By Anoop Bose

“Swami Vivekananda was one of those persons, who belonged to our ancient culture, knit the country together and inspired a new life into the people and awake the country from slumber. His voice was not momentary, although it was suited for the occasion, and rose from the heart of India. During the brief period of his life, not only did he win the hearts of the people of India, but also of the entire world.” — Jawaharlal Nehru

“Swami Vivekananda saw a dream – Bharat Mata will one day be a leader of the world. We have to make the dream true.” — Narendra Modi

On 12th January, 2015, the world and India in particular will be celebrating the 151st birth anniversary of our legendary scholar, saint and spiritual leader Swami Vivekananda, famous the world over as the “Messenger of Indian Wisdom to the Western World”. This year assumes a very special significance with Narendra Damodardas Modi as the new Prime Minister of India whose single greatest source of inspiration was Swamiji and who, by a strange coincidence, proudly bears the name of Swamiji “Narendra”.

On 2 October, 2014, on the occasion of Mahatma Gandhi’s 145th Birth Anniversary, whilst Modi was in Washington, the American President Barack Obama, himself a great fan of both Swamiji and Gandhi, presented Modi a rare 1200 page book entitled “The World’s Congress of Religions” documenting Swamiji’s historic speeches at the Parliament of World Religions at the Chicago Art Institute in 1893 with an accompanying note saying – “This gift celebrates Swami Vivekananda’s valuable contribution as a bridge between India and US and honors our two nations’ shared traditions of pluralism and diversity.”

Modi, who had in the days of his youth unsuccessfully tried to become a monk at the Belur Math (the Headquarters of the Ramakrishna Math and the Ramakrishna Mission in Howrah on the banks of the river Hoogly which was founded by Swamiji and where his mortal remains were consigned to the flames in 1902), subsequently tweeted that he would cherish the gift forever.

My mind is irresistibly drawn to Mahatma Gandhi’s historic visit to Belur Math in 1921, on the occasion of Swamiji’s birth anniversary, when he paid a most glorious tribute to Swamiji, “I have come here to pay my homage and respect to the revered memory of Swami Vivekananda, whose birthday is being celebrated today. I have gone through his works very thoroughly, and after having gone through them, the love that I had for my country became a thousand-fold.”

Gujarat and the making of Swami Vivekananda

It was upon the hallowed soil of Gujarat that Swamiji discovered the true spiritual greatness of India. From November, 1891 when he entered Ahmedabad, to 26th April 1892 when he left Baroda for Bombay, he travelled throughout the length and breadth of Gujarat as a “parivrajaka” or “homeless wandering monk in the quest of truth” carrying only a kamandala (water pot), staff and his two favourite books viz. Bhagavad Gita and The Imitation of Christ by Thomas a Kempis, the 15th Century German Catholic scholar.

It was during this period of wandering in Gujarat that Swamiji’s whole outlook to life underwent a steady metamorphosis and was aptly recorded by one of his earliest biographers, “It was as though all India were pressing its life through the channels of his personality. He passed through awful upheaval. It might have been at Porbandar that this spirit took birth.”

The realization that he had a mission to accomplish in Gujarat came during his visit to the coastal city of Porbandar, the birthplace of Mahatma Gandhi and Sudama, the strong and energetic cowherd friend of Lord Krishna. He told the Maharaja of Porbandar Sri Vikamathii that, “I have a mission to perform. But I cannot clearly see at present, how I shall begin or where it is to be!” In Porbandar, he told his brother disciple Swami Trigunatitananda, “Sarada, now I have started to understand to some extent the Master’s words. Really | have so much power in me, I feel as though I could revolutionize the world!”

Thereafter, in the cell of Sri Sharada Peeth Math at Dwarka, the City of Lord Krishna, he perceived a most powerful light – and that was the bright and luminescent future of India.

During his visit to the historic Jain temples of Palitana, he saw India as one huge temple, enraptured by chapels and sanctuaries everywhere. He perceived the glory of Mahabharata, the longest epic poem ever written. Whilst beholding the ruins of the magnificent temple of Somnath, which was destroyed and rebuilt several times, Swamiji felt deep inside him the glory of India’s past.

