I have just signed the letter to the G8 finance ministers calling on rich countries to keep their promises of aid to the world's poor and signed by key global figures: Archbishop Desmond Tutu, former UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Mary Robinson.

As a a longtime Gandhian student, Secretary-General, All India Jain Minority Forum I endevour to be a global activist for peace, human rights and abolition of capital punishment as a Jain which pioneered the principle of non-violence in human history according to Dr.Albert schweitzer for peace, human rights and media freedom.

Permit me to give a link to my article published recently on "Whither Globalisation?":

Whither Globalisation?
By Bal Patil
22 February, 2007
Countercurrents.org
Abstract

"The world today is embroiled in an economic turmoil caused by the globalisation process. It is a veritable confusion worse confounded by the North versus South polarities of trading policies, developmental disparities and stark reality of opulence contrasted with destitution.

"These are increasingly brought in close encounters of an unforeseen variety in an inter-connected global environment with unprecedented, unpredictable and unnatural fusion of economic systems mixed in a strange brew of socio-ethnic and cultural cross-currents buffetted hither and thither by perennial human greed. An unprecedented global dilemma posed by the merciless process of globalisation with all its ostensible benefits and built-in evils.

"The natural resources of the earth are not inexhaustible. Oil is fast depleting. The last barrel of oil is not too far. A new energy future has to be worked out. Nearly 2.2 billion people in more than 62 countries, one-third of the world's population, are starved for water. Global population has tripled in the past 70 years while water use has grown sixfold due to industrial development, widespread irrigation, and lack of conservation. It is feared scarcity of water may lead to third world war.1 To top it all there is a projected 3C jump in global temperature caused by global warming which in turn would include a loss of up to 400 million tonnes of cereal production and put between 1.2 billion and three billion people- half of the current world's population- at risk of water shortage. It is a case of double jeopardy. This is a wake-up call for the developed industrial nations.

"In "a terrible indictment of the world in 2007" the UN said 18,000 children die every day of hunger and malnutrition and 85 million go to bed every night with empty stomach, 100 mm. Indian kids are malnourished. The spectre of global warming is knocking at the door. With the US poised for a MAD nuclear adventure the mankind is in for a future shock as never before in human history. It is truly all this and hell too scenario.

'Oh, yes, the time has come, my little friends To talk of food and things Of peppercorns and mustard ... The time has come,' as the Walrus said.2 Can the world really afford to hanker after opening this Pandora's box? Isn't this an appropriate time to think about the basic economic ideology of social justice? Equality is neither outdated nor is it the enemy of freedom. The voices of the voiceless, disadvantaged, the diseased and the destitutes, the less privileged in large parts of the world should not be lost in the clamouring sophistry of debates in the cloistered splendour of IMF and World Bank citadels."

18,000 children die every day of hunger and malnutrition; 85 million go to bed hungry every night.
Date filed: 26-03-2007

-BAL PATIL,

Secretary-General, All India Jain Minority Forum, New Delhi,
Ex-Member, Media Expert Committee, Govt. of India,
Ex- Member, Maharashtra State Minority Commission, Govt.of Maharashtra, Mumbai.
Ex-President, National Society for Prevention of Heart Disease & Rehabilitation,
Co-Author: JAINISM (Macmillan Co 1974). with Colette Caillat, (Member Institut de France, Paris,) & A.N.Upadhye, (ex-President, All-India Oriental Conference,) Author: SUPREME COURT'S VOLTE FACE ON CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENT (Published by Govt. of Maharashtra, 1980) Author:Jaya Gommatesa! Foreword by C.Caillat (Publisher :Hindi Granth Karyalay, 2006, Mumbai) My translation of Dr.L. Alsdorf's German Beitraege zur Geschichte von Vegetarismus und Rinderverehrung in Indien is presently being edited for publication by Dr. Bollee, Indologist. My translation of Dr.Asdorf's French Les Etudes Jaina, Etat Present et Taches Futures is published by Hindi granth Karyalay, (2005) Mumbai. as The Jaina Studies Present State and Future Tasks edited by Dr.Willem Bollee. Participant and speaker in the 7th Jaina Studies Workshop on Jaina Law and Jaina Community, Centre for Jaina Studies, SOAS, University of London, & Dept of Indic Religion, Centre for Theology and Religious Studies, University of Lund. Participated and presented a paper on the Evolution of Sramanic Jain Tradition and Its Impact on Indic Civilisation & Religious Fundamentalism in the XIXth World Congress of the International Association for the History of Religion, Tokyo, Japan, 2005.

Patil Estate, 278, Tardeo Road, Mumbai-400007,
Tel:91 22 2386 1068, Fax: 91 22 23893030, Cell: 98692 55533

WAO that's some hot shit right there!