When evil minds combine, good minds have to work together: President

Mumbai, Jan 14 (UNI) Noting Terrorism and-low intensity warfare are affecting many parts of the world, President A P J Abdul Kalam sought answers on how to eradicate the menace.

Dr Kalam posted the first question ''What should we do to free our planet from terrorism?'' on the Yahoo! India Answers' Ask The Planet (ATP) series in India, which was launched here yesterday.

Dr Kalam posted the question to know out-of-box solutions to free the planet from the scourge terrorism.

Ask The Planet series of Yahoo! India Answers forms part of the launch of new initiative by the website in its bid to give an edge to its rivals by providing a forum to the enthusiasts to take opinions of various other people concerned before making their own decision on a particular subject, company's Managing Director, George Zacharias said.

The question posed by the President was replied well by some of achievers in their own fields in the country.

Joining the issue, the first woman IPS officer and Ramon Megsaysay award winner Kiran Bedi, said that ''Before the terrorists fire weapons, terrorism is always in their minds.'' Suggesting a cure for the menace she said that ''that if they have to work for its prevention, one would to address the minds first, because violence first grows in the minds just as peace does.'' ''Once the mind is fed on terrorism and gets hell-bent on causing destruction to achieve political or ideological goals, then weapons, media and money is all oxygen,'' she said.

The founder of the Art of Living,Sri Ravi Shankar, cited the causes of terrorism as being tension and stress in the minds of men and women - narrow ideology and petty mindedness and above all, lack of sense of belongingness with the people of all different religions, cultures and backgrounds. Suggesting a cure, he said that ''First and foremost everyone's identity should connect oneself with the fact that they are part of one divinity and one humanity.'' Blaming it on the religious fanaticism, tennis player Leander Paes, who is the captain of Indian Davis Cup team, said ''We must learn to be tolerant towards people of all religions, colour, caste and creed.'' Also, he felt that spreading the message of peace and love through education is equally important to combat terrorism.

Speaking the campaign, the Director of Yahoo! Search India, Rishi Behal said ''We've roped in some 6-7 eminent personalities to post such questions through our new service to get the opinion of various section of people that are subscribers to our website.'' Also, All-India School Outreach Programme has been launched by the company as part of the campaign to involve young minds. All the ten winning students will get the opportunity to visit Silicon Valley, he added.

UNI