The people of Hindu India believe Puri is the face of Odisha because the lord Jagannath lives there with His siblings. Further, it is an on-the-sea location which attracts the wander-crazy tourists from all over the world. Until twenty or so years ago, the lord had a peaceful time at His coastal abode famous for serving the widest range of pure vegetarian dishes, nearly countless, though some say the main items are fifty-six in number. Puri was chosen by the lord as His place of fun and food, among the principal four, namely, Dwarka in Gujarat where He runs His court; the Rameswaram sea bathes Him; Badrinath in the Himalayas is the long resting place where for six months the madding crowd can;t reach him due to snow; and Puri is for all fun, food and merrymaking.
Until Prabhupada publicised the lord like a divine product across the planet, the deities did have a truly private time. Immediately after Prabhupada, the preacher, began Rath Yatra replication at every other place in the world, fun-loving Jagannath and His siblings got into deep trouble. They lost their private time. The Car Festival is the only occasion during which the deities leave the shrine on an entourage to have a good time and give exposure to the insanely-debarred communities from entering the shrine. Most of the sanctorum rituals are not to be public except a few Veshas or special attires events on rare occasions. On these special days, the deities don dresses and makeup to look like sacred animals and divine incarnations. In the Eighties of the last millennium, Jagannath-devotee politicians put the lord and siblings on television and they sold like hottest commodities. But except some curious pilgrims from across the country, not many from abroad, come because they are not allowed to enter the temple.
When the Nabakalebar meaning the body change event is to occur, the major events of the process are carried out in strictest secrecy. But alas! The administration made it the most publicised event across the globe imagining the move would pull in millions of tourists and pilgrims from all over the world, which is both sacrilege and blasphemy put together. It;s like putting men and women in washrooms made of transparent glass sheets. The servitors, probably the greediest and most unscrupulous among counterpart communities in India, keep making hay as the sun shines and loot the gullible public. The Government-controlled temple administration, during the last divinely private event, not only exposed every part of the process through the media but also kept tempting masses provocatively to rush to Puri in huge numbers and watch the rare processes of the secret event against all religious principles laid down by the founding monarchs and priests.
One must know that during the monarchical times, kings had established superb living facilities for the poor and the lower middleclass sections of the Indian Hindu society in the shape of mutts (monasteries) and Dharmashalas (free lodging and boarding houses) provided with adequate income-generating grain fields and fruit orchards. The monarchs too kept aside fabulously fertile landed property for flowers and herbal leaves and fruits that are offered religiously to the deities everyday for the different rituals. These plants, trees and creepers, invariably fragrant bore lifesaving leaves and fruits. The Jagannath Balabh was the major garden property, now usurped by the State authorities to become a parking place for polluting vehicles.
Puri was gifted by God with a beautiful river called Musa Nadi, virtually until recently the true lifeline of the temple city, amazingly perennial with rain water. The river is so designed by the lord that it harvests rainwater for the entire year to feed all major water bodies linked to the service of the deities. During the rainy season, it absorbs excess water from the sacred ponds and supplies when they run dry during the harshly warm summers. The Patron Goddess of Sankha Kshetra or the Conch Abode, as Puri is called in the scriptures, Maa Alamchandi seated on the Musa riverbank welcomes everybody and permits every material object to enter the shrine city. This river is the immersion place for all the idols that come up during different festivals across the year. But today, the Musa Nadi is virtually dead; no one laments about its pitiable status; no one worries that the immersion place is gone forever; lastly, no one expresses anxiety that the only supply-absorb stabilising river is no more. More than this, the river absorbed all the rainwater flowing on the Grand Road and around the temple. The temple-linked ponds and wells are perpetually charged by the sacred river now ignored by the callous and ungrateful humanity. The sacred river can be brought back to life with just a simple de-siltation grant, to get which there shall never be a problem.
Another worrying issue is related to pollution in the temple premises due to indiscriminate, nay criminal use of polythene bags and other artificial plastic containers for packaging Mahaprasad, the most sacred food offerings to the deities. When the whole world is crying foul about the toxic polythene now banned in many regional states of India, the temple authorities are fairly cool over the crisis. From time immemorial, palm leaf container packaging was the practice and norm. So, vast stretches of palm tree plantation had existed in and around Puri. As polythene came, palm trees gradually became extinct and the communities that did the knitting and craftwork have lost skills for a livelihood with the single lethal decision to permit polythene in the temple. Not once have the authorities made any serious attempt to make the temple divinely clean and sacred by banning polythene, tonnes of which now clog drains and degrade face of the earth where even a blade of grass fails to grow, and the stray starving bovine cattle devour the poison just to keep the ruminating act going and eventually end up in premature death. One executive order to ban polythene in the temple premises would lead to palm trees growing and communities regaining dignity of living creatively by resorting to knitting and shaping palm leaf containers and other household items, including toys like of yore.
lastly, the Swargadwar or the Gateway to Heaven has been literally eaten up by greedy land grabbers in connivance with corrupt State officials over the decades. As per not-very ancient revenue records, the exit to heaven was spread across sixteen acres. Now, the plot is horrifically squeezed to 0.4 acre only. The name Swargadwar is given because the lord of the Universe, Jagannath, is residing in the city. But the lord is brazenly robbed of all his joy — they have buried the Musa river to reclaim land for homes clandestinely; they have forced the environ and health-friendly palm leaf out of the temple, and robbed the Swargadwar of its very physical existence only.
The deities are weeping which the temple authorities don;t get to see and the greedy servitors don;t want to see despite perfect vision. Only the activists in collaboration with responsible media people may be able to wipe the deities; tears. Superior law courts may be provoked to restore divine order.
Weep not lord Jagannath, there is still hope. Your divine abode, called the face of Odisha will regain its glory, for sure.
(The writer is a core member of Transparency International, Odisha)