DailyOh! How long does reciting Hanuman Chalisa take to why terrorist is Word Of The Day
Arvind Kejriwal just had to recite the Hanuman Chalisa. How long do you think it takes to recite the Hanuman Chalisa?
Hey there,
It's Tuesday. Some say it is the worst day of the entire week. Your Monday blues have intensified, and Friyay is still three days away. It's not even midweek yet. But anyway. This Tuesday, we are listening to barb after barb flying in Delhi, where political parties are campaigning before we dive into the elections. They are on February 8, by the way.
Now, like it is with every election in this massive country of ours, tempers are all over the place and words are being hurled at each other. One of those words that Delhi Chief Minister and Chief Ministerial candidate for the 2020 elections Arvind Kejriwal was recently called is 'terrorist'. Who called Kejriwal a terrorist? First, BJP MP Parvesh Verma. Then Union minister for information and broadcasting Prakash Javadekar added his own info to it and threw a taunt at Kejriwal. Javadekar said there is not much difference between anarchist and terrorist, and since Kejriwal has himself said he is an anarchist, ergo, he is a terrorist. QED.
Does terrorist really mean an anarchist? Well, this is why terrorist is our Word Of The Day. Technically, the dictionary definition of a terrorist is someone who uses violent action, or threats of violent action, for political purposes. Should we even go into 'threats of violent action' (hello, Anurag Thakur, ring a bell?)? Last we heard, Arvind Kejriwal wasn't really heard threatening anyone with any violent action. Neither has he used violent action for political purposes. An anarchist doesn't believe in a government or an authority or any rule, so to say. A terrorist believes in their kind of rule, and in order to achieve the end, uses violence as means. That way, Kejriwal might be an anarchist, but a terrorist? Nope.
Elections are quite high on the entertainment factor this time around. Kejriwal also had to recite the Hanuman Chalisa just yesterday. He was answering a journalist, who asked if he visited Hanuman mandir. Kejriwal said he was Hanumanji ka kattar bhakt, and went on to recite the Hanuman Chalisa to prove that he was not 'anti-Hindu' as the BJP had been claiming.
Elections in India: “हनुमान जी का कट्टर भक्त हु मैं।”Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal recites the Hanuman Chalisa - responding to BJP calling him ‘Anti-Hindu’. #DelhiElections #AgendaDelhi pic.twitter.com/biJsnhJuAL
— Zeba Warsi (@Zebaism) February 3, 2020
But that got us wondering, how long does it take to recite the Hanuman Chalisa? Turns out, if you know the Chalisa by heart, it should take you about 3 minutes to complete one round.
If you're a kattar Hanuman bhakt like our Delhi CM here and need to recite the Chalisa 108 times, do you know how long it would take you? Let's do a quick calculation. 3 x 108 minutes. That's 324 minutes. That's just about 5.5 hours. In short, the duration you would have to spend if you watch Gangs of Wasseypur 1 and 2 without a break.
Now speaking of watching films, have you seen this Japanese girl who has watched Satyajit Ray's Pather Panchali? (Have you seen the film? Here's the film, if you haven't.) Now that film was how the West first got to know that we, Indians, also made films (back then, even better than them). The girl we are talking of speaks Bangla more flawlessly than a lot of Bengalis you know. See the video before we take you further.
This took us back to the relation Bengal once shared with Japan. You must know that Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose started his Azad Hind Fauj in Singapore in 1942 to assist the Japanese Imperial Army. Bose and the Japanese were good friends, because both had a common enemy: the British. If you're more interested in the Azad Hind Fauj, you can watch The Forgotten Army on Amazon Prime.
In 2016, Bengal also gave Japan their Miss World. In a way. Priyanka Yoshikawa won the pageant that year. That first name must tell you that this girl too is a Desi Girl. Well, Priyanka's full name is Priyanka Yoshikawa Ghosh. She winning the pageant stirred up a storm in Japan. It was the first time a 'hafu' - a person with a non-Japanese parent - had won the crown. A little bit of digging up her Bengali roots made us stumble upon this too: Priyanka's great-grandfather was the first Chief Minister of West Bengal, Prafulla Chandra Ghosh!
View this post on InstagramIncredible !ndia ???????????????????? #PriyankaYoshikawa #ootd #India #Embassy #Missworld #吉川プリアンカ
A post shared by Priyanka Yoshikawa (@priyankayoshikawa) on
Since we're talking of Bengal, you know one of the major festivals in the region is Saraswati Puja. Saraswati, the Hindu goddess of learning, holds all of Bengal in reverence and fear. Fear? Why? Well, kids in Bengal are told not to read anything - and by anything, we mean even calendars in Bengali households are turned over the previous night to ensure no one accidentally reads anything. That one day, the usually 'study-study-study' Bong parents keep their kids from studying out of respect for Saraswati. If you don't follow the instructions, she will make you flunk your exams. Now, in Bengal, there's no greater fear than failing exams, what else!
We are discussing Saraswati Puja because of Mohammad Shami. Shami posted this picture of his daughter, dressed in the signature Saraswati Puja saree, and got massively trolled by kattar Islamists.
View this post on InstagramLooking so sweet beta love you so much ????????❤️❤️❤️❤️god bless you beta see you soon ????????
A post shared by Mohammad Shami , محمد الشامي (@mdshami.11) on
These trolls believe that as a Muslim, Shami shouldn't have allowed his daughter to take part in the Saraswati Puja celebrations. Well, these people will be quite disappointed to learn of this school in Allahabad's (now Prayagraj) Mohatsim Ganj, where the Saraswati Puja is 25 years old and is celebrated by both Hindus and Muslims; in fact, everyone in the locality, with much enthusiasm.
When the azaan plays at the nearby masjid, the Saraswati Puja celebrations are temporarily suspended. They resume once the azaan is over. The respect for each other's religions is intact in this place despite what social media might have you believe what humans are up to these days.
But what humans have been up to for long, is taking over forests and stamping civilisation over them. Now, this is not without side-effects, right? You know of wild animals straying into human-dominated areas. Just yesterday, a leopard got into Udaipur's famous City Palace and gave the tourists there a real scare (not sure if they resorted to chanting the Hanuman Chalisa, but well) till the forest officials reached the spot. The officials had to sit there and wait for 20 hours till our Mr Spots here decided to show himself. But have you ever wondered why there are so many instances of leopards straying into homes, hotels and human areas?
The answer is in tigers. Leopards and tigers don't really get along too well. So the places where there's a considerable tiger population, leopards choose to stay a bit afar. The leopard habitat usually falls between habitats with high density of tigers and cultivated village lands. Now, humans are scared of leopards. Leopards might not know that, but pretty sure we do all we can to make it known to them how scared we are of them. If only leopards understood the Hanuman Chalisa!
Incidentally, today is Tuesday. The day when Hanuman bhakts go to Hanuman temples and recite the Chalisa.
We leave you with that. See you tomorrow!