Help Center for Jain Students All Over India

Help Center for Jain Students All Over India

Jain Friends, a Social Organization from Pune has just started a Help Center for Jain Students all over India. This center will help Jain students by providing information about following subjects:

● Jain Minority Educational Institutions offering higher education in Engineering, IT, Management, Medical and other branches, where about 50% seats are reserved for Jain students.

● Concession given in fees to Jain students for higher education in various states of India under minority status

● Scholarships offered by State Governments for Jain Students

● Scholarships offered by Charitable Trusts and Social Organizations

● Educational Loans offered by various Banks

● Hostels for Jain Students in various cities

● Special concessions offered by states to Jain Students belonging to OBC

For more information, please write to jainway@gmail.com or send a self addressed and stamped (Rs.5/-) envelop to:
Jain Friends
Post Box No. 58
Jagannath Complex, 199 Mumbai-Pune Road
Chinchwad East, Pune 411019
Maharashtra

-Mahavir Sanglikar
Secretary, Jain Friends
Please note that to prevent misuse, we have not provided this information anywhere on the Internet, and it is available directly from the help center to the students.)

Amit Jain is new Patna SSP

PATNA: The state government undertook a massive midnight transfer in the police administration involving 52 IPS officers and 14 SP-rank Bihar police officers. DG (Civil Defence) Manoje Nath has been made DG (Training). ADG Abhyanand has been made ADG (Wireless and Training). A K Ambedkar has been made the new IG of Bhagalpur while Vinay Kumar that of Darbhanga. B Sriniwasan was made IG (Intelligence).

The commandant of BMP 12 Amitabh Kumar Das has been transferred to BMP 9 in the same capacity. Siwan SP Amit Kumar Jain has been made senior SP of Patna. Sudhanshu Kumar, currently Bhojpur SP, has been made SP of Khagaria. Kamal Kishore Singh, Saran SP, has been made commandant BMP 7, Katihar.

The commandant of BMP 5 Patna Paras Nath has been made SP Motihari. Nawada SP Anil Kishore Yadav has been made SP of Bhojpur. The commandant of BMP 16 Ashok Kumar Singh has been appointed SP Lakhisarai. Katihar SP G P Sinha will be the new SP of Nawada. The commandant of BMP 13 Vinod Kumar will be the new SP of Sheohar. The SP of Madhepura Sanjay Singh has been sent to Aurangabad in the same capacity.

Vinod Kumar, the commandant of BMP 2, Dehri, has been posted as the new SP of Jamui. The additional director of Bihar Police Academy Shyam Kumar has been made Banka SP. The SP of railways, Muzaffarpur, has been posted as the new SP of Gaya.

The SP of Bettiah Amrit Raj has been posted in Siwan in the same capacity. The commmandant of BMP 7, Katihar, Awadhesh Sharma, has been transferred to Muzaffarpur as the new rail SP.

The assistant director (training) Bihar Police Academy Ram Narayan Singh will be principal of CTS. SP (Vigilance) G P Bhadoria has been made commandant of BMP-2, Dehri.

The SP (Rail) Jamalpur Vimal Kumar has been made SP (Vigilance).

Jain Studies in Florida University

Florida International University's Religious Studies Department is receiving $600,000 from South Florida's Jain community to boost awareness of the little-practiced, but influential, religion.

BY MICHAEL VASQUEZ AND JAWEED KALEEM


With perhaps 10 million adherents worldwide -- the vast majority of them in one country, India -- Jainism might be called a bit player on the stage of world religions. Florida International University religious studies professor Nathan Katz, however, would beg to differ.

Katz's years of religious study, combined with a healthy dose of interaction with Jain faculty members at FIU, has shown him Jainism's profound impact on both Buddhism and Hinduism. So, too, did Katz learn of Jainism's role in developing the philosophical ideal of nonviolence -- a torch later carried by Buddha, Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr..

`VAST INFLUENCE'

``Jainism is a very small religion numerically, but has had vast influence in the world,'' Katz said. ``It's very important in the global history of ideas.''

