Shankaracharya holds firm as Swamy urges to end controversy   

PURI/BHUBANESWAR :  Puri Shankaracharya Swami Nischalananda Saraswati on Friday warned he will not remain silent if the government pressurises him to toe its line on the Srimandir Parikrama project even as senior BJP leader Subramanian Swamy met him at the Gobardhan Peetha and said he will take up the issue with Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik.

After meeting Swamy, the Shankaracharya told mediapersons that the government should not take him for granted and expect him to remain silent on the issue. “I will not cow down, but oppose,” he added. If the government wants to develop religious places then it should consult me, he said and added that temples and mutts are religious institutions and should be run by authentic religious persons. He maintained that government should not take the religious institutions to its fold, rather cooperate with such institutions for their development.

After meeting Shankarcharya, Swamy said he will take up the issue with the CM. Stating that there is a need to end the controversy, Swamy said, “Biju Patnaik was a close friend and I have good relations with his son and present Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik. I will take up the issue with Naveen.”  The BJP leader said temples were the centres of knowledge and kings also used to visit such places. It is everybody’s duty to protect the temples. He, however, said that temples should be free from government control. “A government can intervene if there are some irregularities,” he said. 

The BJP leader along with his wife had come to invite Shankaracharya to attend a religious function in Kerala Padmanabh Swamy temple. Meanwhile, BJP MP from Bhubaneswar Aparajita Sarangi continued to target the State government over the Parikrama project. Alleging illegalities in the implementation of the project, Sarangi demanded that the names of heritage conservation architect and structural engineer who cleared the project should be revealed by the government.

Stating that the work was executed in violation of AMASR Act, 1958, and without conducting the Ground Penetrating Radar Survey (GPRS) besides heritage impact assessment studies, Sarangi said  the government should tell the people of Odisha on whose suggestions the project was carried out. It has already admitted its mistake by shifting the proposed reception centre from the temple’s prohibited area, she said and added, the National Monuments Authority (NMA) had also written to Shree Jagannath Temple Administration asking it to reduce the height of the building.

Aparajita said the government is aware of these violations and now left with no option but to cover up its mistakes. “It is also surprising how Puri MP Pinaki Mishra is not aware of what is going on under the project. If the local MP is in dark, imagine the plight of 4.5 crore Odisha people,” she added.