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Recently, actress Jyotika's comment on temples. I wanted to join the issue but i did not see the video (I am not subscribing to any Tamil Channel for that matter). I happened to see the clip in FB.
At the outset, we should understand why we had temples. In those days, Govts did not have industries. Not everyone could do farming. Hence temples served as a medium of providing employment. Architecture, Construction engineering, mason, labor, sculptors, artisans, priests, carpenters, smiths, Casting - each category had employment through this. The Hundi in the temple served as Banks. In those days, they never had banks to keep/ save money. Temples served as banks. Whenever there is a war, people used the money from temple. it served as a means of funds supply in contingency times.
Temples were built in a monstrous manner - reason, under any emergency, the entire village or town people can reside inside, Escaping the attack from opponents, natural calamities, etc., Poor were fed from the temple.
Above all, temples were the place where Sat-Sangh used to happen meaning gathering of well-minded people. This spread the positivity among the people. Prayers, Meditations, devotional hymns, poems - it encouraged everything. Temples were treated as schools too. In today's world most of these features are lost and people accumulate wealth in temples but only to be looted by the authorities and it never serve a purpose of doing any social welfare activities.
Let us now come to Jyotika's speech. She visited the temple and she was flabbergasted by the maintenance of the temple at the same breath she mentioned that the hospital was not maintained the same way. In all fairness, what should have she said, "I request the concerned authorities to take a leaf from the books of Temples and maintain hospitals which is no less than a temple" this statement would have been the best. But alas, Sensationalism sells. If she made a statement, we would not have been discussing this.
"If a hospital is not maintained well, then don't maintain temples. Stop building them or maintaining them." What a thought! Only those who are regressive can think of this. Can she the say the same about Taj Mahal? These are our architectural properties, heritage to be precise. Did she ever give a thought on imagining how the king would have built this temple when they had less equipment or modern engineering? How many labours, how we would have fed them? He did not cut the hands of those who worked but he had a statue for the old lady who served buttermilk to all those workers there. Is she aware of all these?
If temples are extravaganza, so are films and not to mention the award shows. When people are starving why should one spend crores and lakhs for an award show or a film. Films invariably saps the productivity. It consumes time, it consumes money and gives nothing in return. Yes it corrupts one's mind. What does the films do? The portrays Policemen as comedians, or as villains. It portrays lecturers and professors as comedians. It shows that a girl in the 11th reel will fall in love with a boy who eve-teased her in the 4th reel. What are they trying to prove? Not to mention the pelvic thrusts and hip gyration they make in the guise of dancing, vulgar double meaning dialogs, cock-teasing exposures and what not.
Not every activity should be stopped and used for hospitals or food centers. The world is made of multiple dimensions and every one has to flourish. If at all one is to be stopped, it is films. Perhaps Jyotika did not understand this. Let us demolish all the movie halls which add no value, demolish all studios and stop the film industry. Then the turn for temples will come.
Are they ready?
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