Anti-Hindu groups are targeting the Sacred Heritage Site, Pavazhakundru (Coral Rock), Tiruvannamalai, sacred rock worshipped as a living deity, on which His Divine Holiness Paramahamsa Nithyananda had the enlightenment experience at age 12. The Anti-Hindu elements are responsible for the attack, abuse and arrest of female sanyasis who were worshiping there.
The Land Belongs to Nithyananda Sangha
The land has been in legal possession of the Nithyananda Sangha for the past 25 years.
And in such a holy place like Tiruvannamalai where every foot of land and every stone is worshipped as MahaSadashiva Himself, there is no need for permission from anyone to worship! Above all, the Sanyasis had all police clearances and permission from local authorities to do puja in that very place.
On the 16th of June 2017, a group of Sanyasis (Hindu monks) were at Pavazha Kundru in Tiruvannamalai, offering puja to The Sadashiva Shila – sacred rock worshipped as a living deity, on which His Divine Holiness Paramahamsa Nithyananda had the enlightenment experience at age 12.
16th of June 2017
We Got Arrested for Offering Puja
Ma Nithya Deepikananda Swami and Ma Nithya Satyanjana Swami share the incidents that happened on and around Pavazhakundru, The Enlightenment place of His Divine Holiness Paramahamsa Nithyananda.
Ma Nithya Deepikananda:
I have been here in the Adheenam for past 10 years. I am a direct disciple of Paramahamsa Nithyananda-sanayasini of the Nithyananda Order.
Ma Nithya Satyanjana Swami:
I have been here for the past 10 years and also a sanyasini of the Nithyananda Order. We would like to share here about the attacks and incidents which happened in Pavazhakundru Tiruvannamalai. As female sanayasis we have gone through so many attacks and so many persecutions against Hinduism itself where the anti-Hindu elements have attacked Hinduism itself and our Sangha-Nithyananda Sangha and Swamiji, in various ways where we have faced it lively in our day-to-day activities where we were doing our puja, having a sanyas-monk life, serving the society, giving free food to others, giving healing and spiritual counselling where we need to face these attacks. It was heart-melting, which you can see in so many videos where we were not even considered as a female sanyasis and have been manhandled so badly.
Ma Nithya Deepikananda Swami:
So a particular attack we went through very recently – an abusal-attack that we faced in Tiruvannamalai – on our own property – the first Aadheenam run by Swamiji is Pavazhakundru, Tiruvannamalai. Tiruvannamalai is the birthplace of Swamiji where Swamiji incarnated himself in Tiruvannamalai and it has so many services for the community, society and people. See, Pavazhakundru is the first place where Swamiji had his first enlightenment experience and we still worship this place as one of our Shakthipeeta, means one of our power temples.
Ma Nithya Satyanjana Swami:
And in our Nithyananda Sangha, that peeta and that Pavazhakundru paarai -Sadashiva paarai- is a tremendously auspicious and important place for us. The enlightenment cloth that we do puja everyday for. Swamiji from the age of three has been owning that rock and has gotten into so many miraculous states on that rock and we have evidence where his guru has been given the rock and place for Swamiji and we have writing from his guru also saying that this place belongs to Swamiji. Swamiji is the heir for the spiritual angle and the mutt (matha) Swamiji’s guru has there. These will also be given to her disciple which is none other than our Swamiji.
Ma Nithya Deepikananda Swami:
One day what had happened to us last year when we were in Tiruvanamalai, as usual as part of our daily puja routine, we had gone to Pavazhakundru-that place, and had started to doing our puja and started worshipping out deity. Suddenly, immediately, more than 50 assassins just gathered there and started attacking us. The place where we were staying, is just a small hut, they started dismantling that without giving any reason. What to say-they didn’t even consider that some human beings are there doing puja, there are deities, there are worshipping materials that are kept there. They just came and just started dismantling and started bullying us like anything. We could not protect ourselves. So we started asking, “Why are you guys doing like this? What is your problem?’ The answer was, ‘This is not the place that belongs to you. You have to move out of this place otherwise we will move you out of this place.’ Their words were very harsh that they used on us.