He came in close contact with the great Sanskrit scholar Pandit Shankar Pandurang, the Administrator of Porbandar, and began appreciating the teachings of Sanatana Dharma and the need to preach it to the whole wide world. As he studied the Vedas tirelessly with Pandit Pandurang in his awesome library, he became convinced that “India was truly the Master of Religions, the fountain-head of spirituality and the cradle of civilization.” Swamiji also assiduously learnt French as advised by Panditiji who said, “It will be of great use to you, Swamiji”.

He penned a letter in French to his brother-disciples at Alambazar and took them completely by surprise. Pandit Pandurang told Swamiji, “I am afraid you cannot do much in this country. Few will appreciate you here. You should go to the West. Surely you can throw a great light on Western culture by preaching the ‘Sanatan Dharma’.” Thereafter, by a superb stroke of fate, Swamiji heard for the first time about the Parliament of World Religions in Chicago that was slated to be held in September, 1893 and which changed the entire course of his life.

Significantly in Gujarat, both his mental and physical prowess got a new spurt of divine energy. His fellow disciple Swami Akhandananda wrote in his memoirs, “I at last reached Mandvi. I saw that there was a great change in his appearance. His presence illumined the whole room.”

Here in Gujarat, after being rescued by the Thakore Saheb of Limbdi from the awful clutches of the treacherous Sadhus, Swamiji was imbued with a new life. Swamiji came in close contact with some of the most prominent princes, diwans, scholars and eminent personalities of Gujarat. All of them became his great friends and fans and some of them even became his devoted disciples.

At Junagadh at the foot of the Girnar hills and famous for the iconic early 19th Century Shri Swaminarayan Temple, Swamiji met the magnanimous Ayurvedic physician Jhandu Bhatt of Jamnagar about whom he said, “I had been to many places and have seen many beautiful persons, but nowhere have I seen a generous man like Jhandu Bhatt Vithalji”.

While travelling through the Great Rann of Kutch, Swamiji had a miraculous experience of actually witnessing a mirage with his own eyes. In his lecture delivered in New York entitled “The Real and the Apparent Man”, Swamiji described the phenomenon, “One day I was very thirsty and wanted to have a drink of water, so I started to go to one of these clear, beautiful lakes, and as I approached, it vanished. And with a flash it came to my brain, ‘This is the mirage about which I have read all my life’… The next morning I began my march. There was again the lake, but with it came also the idea that it was the mirage and not a true lake. So is it with this universe. We are all travelling in this mirage of the world day after day, month after month, year after year, not knowing that it is a mirage. One day it will break up, but it will come back again; the body has to remain under the power of past Karma, and so the mirage will come back.”

With the princes and diwans in Gujarat, Swamiji not only discussed philosophy and religion, but also various important economic and political problems. He gave them valuable practical advice and even went to the extent of drafting diplomatic letters for them. Though Swamiji scrupulously stayed away from politics, his close association with the princes and diwans in Gujarat created considerable waves and attracted the attention of the ever watchful eyes of the British Intelligence! Thus, the ceaseless wandering of Swamiji in Gujarat was the most significant period of his whole spiritual life.

Exploitation of Women in the name of Tradition Culture

By Manjunatha N G

LAWZ, January 2015 — scanned pages 34–37

In Temple prostitution such as Devadasi cult existed in India since inception. This occupation of God’s slave-girl degraded into temple prostitution in the present times. With the passage of time, a significant percentage of Devadasis became commercial sex workers. Young Devadasis, which are prima facie in Mumbai and on the whole, are engaged as temple prostitutes, and have become subject to treatment as sexual objects. The practice is the direct result of the loss of religious sanction and the erosion of social support systems.

