Irulniki: Krishnamurthy Gnanapadigal reads out the Vedas in the inner courtyard of Veda Patashala in Irulniki village, while his young disciples are rapt in attention behind him.
Who is he going to vote for? Gnanapadigal, well in his 80s, looks up and says, “BJP”. Someone corrects him saying it’s the DMK and not the BJP which is contesting. "DMK", he amends. DMK is no longer considered an anti-Brahmin party. A marked difference from days when it was dubbed a staunch atheist Dravidian. The party’s alliance with the BJP has changed it all.
Veda Patashala, where the present senior pontiff of Kanchi Kamakoti Peetam, Jayendra Saraswathi, was born 65 years ago, justifies the village’s name Irulniki, which means "remover of darkness". The Shankaracharya’s maternal house, donated to the Kanchi Math, runs a patashala that teaches students the Rig Veda and the Yajur Veda. His aged mother Saraswathi lives with him.
It’s believed the birthplace was one of the reasons leading to the Mannargudi constituency (Tiruvarur district) being given to the BJP. Located 7 km from Mannargudi, it falls in Thiruthuraipoondi constituency, where the DMK will take on the sitting CPI MLA in the Tamil Nadu assembly election.
More interesting is DMK chief and Chief Minister M. Karunanidhi household’s relationship with the Shankaracharya, especially through heir to the party leadership and Chennai Mayor, M.K. Stalin.
According to reliable sources, the Karunanidhi family’s association with the Math has been kept as a closely-guarded secret so as not to embarrass the DMK leader. A year-and-a-half ago, when Stalin participated in a function organised by the Sri Shankara Educational Trust, where the Shankaracharya gave away awards to the corporation school toppers, his `association’ with the Math came under the media glare. The Shankaracharya “was quite embarrassed” about this publicity.
Stalin’s family finally decided to come into the open. Apparently, the move helped reduce the anti-Hindu and anti-God image of the DMK. Senior DMK leader and Union Environment and Forest Minister T.R. Baalu and his family, hailing from Mannargudi region, are ardent devotees of the Shankaracharya. On April 27 last year, Stalin distributed 2,481 spectacles at a function organised by the Math. Again on December 1, he distributed another 4,709 spectacles “with the blessings of the Shankaracharya”. The junior pontiff, Vijayendra Saraswathi, was present on the occasion.
Stalin and his family seek blessings from the Kanchi seer on every important occasion, it is believed. While the son openly established his links with the Math, Karunanidhi himself was seen at the recent poojaris’ conference at Madurai, where the Shankaracharya participated. However, the two did not share the dais. Stalin attended the conference along with the pontiff.
Though Karunanidhi’s wife’s visits to the Math have not been made public, the duo __ in the last couple of years __ was seen visiting temples and temple functions.
Karunanidhi isn’t the only DMK honcho to have secretly surrendered to the Almighty. MGR, a DMK man who founded the AIADMK, is known to have visited the Kollur Mookambika temple, near Mangalore, more than once. These visits had been kept a secret. The Shankaracharya rarely visits this place. As one of his younger brothers, Ramakrishnan, said: "He does not treat the village as a special place. To him, all places in the country are important."
Source: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/37466393.cms
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