Thousands of people assembled at the Shambhu barrier on the Punjab-Haryana border as the 'Fateh March', which started out from Nanded Sahib, made entry in Punjab.

The march to honor the 300th anniversary of the triumph of Sikh warrior Banda Singh Bahadur in a battle would end at Sirhind on May 13, a day before the festivities of Fateh Diwas.

Punjab Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal, Deputy Chief Minister Sukhbir Singh Badal and other leaders received the 'Fateh March' as it entered the state.

Haridwar (Uttarakhand), Jan 14 : Devotees have gathered in large numbers for the Maha Kumbh Mela that began in Haridwar on Thursday morning on the auspicious occasion of ''Makar Sakranti''.

Despite severe cold and fog, over 25 lakh people are expected to gather at Har-ki-Pouri for a holy dip.

Officials claimed that around eight lakh people have already reached Haridwar.

The Deputy Fair Officer of the Maha Kumbh Mela, Harvinder Singh said the people of different religions are here to witness the Maha Kumbh.

New Delhi, Dec 25 : The sun was out, so were the cakes and carols! Cutting across faiths, Delhi residents began a fabulous round of merrymaking Friday, with roast chicken and apple pie lunches, visits to friends or simply cozying up with family. It was Christmas day.

Soulful melodies - a part of the midnight mass - in beautifully decorated churches welcomed the day. Wrapped up in woollens, many attended mass even as the minimum temperature dipped to the season's lowest Thursday.

Kottayam (Kerala), Dec 25 : Christians in Kerala gathered at churches early Friday to attend Christmas mass and the prayers were followed by a sumptuous breakfast of 'appams', stew, eggs and cake. It was also a day for family and friends to exchange season's greetings over a bottle of liquor.

In a departure from previous years, some churches held their mass at Thursday midnight, while the traditional Orthodox Church reverted to the custom of the mass ending at around 5.30 a. m.

On Board Aquamarine Vessel, Dec 25 : It was a unique experience not only for the priest but for Christian mariners on board the Aquamarine ship on its way to Maldives.

The mass was conducted in its proper way by a catholic Priest Fr. Justin K. at one of ships Lounge specially set by the cruise staff for this purpose.

It took around an hour for the priest to conclude and provide the cruisers and seafarers to have a glimpse of their traditional ritual, which they though could never happen because of their scheduled travel arranged during this time of the year.

Rome (Italy), Dec. 25 : An “unbalanced woman” jumped the barriers in St. Peter’s Basilica and knocked down Pope Benedict XVI as he walked down the main aisle to begin Christmas Eve Mass, a Vatican spokesman said Thursday.

But according to the New York Times, the pope quickly got back on his feet and celebrated Mass before thousands of the faithful, urging them in his homily to become “truly vigilant people.”

Television images showed a woman in red leap toward Benedict, 82, as he began to walk up the central aisle, as the police and bodyguards scrambled to his aid.

New Delhi, Nov 28 Dressed in festive clothes, Muslims thronged mosques across the national capital Saturday to pray on Eid-ul-Zuha.

One of the main centres for the Eid festivities was the Jama Masjid where thousands of devotees gathered to offer prayers.

In keeping with tradition, people wore new clothes to celebrate the festival.

After prayers, the devotees will sacrifice goats and other animals. People also donate meat to the poor on this occasion of sharing and sacrifice.

London, Nov 27: A psychologist has come up with a novel idea for helping parents find out the perfect Christmas toy for their children – a mathematical formula.

Dr Cliff Arnall, who has previously come up with calculations for the happiest and most depressing day of the year, reckons that mathematics can be used to work out the “play value” of potential purchases.

But the maths is nowhere easy to solve, and the result is also likely to be different for different children.

One.. five…20…100…500…1000. One lost count as nearly 25,000 buffaloes were sacrificed at Gadhimai Mela in Bara district of southern Nepal bordering India on Tuesday.

Protests by activists like French actress Brigitte Bardot and India’s politician-cum-crusader Maneka Gandhi failed to have an impact as nearly 300 people armed with machetes and khukhris butchered the animals to appease Goddess Gadhimai.

Amritsar Nov. 24 : Marking 334th martyrdom day of Guru Teg Bahadur, the ninth master of the Sikhs, a religious procession was taken out in Amritsar, the city of Golden Temple, on Monday.

The procession or, the Nagar Kirtan carried the Guru Granth Sahib (the holy scripture of the Sikhs) in a golden palanquin which passed through various bazaars of the Amritsar.

“Panj Piaras” (the Five Sikh beloved) carrying holy maces led the procession.

A veritable post-modern take on the Ramayana that lay inside the trunk of the Tagore family since the 1940s, is finally out of the closet.

