Bless Ram Mandir ceremony, ask everyone to attend: Spiritual guru Sri M to Shankaracharyas

NEW DELHI: Spiritual guru Sri M has appealed to the Shankaracharyas to bless the Ram Mandir consecration ceremony and ask everyone to participate in it, even if they are not going. He said there might be ''technical reasons'' why the Shankaracharyas are not going to attend the ceremony on January 22 in Ayodhya.

''When a Shankaracharya goes, there are some rules attached to it like they should be given the highest position which is not the case. Also, Shankaracharyas is not the only school of thought. There are many others,'' Sri M told PTI in an interview.

The 'pran pratishtha' of the Ram Temple will be held on January 22, with several dignitaries, including Prime Minister Narendra Modi, scheduled to take part. Some spiritual leaders have said the ceremony should wait till the temple construction is completed.

''We come to the person who is the most critical of this. Nischalananda Saraswati of the Puri Mutt. You cannot deny that he is a learned man. He has written 22 books on Vedic Maths. But I don't know why he is saying this. With folded hands, I appeal to him that he blesses the Ram Janmabhoomi Prathishtha.

''I appeal to him that he blesses it, even though he is not going and he should say that everyone should go and attend this. I again ask all the Shankaracharyas to bless it. It is all right if you can't go but I am sure that they will go afterwards,'' the founder of The Satsang Foundation said.

On the argument that 'pran pratishtha' cannot be held before the temple construction is over, Sri M said ''no scriptures on temple building mandate this.'' He gave examples of several temples, including Somnath, Badrinath, and Rameswaram where the temple structure was constructed after 'pran pratishtha'.

''On all the scriptures on building temples, no where it is said that prana prathishtha can happen only after all the temple structures is constructed but of course it says that the 'garbha griha' should be completed which is in this case. Now the vigraha will be kept and the prana prathishta will be done.

''For example, in Somnath, prana prathishtha was done before the temple. Adishankara himself did prana pratishtha to Badrinarayanan, the temple came later. Lord Ram himself did prana pratishtha of Shiva in Rameswaram, there was no temple there. To say that the entire temple should be constructed is not so correct,'' he said. Sri M added that he has been invited to the ceremony and will attend the event on January 22.

Talking about the Union government's efforts towards renovation and beautification of temple towns such as Ayodhya, Varanasi and Ujjain, Sri M said that ''what should have been done long ago is being done now.'' ''...And of course, because it is done, there might be some political gains, I am not denying that. But I don't think it was done for that. We really required it...I think, this should have been done long back but it is being done now. We should look at it from a positive aspect,'' the spiritual leader said.