Remembering Shantikali Maharaj of Tripura

 

On 27 August, 2000, Swami Shantikali Maharaj was brutally assassinated by fanatics of Christian terrorist organization called National Liberation Front of Tripura (NLFT). This gruesome act was carried out by the enemies of Hindus at an Ashram near Jirania (Khumlwng area) under the Sadar subdivision in the State of Tripura. On Aug 27, 2000, he was presiding at his ashram with a gathering of local devotees. At night, these Christian militants broke into the ashram and murdered the priest for refusing to convert to Christianity along with his followers. It’s also important to note that in the same month another Hindu leader of the Jamatya community, Jaulushmoni Jamatya, was murdered in the hands of Christian terrorist active in the state.

Shantikali Maharaj was a popular Hindu priest also commonly known as Shantikali working among the tribals in Tripura for their socio-religious upliftment. The thirteenth child of Dhananjay Tripura and Khanjan Devi, he was born in a small village named Fulsori in south Tripura district of Subrum subdivision. At his early youth he left Tripura and ventured on a pilgrimage throughout India. It was during his travels that he determined to return to Tripura and establish a temple in the honor of Goddess Tripura Sundari and an ashram from which to administer to the needs of local tribals. After completing his pilgrimage, he devoted his life to establishing the Shantikali Ashram, first consecrated in 1979 at Manu in Subrum, on the auspicious day of Shiv Chaturdashi. The ashram has now grown to include 18 branches in Tripura. It has since been named the Shantikali Mission. The mission has been engaged in providing education to poor children, health services to the poor and running primary schools and orphanages.

Most of us from the other parts of India and many even from the north eastern states are not aware of the anti-India conspiracies cooking up in the region. On the name of serving humanity, the missionary organizations are carrying out large scale conversion. Not only that they are also sowing the treacherous seeds of separatist tendencies in the minds of converts who have posed a serious challenge to India’s sovereignty. The killing of Shanti Kali Maharaj and the chains of events thereafter prove testimony to such activities. The newly convert agents of Christian evangelical organizations are hell bent upon the uprooting the other indigenous faiths that have turned out to be minorities in the region long ago.

Even after the barbarous assassination of Shantikali Maharaj, the Christian terrorist and separatist organization NLTF was not satisfied. Its single point agenda is that Hinduism has to be expunged from their land of Christ. On Dec 4, 2000, nearly three months after his death, an ashram set up by Shantikali at Chachu Bazar near the Sidhai police station was raided by Christian militants belonging to the NLFT. In the months following his death, eleven of the priest’s ashrams, schools, and orphanages around the state were closed down by the Christian terrorist outfit. The mission has been engaged in providing education to poor children, health services to the poor and running primary schools and orphanages. Yet its social work was of no consequence. It was Hindu and that was that mattered to disciples of the intolerant sky-god of Tripura’s Bible belt terrorists. Hence Hindus, including the ‘tribals’, face not just a cultural genocide, but a very real physical one.

Anyone familiar with the history of Christianity should not be surprised by all this. In the west Christianity is on the decline. This is especially the case of established churches which have been rocked by scandals of rape, child abuse, and financial misdemeanors. Therefore they have turned up to India especially. This is because Hindus are the last remaining large body of what the Christian world has historically termed pagans, the unbelieving infidels who have the effrontery to bow down before graven images.

In Europe the indigenous pagan cultures were destroyed by the advancing soldiers of Christ. Charlemagne forced the peoples he conquered to accept Christ or face death. For this the Pope crowned him Holy Roman Emperor. The Teutonic Knights forcibly converted the Slavs and Baltic peoples, and later inspired the Nazi push for lebensraum in the east. The history of massacre of Jews is well known who were considered as the demonic entity therefore should be eradicated by those who served Christ. Only in India did Jews flourish free from persecution, as a direct result of the ancient Hindu tradition of tolerance and acceptance.

It’s this essential foundation of India which Christian evangelists are intent on destroying. The north eastern states of India have been largely converted to Christianity and various cessationist organizations had long plagued the region. In the recent years they seem to be on decline but the tribal belt of central India seems to be falling in the trap of various evangelical organizations. In the recent times we have witnessed activities such as Pathalgarhi movement in Jharkhand posing potential threats to India’s internal security. Its therefore, time has come to think of enacting strong anti-conversion laws if we were to protect India’s integrity and sovereignty.

