HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: sarkar@grip.cis.upenn.edu (Nilanjan Sarkar)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.bangladesh,soc.culture.indian,soc.culture.pakistan
Subject: Re: Contradictions in Quaran
Date: 18 Aug 92 16:34:55 GMT
Followup-To: soc.culture.bangladesh
Organization: GRASP Lab, University of Pennsylvania

In article <1992Aug18.142745.20253@uceng.UC.EDU> mghayalo@uceng.UC.EDU (Manoj Ghayalod) writes:
>In article <1992Aug18.010844.16734@cs.yale.edu> ahmed-shakil@CS.YALE.EDU (Shakil Waiz Ahmed) writes:
>>
>>In article <1992Aug17.195658.19605@uceng.UC.EDU>, mghayalo@uceng.UC.EDU (Manoj Ghayalod) writes:
>>> In article <1992Aug17.151927.11957@cs.yale.edu> ahmed-shakil@CS.YALE.EDU (Shakil Waiz Ahmed) writes:
>>
>>> Maybe when there are not enough women to go around.  
>>
>>The world population has more women than men.
>>
>We are not talking about the world we are talking about Islamic countries,
>are you saying that in all Islamic countries there are more women than
>men. And if I show you one Islamic country with a higher female population
>will you agree that in that country polyandry should be allowed there?

A small observation : In order to prove the 'timelessness' of this religious
dictum, one needs to show that not only now but never will the number of
man  exceed the number of woman. The domain can be global if world population
is the thrust of the argument, or it should be satisfied  even in the small
domain of each Islamic state and should keep on being satisfied till the end
of this universe. How can one prove this ? Otherwise, if such situations ever
arise, then those single men, who will be single because polyandry is not
allowed, can very well consider this law to be a discrimination against them.


>
>Manoj

Nilanjan

P.S. Shakil, I know I said I won't take part in this debate anymore, but
     it is too tempting to resist :-) And, after last night email exchange
     I guess we understand each other better. So, hopefully you will shed
Newsgroups: soc.culture.bangladesh,soc.culture.indian,soc.culture.pakistan
From: khan@xraylith.wisc.edu (Mumit Khan)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.bangladesh
Subject: Rashed Khan Menon shot in dhaka/critical cond.
Date: 19 Aug 92 01:43:20 GMT
Organization: Center for X-ray Lithography, UW-Madison

Menon was shot twice at very close range, in the chest and in the
stomach, with a sawed-off shot gun in a meeting the night of Aug 16. 
He is listed as in extremely critical condition. Assailant (and sponsor) 
unknown [speculations abound of course].

Just when I began to think that political violence is on the way out...

peace
mumit
Newsgroups: soc.culture.bangladesh
From: sarkar@grip.cis.upenn.edu (Nilanjan Sarkar)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.bangladesh,soc.culture.pakistan,soc.culture.indian
Subject: Re: Contradictions in Quaran
Date: 18 Aug 92 22:00:13 GMT
Followup-To: soc.culture.bangladesh
Organization: GRASP Lab, University of Pennsylvania

In article <1992Aug18.122644@IASTATE.EDU> jakhan@IASTATE.EDU (Javed A Khan) writes:
>In article <86423@netnews.upenn.edu>, sarkar@grip.cis.upenn.edu (Nilanjan
>Sarkar) writes:
>
>
>This argument seems to be going round in circles. It seems to me that the
>entire debate is based on the explanation that polygamy was allowed to
>take care of the contingency of women outnumbering men because of war etc.
>But this is just an explanation given by some people (scholars ??) for some
>verse in the Qu'ran allowing polygamy. There is no such explanation, as far
>as I know, given in the Qu'ran and so deciding whether the Qu'ran,God or
>Prophet Mohammad are sexist or not cannot be decided on purely human
>interpretations.


Thanks. I see your point. I do not have absolutely any problem if anyone
says that he *believes* that Qu'ran is written by god and it is god's reason
why he chose one as opposed to the other - it can not be proven right or wrong
by human interpretation but he sincerely believes that it is just. Fine.
No problem here. It is individual's own prerogative what to believe. But
the problem starts when one tries to justify using his "human" interpretation
as why it is rational, why it is timeless and so on. If he wants to do that,
then he should be prepared to answer such common sense questions.