In addition to nonviolence, other central tenets of Jainism, according to Katz, are non-greed, respect for all forms of life, and religious pluralism.

Those values mesh perfectly with FIU, Katz said -- where environmentalism, cultural diversity and a global view of issues are guiding principles.

Thanks to a $600,000 donation from South Florida's Jain community, FIU's role in educating the public on the religion is about to grow. University leaders are scheduled to formally announce the gift Friday afternoon.

The donation -- which with matching funds from the state will bring more than $1 million to FIU -- is to fund an endowed professorship in FIU's Religious Studies Department, part of the College of Arts and Sciences. Katz, who is Jewish, will take the lead in raising the profile of Jainism in all sorts of university classes, both religious and nonreligious.

As part of the gift, Katz's formal title has grown by a few words: He is now the Bhagwan Mahavir Professor of Jain Studies and Professor of Religious Studies at Florida International University.

The Jain professorship is the first of its kind in the Americas, and the endowment is part of a larger initiative by the Jain community to establish a permanent academic education center for Jain studies and research at FIU.

Jayant Shah, president of the South Florida Jain Temple in Weston, praised FIU's new program.

``It's incredibly positive. Only a handful of people know about Jainism, but now the Jain religion will have more exposure,'' said Shah, 66, an electronics exporter who lives in Pompano Beach. ``People will be able to learn about what Jainism stands for. We always believe in `live and let live,' `forgive and forget,' and we respect all lives as equal,''' Shah said.

When he moved to South Florida 30 years ago from Philadelphia, there were about 15 Jain families in the area, Shah said.

``Now in Miami-Dade and Broward, there are about 120,'' he said.

After years of fundraising, he joined those families a year ago to open the 4,000-square-foot, $1.45 million temple -- the only one of its kind south of Tampa -- in a strip mall.

Its interior is made of white marble from India, and central to the temple is the Gabhara, a covered sanctuary that has statues of three Tirthankaras, which are enlightened Jain teachers.

The temple, which is volunteer-run, is usually closed during the week, but opens for services on Sundays.

DALAI LAMA

The $600,000 Jain donation to FIU follows a $100,000 gift from the Dalai Lama last year. In a written statement, the Dalai Lama praised FIU's new endowment, saying, ``In my view, Jainism and Buddhism are like twins who have delivered the message of oneness and nonviolence to the world.''

The Dalai Lama's much-publicized financial contribution came at a time that FIU's Religious Studies department faced an uncertain future.

Confronted with a budget gap of almost $35 million, FIU's board of trustees last year considered significantly downsizing the department. Bachelor degrees, for example, would no longer have been offered.

Religion students and faculty members spoke passionately on behalf of their program, and trustees ultimately backed off the downsizing plan. But the department was urged to beef up its fundraising.

``So we've tried very hard,'' Katz said. ``We've had some success so far.''

Mahavir Jayanti celebrated with SMS and greetings in India

Mahavir Jayanti is celebrated as the birth anniversary of Lord Mahavir, the 24th Teerthankar of Jain religion. Usually it occurs in the months of March or April but this year it is on Sunday, 28 March, 2010. Mahavir, also known as Vardhamana, is the last prophets in the 24 Teerthankaras galaxy. He was one of the greatest Teerthankaras born to Siddhartha and Trishala Devi in the year 599 B.C on the outskirts of Vaishali near Patna.

As a young prince, Mahavir displayed many instances of fearlessness which earned him the name, Mahavir. He was an epitome of physical prowess and intellectual insight. He gave up the comforts of the palace and his kingship and undertook the life of penance for 12 years. He simplified religious procedures and condemned violence in the form of animal sacrifice, superstitions and rituals.

Mahavir Jayanti remembers Lord Mahavir’s teaching, “Do unto others as you would like to be done by. Injury or violence done by you to any life in any from, animal or human is as harmful as it would be if caused to your own self.”

