భారతీయ తాత్విక చింతన

Today is the 125th Birthday of Abraham T Kovoor who was born on this day in 1898. He was the one who started the road show called as the Divine Miracle exposure campaign, which brought rationalism to the people. The topic was question before you believe! By the time this program became popular, Kovoor had already gained a lot pf publicity by throwing a one lakh challenge to claimants of supernatural powers to show them under fraud proof conditions.   This was a three-part affair- he would speak for about 90 minutes and answer questions from the audience. This would be followed by a magician performing the so called miracles- but the explanation would be one line- the godmen claim to have miracles, but I say anyone can do it. The last part would be a stage hypnosis show in which effects of hypnotic suggestions would be shown on volunteers from the audience.    In 1975-76 during the dark days of the emergency, the newspapers were subject to pre-censorship. Hence not much of...