Priests and raagis have acquired vested interests in religious practice. Until and unless they are divested of their stranglehold on places of worship, there is little chance of worship and there is little chance of their being restored as havens of spirituality.
There was a time when I used to look forward to Thursday afternoons and to spending a couple of hours at the mausoleum of Hazrat Nizamuddin Auliya (1238–1325) in New Delhi. Although beggars lined the long corridors leading to the graves of the Peer Sahib and the renowned musician, scholar and poet, Amir Khusrau (1253–1325), once you got past them you were left in peace to enjoy the qawwalis sung in the courtyard.
Soon, the mujawwars (caretakers) of the shrine got to know of me. Every time I went there, someone or the other approached me with a receipt book and a ballpoint pen in hand. Would I make a donation for the langar (free kitchen) and upkeep of the place? After a while, I stopped going to Nizamuddin.
There was a time when I used to look forward to going to Hardiwar for Purnima (full moon). The worship of the river Ganga at sunset at Har Ki Pauri with lit candelabras and leaf boats with flickering oil lamps floating down the river presented a truly magical sight. Seeing the Ganga in moonlight was a mystic experience.
I was younger and could brush aside persistent beggars, pandas (priests who keep genealogical records), purohits (priests) and the innumerable agents of innumerable so-called charitable organizations who surrounded me with the standard receipt books and ballpoint pens soliciting contributions for gowshalas (cow sheds), ashrams and other institutions. I stopped going to Hardiwar.
It was the same at Varanasi. The one and the only time I went to Puri (in Orissa) to see the Jagannath temple, I was unable to step out of the car because hordes of pandas were clamouring for my attention and claiming to be my family purohits.
I have never been much of a gurudwara-goer. But on the rare occasions I visited gurudwaras, I never placed any money in front of the Granth Sahib or in the golak (donation box). I have enough evidence of money being misappropriated by members of caretaker committees, granthis and sewadars (volunteers who offer their services to the gurudwaras). Whatever daswandh (one-tenth) of my earnings I wished to give for charity, I gave to Bhagat Puran Singh (a well-known philanthropist), Mother Teresa or directly to people engaged in good works.
Although there are as yet no beggars or contribution/subscription seekers around gurudwaras, the commercialization that has taken place in Sikh ritual is as bad as among Hindus. There are gradations of akhand (non-stop) and saptah (one week) paaths, depending on how much you are willing to pay for them: novice granthis are cheaper to hire than old hands with clearer enunciation. The rates raagis charge vary enormously, ranging from hundreds to thousands of rupees. Some of them have their rates printed on their visiting cards. I recall one jatha (group) of raagis from Delhi asking for an additional amount if you wanted them to bring their brand new Japanese harmonium.
The commercialization of religious rituals was well exposed, in all its crass vulgarity, decades ago, by the trouble that brewed in the temples of Badrinath and Kedarnath (high in the Himalayas in Uttarakhand). These temples are manned by Namboodri Brahmins from Kerala. None but they could enter the sanctum sanctorum or touch the deities enshrined within.
Apart from drawing regular monthly salaries, they had established a claim to seven-and-a-half per cent of the offering made at the temples. Besides the Namboodris holding the rank of high priests (rawals), there are pandits and Vedpathaks (those familiar with the Vedas) with different functions allotted to them. Rituals are rated like menus of an expensive restaurant. The entire priestly fraternity of Badrinath and Kedarnath were up in arms because the commissions of its members from the offerings were sought to be reduced; they threatened to stop performing rituals, bathe the deities or offer prayers on behalf of pilgrims.
And the less said about the high-profile ashrams which have mushroomed across the length and breadth of the country, under the patronage of jet-setting babas, gurus, and matajis, the better. Look at the cash, solid gold and silver amounting to crores and crores recovered from the ashram of Satya Sai Baba at Putaparthi in Andhra Pradesh! Who could have imagined the 24-year-old Karmapa with crores in cash and that too in various foreign currencies of the world stacked away in his temple-residence in Sidhbari in Dharamsala (Himachal Pradesh)? Look at the huge empires created by the likes of the yoga guru Ramdev and some others, who have fallen afoul of the law. For instance, the spiritual guru, Asaram Bapu, with his headquarters at Ahmedabad in Gujarat and with many ashrams under his wing, had been accused of several crimes, including murder, land encroachment and tax evasion. However, the charges could not be proved. Another guru (with a huge following), accused of murder and also sexual misconduct, was Gurmeet Rahim, who heads an organization known as Dera Sacha Sauda, based in Sirsa, Haryana. Yet another guru, Swami Nithyananda (with his base at Bangalore) was involved in a sex scandal and caught on camera. He has claimed that the images in the video – telecast by a South Indian news channel and also available on the Internet – have been morphed. It seems that now our so-called religious and spiritual gurus too are in direct competition with our corrupt political netas.
Priests, raagis and other similar figures have acquired vested interests in religious practice. Until and unless they are divested of their stranglehold on places of worship, there is little chance of worship and there is little chance of their being restored as havens of spirituality. It is time somebody called the bluff of these money-grabbing parasites and made the houses of God fit places for deities and their worshippers.