Malaysia Hindu Sangam
KUALA LUMPUR, November 16, 2004: The following letter was sent to the High Commission of India to Malaysia by the president of the Malaysia Hindu Sangam, Datuk A. Vaithilingam:
We, the leaders of various Hindu based organizations representing more than 1.5 million Hindus living in Malaysia, write to you to register our strong protest on the manner of arrest of His Holiness Kanchi Shankaracharya Sri Jayendra Sarasvati Maharaj. The Hindus of Malaysia are shocked, outraged and extremely saddened by the manner in which the authorities have arrested and dealt with His Holiness.
His Holiness is the 70th Acharya in a line unbroken from the great Adi Sankara the great Vedantic scholar who was born in South India but whose influence spread throughout India from Benares in Central India and Badrinath in the foothills of the Himalayas. His Holiness is the head of the Sankaracharya Mutt in Kancheepuram in Tamil Nadu State. He is the center of a sacred and sanctified institution as its revered authority. Most Malaysian Hindus, tracing our ancestral roots to South India, hold His Holiness in great reverence – a reverence shared by Hindus in general.
His Holiness was, however, unceremoniously apprehended by the Indian authorities in a manner showing total contempt towards the religious feelings of Hindus. From early news reports, we note that His Holiness was arrested whilst performing a religious ceremony away from his home state of Tamil Nadu on the eve of Deepavali, one of Hinduism’s most sacred days. We note further that His Holiness was thereafter ordered into judicial remand in the wee hours of Deepavali morning, and is now in remand in Vellore prison where the circumstances he is in has forced His Holiness to sacrifice some of the usual ritual practices of ascetic sages.
We also note that counsel for His Holiness has stated in the Madras High Court that the basic human right and fundamental liberty of His Holiness to immediate and adequate legal counsel was denied to him. When an individual has the might of the State with a most serious allegation pitted against him, the greater is the individual’s need for immediate access to counsel. Failing to grant a detainee the basic rights recognized by international law may lay the path for innocents to be unjustly detained and for the real perpetrators of crimes to remain at large.
His Holiness must be presumed innocent unless he is proven guilty in a free and fair trial before a Court of law. Whilst we respect that the judicial process must take its course without fear or favour for any person, the lack of any credible evidence provided to the public until now and the unseemly haste of His Holiness’ arrest all point to the authorities making this arrest improperly. We note that His Holiness has been based in the Kanchi Mutt for many years and there has been no indication whatsoever that he wanted either to evade or avoid judicial apprehension. If indeed His Holiness is a flight risk (as apparently suggested by the Prosecutor in the Madras High Court) cogent evidence of this should immediately have been made available to all concerned. The way His Holiness was apprehended gives the impression that the Indian authorities have absolutely no respect for the Hindu religion. We cannot conceive a situation in which Indian authorities would have behaved similarly to a religious leader from any other religion whilst he was performing a religious ceremony during one of his holy days. We are disappointed that the authorities have failed to justify to the world the urgent need to arrest His Holiness in the grossly insensitive manner in which it was done.
We appeal to the Government of India and the State Government of Tamil Nadu to act immediately and take appropriate action to show that they recognize that the arrest of His Holiness is a Mutter of great international importance affecting not only the personal freedoms of His Holiness but also the sanctity of the Hindu religion and the rights of millions of Hindus around the world to practise the Hindu religion in community with each other.
Datuk A. Vaithilingam, PJN, SSA, AMN, ASA, PJK
President, Malaysia Hindu Sangam