DMK’s contribution to temples – From Annadurai to Stalin

DMK's parent house is Dravida Kazhagam and its root is Periyar. It was Periyar who strongly denied the existence of God and deeply planted the atheist mentality in Tamil Nadu. Annadurai was also a member of the Dravida Kazhagam with an agnostic mentality.

Even though Annadurai was an agnostic, he did not advocate atheism as the principle policy of his newly started political party, the DMK. Annadurai made 'One Clan One God' the policy of DMK as opposed to Periyar's complete denial of God's existence. There onwards, this policy existed as a small difference between Dravida Kazhagam and Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam.

The change of policy is due to Anna's belief that a party which denies the existence of God cannot succeed in a place whose people are stern believers of God. Anna, for this reason did not consider Periyar as a role model in the matters of God but he still followed the main principles of Dravida Kazhagam such as social justice, self-respect marriages, caste equality etc.

During the 1967 elections, the information of vote buying reached the ears of Annadurai, mainly done to defeat him in Kanchipuram constituency. The cash for vote given by Congressmen was Rs.5 per vote. Congressmen's campaign involved giving of Rs.5 and getting a promise in front of the Tirupati deity to vote for Congress.

Anna jokingly said, "...to defeat me my opponents have to climb seven hills and bring the deity from there". Anna said this not to criticise the God but to criticise the wrong-doers. The evidence to this is the organisation of Kumbakonam Mahamaham festival by former CM Karunanidhi when he was a Minister in Anna's Cabinet, which shows that Anna took religious matters seriously.

After Annadurai's death, Karunanidhi who is also an atheist became the DMK's leader. Like Anna, he also did not impose his personal beliefs on the party and its members. This is evident from two events, one is the organisation of the chariot festival in Tiruvarur after he became Tamil Nadu CM and the other is the appointment of Kundrakudi Adigal as the member of MLC (Madras Legislative Council).

In 1992, when DMK was celebrating its silver jubilee, a debate surfaced regarding the stand of DMK in the matters of God. Murasoli Maran, the brain behind the DMK party at that time explained in an interview, "...dravidian movement is never about going to temples, worshipping etc. The key principles of the Dravidian movement are rationality, social justice and abolition of untouchability."

Karunanidhi, during his lifetime, gave complete freedom to his household women to worship God and he never asked any of his family members to hide their devotion to God in public places. This is proof for Karunanidhi's non imposition of his personal beliefs on others. Former CM Karunanidhi organised a chariot festival in Tiruvarur after he became CM, now the present CM Mr.Stalin organised more than 1000 consecration festivals in temples of Tamil Nadu in his 2 year reign.

During the 1000 year anniversary of Thanjavur Brihadeeswara temple, everyone advised Karunanidhi not to conduct the festival due to the belief that it will be a bad omen for the reign. Karunanidhi set aside all those superstitions and successfully celebrated the 1000th anniversary as a state festival.

Renovation of 4724 temples at the cost of 523 crores; constitution of a welfare board for the village temple priests; launch of a scheme to provide bicycles to 10000 priests in 2010; enactment of law on 2.10.1970 to allow persons from all caste to become priests are some of the measures taken during the reign of Karunanidhi.

Tamil Nadu's current CM, Mr. Stalin is also walking in the path of his political forefathers. Steps taken by him include, the appointment of 3 women as priests for the first time in Indian history; recovery of temple properties worth 5000 crores in the last 2 years etc. Former CM Karunanidhi reclaimed around 5 lakh acres of temple land which was in the hands of private individuals. During Karunanidhi's reign, 432 temples were consecrated at the cost of 8484 crores.

Steps taken during the DMK reign of 2006-2007 include the renovation of 240 chariots, consecration of 5000 temples, distribution of 25000 to each tribal and Adi Dravidar temples amounting to 17.5 lakhs and the increase of amount given to temples annually from 75 lakhs to 3 crores.

Like this, the spiritual programs of DMK continue even today. The scheme of giving free food to devotees in temples has been functional since 2002, which was extended in 2021-22 to temples like Tiruttani, Tiruchendur and Samayapuram as per the order of CM Stalin. It was CM Stalin's DMK government who celebrated Vallalar's 200th anniversary grandiosely. It was CM Stalin's DMK government which digitised the manuscripts in 30 lakh temples at the cost of 5 crores.

DMK is not against God, it is only against social injustice!