Arrest of Kanchi Shankaracharya - warning - the story's other side

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The Rediff Special/A Ganesh Nadar in Kanchipuram

 

November 13, 2004

 

Sankararaman Anantakrishnasharma worked with the Kanchi Kamakoti Peetham --

arguably, South India's most respected Hindu Math -- for 60 years. He was

among the four men who walked with the late Kanchi Shankaracharya Sri

Chandrasekharendra Saraswati to Kashi from Kanchipuram. Anantakrishnasharma

served Sri Chandrasekharendra Saraswati all his life.

 

The Shankaracharya provided Anantakrishnasharma a one room tenement in the

temple town. This Anantakrishnasharma built into a three room house, of

which one is a prayer room. When Anantakrishnasharma died, his only child

Sankararaman took his place to serve the Kanchi Shankaracharya.

 

But Sankararaman did not apparently get along with Sri Jayendra Saraswati,

the junior Shankarcharya, especially after the seer abruptly left the

Peetham in August 1987, a decision that has never been adequately explained.

Their relationship worsened after Sri Chandrasekharendra Saraswati died.

Sankararaman stopped frequenting the Math as he used to.

 

He got a job at the Devarajasamy temple. His diligence paid off. For the

last seven years he served as the temple's manager. He improved the temple's

finances by charging an entrance fee at peak hours, enabling him to pay the

shrine's staff on the first of every month. Earlier, the staff got their

salary irregularly. The remunerative process became regular, thanks to

Sankararaman's foresight.

 

He was an able administrator and a strict enforcer of discipline inside the

temple. At home he was a quiet man and did not discuss temple matters or any

other dispute with his wife or children.

"He never spoke about his life outside the house to me," his widow S Padma

told rediff.com His son Anandsharma studies in the final year at a Sanskrit

college in Chennai. He plans to do an MA in Sanskrit and teach the language.

His father always wanted him to study the scriptures, says the shocked

Anandsharma. "He told me to be on the side of justice always," says the 20

year old who wears his hair in the Brahminical knot, the choti.

 

 

Sankararaman's daughter Uma is 17 and in Class X. She would not speak to

this correspondent because she is fasting today, the second day of the

Kandachasti fast, which lasts six days and nights. The fast is dedicated to

Lord Muruga, Lord Shiva's son. "This is the first time she is fasting. Her

father's death made her do it," says her mother.

 

In 2000, Jayendra Saraswati planned to travel to China. Sankararaman was

aghast. The scriptures clearly dictated that a Hindu would lose his religion

if he crossed the oceans. He moved the court to stop the Shankaracharya from

going to China. He argued that if Jayendra Saraswati traveled by road he

could go to China, but he should not cross the oceans. An ordinary Hindu

could make a mistake, he argued, not the head of the Kanchi Math. The

Shankaracharya canceled his trip.

 

In October 2000, Sankararaman's mother died. A year later, in October 2001,

he decided to pray at the Math. For a year he had not visited the temple in

his mother's memory. He decided to visit Sri Chandrasekharendra Saraswati's

grave and then the Kamakshi temple. He was not allowed to enter the Math.

 

That humiliation did not deter him. As he had served Sri Chandrasekharendra

Saraswati for many years, every time he felt the Math was moving in a

direction different from the senior Shankaracharya's time he would object,

often in writing to Sri Jayendra Saraswati. In his last letter dated August

30, 2004, which has since been reproduced in Nakkeeran, the Tamil magazine,

he warns the Shankacharya: 'I am going to court to remove you from the

leadership of the Kanchi Math. You are misusing your authority.'

 

 

At 5.30 pm, on September 3, 2004, five men attacked Sankararaman in the

Devrajasamy temple and stabbed him to death. Among those present at the

scene were three temple employees who said they did not see the murderous

assault. They said they only saw the backs of the killers.

 

T A Kannan, a friend of the family, told rediff.com: "We reached there at

5.45 pm. He was already dead. There was blood everywhere."

 

 

When they heard of the Shankaracharya's arrest on Friday morning, the family

did not know quite how to react. "It only proves that everybody is equal

before the law," says Kannan, adding, "Nobody opposed the Shankaracharya

because of his political clout. Sankararaman was fighting a lone battle

because of his proximity to Chandrasekharendra Saraswati."

 

Sankararaman was 52 when he died. He was an only child. His wife has many

relatives but none are well off. The temple will give the family Rs 74,000

as a final settlement. A daughter in school and a son in college. The family

is clearly in dire straits.

 

Kanchipuram is famous for its Kamakshi temple, its silk sarees, and, of

course, the revered Kanchi Kamakoti Peetham. But the town now finds itself

in the news for all the wrong reasons. And within its folds lives a

vulnerable family that wonders how their poor but peaceful world was

shattered one September evening.

 

2004 rediff.com India Limited. .