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Showing posts from February 11, 2011


The meaning of the name Venkateswara

The name Venkata is exclusively used to refer to Balaji. It is not used for any other deity. There are two different meaning for Ventaka in Sanskrit – the first is ‘destroyer of sins.’ It is said that Brahma promised Vishnu that whoever visits the Tirumala hills will redeem their sins. Thus the Seshadri hill on which Venkateswara sits came to be known as Venkata and Vishnu came to be known as Venkateswara. This meaning of Venkata is based on the use of the term found in the Brahmanda Purana and Bhavishyottara Purana. Another meaning of Venkata is ‘giver of worldly wealth.’ This meaning is found in the Vayu Purana. Scholars are of view that this meaning relates to one of the qualities of Venkateswara. The earliest reference of the term Venkatam is found in Tamil Grammar Text, Tholkaappiyam, which is believed to have been written around 200 B.C. The meaning of the term here is ‘burning debts’ – ‘Ven’ means burning and ‘kadan’ means debt. This meaning relates to the debt th

Conversion Laws in India – Soon there may be proof and documents of conversion?

There are many people in India get converted from other religions to Hinduism for marriage and due to other reasons. But these conversions do not have legal approval. For example the converted person will not get benefits under the Hindu Marriage Act (HMA), 1955. Honorable courts in India faced numerous difficulties due to lack of proof and documents of conversion. Several divorce cases of inter-religious marriages are pending in the courts on the issue of conversion. To solve this problem, the 19th Law Commission under Justice P.V. Reddi, in its latest report on “Conversion/re-conversion to another religion — mode of proof” to the government has suggested a solution. The Telegraph reports The commission has said that within a month after the date of conversion, the converted person can send a declaration to the officer in charge of registration of marriages in the concerned area. The officer, in turn, shall exhibit a copy of the declaration on the notice board of the office till th