Richest Temples, Poorest Worshippers

"  If in this world, there were none to beg, would there be any glory for the rich? – Tirukkural 101 Ch.106. 1059″

Recently, Hindutva party leader and  Karnataka tourism minister Gali Janardhan Reddy gifted the Balaji Lord with a 16-kg diamond-studded crown priced at Rs 45 crore!.  In the last 5 years,  Bellary Reddy brothers  generated 4,000 crore of profit before tax from the iron-ore business in Bellary and delivered 1 % commission to their favourite God!   This is the eighth and the largest crown  presented to the Hindu God by dirty money makers. The current estimate of gold ornaments with this Hindu Temple exceed 15 tons and valued at more than $7 billion.   Lately,  one Hindu priest  of this temple was arrested by police for  mortgaging  jewellery of worth Rs nine lakh.

Interestingly, a case against Janardhan Reddy  for destruction of the 200-year-old Sugalamma Devi Hindu Temple located in the mining zone was dropped drown by Hindutva government in Karnataka state. When  RSS cannot save their own gods from these  Hindu mafia dons,  how can they protect Hindu temples from Muslim invaders?

In the past,  Reddy brothers coughed up nearly Rs 200 crores from public through their finance business in 1999 — Gali Karunakar Reddy, 47, minister for revenue, Gali Janardhan Reddy, 42, minister for tourism and infrastructure, and Gali Somashekhar Reddy, 41, a BJP MLA are the sons of a former police constable who made billions by  stealing state owned minerals with the support of Hindutva politicians.

Religious taboos are the main marketing tools of RSS aka  Rumour Spreading Society. RSS  can  sell their rotten hindutva as long as  illiterate idiots are a majority in India.   Crooked RSS  leaders deny universal education to India's poor  in order to flourish the religious taboos.  For eg,  RSS promote  belief in the snakes' divine powers, and prohibits  harming the deadly reptiles like Cobras.  But, according to estimates cited by the World Health Organization, serpent attacks kill as many as 50,000 Indians each year.

The Bellary Reddy brothers  cannot be intimidated by  India's flawed legal system.  The director board of   the renamed EAST INDIA COMPANY aka India Inc is overloaded with  billionaires who generously fund hindutva mafia.  Mining Barons like Anil Agarwal of VEDANTA and Bellary REDDY brothers are engaged in rapid acquisition  of tribal lands and its rich resources of this poor nation.  In return, their  personal greed is  supported  by world's largest terrorist organization, RSS.  Pro Hindutva media men like  Rajeev Chandrashekhar ( the Indian partner of Rupert Mudroch) and   Subhash chandra of ZEE TV own influential part of Indian media. They don't have any commitment to the poor of this country. They will continue to find fault with displaced tribals, dalits and minorities.  Truly, India Inc own this nation.

Some Temple Facts:

• Balaji, Lord of Seven Hills, Andra Pradesh is the richest deity in the world. In the 9 days of Navaratri, it got around Rs 12.05 crore. The facilitators of Balaji Temple, Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanam (TTD), has more than Rs 1,000 crore in fixed deposits in various banks.  The total annual income of Balaji temple trust is Rs 600 crore, the budget outlay for the year 2008-09 was Rs 1,925 crore.  20 lakh pilgrims visit Balaji temple per year. It receives around Rs 300 crore , 350 kg Gold & 500 kg Silver.   The East India Company made around 25,000 pounds every year from the Tirupati temple in the mid-1750 s.

• Mata Vaishno Devi, Jammu is the second most visited Hindu temple in India. Daily income is Rs 40 crore, Annual income: Rs 500 crore

• Over 1 lakh devotees visit Guruvayur Krishna temple in Kerala, Rs 125 crore in fixed deposits, annual income: Rs 2.5 crore

• The 250-year-old Siddhivinayak Temple, Mumbai has an annual income of Rs 46 crore, Rs 125 crore in fixed deposits. Rich donors get privilege to Siddhivinayak Temple, Mumbai. They can buy a gold or platinum card, priced from Rs 1 lakh to Rs 6 lakh.

( 1 crore is equal to 10 million.   1 million USD  is roughly around 4.7 crore INR )

Note:

According to WFP, India accounts around 50% of the world's hungry. Around six out of 10 Indians live in the countryside, where abject poverty is widespread. 34.7 % of the Indian population lives with an income below $ 1 a day and 79.9 % below $ 2 a day.

In India, wealth of 36 families amounts to $ 191 billion, which is one-fourth of India's GDP. In other words, 35 elite Hindu families own quarter of India's GDP by leaving 85 % ordinary Hindus as poor! Corruption in India indirectly kills more than 8,000 people a day by diverting money from food programs to the pockets of crooked officials, who are mostly from upper caste hindus.  Indian bureaucracy ranked worst in Asia: Hong Kong-based Political & Economic Risk Consultancy.

The dominant group of Hindu nationalists  come from the three upper castes ( Brahmins, Kshatriyas, and Vaishyas ) that constitute only 10 per cent of the total Indian population. But, they claim perhaps 80 % of the jobs in the new economy, in sectors such as software, biotechnology, and hotel management. Forbes list of 10 wealthiest CEOs in the world listed 4 upper caste Indians, yet almost half of India lives on less than a dollar a day.  India's 100 richest people have a combined net worth of 276 billion U.S. dollars, which was almost a quarter of the country's Gross Domestic Product (GDP).

Hawala transactions in India range between $13 billion and $17 billion annually ( US state department report) India lost over $115 billion during 2002 and 2006 due to hawala, more than India's combined budget for health, education & internal security. (GFI report).  Corrupted Indian authorities  will never trace Naresh Jain, the world's largest money launderer. He is accused of running a hawala network of over Rs5,000 crore.

The fact is that hindutva capitalism is most unfair system where the majority of the Indians has to suffer so that the bullys like Bellary brothers have their whole cake at expense of everyone else!

"The whole business of Hindutva and its nationalism is a poison in the body politic of India. We have to accept that the poison has been injected and it will take a lot to purge it," Arundhati Roy