Devadasi system is the religious sanction given to prostitution of helpless economically and socially deprived women; it is the glorification of humiliation of women. Inherent in this system is the fascistic belief that a certain section of human population, the lower caste, is meant to serve the ‘higher caste’s superior men’. Inherent in it is the feudal-lord-temple-priest-nexus, where the priest, already having a psychological hold over the minds of simple people to the point of dictating their way of life, uses his power to give ‘religious sanction’ to the practice by declaring it ‘sacred’, and thus persuade and lure simple minded villagers into this worst form of prostitution.

Devadasi literally means God’s (Dev) female servant (Dasi), where according to the ancient Indian practice, young pre-pubertal girls are ‘married off’, ‘given away’ in matrimony to God or local religious deity of the temple. These girls are not allowed to marry, as they were supposedly married to the temple. She ‘serves’ the priests and inmates of the temple, and the Zamindars (local land lords) and other men of money and power, in the town and village. The ‘service’ (read sexual satisfaction) given to these men is considered akin to service of God. The Devadasi is dedicated to the service of the temple Deity for life and there is no escape for her. If she wants to escape, the society will not accept her.

There are more than 450,000 Devadasis trapped in this form of prostitution, deified and glorified by the heinous religious sanctions. According to the 1934 Devadasi Security Act, this practice is banned in India. This ban was reinforced again in 1980s but the law is broken every day. Poverty and ‘Untouchables’ contribute to the persistence of this terrible practice.

A report commissioned by the National Commission for Women (NCW) in India reveals the shocking reality of how thousands of Dalit women continue to be forced into the Devadasi system in several states of India. Estimates suggest that girls dedicated to temples in the Maharashtra-Karnataka border area number over 250,000 and are all from the Dalit community of untouchables. More than half of the Devadasis become prostitutes. According to a survey carried out among 375 Devadasis by the Joint Women’s Programme, Bangalore for the NCW, 63.6 per cent of young girls were forced into Devadasi system due to custom, while 38 per cent reported that their families had a history of Devadasis.

Most Devadasis are single. However, 65 per cent of the Devadasis were associated with a patron. About 95.2 per cent have children. And among those with children, more than 95 per cent could not register the names of their patrons (as the fathers of their children) in school admission records. The overwhelming majority of Devadasis (95 per cent) earn less than Rs 1,000 a month. In Andhra Pradesh these Devadasis are called Joginis, while in Jejuri in Maharashtra they are called Muralis. They are known by different names in different areas.

In the state of Karnataka in the region of South India the devadasi system was followed for over 10 centuries. Chief among them was the Yellamma cult. The stories seem to indicate that in the state of Karnataka devadasis originated from Brahmin women who were thrown out of their homes by their husbands. The social reform movements, spearheaded by Ram Mohan Roy, Periyar, Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar, Govind Ranade, Dhondo Keshav Karve, and other prominent social thinkers, questioned the practice of devadasi system and pleaded for its abolition.

Pioneers like Madam H.P. Blavatsky and Colonel H.S. Olcott, the founders of the Theosophical movement, had undertaken an extensive tour of South India and propagated the revival of devadasi institutions and the associated art of sadir. They gained support from all sections of the native elite by their public denouncement of western Christian morality and materialism. In 1882, the Theosophical Society of India had set up its headquarters in Adyar, Chennai with the set goal of working towards the restoration of India’s ancient glory in art, science, and philosophy.

According to their view, it was the model of the ancient temple dancer as pure, sacred, and chaste women, as they were originally. They stressed that the dance of devadasi was a form of “natya yoga” to enhance an individual’s spiritual plane. The revivalists wanted to preserve the traditional form of sadir dance by purifying it. As a consequence of purification, some modifications were introduced into the content of the dance, which was strongly criticized by dancer Balasaraswati and other prominent representatives of the traditional devadasi culture. The revivalists mostly belonged to Brahmin dominated Theosophical circles. Many Brahmin girls started to learn the dance from devadasis.

