Whitewashing 4000 years of history ?!?

I was both outraged and upset when I read the article in “The Hindu” about how 4000 years of history and art are treated in India especially after seeing all the efforts the western world puts into preserving its history, which are most of the times only a few hundred years old.

An excerpt from the article (if the link becomes obsolete in a few days) - “There are more than 50 temples in Tamil Nadu, which have exquisite murals of the Pallava, the Chola, the Nayak and the Maratha periods. A couple of palaces - the Ramalinga Vilas at Ramanathapuram and the Padmanabhapuram Palace in Kanyakumari district too have murals.

At the centre of destruction of murals in temples are the HR and CE officials**. They have not only whitewashed murals in many temples but continue to sandblast sculptures and inscriptions, disfiguring them. In the name of renovation and kumbabhishekam, the HR and CE officials have fully or partially whitewashed, out of existence, beautiful murals in the Pundarikaksha Perumal temple, Tiruvellarai, near Tiruchi, the ‘Tiruvilayadal Puranam' murals in the Meenakshi temple at Madurai, the Kallazhagar temple at Azhagarkoil, near Madurai”.

When I looked at the whitewashed walls, I died a little! How can anyone in their right minds do this?? I can understand the lack of funds for doing a full-fledged renovation of the murals but painting over them with low cost lime paints is nothing short of defacing them on purpose.

The only reason I always hear is that preserving art and history takes a backseat in a country where people are struggling for the basic amenities of life like food and shelter. Agreed. It is a huge problem but does that mean that future generations learn and see nothing of our past and our rich cultural heritage? Do we just want to be a country of skyscrapers and people in the next century?

Any time I see a historical artifact from India in a museum elsewhere (say in the UK or Germany), I would reflect for a moment in how and when it was acquired and in most cases it was not a gift from an Indian emperor but just the result of Colonialization and shameless plundering. When I now compare how such artifacts are treated within and outside India, it makes me wonder whether they are better off away from home…..

I understand there is no point in just grumbling without doing something about it. I jotted down my thoughts here

• Choose temples in their historical order of importance (targeting those that have not yet been affected by this mindless renovation) and issue a ban on implementing renovation without a 90 day notice period and an explicit approval from historians who specialize in that era
• Task students studying art and history to research the restoration techniques and if possible, the costs involved and create a report for each of the categories like pallava murals, chola frescoes etc.
• The reports can be used to approach the Govt. or organizations that work towards restoring temples and/or other monuments and can also be used in contacting UNESCO heritage programme to see if any funds could be allocated for these purposes
• If there is an NPO that people can rely on, it will definitely bring in funds from within India and outside. I would gladly give 1% of my salary every year to this cause.
• Above all, it is of extreme importance to make sure that this is not projected as a religious issue because it isn’t. I would not have been any less concerned about the destruction of such historical sites if I had been a Christian or a Muslim and I am sure plenty of Indians would agree with me

I understand fully that it might take decades before any of the above are implemented with a big “if” in the front but it hurts a lot more to not even try ! I have sent this blog post to “The Hindu” as well hoping that I am one among many who feel the same way and our combined efforts will take us a little bit forward.

I would appreciate any comments or suggestions from the readers for eg: information on such organizations if they already exist.

Copyright: Photo is from the article in "The Hindu"

**HR and CE officials = Hindu Religious and Charitable Endowment Department officials

The temple tour

What does this remind you of ?? South India, traveling in a car or a van and seeing at least 3-4 temples in a day ? Well, you are right about the latter but bang wrong about the former since the temple tour was in London…that’s right…I said London. I saw three temples in a day (and four in all, during my brief stay) and that is a record. The only time I have done this before is when amma or some perusu gets over-excited about a pilgrimage trip in South India and decides to take me along !

The first stop was the Mahalakshmi temple in Eastham – obviously, in the desi part of the town. The temple itself was small (but nice) and what completely shook me was the poo kadai at the entrance, I mean finding malli in winter in Europe is just too overwhelming for someone who lives in Munich. I entered the temple to find it pretty crowded because of the Satya narayana puja that was going on and I couldn’t believe my eyes when I saw rows of desi couples all set with their Puja saman….to me it looked too real, too desi and although I knew London has a huge desi community, seeing it was a very different experience. Perumal and Thayar were brilliantly decorated and the swamy vigraham itself was beautiful. I felt a shiver pass through me when the archagar (with a nice iyengar namam) placed the sadari on my head and gave me theertham and thulasi.

The walk after visiting the temple reminded me of a less crowded Pondy bazaar….jewelery store, pullayar statues, oodhubathi vasanai…I was smelling home….!

The next step was the Murugar temple. This brought back a bigger flood of memories because it was this typical temple you see in everywhere in Chennai, with multiple sannidhis housing multiple vigrahams – from Pullayar to vennai covered Anjaneyar, a Dwajasthambam, a place for Navagraham and even a used ther ! The only thing missing was the prasadam…unfortunately there were no dhonnais with chakara pongal or vennpongal in it.

The temple Kopurams I saw were all ivory colored and I was wondering why they do not get it painted in colors like in India. I believe its either too expensive to do and/or too difficult to maintain because of weather conditions.

Since I had heard so much about the Swami Narayana temple, we decided to visit that as well. I was simply stunned by its beauty that I didn’t even remember to pray all the time I was there. The only thing I did was crane and stare at the ceiling, then at the pillars, at the arches and then repeat everything all over! Even when looking at Swamy – Rama and Sita or Rukimini and Krishna, I spent too much time looking at them, how well they were decorated and somehow the beauty in the place was too much for me to shut out and concentrate on prayers.

The temple tour came to an end just before I left London, when my friend suggested making the Ambal temple my last stop. As we walked in to the temple, there was a huge hall with a LCD screen that was displaying Ambal. My friend points to it and says ‘Swamy paaru’ and I think to myself ‘enna dhan technology develop analum, vigrahathuku badhila LCD screen konjam too much’ and I say so to my friend who bursts out laughing as we enter another hall that houses the sannidhi. Then I smile with comprehension and realize that the LCD was just a quick preview :D !

Yes, it was my first temple tour outside India. It was also the first time
- I left my snow boots at the seruppu stand in a temple
- I walked into the temple with socks on and wearing a jacket
- I did a hurried pradakshinam because the floor was too cold (and I had these mental images of running around the Sirrangam temple when the sun is blazing hot struggling with the really hot stone floors in spite all the water that is poured on them to keep them cool)

PS: I cannot translate all the tamil words in this post because some of them aren’t even tamil, they are sanskit words mostly used in the context of temples and related stuff.

Gold fish translator:

Poo kadai – flower shop (in India)
Malli – jasmine
Kopuram - (temple) tower
Vigraham - (sanskrit) idol
Seruppu - slippers/shoes


enna dhan technology develop analum, vigrahathuku badhila LCD screen konjam too much’ – irrespective of development in technology, replacing an idol by a LCD screen is simply too much !