Delhi Riots 2020: The Untold Story, Bloomsbury and the Left Liberal Cabal

On Saturday, the 22 August, 2020, Bloomsbury India announced that it will not publish the book “Delhi Riots 2020: The Untold Story” by Monika Arora, Sonali Chitalkar and Prerna Malhotra. It was done under the pressure from tiny global left liberal cabal that controls Indian publishing and constantly imposes ideological censorship. These unscrupulous ‘gatekeepers of conscience’ allow what is convenient to them and cry foul on the name of freedom of expression when things don’t suite to their designs.

We are told that this cabal is rejoicing since the book was stopped from getting published on the intended date. But in my opinion, it’s a moment of celebration for the nationalists as the lies of freedom of thought and expression that were being served for such a long time stand exposed in the backdrop of this cacophony. It’s also important to note that Bloomsbury India has already published a book called “Shaheen Bagh: From Protest to Movement” by Zia-us-Salam and Uzma Ausaf. Not only that a third grade book by Aziz Bernie which spread a naked lie that the 26/11 Mumbai terrorist attack was orchestrated by RSS and its affiliates also went through publication in this country.

This cabal has constantly talked that an idea should be countered with an alternative idea. Then how come the likes of William Dalrymple, Khaled Hosseini, Atish Taseer supported by Nidhi Razdan etc. lobby with Bloomsbury’s head office in UK and pressurize Bloomsbury India to withdraw from publishing the book? Bloomsbury India, which was supposed to be publishing the book had done all the scrutiny of the manuscript and had approved the publication. The last minute withdrawal leads to breach of trust and breach of contract for which it must pay. Even before the book was launched, it was on high demand as it was rated number one best seller in the political category on Amazon. This in fact sent the shivers down the spine of the unholy alliance of the Urban Naxals and Jihadists who were complicit in orchestrating the Delhi Riots, 2020. Howsoever, these left-(il) liberal- (pseudo) secular gangs try to suppress the truth, it will surface. The book “Delhi Riots 2020: The Untold Story” has already been published by Garuda Prakashan and surly millions of its copies would be sold.

Is this selective approach of the so called freedom of speech and expression an isolated incident? We cannot remain oblivious to the fact that these gangs became successful in banning the book “The Satanic Verses”, by Salman Rushdie on 5 October, 1988 during Rajive Gandhi’s premiership in India. Then the Jihadi gangs stopped Salman Rushdie from participating in Jaipur Literatrure Festival in 2012.  This time again, it was Ashok Gehlot led congress government in Rajasthan. In the similar vein Taslima Nasreen’s book “Lajja” was banned by the Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee Government (the left government in West Bengal) in 2003. The author was hounded and attacked during her book launch function in Hyderabad by the fanatic goons of Asaduddin Owaisi’s AIMIM party in 2007.  The nationalist historians and commentators were systematically sidelined or their books and commentaries were stopped from getting to the mainstream discourse.

This unholy alliance left no stone unturned in demeaning the then Gujrat Chief Minister and the present Prime Minister of India Shri Narendra Modi. The left-liberal academicians and journalists tried every trick to humiliate him at every platform though the Supreme Court-appointed special investigation team had absolved him all the charges leveled against him in relation to 2002 Godhra riots in Gujrat. This tiny global cabal had become successful in lobbying with US government to deny him a tourist visa under little known law on religious freedom called International Religious Freedom Act of the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA) in 2005. In the same year he was forced to cancel his visit to London due to protests by these dubious characters. European Union too had yielded to such a nonsensical pressure.

As Shri Narendra Modi rose in his stature and was likely to be presented as BJP’s formidable prime ministerial candidate, the countries in question started revoking their previously held position. Again the cabal of sixty-four members of Indian Parliament, 25 from the Lok Sabha and 39 from the Rajya Sabha, petitioned US President Barack Obama to advise the State Department to hold firm to its 2005 decision. One of these tricksters called Aatish Taseer had cajoled Time Magazine to portray Narendra Modi as ‘India’s Divider in Chief’ on the cover of its May 20 issue in the midst of 2019 general elections in India. What happened in the 2019 general election is the history for them all to see.

These slavish minds, still in their colonial shackles and deep slumber, don’t seem to be awakening to the new India. The new India that’s emerging after 2014 is firm in its resolve to rise with its cultural roots. It’s not weak, meek or submissive. The long pending issues such as Legal Ban on Triple Talaq in July, 2019, Abrogation of Art. 370 in August, 2019, the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) in December, 2019 and the construction of Shree Ram Temple at Ayodhya (the Birth Place of Prabhu Shree Ramchandra) on 5 August, 2020 following Supreme Court’s verdict on 9 November, 2019 are being carried out at a faster pace. Now they are desperate as the patronage they enjoyed doesn’t seem coming back anywhere in their sight.

