BELAGAVI: An IT professional working in Bengaluru is on a mission to restore neglected Jain statues across Karnataka. Sangamchand Sangannavar, who recently restored statues at a remote village in Belagavi district, has so far revived eight such statues.
Sangannavar, who hails from Jain community, developed the passion for restoring jain relics about four years ago after reading the history of Jainism in books and online.
On Facebook, he was constantly following posts related to Jain artefacts discovered in neighbouring states like Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu. He even visited those places to draw inspiration. Sangannavar, who is from Belagavi, works in an IT company in Bengaluru.
He has revived statues of Tirthankaras in Kolar, Kalaburagi and now in Belagavi. In 2018, through locals from Bolewad village he learnt about three abandoned statues in a dilapidated condition. A leg of one of the statues was broken. “With the help of locals there, I built a platform to install the idols after bringing them back to shape. This gave me immense satisfaction to continue my hobby along with my regular profession,” he said.
After that, he found about statues that were pushed to oblivion at a village in Kolar district in 2019. There too, with the help of locals, he did restoration works. Sangannavar told TOI that most of his projects are self funded, but sometimes community members also provide financial assistance.
A few weeks ago, people of Nainglaj village near Chokkodi in Belagavi district made a Facebook post about a Jina Bimba (image) which was in a shoddy condition. Sangannavar then rushed to the village as he was working from home in Belagavi and started restoration work.
Apart from giving life to the statue, he also built a platform for the installation of idols. Sangannavar said, if more people inform him about neglected statues, he is ready to help them revive them across the state.
Caption: Sangamchand Sangannavar with the idols he restored at a Belagavi village