If any
of my readers happens to visit my home town Pune in India, the first
thing he/she would notice on arrival, would be the 3 wheeler, black
and yellow coloured taxis, plying on the roads. If the visitor is
more curious and looks carefully at these taxis, often called as
'Rickshaws,' he would not fail to notice a cotton thread with a
string of a lemon and few green chillies, hung from the body of the
vehicle almost grazing the road.
This
would be his first view of deep rooted blind faith system of the
Indian masses in black magic, superstition and occult practices as
this lemon-chilli string is supposed to ward off evil thoughts of
enemies of that taxi owner and any attempts of black magic done on
him. Traditionally, Indians are ridden with age old beliefs and
faiths that are almost impossible to get rid off. Besides black
magic, most believe in an ancient cult, which believes that the
design of a dwelling and the way things( furniture, beds) are
arranged in it, has an effect on the future of that person and
whether he would find happiness in the house or face perils. His
future in short, is dependent on design of his dwelling.
There
have been many crusaders, who have given their lifetimes to this
cause of eradication of age old beliefs and faiths in the Indian
society. One such crusader of our times, who stands out, was Dr.
Dabholkar. Sadly, he was shot and killed on 20 August 2013, by some
still unknown assassins, obviously hating him for his fight with
black magic. Dr. Dabholkar was a rationalist, atheist and a social
worker. His greatest achievement was setting up in 1989, an
organization that fought for eradication of superstition and created
an army of followers who staunchly believe in his ideas.
In
2010, DR. Dabholkar made several failed attempts to get an
anti-superstition law, enacted in the Indian state of Maharashtra. It
was met with political opposition, which said that it would adversely
affect Hindu culture, customs and traditions. Dr. Dabholkar had
clarified that in the whole of the proposed law, there was not a
single word about God or religion. The Indian constitution allows
freedom of worship and nobody can take that away, this was about
fraudulent and exploitative practices. Only after his death,the
Maharashtra Cabinet cleared the Anti-Superstition and Black Magic
Ordinance, however the state parliament would still need to support
the bill for it to become the law.
In
2009, Dr. Dabholkar, along with an eminent astrophysicist, Dr. Jayant
Narlikar and few others, carried out a statistical experiment that is
little known. The results were published in the issue of the magazine
'Current
Science' in March 2009.
This study relates to a traditional practice in India of preparing a
horoscope for a person. Horoscope is a cellular table, drawn on
paper. Each of the real and imaginary planets are assigned a
particular cell in this table, this assignment of the planets to a
particular table relates to the planetary positions in the sky at the
time of the birth of that person or at some other point in time. It
is believed that the personal qualities, characteristics and his
actions in future are all decided and controlled by his/her
horoscope. It is also believed that the horoscope can tell whether a
day or a period of time would be beneficial or favourable to a person
or would bring doom to him.
Unfortunately
many learned and otherwise rational people, including politicians,
senior bureaucrats and decision makers,blindly believe in this
horoscope that they would not take any crucial decisions unless
their horoscope dictates that the time is favourable to them. Such
believers would not consider marrying their children to a suitable
boy or a girl unless their horoscopes have a so called match.
Coming
back to the statistical experiment done by Dr. Narlikar and Dr.
Dabholkar, I quote from the abstract of the report:
“This
paper describes a recent test conducted in Maharashtra to test the
predictive power of natal astrology. It involved collecting 200 birth
details of 100 bright school students (group A) and 100 mentally
retarded school students (group B). These details were used to cast
horoscopes or birth charts for these children. After recording these
details the charts were mixed and randomized and astrologers were
invited to participate in a test of their predictive ability.
Fifty-one astrologers participated in the test. Each participant was
sent a random set of 40 birth charts and asked to identify to which
group each chart corresponded. Among the initial 51 participants, 27
sent back their assessment. Statistical
analysis of the results showed a success rate marginally less than
what would be achieved by tossing a coin.
The full sample of 200 birth charts was given to the representatives
of an astrology institute for identification. They also did not fare
any better. The
limited but unambiguous procedure of this test leaves no doubt that
astrology does not have any predictive power as far as academic
ability is concerned. Ways
of extending the scope of this test are discussed for future
experiments.”
Unfortunately,
superstition, blind faith and belief is such an integral part of the
mental frame up of Indians that no rational thinking helps. I read a
news item today itself, that when India's Mars spacecraft was moved
from the manufacturing plant in Bengaluru city to the rocket launch
pad on east coast of India, Rocket and space scientists dealing with
cutting edge space technologies, performed a religious “Pooja” or
a worshiping ritual for the spacecraft, before it actually left for
the road. With this kind of mentalities prevalent in the society, one
can well imagine the obstacles and difficulties, Dr. Dabholkar must
have faced in his mission to eradicate superstition.
Dr.
Narlikar, who was the co- experimenter, in above mentioned
experiment, has recently come out with some startling facts about
Astrology itself. He says:
"In
the Vedic era, there was never a seven-days-a-week concept.
Similarly, astrologers were also not known at the time. They came
later, when Alexander came to India and brought several of them along
with him. They stayed back after he left India. Indians carried
forward astrology." He adds that people should first test the
credibility of the predictions made by the astrologers by using the
yardstick of statistics and scientific approach and matching
horoscopes by astrologers and the predictions made by them is not
accurate and hence people should not depend on them.
Unfortunately,
not many would believe him. That is the sad part of the whole story.
4th
October 2013
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