The Delhi riots and the recent communal riots in Bangalore are the manifestation of their desperation. The Jihadi and Urban Naxal gangs are hell bent upon weakening the fabric of Indian society but the diversity at the base of which their lies unity is strong enough to endure such assaults. It’s therefore incidents like Bloomsbury withdrawing the publication of the book that intends to expose this nexus won’t have much bearing. In fact it’s a wakeup call to not rely on the foreign publishing houses and create our own platforms that that will help us build new India’s pillars deep and lift them to the sky.

Remembering Swami Lakshmananada Saraswati Ji: His Legacy and Lessons

Today on 23 August 2023, it would be fifteen years since Swami Lakshmanananda ji was assassinated by fanatic Christian Missionaries and the Maoist Gangs in the Kadhamal District of Odisha. Swami Lakshmanananda Saraswati ji, a Hindu monk devoted to the cause of awakening Hindus against Christian evangelism was seen as a big stumbling block in their activities to covert the innocent Hindus taking advantage of their ignorance and poverty.  They killed him in alliance with Maoist gangs of the Kandhmal district on the auspicious day of Janmashtami. There have been many such killings and numerous attacks on Hindu saints and monks. What’s appalling is that these brazen acts against Hindu monks and people adhering to Hinduness have either gone unreported or brushed under the carpet. Moreover the state and central governments of those days coined terms such as Hindu terror, saffron extremism and so on and did not leave any stone unturned to further malign Hindus. Therefore, while we remember Swamiji on his fifteenth martyr day, we also need to know the deeper conspiracy that’s brewing in the country. 

Swami Laksahmanand Saraswati deicided to be a Sanyasi at the age of 25 and he went to Himalayas. There he performed tapasya for 12 years and then he came to Rishikesh. There he started studying Hindu scriptures and he became proficient in Vendanta. Therefore the other Sadhus in Risheksh named him as Vedant Keshri Swami Lakshmananda Saraswati.

In 1968, Swamiji had come back to Kandhmal in Odisha and made the district his karmbhumi. He came to the Kandhmal district as per the suggestions of other Sadhus at Rishikesh and after consultation with the leaders of Rashtriya Swayasevak Sangh. Within a year of his coming to the district, Swamiji set up an Ashram at Chakapada in the Kandhamala district.

Kandhmal District even today is a remote district populated mainly by two major communities. The Kandhas, who are Scheduled Tribes, constitute 53.6 percent of the total population of the district. The other major community is Panos, a Scheduled Caste Community constituting 16 percent of the total population of the district. The Panos have largely been converted to Christianity.

Seeing the deplorable condition of people in the district, Swamiji decided to work for the all-round development of them. He started imparting Sanskrit Education to the poor tribal and Dalit community students in the ashram that Swamiji had set up in 1969. Today the School that he ran in the Ashram has turned out to be a well-known college in the area.

Swamiji was committed to the cause of the Hindu awakening of people in the Kandhmal district. With the help of people from surrounding villages, he repaired Birupaksha Temple, Anandeshwara Temple, and Jogeshwara Temple in the Kandhamal district.  Swamiji believed education of young boys and girls in the district can help them realize their original fold and also help them explore promising opportunities for a brighter future. With this in mind, he established a separate residential school for girl students at a place called Jalespata in 1989. Even today hundreds of girls study in this School and many have settled well in their lives.

Along with setting up Ashrams and Schools, Swamiji also kept working for the spiritual development of people. Therefore he started organizing Jagannath Rath Yatra from Kalinga in which thousands of people participated overwhelmingly. He also organized Satsangas and other religious celebrations in order to inculcate good Sanskaras and to raise the bar of the socio-cultural outlook of people. Such initiatives not only imbibed spiritual development in people but also ensured liquor-free villages.

People started realizing what they had missed by converting to foreign religion as Swamiji’s spiritual initiatives exhorted them to respect their deity ‘Penu Basa’-their sacred place and ‘Darni Penu’-Goddess Earth. Swamiji encouraged the local inhabitants to re-invoke their deities and various ways of worship. Importantly Hinduism celebrates diversity of ways of worship whereas in Christianity such indigenous faith and practices are decried. The enthused people then embarked on carrying out Ratha Yatras in the area and set up Bhagwat Tungis or the place of religious discourses.

