Many government trained priests work part-time

V Ranganathan, president, Tamil Nadu Government Trained Archakar Students Association, says, “priesthood is considered one of the most sacred professions in the country for ages and priests command a high respect in the society for they are seen as messengers of God.”

Though the profession remained a domain of a single community, former Chief Minister and DMK patriarch, Karunanidhi, following in the steps of his mentor Periyar, passed a legislation paving the way for members of all castes to become priests after undergoing proper training. Though Karunanidhi could not immediately implement the Act, he managed to introduce it when he became the Chief Minister for the fifth time in 2006.

Subsequently in 2007-08, a one-year training was given in six centres, four Shaivaite shrines and two Vaishnavite shrines, across the state to 206 persons belonging to various castes. However, the appointment of the trainees was stayed by a court and the hurdle was cleared after the intervention of the Supreme Court in 2015.

After the ban was lifted, the Hindu Religious and Charitable Endowments (HR&CE) department in a historical step appointed the first government trained non-Brahmin priest in one of the temples managed by the HR&CE in Madurai. The decision was hailed as revolutionary one by various quarters.

However, the priests, who completed training, have been demanding the government to provide employment in all the temples across the state. 

Ranganathan told DTNext that except for one priest, the remaining 205 were yet to get appointment orders even though 10 years have lapsed after the training. Among them, more than 100 were serving as priests in small temples  “They perform Ganesh poojas in houses, render prayers during festivals in village temples, besides doing domestic functions. They do it to stay connected to the profession and to keep in touch with the rites and rituals,” explains Ranganathan.

For instance, Ranganathan himself is working at a computer centre to take care of his family as he is the sole breadwinner.

Similar was the case with Marichamy, who was the first government trained non-Brahmin priest appointed by the government recently. He too was working in a private company before getting his appointment from the government as a temple priest.

When the AIADMK government came to power, it introduced some significant changes to the archakas training programme.

Sources in the HR&CE department said that the first change was the name, the archaka training centre was rechristened into Veda Agama Pada Salai. Another notable one was that the programme was indirectly restricted to a single community. 

Apart from renaming the centre, the course structure was changed and made into a three-year programme and the number of training centres were also reduced. Only Vedas were taught as part of the training. Also, the number of training centres was reduced from six to three in the scheme. The number of trainees allowed to attend the programme was scaled down from 207 to 60 at present.

In the Archakas training centres introduced by the DMK, the programme had a regular schedule every day like any other normal institution. It was later curtailed to a session either in the morning or in the evening. But the move was aimed at facilitating college students also to undergo the priest training. 

Due to these changes, only students of Brahmin community were undergoing training in all the three training centres now and non-Brahmin students were not being included citing various reasons, sources said. Another source said that when the ‘Veda Agama Pada Salai’ scheme was launched, boarding and lodging facilities were provided free of cost. But, a year later the government revised its policy and discontinued the facilities. 

However, a senior official at HR&CE department refuting the allegation that non-Brahmin students were not being admitted to programme purposefully said that non-Brahmin students did not evince much interest in the course as the already trained non-Brahmin candidates were not employed. 

The official also said that the recruitment of government trained non-Brahmin priests would continue and advertisements would be given in the newspapers. But, there might not be vacancies in all the temples at one go. So, many trained non-Brahmin priests do not opt for a job with a consolidated pay, the official added.