Dharmastala and Kukke Subramanya : Microcosm of Socialism versus Capitalism

Hailing  from coastal Karnataka visiting holy places of Dharmastala and Subramanya is more or less yearly affair. Sri Manjunatha Swamy, form of Shiva , is worshipped at Dharmastala  and  snake god Subramanya swamy is worshipped in Kukke Subramanya . We do visit this place in quick succession. With my increased interest in politico-economics. I couldn’t resist  observe these places through same lens.

                I indeed remember the history of Dharmastala courtesy watching overnight Yakshagana play called Dharmastala Kshetra Mahatme , which is a traditional dance-drama format of coastal Karnataka where the different historical and mythological stories are enacted. As per this Dharmastala is established in 15-16^th century when Manjunatha Swamy idol is brought from  Kadri and the Jain family of Heggade given responsibility to manage temple and lord. The tradition has been continued till now, which current Dharmadhikari, a God fatherisque reference, Shri Veerendra Heggade is carrying the baton of management . In case of Subramanya according to mythology Subramanya , son of Shiva and Parvati after defeating daemon Tharak settled here with Vasuki.  However the temple is understand Government controlled and managed by Government of Karnataka via Administrative Officer

                I don’t want to comment on divine aspects of both places and compare since that is not the intention of this article. I want to comment on politico-economical aspects of it. Both the temple gets huge amount of money  through the donations from disciples. In fact Subramanya tops the list of most earning temple in Karnataka. Dharmastala run by family , most of the aspects like prasada,annasantarpana,lodges are  run by temple scantily  tenders and auctions happens . In fact private enterprise are rarely encouraged. These makes me think of this as a communistic-socialistic setup.  Where as, in case of Subramanya most of the administration is via tenders and auctions. Most lodges are run by private players . seeming like a capitalistic setup.

                In terms of Pooja and Darshana setup , Dharamastala has splendid Q management system , proper Darshana setup. While in Subramanya the Q is mismanaged when number of people is slightly higher. Pooja system is well managed.

One of most important work done by temples is Annapsantarpana . While Dharmastala had this for more than 15-20 years . This is relatively new phenomenon. The number of people served in former is much higher. The efficiency and quality too. This has been huge success that it is featured in Discovery’s MegaKitchen series along side AksharPatra, Golden Temple and IRCTC. In fact with special seats for elders this seems to more properly managed than the latter.

While in Dharmastala the lodges are managed by Temple and are at very affordable rates with normal service across the board. However I could hardly book anything online and via phone. In case of Subramanya there are lot of lodges run by local people , easily available online. In former case , getting room and priority treatment would solely be based on contacts you have within system, remainding me of License raj. While in case of latter based on how much you can afford various options where available. For  people like me latter seem to be much convenient .

In terms of donations and charity by temple , dharmastala has been running lot of institutes  from primary to higher secondary education including medical and engineering colleges. This including various Yoga and traditional indian colleges. Many of these colleges have various student help programs for deprived students. Including Siddavana , which is residential school with expenses taking care by temple. These institutes are also spread accross Karnataka. While in case of Subramanya there are only couple of schools and colleges run near Kukke. So without doubt the former seems to work better in terms of giving back to society. Dharmastala also runs one of the biggest self help group in India, coupled with micro-finance setup helping lakhs of mostly rural and  backward women.

So in totality Socialistic setup seem to work better for improvement of society  while capitalistic ones seems to favour few. However one might argue this is purely because of the one person and the system itself. This is a true hypothesis, however for socialistic society to work we also need one proper person like Deng Xiaoping of China,Lee Kuan Yew  of Singapore.

Also another aspect may be because of the crowd demography. While n case of Dharmastala it is people from North Karnataka who visit in more number since they are followers of Shiva , it   necessities targeting welfare measure for those people. In case of Subramanya it is Brahmins and upper medium class people  who are dominant visitors with likes of Ravi Shastri, Vijay Mallya.

However there are also stories of high handedness in case of former , which doesn’t have enough evidence yet. If true is real problem with the former system.

I will let readers decide on the better among the both.