>--Javed.


Nilanjan
From: Eric_S_Klien@cup.portal.com
Newsgroups: soc.culture.bangladesh
Subject: Electronic Matchmaker
Date: Fri, 14 Aug 92 01:00:57 PDT
Organization: The Portal System (TM)
Distribution: world

Bangladesh women, having a problem finding a Bangladesh man?  I am 
about to launch a free electronic matching service on Usenet.  Thanks 
to the imbalance of men to women on Usenet, more guys than gals have 
expressed an interest so far.  If you would like to see the fifth 
draft of my questionnaire so we can alter it to also fit women's 
needs as well as men's, either send me mail or look at the copy I 
posted in alt.personals.  
 
This service is serious and I already have 291 men and 162 women 
signed up so far.  The site of the service has already been selected 
and programming has begun.  
 
I should point out that this questionnaire really, really, really, 
needs some more input on CULTURES.  I need some questions to make 
sure that matches are compatible culturally.  
 
                                                          Eric Klien
Xref: sparky soc.culture.bangladesh:4571 soc.culture.pakistan:13841 soc.culture.indian:28555
From: raja@magic (Raja Seth)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.bangladesh,soc.culture.pakistan,soc.culture.indian
Subject: Re: Contradictions in the Qu'ran
Date: 18 Aug 92 15:33:56 GMT
Reply-To: raja@ctron.com
Followup-To: soc.culture.bangladesh
Organization: Cabletron Systems Inc.,




ag3l+@andrew.cmu.edu (Arun K. Gupta) writes:
: 
: Nadeem Malik is correct in the statistics that (at least in 1971 or so)
: there were more Hindu men with two or more wives than Muslim men with
: two or more wives in India.

....It matters even though there are 5 times as many Hindus as Muslims 
in India ??!!!! On any statistics there will be more number of
Hindus doing any 'X' than muslims in India !!

regards......raja

--------------------------------------------------
|
| Raja Seth : raja@balrog.ctron.com
|
| All opinions expressed in this article are my own. 
| The company I work for has no claim or liability
| to this article in any implicit or explicit form. 
|
------------------------------------------------------
Xref: sparky soc.culture.bangladesh:4504 soc.culture.indian:28238 soc.culture.pakistan:13700
From: sankar@hal.COM (Sankar Bandy)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.bangladesh,soc.culture.indian,soc.culture.pakistan
Subject: Re: Contradictions in Quaran
Date: 15 Aug 92 00:09:40 GMT
Organization: HaL Computer Systems, Inc.
NNTP-Posting-Host: quality.hal.com

In article <1992Aug13.214419.3588@sol.cs.wmich.edu> sherwani@sol.cs.wmich.edu (Naveed Sherwani) writes:
>In article <1992Aug13.170346.3087@bernina.ethz.ch>, nadeem@igpho (Nadeem Malik) writes:
>> Since just about everyone has given their opinion on this hot thread, I may
>> as well add my ta-pence worth of comments:
>> 
.......... Stuff deleted ..............
>
>May we ask, what happens to females who don want to participate
>in this ultimate society. Islam dos not apply to career oriented women
>or does it ?
>
.........etc. etc.
>
>I like Islam for great things it achieved in terms of equality
>of races, some rights of women, etc. but it scores rather low in 
>equality of man vs. woman, as examplified above.
>
>I dont want to bash Islam too much, but at the same time we must
>point out its weakenesses if we see any.
>
>regards,
>
>-Naveed

I have only one thing to say to your posting. JAWAB NAHIN !!

BTW, can you even make an educated guess (NO ILL INTENTIONS) as to approx.
what % of people (in our generation) share your opinions in PAKISTAN and
SINDH ? This is a serious question to you. THANKS.

