Iranian Scholars Attend Indic Conference

12-22-2005, 05:58 PM

Five Iranian scholars presented some of the most thoughtful papers
on issues related to culture, religion and mysticism making a
omparative study between Islam, Hinduism and Buddhism, which were
highly appreciated by those present in the panel.

New Delhi, Dec 22, IRNA
India-CSDS-Indic Civilization
Madhu Purnima Kishwar, a senior fellow at the Center for the Study
of Developing Societies (CSDS) and editor of Manushi (a journal of
women and society) in an exclusive interview with IRNA spoke about
the objectives of CSDS in organizing the Second International
Conference on Religions and Cultures in the Indic Civilization.

She said, "The intention to organize this int'l conference was to
promote an academic and scholarly interest in the Indic civilization
and heritage because we in our modern education system partly due to
our colonial past have continued to ignore our cultural and
civilizational heritage and faith system, so much so that most of us
have a very distorted idea about our sense of historical past.

"This also makes us very slavishly pro-west because we do not look
towards other cultures, societies and civilizations with which we
have an intrinsic connection like the entire Asian civilizations
namely, Persian civilization of Iran, China, Bali, Mesopotamia, and
Egypt as well."
These civilizations, Madhu added, are far more connected to that of
this country that is, "Indus Valley" and "Harappan" civilizations
and share many common features with each other.

The Indian editor continued, "Regretfully, we the inheritors of
these deeply enriched civilizations do not recognize ourselves and
our identity with them. What we have been doing till today is to
look towards west and get inspiration from strange cultures and
civilizations of unknown planets of America (with no historical
civilization) and Europe, simply, because we do not have real sense
of our heritage and history and do not intend to believe in
ourselves.

"So, our intention of this interaction has been to promote a kind of
intellectual interest, because, I personally believe people without
having a sense or knowledge of their ancestral past cannot build an
independent, healthy and prosperous future," she argued.

"Our aim is to promote study of Asia's glorious past and
understanding of what the issues are or how people co-exist and what
are the differences, to respect these differences, find out about
the commonalities and adopting them," Madhu Purnima added.

"In a better way, we are trying to create an atmosphere of
convergence among followers of oriental cultures, civilizations and
beliefs."
There are many participants from various countries around the world
like Iran, Afghanistan, U.S, Pakistan, Malaysia, Sri Lanka,
Indonesia, and Europe who presented valuable papers.

The Iranian participants were amazing and their knowledge of
Hinduism, Buddhism and their comparative studies with Islam and
other Abrahamic religions, mysticism was quite enlightening, and
their participation was felt by every audience hearing them, she
said.

I hope in the years to come "Indic Studies Network" will acquire an
entity of its own and through this process a new institution
building process shall emerge which will promote serious and
scholarly studies of Indic heritage and encourage regular dialogue
processes among various cultures, religions and civilization, the
convener of the conference said.

The other aim of this network as disclosed by her, is to focus on
important issues and challenges of the contemporary world which are
cause of conflicts and problems that need to be solved.

Another objective of this kind of academic, scholarly and
intellectual interactions is to create awareness on the positive and
useful aspects of globalization which will help us (developing
countries) get closer to each other, believe in ourselves as
entities enriched with indebt cultures and civilizations and
collectively counter American domination in political, economic and
cultural spheres.

"One of the best ways to counter American unilateralism is to ignore
USA, we have to stop being obsessed with this country. The best
thing Americans deserve is to be ignored by us and this is the best
way to punish "the evil empire" America and in order to achieve this
goal, all ancient civilizations including their inheritors should
unite.

It is in fact, in this context that relations between India and Iran
are maintained well, strengthened and expanded in various fields of
mutual interest, simply because we belong to civilizations that have
their roots in the same soil, the Indian scholar said.

My appeal to all Muslims of the world is, come let's join hand and
unite by not allowing the world to become America centric, Madhu
concluded.

The 4 day conference was held in New Delhi on 17 December and ended
on 20 December 2005, after presentation of scholarly papers by an
impressive number academicians and intellectuals from India and
other countries around the world including Iran.

Five Iranian scholars presented some of the most thoughtful papers
on issues related to culture, religion and mysticism making a
omparative study between Islam, Hinduism and Buddhism, which were
highly appreciated by those present in the panel.
http://www.irna.ir/en/news/view/menu...1758174942.htm