Swamiji was an ardent worshiper of mother cows and he worked relentlessly for the prevention of cow slaughter. For that, he carried out several campaigns, agitations, and demonstrations for a legal ban on the slaughterhouses that killed cows. It’s also important to remember that in 1966, when Hindu organizations launched a major campaign to demand a ban on the slaughter of cows in India, Swamiji also took part in the agitation in Delhi. He was arrested along with many others and spent 18 days in Tihar Jail.

Swamiji believed that the Christian Churches were involved in the fraudulent conversion of the simple-minded people and were uprooting them from their great traditions and culture. He also propagated that such wrongful conversion was creating a serious threat to India’s internal security and sovereignty. He was determined to stop such illegal and immoral behavior on the part of evangelical organizations. He actively protected poor Hindus in that area from falling into the trap of Christian evangelists.

Swamiji's activities had infused self-confidence among poor tribal and Dalit people in the area. The Church-led intrusion into the practices that they had been following inherited from their ancestors had also created disenchantment about Christians in the minds of people. Therefore the re-invoked respect for their age-old culture and tradition started drawing them back to their original fold. It was a major irritant for the intolerant Christian zealots and they conspired to remove Swamiji from their immoral path.

They made an alliance with Maoists active in the area and made eight attempts before they became successful in assassinating Swamiji on 23 August 2008. The barbarous incident of killing of Kalpvriksha Giri Maharaj (70) and Sushil Giri Maharaj (35) in the Gadchinchale village in the Palghar district of Maharashtra on 16 April 2020 also hints at the same kind of unholy alliance.

The divisive forces in collusion with Christian missionaries mostly active in poor, tribal, and Dalit areas and localities are creating havoc. Therefore, as we remember Swami Lakshmanand Saraswati ji on his 15^th Martyr Day on 23 August 2023, we must also understand the wildfire of the conspiracy that’s spreading in such areas of India thereby posing serious threats to India’s unity, integrity, and sovereignty.   

Socio-Cultural Lives of Madias and their Positioning in the Present Context

Madia-Gonds or Madia or Maria as they are referred to, belong to one of the particularly vulnerable tribal groups (PVTGs) as classified by the Debhar Commission (1960-61). Such a classification was made based on their underdevelopment even within tribal population in India. This sub-category within Scheduled Tribes was created during the Fourth Five year plan taking their low level of development into consideration. The Debhar Commission Report and other studies have also referred to them as “Primitive Tribal Group”. A pre-agricultural system of existence, their practice of hunting or gathering, zero or negative population growth, extremely low level of literacy in comparison with other tribal groups are some of the characteristics that these tribal groups show in general. 

Madia-Gonds are one of the endogamous Gond tribes living in Chandrapur District and Gadchiroli District of Maharashtra State, and Bastar division of Chhattisgad State of India.They particularly differentiate themselves by calling them Madias who originally do not show much of close cultural association with Raj-Gonds who used to be the rulers and maintained their own princely states once. They refer to the area where they reside as Madia-Desh and speak Madia dialect of Gondi. Till recently they practiced shifting agriculture which they called as jhoom. Certain studies have pointed out to the living megalithic practices amongst the MadiaGonds. One of the findings of The Bench Mark Survey done in 1997–1998 has shown that 91.08 percent of Madia Gond families lived Below Poverty Line.

Cultural Life of Madias

The Chandrapur district gazette description of the Madia describes the tribes as they  inhabit the wilder tracts, and are in their unsophisticated state a very attractive people. The villages are usually built deep in the jungle near some wide shallow stream, which offers facilities for the gata (their staple food) cultivation, and the surrounding jungles supplement the fruits of their agricultural efforts. Few villages lack the customary grove of toddy – Palm wine trees, the juice of which, fermented or unfermented, is ever acceptable to them. The Marias are a lithe, active looking, well-built set of men, open, hearty manner, and the cheerful smile of good fellowship. Their dress is scanty, consisting of a compromise between a langoti (a loincloth) and a dhoti, a strip of cloth wound tightly round the waist in rope-like folds and passed between the legs with the spare end hanging down in front below the knees. Often this garment diminishes to the scantiest rag. They adorn their necks with handsome strings of beads and their arms occasionally with metal and glass bangles. Their ears are pulled out of shape by the weight of numerous brass rings with which they are usually garnished and occasionally they wear pagris. A curved knife with a brass mounted handle is stuck into the waist cloth and, from the shoulder dangles the ever handy axe without which a Madia seldom moves. Maria women wear a lugada of strong cloth usually white with a coloured strip in the border. They wear no choli (blouse), no Gond woman ever does, and their necks, like their husbands are garnished with beads. They frequently tattoo their faces and limbs in intricate patterns.”