>> Sankar
Newsgroups: soc.culture.bangladesh
From: bhattach@dip.eecs.umich.edu (sayan bhattacharyya)
Subject: Re: Bangladesh and State Religion was Re: Contradictions in Quaran
Organization: University of Michigan EECS Dept., Ann Arbor, MI
Date: Wed, 19 Aug 1992 17:15:20 GMT

In article <1992Aug19.155253.8648@honte.uleth.ca> buchignani@hg.uleth.ca writes:
>re: Bangaldesh as an Islamic state
>
>It seems to be that looking simply at the legal system to decide
>(or more realistically, to define) this is too limited. Everyday
>social and cultural practice is relevant also. In the latter
>respect, Bangladesh is clearly moving steadily towards being an
>Islamic state. Supporting evidence is of course easy to supply.
>
>One could go further and claim that inasmuch as new definitions of
>Islamic orthodoxy that are pervading the countryside are fundamentally
>altering Bangaldeshi/Bengali culture, replacing many elements with
 ----------------------------
>highly Arab-influenced ones.
>
>Norman Buchignani
>Department of Anthropology
>University of Lethbridge


I am curious to know whether people on this net make any distinction between the 
words 'Bengali' and 'Bangladeshi' . Personally I would prefer to use 'Bangladeshi'
for those aspects which pertain specifically to Bangladesh as a country, while
'Bengali'  would refer to the common pool of culture shared by both citizens of
Bangladesh and Bengali-speaking citizens of India. Thus, I would think that the
two words are not interchangeable. Thus, one can speak of 'the Bangladeshi  
geography' but not of 'the Bangladeshi language'.

Since the two words are not interchangeable, your use of the phrase 
'Bangladeshi/Bengali culture' might give the erroneous impression that
you are suggesting that a de-Bengalification and Arabisation is taking
place among all Bengalis irrespective of the national divide. This is
erroneous because no such Arabisation is taking place in West Bengal, the
predominantly Bengali-speaking region in India.

-Sayan Bhattacharyya
From: hassan@cup.portal.com (hassan monu alam)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.bangladesh
Subject: Re: THE VISION OF WORLD PEACE
Date: Wed, 19 Aug 92 16:50:02 PDT
Organization: The Portal System (TM)
  <1992Aug16.030006.10825@massey.ac.nz>
  <19AUG199215545987@vax2.concordia.ca>

 >Hey ! are you in the wrong group ? Bloody #^$*@^*^%@&*!!# !

 >- deb chatterjee
>(a good samaritan)

 Yes, and you are writing in the wrong language. Nobody speaking
English would mistake you for any type of Samaritan :-).

Hassan
Newsgroups: soc.culture.bangladesh
From: jakhan@IASTATE.EDU (Javed A Khan)
Subject: Re: Contradictions in Quaran
Reply-To: jakhan@IASTATE.EDU (Javed A Khan)
Organization: Iowa State University
Date: Tue, 18 Aug 1992 17:26:44 GMT

In article <86423@netnews.upenn.edu>, sarkar@grip.cis.upenn.edu (Nilanjan
Sarkar) writes:
> In article <1992Aug18.142745.20253@uceng.UC.EDU> mghayalo@uceng.UC.EDU (Manoj
Ghayalod) writes:
> >In article <1992Aug18.010844.16734@cs.yale.edu> ahmed-shakil@CS.YALE.EDU
(Shakil Waiz Ahmed) writes:
> >>
> >>In article <1992Aug17.195658.19605@uceng.UC.EDU>, mghayalo@uceng.UC.EDU
(Manoj Ghayalod) writes:
> >>> In article <1992Aug17.151927.11957@cs.yale.edu> ahmed-shakil@CS.YALE.EDU
(Shakil Waiz Ahmed) writes:
> >>
> >>> Maybe when there are not enough women to go around.  
> >>
> >>The world population has more women than men.
> >>
> >We are not talking about the world we are talking about Islamic countries,
> >are you saying that in all Islamic countries there are more women than
> >men. And if I show you one Islamic country with a higher female population
> >will you agree that in that country polyandry should be allowed there?
> 
> A small observation : In order to prove the 'timelessness' of this religious
> dictum, one needs to show that not only now but never will the number of
> man  exceed the number of woman. The domain can be global if world population
> is the thrust of the argument, or it should be satisfied  even in the small
> domain of each Islamic state and should keep on being satisfied till the end
> of this universe. How can one prove this ? Otherwise, if such situations ever
> arise, then those single men, who will be single because polyandry is not
> allowed, can very well consider this law to be a discrimination against them.
> 
> 
> >
> >Manoj
> 
> Nilanjan
> 
> P.S. Shakil, I know I said I won't take part in this debate anymore, but
>      it is too tempting to resist :-) And, after last night email exchange
>      I guess we understand each other better. So, hopefully you will shed