Written and designed by Abanindranath Tagore (1871-1951), the master of the Bengal school of art, the work is being published as a book this week in Kolkata.

The publication is a facsimile reproduction of the 272-page scrap book that Tagore had originally done between 1934 and 1942.

It is titled Khuddur Yatra (Journey of Khuddu) and is one of the versions of the Ramayana that Tagore wrote.

Belgrade - The head of Serbia's Orthodox Church, Patriarch Pavle, died at the age of 95 on Sunday, local media reports quoting the church said.

Pavle had led the church through its post-Communist resurgence and its troubled role in the Balkan wars.

He died at the military hospital to which he was admitted two years ago. Pavle leaves behind a church torn in a power struggle between reformists and dogmatics, who failed to agree on electing a new patriarch a year ago. (dpa)

New Delhi, Nov 15 : Thousands of devotees gathered at the 62nd conclave of the Sant Nirankari Mission, a spiritual sect here on Saturday.

The three-day conclave will see religious discourses on spreading the message of peace and unity based on spiritual awakening.

Baba Hardev Singh Ji Maharaj, head of the Nirankari Mission, who was felicitated along with his mother and wife welcomed the people at the conclave.

Your history textbook must have told you about the 1893 Parliament of World Religions held in Chicago, famously attended by Swami Vivekanand. What you are probably unaware of is the presence of another Indian at the international event.

The man was Virchand Raghavji Gandhi, an erudite Jain scholar who was the first to introduce Jain philosophy to the western world. On Sunday, nearly 108 years after his death, the World Jain Confederation (WJC), along with the Postal Department of India, will release Gandhi’s stamp, at Vile Parle’s Bhaidas Maganlal Sabhagriha, to commemorate him.

An 11-year-old Boston schoolboy was on Wednesday anointed the head of a Buddhist sect in Darjeeling as the reincarnation of a high-ranking lama who died more than 750 years ago.

Jigme Wangchuk, a fifth grade student of St Peter’s School in Boston, will be known as His Holiness (HH) the Second Galwa Lorepa, head of the Drukpa sect. The first Galwa Lorepa died in
1250 in Tibet.

The US-born Wangchuk, now revered by lakhs of followers in Nepal, Bhutan and Ladakh as the rinpoche (high priest) of the Drukpa Sangag Choeling Monastry in Darjeeling, told HT at the monastery: “It’s a big transition. I do miss being a cheerful schoolboy. I miss my home, my grandparents, aunts and uncles. However, being a rinpoche is a great honour.”

Are stealing, murder and extortion crimes? Or are they sins?

These questions might seem incongruous for a news report to begin with, but they have created ripples in rebel-controlled Christian Nagaland. They have, in fact, pitted a state baptized by American missionaries against Korean “biblical encroachers”.

Two pastors of the South Korea-based Good News Mission (GNM) – Ock Soo Park and Kim Sae Yoon – apparently rubbed the Nagaland Baptist Church Council (NBCC) the wrong way prior to its four-day Bible Crusade that began in Dimapur on October 26.

Sometime ago, I found a photo of Shirdi Sai Baba near South Block in New Delhi. I picked it up and kept in my pocket, thinking it be a significant omen. Such a thing had never happened to me before. I thought Sai Baba might have taken some pity on me.

These led me to reading books on Sai Baba, which were full of miracles confirming super human healing and remedial powers of the saint. I was in search of some spiritual solution to the enigma of life and all-pervading suffering. But I was not spiritually inspired by reading.

After keeping it in abeyance for 15 years, the government on Monday hiked the airfare for Haj pilgrims by Rs 4,000. The fare will now be Rs 16,000.

The cabinet decision, which came immediately after the assembly elections in Maharashtra, Haryana and Arunachal Pradesh, would reduce the burden on the state exchequer significantly as the government used to pay about Rs 400-450 crore every year to Air India as subsidy.

While the total cost of Haj operations was estimated to be more than Rs 600 crore, the pilgrims’ airfare amounted to Rs 150 crore only.

We all have a basic need to be loved. If we don’t get it, we feel sad and hurt. To love and to receive love is the food for our body that helps us grow well in a wholesome manner.

But what is more important is to transcend form personal love to spiritual love. From spiritual point of view, love is defined as self-expansion.

Divine love (Bhakti) expands and enlarges itself. There is no selfish expectation here.

It is perhaps beyond our understanding but within our experience. It is beyond our material self but within the reach of the self that is divine, and we all are part of that divine.

Dhanteras apart from being the inception point for celebrations has special significance and enjoys great reverence in the northern belt of the country. To mark the auspicious day, houses and business premises are renovated and decorated. Entrances are made colourful with lovely traditional motifs of Rangoli designs to welcome Goddess Lakshmi. In her wait the lamps are kept alight all through the night communicating the dedication of the devotees.