"Educated" guesses

A couple of days ago, I found this article. On initial reading I was outraged and very near ashamed at this line of thought. I was even more worried when there was a discussion group opened on the same website, and a lot of the guys seemed to support the Sankaracharya. Personally I think these are foolish statements, and cannot imagine why educated people (on the discussion group) would think like this. But it also got me thinking.

Who is the Sankaracharya to decide policy for the country? How then is this any different from Pat Robertson asking God to kill some foreign leader?

On careful thinking though it got me thinking. Reading the article again, this is what let me to a conclusion:

He alleged that family planning measures were proving to be the bane of Hindus who would 'become a minority in India quite soon if these practices continue

So, it turns out that Mr. Sankaracharya, is not worried about the moral or ethical issues of family planning or abortion (that's different from Mr. Robertson's abortion stand). He is only worried that there would be more non-Hindus (I presume he is worried that these will be Muslims). Why would he be worried? I guess if there's more non-Hindus, that's those lesser people who would listen to him. So, basically he is covering his base and making sure that 30, 40, 50 years from now as well, there are people giving "bhaav" to whoever is the Sankaracharya at the time.

Personally, I'd like to tell the Sankaracharya not to worry about it. Leave it to the "market" forces. If, for whatever reason, there are more non-Hindus than Hindus in India, so be it. Why don't we try to be better people and therefore better Hindus? Make Hinduism a fair and just religion and trust me, there will be a lot more people turning to Hinduism. Why don't you let women have equal rights? Why don't you ask Hindus not to indulge in female infanticide? Why don't you ask Hindus to educate their children? Could it be that when people get more educated and informed, the less they would listen to him?