This argument seems to be going round in circles. It seems to me that the
entire debate is based on the explanation that polygamy was allowed to
take care of the contingency of women outnumbering men because of war etc.
But this is just an explanation given by some people (scholars ??) for some
verse in the Qu'ran allowing polygamy. There is no such explanation, as far
as I know, given in the Qu'ran and so deciding whether the Qu'ran,God or
Prophet Mohammad are sexist or not cannot be decided on purely human
interpretations.

--Javed.
From: misra@matt.ksu.ksu.edu (Boo!)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.bangladesh
Subject: Re: Minoritity in Govt. positions
Date: 14 Aug 1992 12:47:08 -0500
Organization: Kansas State University
NNTP-Posting-Host: matt.ksu.ksu.edu

kundu@watson.ibm.com (Sandip Kundu) writes:

>        post              total            minority
>        
>        IG                1                0
>        DIG               6                0
>        Additional IG     18               1
>        SP                87               2
>        Secretary         49               0
>        Addl. Secy        26               0
>        Joint Secy        134              3
>        Excise & Cust.
>        officers          152              1
>        Income Tax 
>        officers          450              8
>        Major Gen         22               0
>        Brigadier         65               0
>        Colonel           70               1
>        Lt. Colonel       450              8
>        GM in 
>        nationalised      37               0
>        Banks        

>(Banks surveyed are Sonali, Janata, Agrani, Krishi and Shilpa)

>He has also compiled statistics to show that for a government
>job, given two candidates with similar qualifications, X from 
>a religious minority and one Y from majority, Y is about 50 times 
>more likely than X to get the job. 


	I rest my case.. Thanks.
>Sandip Kundu
Newsgroups: soc.culture.bangladesh
From: s1006420@titan.ucc.umass.edu (and a thousand battles shall be won..)
Subject: culture x nature
Organization: University of Massachusetts, Amherst
Date: Tue, 18 Aug 1992 22:29:53 GMT

Newsgroups: poster
Subject: Re: Culture x Nature

In article <1992Aug18.153053.29379@cbnewsh.cb.att.com> rps@cbnewsh.cb.att.com (raj.sharma) writes:
>(and a thousand battles shall be won..) writes:
>
>> My point is that culture overrides nature in several aspects ...
>
>	
>	The culture that is not in harmony with nature
>	                 is a false culture;
>    	and [therefore]
>	not worth having.
>	
>
>---raj

I agree with you that it is not worth having. Unfortunately you
can only apply the word false in the sense of misleading,
since such 'false' cultural ideas and cultures are very much real and
prevalent.

How to engender culture (in practice) that is in harmony 
with nature and with all human beings, 
since we cannot start from scratch, there is always the
inertia of what the past accumulated into, is one of the most
challeging problems IMO.

V.


