[Reader-list] Here's the posting for April-Roadside Temples

[kalpagam - umamaheswaran]

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  Roadside Temples in Chennai- Second Posting
I had last indicated that this time I will discuss what I have found in the field so far. In this I will discuss the temples I have visited so far. In the next posting I will discuss what women respondents have so far told me. I hope that with what I have gathered so far, I will be able to chalk out the itenary and the strategy of my intensive fieldwork in the month of June. The first temple I visted was the temple of Manikandanswamy opposite Mandaveli market and occupies the pedestrian platform while abutting the Corporation School building. It is clearly a roadside temple and could be considered occupying illegal land. The temple is also known as Ayappan temple and was first put up there in 1978 by one Natarajan, whom the temple pujari asked me to consider as a local "dada". He probably sold vegetables there but had died four years ago. The family of Natarajan still retain control in terms of sweeping and cleaning the temple and takes the hundi collection but the Pujari, also known as Kurukul, who is an AdiSaivam gets to retain the dakshina and no other earnings from the temple. Although the idol was installed in 1979-80, it remained a small temple between 1981-1986, when in 1986 the Navagraham was installed. In 1984 the Kumbabishekam was performed and in 1992 with the support of one of the devotees Ganesan Chettiar the present temple Mandapam was constructed.  Although there are no trustees of the temple there are 4 or 5 active devotees. One K.Annaswamy a former employee of Union Bank who had opted for VRS is an active member who since 1997 has been doing the "Panguni Uthsavam" and has ensured that two pujas are performed in a day-morning and evening. On "Panguni Utharam" and a few other days like New Year on Jan 1st, the temple performs Anna Dan for which the active devotees support; even otherwise every Tues, Friday and Saturday the temple distributes prasad of Pongal, Rice and Payasam to about 30 or 40 persons. I was told that on Saturdays the temple attracts crowds. The pujari has been with the temple since 1982. The son of a pujari of a Sivan temple in a village Paachur near Trichy, he belongs to the AdiSaivam caste and has studied upto SSLC but learnt Sanskrit from his father. He had apparently come to Chennai to visit his sister and just stayed on here as a pujari never returning to his village. When he is on leave, his sister's son performs his duties. Apparently when the temple was first started, it was the only Aiyappan temple in Mandaveli, though since then a much bigger one in a nearby posh residential colony MRC Nagar has come up. I interviewed a family of flower sellers at the front of the temple, who claimed they were selling flowers at that spot for the last twenty years. In their estimate about 50 to 60 people visit the temple everyday but more people visit on festival days and months. At this time, in March about 10-15 people visit, though when I was there about 8 people had come by. The flower sellers reported that whereas earlier they had 100 percent profits, they don't get that much these days nor is every temple visitor their customer either. 
	The second temple I visited was just a few yards from the first, also constructed on the corner of the pavement under a big neem tree,  known as "Thandumariyamman Koil" which I have known to exist since my primary school days. As the Abishekam was in progress I could not speak to the pujari but the plaque on the wall stated that the Kumbabishekam was done in September 1997 under the leadership of Dr. Viswanatha Sivacharya. The "Dharmagartha" of the temple is a hereditary position currently occupied by a fifth generation incumbent who oversees the temple. It has the support of a few big local people, one of whom Mr. Yellappa Mudaliar, listed in the plague, has a cloth store just opposite the temple for many years. The temple has an interesting history for it originated with a break away group from another temple just opposite to it which claims to have been started in 1913 under the name of "Thandumariyamman Koil". When the splinter group after some controversy started the temple with the same name in 1961, the older one subsequently changed the temple to "Renukambal Mariamman Temple". 
	Until my recent interview, I thought both were just one temple, and the one opposite which in earlier years had stone figures of snakes under the intertwined Neem and Arasam (peepul) trees with a thatched roof was thought by me as the place where they kept the decorated goddess before and after a procession and for community events like the "koozhu" offering. This temple too is on the roadside abutting a flour mill. Some space near the temple even now belongs to the splinter group where they have put up a mantap of Ramalingaswamigal. The pujari of this temple whom I interviewed produced a certificate dated 10-8-1945 which claimed that the temple had been in existence then for 32 years and was managed by the caste members of Vanniyakula Kshatriya in the Mylapore neighbourhood. This "mariamman" temple has attracted many notable visitors like Congress leaders Kamaraj, Bhaktavatsalam and Kakkan as also cine stars like K.R.Vijaya and spiritual figures like Kripananda Warier and Anantharama Dikshidar. This temple has also figured in film shootings, especially of the most popular Tamil film "Aadhi Parashakti" in which actress K.R.Vijaya is shown to be worshipping in the temple and a snake slides down from the main diety. It has also appeared in the Tamil film "Rajarajeswari". The Kumbabishekam for this temple with its new construction was done on September 6th, 1998 but an earlier Kumbabishekam for the Amman was done in 1942. I was shown the "Swayambhu", the snake pit under the neem and arasam tree and stone figures of Rahu, Ketu and so on. The Moolavar or the presiding diety, the Amman goddess is a decked figure on the trunk of an old "Athimaram" or fig tree. I was told that in earlier pre-independence times, there used to be sacrifices of goats and buffaloes for this goddess and that much of the area then were grazing fields for cows and sheep. Today the temple is expanding in its very limited space and has a number of exquisite stone figureines from Uraiyur in Tamilnadu that is noted for these sculptures. The temple also lends the "procession murthis" to other temples. Today the donors for this temple are drawn from Mudaliar, Brahmin and Vanniyar caste people in the neighbourhood. The temple is managed by a group of 11, of families of hereditary trustees, half of whom live in the neighbourhood and the rest are scattered in the city. On days like Krithigai and Sankatachathurthi, there are special pujas in this temple. During the Tamil month of Aadi there is a "Thiruvizha" and special puja offerings on Thursdays, Fridays and Sundays. The pujari of this temple is 54 years and was formerly an employee of Coromandel Garments (a Tata unit that supplied clothing to the defence sector) who opted for the VRS scheme. Today he gets no monthly salary as a pujari but gets to keep the "dakshinai" that he receives from the devotees to whom he gives "Vibhuti" and "Theertham".
	What I have gathered so far suggest certain questions and lines of inquiry in my more detailed survey to follow. First is a classification of temples in terms of size and age. Second why did so many temples perform Kumbabishekam in the 1990s. What is the significance of Kumbabishekam as a community event and as Hindu religious ritual? Does its performance imply the coming under the fold of a more sanskritic form of Hinduism, that is from the more popular variety of Hinduism into a more formalized one? I need to make note of who or which groups start the temple and who subsequently support them, the cross section of devotees they attract, the community events around a temple, issues of temple management, and biographical details of the pujaris. I need to inquire into location choice as well.   
	
   
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