Kurukshetra, Oct. 1:
Swami Raghaveshwara Bharati, pontiff of Ramachandra Mutt in Karnataka’s Shimoga, yesterday flagged off the four-month, nation-wide Vishwa Mangala Gau Gram Yatra for cow protection, sponsored by the RSS, Vishwa Hindu Parishad and sundry mahants.
VHP’s Mr. Ashok Singhal demanded a ban on cow slaughter and said that cow meant a return to a rural idyll. Enough to have even Gandhians from Vinoba Bhave’s ashram join in.
The man who really enthused the crowd at the Brahma Sarovar, in a town where every vacant space is supposed to have been a Pandava-Kaurava battlefield, was Suresh Oberoi. The former actor kept following the swami throughout.
Following his father's footsteps, Vivek Oberoi has been a follower of swami’s hermitage in Hosanagar among the arecanut plantations. The monk’s disciples claimed Vivek is full of energy to do everything possible for mother India.
The swami has powerful impacts on Karnataka chief minister B.S. Yeddyurappa and his predecessor H.D. Kumaraswamy, to both of whom he had gifted a rare cow.
The swami has been a doer, his mission being to revive the local strains of cows, cleansing the cattle population of the hybrid Jerseys and restoring the “forgotten” spiritual bond between the gau mata (mother cow) and her errant sons. So he flaged off the yatra, a ride on a motorised bus.
Sangh’s second-in-command, Suresh Joshi, said: “The village is India’s soul and the cow is the soul of the village and should be cherished.”
The swami craved Mother Cow’s forgiveness for humankind’s sins and promised that just as Krishna had made a “man” out of Arjuna in Kurukshetra, every male present would morph into her “worthy sons”.
Indresh, the pranth pracharak (state propagandist), said this would be the Sangh’s line during the yatra to try and strengthen its networks in rural India.
