Genocidal Life Attacks in Vedaranyam and Panchanathikulam, South India🔗

In 2016, I went from Thiruvarur to Vedaranyam and Panchanathikulam aadheenam to serve at the temple. One day, as I had just finished the temple cleaning, I was surrounded by 10-15 mobs there who attacked my life.

Suddenly, 50 people barged in and started beating and breaking all the things. Shivanandam and Rajashekar were behind this. They used iron rods and beat me and another Sanyasi, repeatedly threatening us to move out or else get killed. Shortly, they lifted the heavy table and beat us with it, breaking the table leg on my shoulders, I kept holding my head to save my life! By now, we were profusely bleeding, my body was in such agony. I could no longer raise my hand to cover my head to protect me. I saw death in front of me and I cried my last prayers within!

Next, they took all the vessels and smashed them on our heads. One vessel was thrashed on my head, I almost fainted. The inhuman brutes, then dragged both of us onto the road dragging me all the way by my small hair tuft. I was in unbearable excruciating pain. With sunken eye and a dizzy vision, I saw a huge mob gathered around and watching the gory scene of my life being taken.

They grabbed the temple keys, tore my ochre clothes, broke my phone and continued hitting me with more intensity. With each hit, I grasped for breathe to live. They had iron sticks and palm tree branches and they did not leave me till my whole body was beaten and bruised. There was no way to call for help and the neighbours ganged up with them! We were innocent Hindu monks just wanting good for the society.

I wasn't sure if I would make it through alive, just one person surrounded by over 15 people with weapons. I was rushed to hospital with severe injuries and I nearly escaped fatal injury to my head and eye. Constantly my brother sanyasis were admitted to the hospital for severe beatings and life attacks we got. No support from police authorities came even though we kept on filing complaints.

New lies and rumours were spread around like we were running a prostitution centre! We kept going to the police station to file complaints and stop these lies being printed and spread in the community but no avail. Till date there is no action taken by the police authorities. Swamiji is the legal owner of this land and we cannot enter or live in our own home, nor can we perform our rituals in our temple. When will this finally stop? When will justice happen for the innocent? What has happened to our human rights?

-Ma Nithya Shantananda Swami

A female monk unlawfully arrested and punched in the stomach without any way of defending herself, still lives with the trauma of how she was victimised.

Although I had been living is US for ten years, I couldn't ignore my Indian roots. Whenever I did, it made me feel out of sync with my identity. I was struggling between the culture which suited my convenience and the culture in its purest form which was back home. Soon I realised that my vedic culture was not a formality for me but something that I yearned for immensely. I was desperately looking for an avenue which could bring me out of the guilt of not being able to return to my roots. Finally I reached a stage where it was crucial for me to come to terms with the reality and set my priorities straight in life. I wanted to return to my homeland, my culture and connect to my roots.

My good fortune happened seemingly by chance when I was invited by a family friend to a spiritual program by Paramahamsa Nithyananda. It was the beginning with my dramatic rebirth and spiritual awakening. Until meeting Swamiji, I knew very little about Gurus or their teachings. Only few year later I realised how blessed I was to be direct disciple of a rare Avatar and authentic Guru. Having found direction in life, I returned to India.

I read about persecutions hundreds of years ago, when the right of a person to freely practice his or her religion without interference or hindrance was denied. They were forcefully converted to other religions, and were killed if they refused. Never did I imagine that it is still the reality of the modern world until the time it happened to my beloved Guru. He was illegally arrested after massive character assassination campaign in media using a fake video with a south indian actress. He was charged with false allegations ranging from stealing land, illegal gold, tiger skins, all the way to sex and drugs. Media constantly replayed a few tapes none of which were verified. This caused large-scale demoralisation, fear and panic among the devotees. What could be more painfully helpless than watching your beloved Guru being slandered, insulted, abused and locked up and not being able to do anything to stop it. My trust in humanity, justice, and in life itself got shaken.

When I was gradually recovering from this intense trauma, there was a second attack. And this time, I too was the victim. On 7th of July, 2012 will be remembered as one of the darkest day in the memories of our sangha (Spiritual community). We were reliving the terror of what happened in the year 2010 again. It started with the press meet which was organized in the ashram that day to reach out to people to present our side of story. What was organized as a friendly press meet turned out to be a terror trail. Swamiji was answering various questions from various media persons. Suddenly, Ajit (a reporter from Suvarna TV - popular News channel in South India) tried to approach Swamiji and attempted to jump on stage where he was sitting. He was carrying a packet which we suspected to be something deadly for Swamiji’s life. I along with few other sanyasi disciples got into panic and rushed towards Ajit to stop him. He started abusing Swamiji and got physically violent. He came along with many assassins.