video message for the conference.
Another speaker Mr Bahuguna could not make it due to health issues as
he was admitted to a hospital. (Why the organizers did not announce
the reasons for the absence of these four speakers? Even now there is
some explanation for just two. What happened to Dr. Khosla and Dr. Sarabhai?)
Mr. Shenoy’s
prejudice is clear from his own admission that he left the conference
immediately after the inaugural session. We find it interesting that
he claims that the three-day conference was a failure – when he was
only present for a few hours in the
beginning. Its also interesting that he is making such a big fuss about
washing his own plates when he claims to represent an NGO. (Should
I wash dishes after paying Rs. 5000? For washing dishes they refer to
my NGO status. How many NGOs in India can afford to shell out Rs. 5000?)
Development
can only be sustained in an atmosphere of cordiality and respect –
this fact has been reiterated at several forums around the world. Mr.
Shenoy’s attitude and irreverence towards the speakers at the conference
is shocking. Deriding them for expressing their respect for Sri Sri
and his work further exposes Mr. Shenoy’s ignorance of the magnitude
of service projects that have been inspired by Sri Sri.
Without
researching the Foundation’s work in environmental programs, Mr Shenoy
intentionally quotes Sri Sri’s words on global warming totally out
of context. Sri Sri never implied that global warming was not a serious
problem. He was just making the point that while trying to tackle the
problem of global warming, it is not helpful to create a fear psychosis.
(Comparing Y2K to Global Warming and explaining how no catastrophe
took place as a result of Y2K does not sound like trying to avoid fear
psychosis. It was because of the huge investment that was made to avoid
the problems of Y2K, problems were avoided. No such statement was made)
That Mr. Shenoy had come to the conference with a biased and closed
mind is evident. When our organizing team approached him to address
his concern, he refused to speak to them.
It is
surprising that an esteemed newspaper like yours would choose to publish
such a poorly researched story while his own publication that Mr Shenoy
represented at the conference (for which he is the chief editor) refused
to carry his false propaganda against the Art of Living Foundation and
its founder. (In fact since then I have offered my resignation to
Catalyst)
Dr. Richa Chopra,
Director
All India NGO Summit
for Protection of Environment and Access to Social Justice — Bangalore,
India.
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