Everything about Lord Jagannath is kingsize. Right from the volume of the wood needed for the chariots to the elaborate meal offered to him on a daily basis. Size does matter to the God who is “Bada Thakura” to millions of devotees. Literally.
And, with June 29 the biggest day of the Odia religious calendar drawing close, the run-up to the Rath Yatra just could not do with a smaller controversy. The issue of allowing devotees on the chariots and touching the deities snowballed into such massive proportions that the Orissa High Court had to intervene and settle it. After the High Court decision recently which states that the stand taken by the Temple Managing Committee to go by the opinion of Shankaracharya has to prevail, the matter seems resolved for now. However, it is, in all likelihood, set for a prolonged tussle. The servitors are not in the mood to let go easily.
The matter gripped the state. Opinion polls were conducted by newspapers and SMS surveys were run on TV news channels. Everyone wanted to have a say. While a serious debate ensued, “No”, said Shankaracharya of Puri Gobardhan Peetha, Nischalananda Saraswati, adding, “it is maha paap to mount the chariots and touch the deities.” “Yes,” said Daitapati Nijoga, a body of servitors whose role assumes significance when the three deities venture out of the Sri Jagannath Temple for the annual nine-day jaunt. With battle lines drawn between Shankaracharya on one side and Daitapati Nijoga, the body protectors of the deities on the other, the entire state was engrossed in the question—to climb the chariots or not? To touch the deities or not?
The controversy, was in fact, fuelled by the State Government. It announced partial restriction on the practice. “Devotees will not be allowed on the chariots on three days—the Rath Yatra, Bahuda (Return Car Festival) and Suna Besha,” announced Minister of State (Independent Charge) for Law Arun Sahu after a hurried meeting with the representatives of Daitapati Nijoga on June 11.
What followed was a verbal war. The Puri Seer, who was camping in Chhattisgarh, sent his spokespersons to register his dissatisfaction over the decision. “The Government should implement my recommendations and not ignore and distort it,” Nischalananda Saraswati’s spokesperson read out the statement at a media conference three days later. The Record of Rights of Sri Jagannath Temple makes the Puri Shankaracharya the final authority to take decisions on religious matters and it is codified, spokesperson Manoj Rath said. Daita servitors are “sevaks” of the Lord and should not meddle in the religious decision-making, he added. The Daitapati Nijoga, which had managed to get a favourable order from the State Government on the matter only days before, was in no mood to back out. “It is an established tradition for centuries to allow devotees to mingle with the deities who venture out of their temple only during the Rath Yatra. Why should anyone come between the devotees and the God?” chief spokesperson of the Daita servitors body Jagannath Swain Mohapatra said. He even accused the Shankaracharya of making attempts to disrupt the Rath Yatra by imposing his views on the religious matters.
With the Rath Yatra inching closer and the issue slowly getting out of hand, Speaker of Odisha Assembly called an all-party meeting to constitute a panel to resolve the matter but before that, a PIL paved the way for the HC to intervene. On June 20, a division bench of Chief Justice AK Goel and Justice AK Ratha upheld the stand of Jagannath Temple Managing Committee to go by the opinion of the Shankaracharya. Any contrary opinion of the State Government will be inoperative, the bench said, putting the controversy to rest.
The controversy was simmering since November 5, 2013, when Puri Shankaracharya submitted his recommendations pursuant to a request from the Managing Committee of the Sri Jagannath Temple Administration (SJTA) to offer his views on the issue. While the Managing Committee accepted the seer’s views and sent them across to the State Government on November 11 for taking a decision, the latter sat on it. The entire controversy has its genesis in the use of iron ladders that the temple administration introduced in 2006 to facilitate devotees climbing the chariots to have a glimpse of the deities during the Rath Yatra. Over the centuries, people attempted to mount the chariots. The servitors and priest obliged.
However, once the ladder system was introduced, it turned into an annual practice and continued without any objection. “The ladder system was an administrative decision and when it was started, the religious side was not taken into consideration,” Puri King Gajapati Dibyasingh Deb said.
Things took a turn for worse in 2011 when the servitors had a face-off with the security personnel resulting in a lathi-charge and leaving scores injured. The temple managing committee decided in October 2011 to withdraw the system. Subsequently, basing on an inquiry report, the Home Department of the State Government issued an order in March 2012 to stop the practice which was endorsed by the temple committee. However, the Daitapati Nijoga insisted that the ladder system must stay on. The administration gave in. During the 2012 Rath Yatra, a foreign national went up the chariot only to be manhandled and evicted by the servitors. A case with Puri Police was lodged and even the State Human Rights Commission probed into the matter.
This incident prompted the Managing Committee of SJTA to write to the Shankaracharya seeking his views. However, after the misbehaviour meted out to noted Odissi danseuse Ileana Citaristi fuelled huge outrage last year, the administration was forced to pursue the matter in the earnest. The Puri Shankaracharya held seven rounds of discussions, sought expert views from scholars from Odisha and outside, involved the Mukti Mandap, the seat of saints at Sri Jagannath Temple, along with various servitors bodies before submitting his recommendations which were later published as a 260-page book to the temple administration on November 5, 2013. The managing committee accepted it on November 7 and sent it to the Government four days later. On May 12 this year, the Shankaracharya had held the first public meeting on the issue.