Campaign by the Hindutva Forces in Favour of the Alleged Killer

The Tamilnadu police arrested the Shankaracharya of Kanchi Kamakoti Peetham, Jayendra Saraswati, on 11th November 2004 in Mehbubnagar of Andhra Pradesh for his alleged involvement in the murder of A. Sankararaman, Manager of the Sri Varadharajaswamy Temple at Kancheepuram. Sankararaman was brutally murdered on 3rd September 2004 in his own office. Jayendra Saraswati is also alleged to have been involved in the murderous attack on some S. Radhakrishnan, connected with the mutt, on 20th September 2002.

The Hindutva forces – RSS, BJP, VHP – raised a hue and cry throughout the country in connection with the arrest of the Shankaracharya. They organized a sit-in demonstration for three continual days at Jantar Mantar in New Delhi, which was attended by the top leaders of BJP, and also called an all-India strike for a day. The BJP President, Sri L.K. Advani, even went to the extent of claiming that the Supreme Court had specified separate guidelines for treating VIPs. The Hindutva forces also demanded that the proceedings of the case against Jayendra Saraswati be conducted outside Tamilnadu. However, evidences against him started pouring in and soon the campaign of the Hindutva forces collapsed due to lack of popular support.

The top leaders of ruling class parties raised a lot of clamour against how the police dealt with Jayendra Saraswati. The ex-Prime Ministers, Vajpayee and Chandrasekhar, and the ex-President, Venkatraman, alleged that the police had ill-treated Jayendra Saraswati. Not only that. The present Prime Minister wrote to the Tamilnadu Govt. asking the Govt. to treat him properly. Several senior leaders of the Congress, the President of Samajwadi Party and the Chief Minister of UP, Mulayam Singh Yadav, also lent their voices to this chorus. And this hullabaloo was going on at a time when there was no report of police ill treatment towards Jayendra Saraswati. Even Jayendra Saraswati himself stated that he had been properly treated by the police.

The DMK President, M. Karunanidhi, initially welcomed the arrest of Jayendra Saraswati. But, a few days later, he flipped sides and held the Tamilnadu Chief Minister, Jayalalita, responsible for the arrest.

The outcry of the major ruling class parties, especially the Hindutva forces, RSS and BJP, in favour of the alleged killer, unmasks their regressive and reactionary character. They want that religious authorities of Hinduism be put beyond the preview of law. They tried to misguide the people as if the Shankaracharya had been arrested in connection with some religious activities. As if murder, too, is a religious activity for them! A case of the murder of the head priest of the Ram Temple in Ayodhya (who was against the VHP) is still undecided.

The bedlam of RSS, BJP in favour of Jayendra Saraswati was not at all unexpected. He had long been acting in close association with the Hindutva forces. He had been supporting the Hindutva forces in the name of articulating against the issue of religious conversions in Tamilnadu. In the recent past, he made an unsuccessful attempt to impose the VHP formula for the Ayodhya issue on the Muslim religious leaders in the name of solving the dispute. He had also inaugurated the election office of BJP in Chennai during the 2004 general elections. He also had close relations with the Tamilnadu Chief Minister, Jayalalita. He is also said to have been a major player behind the Act against religious conversions in Tamilnadu (which was later scrapped).

As a matter of fact, the Jayalalita Government in Tamilnadu was forced to arrest Jayendra Saraswati when evidences against him in the murder of Sankararaman came pouring in and the Tamil newspapers were alleging that the Tamilnadu Govt. was protecting him. Jayendra Saraswati’s conflict with Sankararaman and Radhakrishnan was a familiar story. His repeated communications with the murderers of Sankararaman and the payments made from the accounts of the mutt strongly suggested his involvement in the action. Several other informations came to light following his arrest, which brought several of his exploits under the scanner of investigation.

The Hindutva forces utterly failed in building up a movement in favour of Jayendra Saraswati. The people registered their protest against the business of murder and other misconduct in the guise of religion. The case is subjudice, but the people have rejected the proposition of religious heads being beyond law. The Hindutva forces also tried to play the communal card when they found their campaign dwindling. They questioned if the government would have dared to go for such action against heads of other religions. Even this ploy failed to bear fruits for the Hindutva forces.

The Hindutva forces have further exposed themselves while siding with alleged killer, Jayendra Saraswati. Secondly, other ruling class parties – Congress and Samajwadi Party – have made it clear that they also want the people to be under the stranglehold of the dealers of the business of religion. DMK has presented a very good example of opportunism.

The progressive and democratic forces in the country have opposed the campaign of the Hindutva forces and have demanded judicial proceedings against Jayendra Saraswati.