Mahavir initiated a very simple path for the householders, namely, Ahimsa (non injury-physical or mental, to others), Asteya (non-stealing), Brahmacharya (temperance in sexual pleasure) and Aparigraha (non-acquisition of property). He also enforced upon abstinence from any kind of physical and material comforts for monks and nuns. He laid stress on highest ethical and spiritual discipline and emphasized that the Unity of Life forms is the highest saving principles of mankind.

Mahavir Jayanti reminds people of Lord Mahavira’s message of non-injury to every living being and stressed on the ill effects of never ending human craving that ends up destroying and exploiting other living species. Such human behavior may land them in deadly perils.

Even after 2500 years of passing away of this pious soul, monks till today maintain his pure and upright tradition and spreading Mahavir’s teachings of peace, non-violence, non-injury and brotherhood among people. Thousands of Sanyasins and Sanyasinis walk on foot on Mahavir Jayanti from town to town spreading his messages.

Prime Minster Manmohan Singh and President Smt. Pratibha Patil greeted the nation on this occasion. “Lord Mahavir’s profound message remains a beacon of hope in today’s world,” he said.

Mushayara held on Mahavir Jayanti

Bhopal, Mar 28:
A general meeting and programme Mushayara were organised under the aegis of Guldasta (literary organisation) on Sunday at Guldasta Bhawan, Chhawni (Mangalwara). The programme was presided over Professor Iqbal Ahmed Arif and the programme was conducted by the former Corporator and President of the organisation Mohammad Rais Khan.

Ashok Jain Bhabha was also present as chief guest. On the occasion, Corporator Aziz Uddin, Corporator Rafique Qureshi, Corporator Shahid Ali, spokesman of District Congress Anand Taran and large number of eminent personalities were present. Journalist Arif Aziz was felicitated by presenting Gultasta Samman. Jamal Ahmed expressed gratitude to all the personalities for attending the programme.

From Central Chronicle

Mahavir Jayanti Celebrated in Nepal

Himalayan News Service


KATHMANDU: Nepal Jain Parishad (NJP) celebrated the 2609th birth anniversary of Mahavir as a welfare festival today. Mahavir 24th Teerthankar of Jainism, a religion of non-violence and peace.

Yoga Guru Swami Ram Dev, the chief guest, said that teachings of Mahavir were guidance for life, peace and non-violence.

Vice President Paramanand Jha, special guest in the programme, said that Nepal born Buddha and India born Mahavir were the towers of undefeatable principles of peace and non-violence.

At the programme chaired by Kishan Lal Dugar, president of NJP, Ayurved Acharya Balkrishna, Dr Kusum Pragya, and Manibhadra Muniji, founder of Jain Saint Nepal, underlined the teachings of Mahavir as a form of love, kindness and superhuman, treating all beings equally.

Jain community Raised Over £11K for RSPCA on Mahavir Jayanti

By Raj Sarin

March 31, 2010

Over 400 members of the Jain community in Manchester celebrated the birthday of Lord Mahavir over the weekend and marked the occasion by raising money for RSPCA.

The event took place at the Jain Community Centre, Longsight where Pujya Samri Ji Prasana Pragya and Samri Ji Rohit Pragya from Jain Vishwa Bharti, London held four days training to enrich life through practice of non-violence.

A stage production by young children and students showed the benefits of meditation and non-violence.

Jains try to follow the teachings of Lord Mahavira who taught his followers about the true path of happiness. His teachings on complete non-violence and the importance of austerity shows them the path to achieving salvation and spirituality.

A cheque for £11,768, collected by the Jain community was presented to Susie Hughes from RSPCA by the Lord Mayor of Manchester, Councillor Alison Firth.

Said Susie: "This was the largest amount RSPCA have ever received in the U.K. It is a most wonderful achievement from a community that should stand as an outstanding example to us all".

President of Jain Samaj, Piyush Mehta and vice presidents Kiran Mehta presented awards to Ruchir Shah and Ashok Mehta for raising the maximum funds for the charity and thanked the members of their community for their help.