This debate is old, petty, stale, futile and reflects so poorly on the general cultural traits of the entire Sri Vaishnava community of Tamil Nadu.
Sri. Rangarajan Narasimhan has made his name as an indefatigable firebrand activist for protection of Hindu temples in Tamil Nadu. I have great personal respect for him on that account.
However, his recent public pronouncements on the recent High Court verdict given on the disputed rights of the Tenkalai and Vadakalai sampradayam inside the Kanchipuram Sri Varadaraja Perumal Kovil, all smack of triumphalist intemperance … bordering on arrogance. His X posting as a tweet above on the “Sri Sailesa Dayaapaatram” Vs “Ramanuja Dayaapaatram Tanian” controversy is a clear reflection of such an attitude of religious imperiousness if not imperialism.
This age-old “Tanian” controversy has for the last 200 years been the bane and unmitigated shame of the Sri Vaishnavas of Kanchipuram. The Tenkalai-Vadakalai goshti (priestly assemblies inside the sanctum) have bitterly fought (sometimes even descending to the level of fisticuffs!) for their respective right to sing their own respective Tanian litany as offering of worship to the Deity by chanting aloud the glories of their respective Acharya lineage and pantheon. The two century old dispute has gone to the Courts for resolution dozens of times! The arguments put up by representing lawyers in the various courts for and against each of the Tanians would perhaps indeed fill volumes in a full-sized library! The arguments of both sides have been endless, bitter, cantankerous, pedantic, obtuse, arcane … and, many a time, ludicrous!
Sri Rangarajan Narasimhan’s X post today is thus nothing more than a grand, gloating and culminating reiteration of all such arguments of the Tenkalai litigants made before the honourable judges yesterday and which won the day in court.
This Tanian controversy to anyone who is not a Sri Vaishnava might strike one as just a farce .. a saga of tragi-comedy of epic proportions.
Rangarajan Narasimhan’s own pronouncement on his X post is nothing but a flourish of exuberance being waved about in the digital marketplace in the heady moment of savouring diehard Tenkalai triumph following the Court verdict favouring their sect but it is truly as puerile as two schoolboys arguing over which is a better national anthem ? “Jana Gana Mana…” or “Vande Maataram”?
Both anthems are wonderful patriotic hymns in praise of our country . But then just because the former has been gazetted by the Government to be the official national anthem does it mean “Vande Maataram” cannot or should not be sung with fervour and pride by Indians? How then can anyone make the absurd claim that a Sri Vaishnava temple cannot be Sri Vaishnava in character if “Ramanuja Daya Paatram” is sung therein ?
Is Rangarajan Narasimhan’s great Doctrine going to be then extended to its perverse conclusion that those Vadakalais who chant “Ramanuja Daya Paatram” also have all lost their Sri Vaishnava character?! In Vedantic thought, the human Sarira itself is held to be “devaalayam”, isn’t it?
The “Decline and Fall of “ubhaya vedantins” I fear cannot be arrested or reversed so long as this kind of rabid bigotry continues to be practised within this community by such influential insiders and otherwise doughty Sampradaya activists/champions like this Sri Vaishnava gentleman from Sri Rangam.
Adiyen daaaoham 🙏
Sudarshan Madabushi