Amma Preaches Love; Shah Hails her Role in Modi's Flagship Programmes

Amma Preaches Love; Shah Hails her Role in Modi's Flagship Programmes

KOLLAM:Mata Amritanandamayi turned 62 on Sunday and her birthday celebrations, ‘Amritavarsham 62,’ concluded here in a grand manner.

The enthusiastic crowd from all over the world gathered at the mega pandal that could accommodate around 2 lakh people. The surroundings reverberated with chants of Loka samastha sukhino bhavantu.

Amma, in her address, expressed her pain at the suffering of people, be it in refugee crises, wars or natural calamities. She called for love and compassion with others to resolve these issues. Amma said India was suffering from a split personality — success when it comes to technological advancement and failure in terms of poverty, illiteracy, health sanitation and crimes against women.

However, Amma said, the condition could be remedied if the nation overcame segregationist attitudes and worked in unity.

“A split personality is never a sign of sound health,” Amma said. “If we want to see India become powerful and healthy again, we need to merge these two faces into one beautiful face.” BJP president Amit Shah praised Amma for her commitment to ‘vasudaiva kudumbakam’  and thanked her for the invaluable contribution to Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s two flagship programmes — Swachh Bharat and Namami Gange. “Amma has touched the lives of 3.6 crore people in the past 40 years. I have not seen anyone like her. Let the Ganga of her service flow everywhere and bring nourishment” he said.

Amritakeerthi Puraskar 2015, the award for cultural excellence, was presented to Sanskrit scholar and poet Muthukulam Sreedharan by the Governor P Sathasivam. The organisational excellence of Mata Amritanandamayi Math was evident at the venue and the man behind it, Swami Amritaswarupanada Puri, started the day with satsang and Gurupuja. While welcoming the crowd that spoke different languages, he said for ‘mahatmas’ like Amma, love is the language for communication. Chief Minister Oommen Chandy, Home Minister Ramesh Chennithala, economist and writer S Gurumurthy, Deputy Chairman of Rajya Sabha P J Kurien, Union Minister for Minority Affairs Najma Heptulla, Ambassador of France to India Francois Richier, Minister of State (Independent Charge), Ministry of AYUSH,  Sripad Yasoo Naik, national general secretary of the Bharatiya Janata Party Ramlal, Minister of State for Railways Manoj Sinha, former President of the Vishva Hindu Parishad Ashok Singhal and SNDP Yogam general secretary Vellappally Natesan were  present at the function. As soon as the programme concluded, Amma began giving her signature ‘darshan’ to the attendees.

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