RELIGION Again

I don’t want to write about it again and again. But there are so many flaws in it and weather I want or not but I bump into those flaws frequently and it forces me to write. FLAWS – not in religions but in us, how we follow it.

My recent trip with my parents to McleodGanj, started on a religious note and ended on one. And unfortunately both experiences were not that good. On the way mom saw the signboard saying, Maa Chintpurni Mandir – 2 Km’s towards left. And obviously she was keen to visit. And when we reached there, needless to say, there also the commonest scene of Temple’s prevails – shopkeepers forcing you to buy Prasad from their shops, plenty of Beggers almost reaching your pockets to snatch some money, even the trans-genders; but that’s not the reason I am writing this.

Part – 1

As we reached the main Temple for offering our prayers, the Pujari reached out to hold my Prasad to offer it to the statue of Mata chintpurni. There were five Pujaris cramped in that small room; and we had to make efforts to have a look of the statue. But I was happy as it seemed that the Pujari was making personal efforts for us to reach in front and pray together as a family unlike other big temples where the pujari’s itself push you away to make room for the others to come. But that happiness of mine, was short-lived. He took a minute or two for the offerings and then asked us to come to the side gate to get the Prasad. That’s where the story began.

The pujari asked us to bow to the banyan tree branch and we obliged, he gave me the Prasad and instructed us, where to place the Chunari and what to do with the other things. He continued his instructions looking strangely at each one of us; my Dad gauzed his intentions and he pulled out a fifty rupee note to give it to him. To this his eyes opened wide in surprise and my Dad put that fifty rupee note back in his pocket to pull out a rupee hundred note. As he handed it to the Pujari, he started begging for more ‘panch log hai hum sardar ji, iss se kya hoga’. I was stunned by his behavior. Seriously, are we in a Temple? Are you a Pujari? Furious I ran out battling the small beggars and Hizras asking for money at every step we took.

Part – 2

On our return journey, we planned to stop at Anandpur sahib to offer our prayers to the ‘birth place of Khalsa’. My prime motive was to visit the ‘Virasat-e-Khalsa’ a newly built museum dedicated to Sikh history; which the Akali government boosted about that it will be an eighth wonder of the world. I was really impressed by the architecture of the building. After witnessing the architectural marvel you will enter the building thinking of a joy ride to the history, but the miss-management and arrogant & un-friendly staff will spoil your mood. Fabulous building it was, but so poorly utilized. Billions have been spent on the project, and they don’t have few hundred rupees to repair the faulty audio guides. You will have to wait for ‘don’t know how much’ time to receive the audio guides which were in use by the people ahead of you. When they finish the tour, their audio guides will come to you. There were thousands of the devices lying there, but all faulty. Blame it on the management or the illiterate people who destroyed them knowingly or un-knowingly; the later one was more obvious.

The technology was at its poorest level, one of the animations of the Golden Temple displayed there was so poor that even school children will hang their head with shame. The Audio-Visual of the Sikh history which I thought will be the high-light of the place was not working properly; two of the five projector screens were out of order and the rest three were not clear. We were pushed further by the crowd who had no interest in this poorly displayed show. We moved towards the 3-D paintings and cut-outs of the history in other rooms but that too were far behind the present technological standards. Adding  to that, the staff was not cooperative in fact very egotistical and rude. At the exit gates the girl on duty literally fought with me when I just asked her to where to place the audio device.

From the condition of the services just in few months of its operation I can just say we Indians don’t know the value of periodic maintenance. In abundance public money is spent on the project and then it was left on its own mercy. Billions of dollars went down the drain.

Please for GOD-sake stop selling out RELIGION.