Ma Nithya Satyanjana Swami:
Despite us showing documents from our side, there were only a couple of us – fifteen of us, but the people who came there were so many and they were not even listening. It was like a pre-planned, pre-meditated attack. They want to destroy our puja prayer place and seva service. They want to get rid of us from that place. They were very clear. The words they were using were so abusive and anti-Hinduism. Like they don’t want any puja to happen, any rituals to happen there and they were saying that it was not because they don’t want, it was like they were using the place itself for anti-Hinduism activities.
Ma Nithya Deepikananda:
To tell you the truth, since 2002, that is the specific place from where Swamiji started his first Annathaan, his first service for the people. Then from there, we still continued to do service and puja for the Sadashiva Sheela -the enlightenment rock. We are worshipping that place as a temple, that rock is a deity-as Arunachala himself because if you see the picture, that hill is part of Arunachala-the very rock is part of that. It is representing Arunachala. That hill is Sadashiva, God.
Ma Nithya Satyanjana Swami:
In Tiruvannamalai, in particular, each nook and corner has been worshipped as Arunachala and Arunachala in the form as the rock, small temples and they can’t even tell us not to do puja and have no right to stop us.
Ma Nithya Deepikananda:
See we are doing puja prayers but what they are doing is coming and drinking alcohol there, they are bringing so many women and doing so many mistakes and wrong things over there.
Ma Nithya Satyanjana Swami:
Illegal activities are continuously happening around that area. When we are doing rituals they feel offended that they are not able to do as they see fit. See, we started doing gardens, beautifying that area, we see it as holy. Mostly they are from other religions and communist parties and they don’t want that (Hindu Rituals) to happen.
Ma Nithya Deepikananda:
So what they did is they made a false case saying that we are “grabbing the land”. We don’t need to grab the land because the land belongs to us -we have enough documents and evidence for that. We have the proper evidence for that which we got through the proper government officials.
Ma Nithya Satyanjana Swami:
We have had those documents for several years and we showed those papers to the officials who came on that day but they were not listening. It was like it was pre-planned and wanted to execute the unwarranted attack. They destroyed the area even though we said: ‘Okay we are halfway through puja, give us a little time, we will finish our puja, we will complete our rituals and we will talk and show.’ Particularly, when I came out of the puja and I spoke with the official and showed the papers, I asked for some time in order to discuss and that our lawyer was also on the way. Before any consideration could be given, they just wanted to mishandle us and dismantle everything we were doing.
Ma Nithya Deepikananda:
Actually, they started dismantling the hut we were sitting under and the hut was about to fall on our heads.
Ma Nithya Satyanjana Swami:
See it was pre-planned because a day earlier itself, some of the rowdies came and saw us getting ready for puja because every day we do puja there. It was so evident. They were just grabbing our dresses, not even thinking we are female sanyasis, and we have deities, abusing the deities so much-pulling it from our hands wanting to throw them on the ground and using abusive words.
Ma Nithya Deepikananda:
Not only that, see, there are anti-Hindu elements. They don’t respect the deities, they don’t respect the God, they don’t respect any of our rituals. So what they did is, they were wearing slippers and walking around touching the deities. Not being barefoot is deemed as disrespectful.
Ma Nithya Satyanjana Swami:
They were walking around with slippers, using abusive language. They just wanted to show their anger and dominance towards Hinduism itself. The words they used were very clear, “how can a Hindu ritual happen here? How do you do this etc” They were abusing us, pushing us, pulling our sarees, even when we want to talk with them so politely, to explain the situation, what is going on, what we stand for. They were all not local people. They were all paid rowdies because we know the local people and they are so supportive of us and because we do daily puja, healing, counseling, yoga, Anna Daan.
Ma Nithya Deepikananda:
Every year, the Nithyananda Poornima, we are celebrating Nithyananda Poornima, we invite the local people and giving praasaadam, and allowing them to take part of our rituals and everything.
Ma Nithya Satyanjana Swami:
One more situation you can see is the local people wanted to come there and offer garlands. That day, these rowdies mishandled everybody even threatening the local people to leave, arresting two female sanyasis and male sanyasis who were helping them to do puja and treating it as if some illegal activities were happening. Even Ma Nithya Deepikananda was arrested that day.
