Perturbed Hindus ask for immediate recall of Shiva and Ganesh puppets
By ANIThursday, March 4, 2010
NEVADA - Upset Hindus have asked for the immediate withdrawal of Shiva and Ganesh puppets and few other similar products, calling it inappropriate, upsetting, and denigrating.
Hindu statesman Rajan Zed, in a statement in Nevada (USA) today, said that inappropriate usage of Hindu deities or concepts for commercial or other agenda was not okay as it hurt the devotees.
Lord Shiva and Lord Ganesh were highly revered deities in Hinduism and using them as puppets was troubling for the devotees, because in reality the believers put the destinies of themselves in the hands of their deities, Zed, who is president of Universal Society of Hinduism, added.
Meanwhile, Bhavna Shinde of Forum for Hindu Awakening, in a communiquĂ© to The Unemployed Philosophers Guild, a Brooklyn (New York, USA) based company which sells these puppets and other products, wrote: “We would like to bring to your attention that millions of Hindus around the world worship Lord Ganesh and Lord Shiva as their revered symbols of faith. Using the images of these Deities in clocks/watches and making puppets and dolls of them, trivializes these revered symbols of faith. The concept of manipulating puppets and playing with dolls made after Deities is downright denigrating, given that Hindus perform devoted worship and spiritual practice to experience the eternal truth that these Deities govern the universe.”
“Hence, we urge you to immediately withdraw from your website and shops these toys and materials made after our revered Deities and in future not make such toys and materials that denigrate Hindu sacred symbols”, Shinde added. (ANI)