Dedicated to a life of sexual slavery

In contrast to the abolitionist portrayal of devadasis as prostitutes, the revivalists sketched them as nuns in order to defend and legitimize the institution. Still others claim that a devadasi was neither a prostitute nor a nun: “She was a professional artist who did not suppress or deny her feminine skills.” Devadasi women kept classical dance forms, like Bharatnatyam and Odissi, alive for centuries.

The Devadasis, spread all over India, lead intolerable lives. They have been quenching the thirst of millions of upper caste Indian males’ lusts. Since the inception of this deplorable system, the Joginis have been subjected to merciless subjugation and injustice.

Many of these women were tiny girls when they became Devadasis, “dedicated” to the sect by poverty-stricken parents unable to pay their future dowries and hopeful that a pleased goddess would make the next pregnancy a boy. Tradition has for centuries locked Devadasis into a proscribed and highly stigmatized social role. Forbidden to marry or work outside the temple, they have spent their lives tending the shrines and decorating altars, singing and dancing, telling devotional stories and collecting coins from worshippers to support themselves and their religious work. They continue to face discrimination and indignities on the basis of caste, remain politically powerless and suffer from acute poverty, oppression and exploitation. They run high chances of acquiring sexually transmitted diseases. Although in independent India, many steps have been taken to prevent the system and rehabilitate the Devadasis, they are not enough to improve the situation as the root cause of poverty continues to push young girls to the roads of ‘sacred prostitution’.

Legislative initiatives

To combat the situation from time to time several legislations were passed. In 1924, Indian Penal Code was amended and section 372 and 373 declared the practices of dedicating girl for the ultimate purpose of engaging them in prostitution as illegal. As early as in 1927, Maharaja of Mysore passed the Hindu Religious and Charitable Endowment Act 1927 of Mysore; for the welfare of the Devadasi. The devadasi system dates back to the 1934 Bombay Devadasi Protection Act. This act pertained to the Bombay province as it existed in the British Raj. The Bombay Devadasi Protection Act made dedication of women illegal, whether consensual or not. According to this act, marriage by a devadasi was to be considered lawful and valid, and the children from such wedlock were to be treated as legitimate. The Act also laid down grounds for punitive action that could be taken against any person or persons found to be involved in dedications, except the woman who was being dedicated. Those found guilty of such acts could face a year’s imprisonment, a fine, or both. The 1934 Act also provided rules, which were aimed at protecting the interests of the devadasis. Whenever there was a dispute over ownership of land involving a devadasi, the local Collector was expected to intervene.

Reasons for dedication in modern times

The sanctions provided by social custom and apparently by religion, combined with economic pressures, have pushed girls from poor families into becoming the wives of a deity. The three factors (religious, social, and economic) are interlinked.

In a 1993 study, Asha Ramesh found that: (a) If the parents were childless, they vowed to dedicate their first child if it happened to be girl. (b) If there were no son in the family, the girl child was dedicated and could not marry as she becomes a “son” for the family (earning the family’s livelihood). Yet another economic reason contributed to the dedication. If the girl’s family had some property, the family ensured that it stayed within the family by turning the girl into “son” by dedicating her.

Life after dedication

In spite of these legislations, “the devadasis have been subjected to merciless subjugation and injustice. They continue to face discrimination and indignities on the basis of caste, remain politically powerless and suffer from acute poverty, oppression and exploitation.”

A devadasi after her dedication in the temple, usually acquire a patron. A tough life of devadasi begins after the first person deserts her. Every year, dedication of young girls of Holers, Madars, Samgars and such other Dalit castes takes place in the temple of Yellama at Saudatti near Maharashtra-Karnataka border, temple of Khandoba at Jejuri, District Pune; temple of goddess Ambabai at Kolhapur, temple of Renuka at Pune, temple of Bhavanimata at Solapur and Hanuman temple of Palepally in Mahboobnagar, Andhra Pradesh. Every year mid January in Yellama temple at Saundatti near Maharashtra-Karnataka border, young girls are dedicated to the goddess Yellama.