Ma Nithya Deepikananda:
What happened was, we just finished puja and we were walking down and some policemen came and told us ‘please get into the vehicle’ and I had no clue why I was being arrested for doing puja. I said, ‘You tell me under which section for doing puja are you going to arrest me.’ They don’t even have the space of listening. They were not even concerned that they were arresting 2 ladies and so female police have to be there, who were not there. And despite the law stating females should not be kept in police station after 6pm yet we were sent out only after 7:30pm.
Ma Nithya Satyanjana Swami:
I was also there and I was asking what was happening and all they said was ‘oh no no nothing we are just enquiring.’
Ma Nithya Deepikananda:
They did not say anything to us just, ‘Please get into the vehicle, please get into the vehicle.’ In the police station, they were asking, ‘You have so many ashrams-you have so many temples around the world, why you have to do puja there. Why are you guys always causing a problem there?’ Actually, the truth is, we are not creating any problem. Whenever we do seva and puja there we face problems because of these communist fellows.
Ma Nithya Satyanjana Swami:
It is very clear that these communists don’t want this place to be a ritual. If we see the Pavazhakundru and the Arunachala hill, there are so many occupants – more than 3000 houses occupied for several years. Only when we want to do our spiritual activity and serve society, we are all being mishandled and made to seem like we are doing some illegal activities.
Ma Nithya Deepikananda:
See, we are sanyasis. We don’t need any land or any property or anything because we already sacrificed everything, we already renounced everything and we just serve society. In Hindu history, if you go and see all the enlightened masters like Swami Vivekananda where he went and sat in the kanya kumari – that became his memorial now. Especially Adi Shankara, where he left his body-that became a temple now. So where ever the masters have become enlightened, the enlightenment energy still stays there and continuously the energy produces and radiates good things to the people. So if we go and worship, that will bring more positive energy added to the collective consciousness of the universe itself. We have a plan to build a free school, free Anna Daan, etc. just for people to come and have darshan blessing of Arunachala and the Sadashiva Sheela and get the same enlightenment experience that we all get and Swamiji got.
Ma Nithya Satyanjana Swami:
The media is portraying us as if we have only been going for the last 20 days. For 25 years we have been worshipping-all of our devotees, followers have been. Everyday puja is happening. Whenever devotees from all over the world come to Tiruvannamalai, they don’t miss doing puja and receiving blessings from there, then only will they leave. We as sanyasis have taken up the responsibility to maintain the sanctity of that Sadashiva paada and doing puja every day. Local people know we don’t do anything harmful, they are very close to us and helping us with all the rituals and participating in the rituals also. But the media is portraying us as grabbing the land which is not true.
Ma Nithya Deepikananda:
What I wanted to say was by portraying us as grabbing the land, it is clearly an attack on Hinduism, through Swamiji, because wherever Swamiji is, He is taking Hinduism as a leader. The attackers just don’t want to allow Hinduism to flourish, so by destroying Nithyananda, Nithyananda sanyasis and Nithyananda property, they are directly destroying Hinduism. So they are anti-Hindus attacking us and are continuously creating false news. The media is projecting this false news, they don’t have any respect for sanyasis – not even females. You are not supposed to touch women you don’t know but they touched us, pulled our sarees -there is so much we have gone through. So even after going through everything, because of Swamiji’s blessings and spiritual strength that we carry inside, we still wanted to serve from that place without missing a day, we are doing puja there. This is our belief in God, this is why this is happening. So what I really wanted to tell you is whatever is happening to us, it is destroying Hinduism directly. Destroying Nithyananda is destroying Hinduism directly. That is what these anti-Hindu elements want to do to society. So they are attacking everywhere not just Tiruvannamalai – in so many other Tamil Nadu places, we have been attacked like anything without having any reason.
Ma Nithya Satyanjana Swami:
They are saying “land grabbing land grabbing”. So many properties we have and even in Tiruvannamalai, our main Aadheenam, we give food to thousands every day, any and every Purnimi more than 50,000 people come and have food and we have so much land, why should we grab land when people are ready to give us properties. It is very clear that whatever media is portraying is not true. It is attacking Hindu monks continuously everywhere. Swamiji is reviving Hinduism and it is clear that the attacks come from atheism. They are attacking Swamiji to stop the growth of Hinduism. This is what we would like to explain.
Ma Nithya Deepikananda Swami and Ma Nithya Satyanjana Swami share the incidents that happened on and around Pavazhakundru, The Enlightenment place of His Divine Holiness Paramahamsa Nithyananda.