The Chandrapur district gazette description of the Madia further maintains about their dance as Madias, are very fond of dancing. It is the great amusement of the people. Night after night in the eastern tracts in the cool, moon-lit nights of the hot weather, the rhythmic lilt of a Gondi chorus fills the air, as the villagers dance round a fire in some open space near the hamlet. The favorite dance is a peculiar rippling step forward with the foot dragged, not very graceful when done by a single individual, but looking quite different when done in unison by a great circle of dancers singing a 're-la', 're-la', chorus to which the step keeps time. In some villages, where the headman is an enthusiast for the pastime, a trained band performs weird and wonderful step dances to the sound of the drum. At a big dance, the trained band occupies the inner ring round the fire, while the common folk, men and maids, in separate rings move round in great circles in opposite ways. All are dressed for the occasion in their best, bearing in their hands weird ornaments of wicker work, with garlands of flowers on their necks and in their hair, feather ornaments humorously or coquettishly placed. Seen in the glow of a huge log fire, glinting on the shining beads and barbaric ornaments of the dancers, with the throb of the drums and the beat of many feet moving in unison to the wild music of the voices in chorus, a Madia dance is a spectacle not easily forgotten, but lingers as a characteristic scene when other details have faded out of the memory. Men and women ordinarily dance in separate circles but in the dances where the young men choose their brides, they dance in couples.

Ghotul, a place where social gathering takes place, occupies a significant place in the socio-cultural lives of Madias. It’s a centre where Madia people gather and decisions related to every aspect of their lives are made democratically. Madias worship stones by instituting them at their places of worship and regarding them as their Gods. Before embarking on any work of importance, they hold a celebration called Pandum e.g., BijaPandum before sowing seeds in the fields, PindiPandum before harvesting, Talin (Mother Godess) Pandum etc. Such celebrations generally take place in Ghotul in a village or a place of worship somewhere in jungle away from the village that they reside. It’s in Ghotul that the young men and women of Madia tribe gather and dance in the night particularly after dinner. It’s in here that they chose their partners for lifetime. Married women are not allowed to enter the Ghotul neither are they allowed to participate in worshiping their Gods and Goddesses whether in village or in jungle. However, Madia culture extends freedom to young women to choose their partners. As married women they have freedom to take divorce from their husbands if they are subjected to ill treatment by them or if they cannot beget a child from them. They have a right to spend their earnings. Husbands do not interfere in their affairs.

Life of Madias in the present context

In the recent times Madia tribe has shown significant potential for its development and readiness to match the steps of changing times. However the efforts made by the central and the state governments as well as those of the panchayti raj institutions of their development face some steep hurdles. The reasons being; the Madias have historically dwelt in isolated forest and hilly areas. Remoteness of their places of dwelling and governmental and administrative apathy to reach to them and bring improvements in their situation has further isolated them from the mainstream paradigm of development. The administrative mechanism seems to be awakened in the recent years and is trying hard to reach to them through the means such as Tribal Sub Plan (TSP), Special Central Assistance (SCA), State Tribal Commissionerates etc. However, their years of alienation has created space for skepticism towards the state led initiatives and the younger generation seem to be falling prey to propaganda of Maoists and some misleading individuals and groups. 

The work done by non-governmental initiatives, individuals and organizations, to a larger extent, has proved a milestone in bringing the Madia people to the mainstream. The Vanvasi Kalyan Ashram has been making unceasing efforts in such areas of Chatisgarh, Maharashtra and across the country that provides for their education, healthcare services, livelihood etc. through the network of its committed karyakartas. NGOs such as Lok Biradari Prakalp, Hemalkasa, Bhamragad and Society for Education, Action and Research in Community Health (SEARCH), Chatgaon too are doing a commendable job for the cause of Madias in Gadchiroli district of Maharashtra state. Work done by these organizations along with genuine governmental efforts have been ushering in much needed changes in the lives of these fellow countrymen. Most of them now can be seen doing wonderfully well as MPs, MLAs, ZP-Panchayat Samiti-Gram Panchyat Members etc. The students from Madia Community have taken courses in Engineering, Medical Research etc. and they are doing proud job as doctors, engineers, lawyers, professors and so on. This change certainly augurs well with society and the nation as a whole.