Implementation and rehabilitation

Implementation of law against the devadasi system and rehabilitation of liberated devadasi in different states are unsatisfactory. The National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) report expressed deep concern over the “poor rehabilitation of the liberated devadasis”. Majority of them are not aware of the facilities they can avail of.

Every year thousands of unmarried girls are dedicated to gods or goddesses on a particular full moon day. The poor and ignorant parents cannot withstand the pressure of the priest who is in league with the traffickers. As a result, devadasi custom and commercial prostitution have become closely linked. Many devadasis are found to be victims of AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases. Ninety five percent of devadasis are earning less than Rs.1000 per month.

“To combat the situation, a multi-pronged attack on the problem by constant counseling, awareness building, economic and social initiatives and consciousness-raising activities is very much necessary,” observed Hon’ble Mr. Justice Y.K. Sabharwal, the Chief Justice of India on 10th September 2005 at Mahati Auditorium, Tirupati, Andhra Pradesh.

The devdasis and their children have no access to rightful means of existence with dignity. To give them a clean healthy life, free of stigma and discrimination is a challenge to the law enforcing functionaries as well as the National Legal Services Authority.

The concerned state government has taken steps to prohibit dedication of women and girls to the temples and to rehabilitate the devdasis; but much more has to be done to combat the challenges. According to the government agencies, i.e., Women Development Corporation (WDC), the number has considerably reduced and the system prevails to some extent but the rituals are being performed stealthily. But according to the NGOs, the figure estimated is about 25,000. It is said that since the system of devadasis has been prohibited under Karnataka Devadasi (Prohibition of Dedication) Act, 1982 and therefore, the system is not being practiced publicly.

The entire work of rehabilitating devadasis, through the government, is being canalized through Women Development Corporation in the state and it has been identified as Nodal Agency for all governmental aid. The Women Development Corporation has opened many offices to implement the schemes at various places where the system of devadasis is prevalent. Glimpses of the rehabilitation measures published by Women Development Corporation are enclosed herewith, which is self-explanatory.

The main object of opening of these offices is to completely prevent the evil system of Devadasis and to re-habilitate the Ex-Devadasis by proper financial and social development programmes. Camps have been organized in the matter of eradicating this evil system and implementation of several programmes inclusive of health programmes and programmes arranged by Ex-Devadasis self-help group; some income generating programmes have also been identified and financial assistance is being given through banks and, of such assistance, 60% is being given as subsidy by the Women Development Corporation; with the active co-ordination of Ex-Devadasis sangha called as “MASS” the evil system is stated to have been completely stopped in the district of Belgaum.

The role of legal services authorities and NGOs

The challenges faced by the society and in particular the adverse impact of the devadasi system on the masses and the step to be taken to rehabilitate the victims of devadasi system and their children. Though there are laws passed by many states for the prevention of the devadasi system with special beneficial provision, aiming at bringing the devadasi to the mainstream of the society, yet these provisions are not known to the victims of this system and it is in this area, the author feels that the legal services authorities have a great role to play by organizing awareness programmes and camps in such places where this system still prevails and educate the masses. This would go a long way in rehabilitating the victims of devadasi system.

The district and sub divisional judicial officials, senior advocates, law teachers, NGOs, devdasis and their self-help groups, district law enforcing officials, district administrative officials may speak on the problems faced by them; and district legal services authority may prepare “District Action Plan (DAP)” to combat the situation at the district, taluk, police stations and village level.

The survey pointed out that Devadasi system is more prevalent among three Scheduled Caste communities – Holers, Madars and Samgars in Karnataka. Nearly 40 per cent of them join the flesh trade in cities and the rest are involved in their respective villages. A Devadasi, in a way, is considered “public property” in the village. Devadasis who do not become prostitutes struggle to survive as agricultural laborers or maidservants.

The role of the NGOs appears to be pivotal in eradication of the devadasi system and rehabilitation of the liberated devdasis. It is a hard fact that this deep rooted problem cannot be addressed properly by the efforts of the district legal services authority or state legal services authority alone. Hence, NGOs and devadasi self-help groups (SHGs) should be involved in the process.