				   
Newsgroups: soc.culture.bangladesh
From: trumpet-user@UniversityofNorthTexas (Lear)
Subject: Test...ignore
Organization: College of Arts and Sciences
Date: Tue, 18 Aug 1992 17:41:45 GMT

This is just a test.....
Newsgroups: soc.culture.bangladesh,soc.culture.indian,soc.culture.pakistan
Organization: Rohm and Haas Company
Date: Thu, 13 Aug 1992 15:25:54 EDT
From: <RBNXHS@rohvm1.rohmhaas.com>
Newsgroups: soc.culture.bangladesh,soc.culture.indian
Subject: Re: Few remarks on the issue of FINALITY of Prophethood & Islam (5)

In response to Hakim's Bahai ideas circulated on the SCB:
Please do not use the SCB for discussing your religion. Use the
appropriate Net, which is soc.religion.bahai and if I am not
mistaken you are moderating the group with Mark Towfiq.
    About three weeks ago, I posed a question to the Bahais
    as to their view on Jesus in the common platform,
    talk.religion.misc. And at that time, I was asked to
    pose the question (by Mark) in your Net. I subsequently
    sent my questionaire to your Net - srb, and it never
    got posted in last 3 weeks. Again, I sent the same
    question, still it did not get posted. Now, I see you
    using SCB and other nets to propagate your views.

    Are you not violating your sets of rules, here? If you
    can't post my simple question - as to what is the belief of
    the Bahais concerning Jesus in your srb then is it fair
    to use SCB when you require them, esp. given the fact that
    there is hardly a single Bahai in Bangladesh? Bangladesh
    has been a country which is comprised of Muslims, Hindus,
    Bhuddists, Christians and some animists. In my entire life
    in Bangladesh, I have never met a single Bahai. You want
    to present your religion, fine, go ahead and use SRB, not
    SCB.
          - Siddiqui.

Xref: sparky soc.culture.bangladesh:4538 soc.culture.pakistan:13767 soc.culture.indian:28373
From: s1006420@titan.ucc.umass.edu (and a thousand battles shall be won..)
Subject: culture x nature
Organization: University of Massachusetts, Amherst
Date: Tue, 18 Aug 1992 22:34:02 GMT

Subject: Re: Culture x Nature

In article <1992Aug18.153053.29379@cbnewsh.cb.att.com> rps@cbnewsh.cb.att.com (raj.sharma) writes:
>(and a thousand battles shall be won..) writes:
>
>> My point is that culture overrides nature in several aspects ...
>
>	The culture that is not in harmony with nature
>	                 is a false culture;
>    	and [therefore]
>	not worth having.
>	
>
>---raj

I agree with you that it is not worth having. Unfortunately you
can only apply the word false in the sense of misleading,
since such 'false' cultural ideas and cultures are very much real and
prevalent.

How to engender culture (in practice) that is in harmony 
with nature and with all human beings, 
since we cannot start from scratch, there is always the
inertia of what the past accumulated into, is one of the most
challeging problems IMO.

V.


				   
Newsgroups: soc.culture.bangladesh,soc.culture.indian,soc.culture.pakistan
From: mgundeko@pcserver2.Naitc.Com (Murthy Gundekota)
Subject: Re: Contradictions in Quaran
Organization: Somewhere near Chicago
Date: Wed, 12 Aug 92 17:50:48 GMT

In article <1992Aug12.172943.21294@cis.ohio-state.edu> chandra@cannelloni.cis.ohio-state.edu (B Chandrasekaran) writes:
>since god has ordained so.  Since both of us believe that separation
>of religios/personal from social as arbitrary, the only approach for
>us is to try to extinguish each other.  You break my idols and put me
>in jail for worshipping them, and I repeat the favor and so on.

This is precisely the premise of Salman Rushdie's plot in the controversial
novel. I forget the names of two characters who claim relationship with
God. One of them `hires' a poet called Bali to cast God's words (really
Bali's own) for people to follow. Of course, such a thing will be called
blasphemy by Islam. Nay, people who claim to know the will of Allah. Now,
that's something to think about.

[after some interesting anecdotes]
>We can always say, "Well, let me behave the way
>that I think god asked me to. As for the others, let god sort it out."
>
>Welcome to secularism. 

In spite of our good  intentions, the religious fundamentalists seem
to consistently adopt one aspect of secularism (probably using it
to their advantage): ``Let us agree to disagree.''


Murthy
Xref: sparky soc.culture.bangladesh:4406 soc.culture.indian:27797 soc.culture.pakistan:13548
From: buchignani@hg.uleth.ca
Subject: Re: Bangladesh and State Religion was Re: Contradictions in Quaran
Reply-To: buchignani@hg.uleth.ca
Organization: University of Lethbridge
Date: Wed, 19 Aug 1992 15:52:53 GMT

re: Bangaldesh as an Islamic state

It seems to be that looking simply at the legal system to decide
(or more realistically, to define) this is too limited. Everyday
social and cultural practice is relevant also. In the latter
respect, Bangladesh is clearly moving steadily towards being an
Islamic state. Supporting evidence is of course easy to supply.

One could go further and claim that inasmuch as new definitions of
Islamic orthodoxy that are pervading the countryside are fundamentally
altering Bangaldeshi/Bengali culture, replacing many elements with
highly Arab-influenced ones.

Norman Buchignani
Department of Anthropology
University of Lethbridge
From: hossain@ee.rochester.edu (Razak Hossain)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.bangladesh
Subject: Report in Courier
Keywords: SCB, The Courier
Date: 20 Aug 92 15:28:50 GMT
Organization: Univ of Rochester, College of Engineering and Applied Science

I noticed that some of you are interested in what was written about SCB in
"The Courier" by Naeem. It is a rather long article, which mentions SCB as
a forum by which Bangladeshis in America maintain ties and debate issues,
related to Bangladesh.

Despite living a scanner-less, time pressed life, I shall try and post the
article as soon as possible.

By the way is there anything new on the shooting of Rashed Khan Menon. If
indeed the Jammat perpetrated this act one must fear what sort of Government
they will run if they ever come to power.

Regards,
-Raza 
Xref: sparky soc.culture.bangladesh:4459 soc.culture.indian:28038
Organization: Rohm and Haas Company
Date: Thu, 13 Aug 1992 15:53:24 EDT
From: <RBNXHS@rohvm1.rohmhaas.com>
Newsgroups: soc.culture.bangladesh,soc.culture.indian
Subject: Re: Bahai deception on the finality of the Prophethood

In response to Kamran Hakim's article (5 part) on the concept
of finality of the Prophethood:
--------------------------
         First, I don't think SCB should be used for such discussions.
         Since, however, Bahai view has been presented on the Net and
         after reading the series of articles presented on the Net by
         Kamran Hakim, I think an appropriate answer is necessary to
         clear the cloud about this issue.

Second,  Kamran tries to deceive Muslims (both Shia and Sunni) by
         presenting views that even some scholars of these two
         schools of thought agree with Bahai understanding of the
         word khatum-un-Nabi.  He uses the names of certain scholars,
         calling them well-known Muslim scholars. In reality, Muslims
         have never heard about such scholars. To give an example,
         he presents Ahmad Hamadi al-Muhammad as an Islamic
         scholar. We have never heard about the existence of such
         a scholar. Where did you find them, under the Bahai faith?

Third,   Kamran presents Shawkani (Shokani) as an Islamic scholar.
         Muslim scholars know 'Shawkani' as a liar. He was a
         yahud, who in order to deceive Muslims, appeared to
         behave as a Muslim. No Muslim accepts his views.

Fourth, Kamran presents a hadith, narrated by Ayesha (R) which says
        that there is possibility of other prophets coming after
        Muhammad (Sallal-lahu-alaihe-was-salam). This is an outright
        lie. He even suggests that it is mentioned in Jalal-uddin
        Suyutti's (R) book. That is a total fabrication by
        the Bahais.

        Muslims have the science of ISNAD to check up the hadiths
        that trace back to Rasulullah and all these hadiths always
        make it very clear that there will not be any Nabi or
        Rasul coming after Muhammad (SAWS). This has always been
        the understanding of his sahabas and others who followed
        him and these are documented in books and writings for the
        last 14 centuries. We don't need any fabricated writings
        to teach us otherwise. So, I shall like to warn Muslims
        not to get deceived by lies and distortions of Kamran.

Finally, I hope that I never have to use SCB for discussing religion again.
        You are welcome to have your views and can propagate it, but
        please, do not use SCB for doing it.


        - H. Siddiqui.