Prabhas Patan, Gujarat: When twilight descends, the voice of Bollywood actor Amrish Puri rises over the waves from the nearby sea, and the show begins. Tracing back several millennia, Puri narrates the story of Somnath, the temple that houses the oldest Shiva lingam in India.
Hundreds gather daily for this sound-and-light show, some travelling days, others just a bus ride from nearby villages in search of an evening out on wooden benches in an open amphitheatre. When it all ends, the audience makes a beeline for another darshan, or viewing, of Somnath.
The temple’s trust hopes that as the devotees go through the mix of ancient and mode-rn, they will leave behind a donation in the boxes scattered about the temple grounds.
The site of a proposed beach garden near Somnath temple in Gujarat. The temple has added roads, a Sanskrit university, Vedic library, hotels and fountains in its aim to create a “divine India” (Picture by: Priyanka P. Narain/Mint)
India’s rising affluence and real estate boom is transforming this sleepy town in southern Gujarat into a religious amusement park. And it is by no means an isolated example. From the veteran Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanams in Andhra Pradesh to upstarts such as New Delhi’s Akshardham, temples across India, flush with donations and growing real estate assets, are expanding their influence and reasserting their traditional role in society as places of social interaction, learning, cultural assimilation, and, increasingly, entertainment steeped in religion.
Consider the Somnath temple. Within five years, the temple’s revenue has grown from Rs2 crore to Rs10 crore, and the number of visitors from 100,000 to 500,000. And so is Somnath’s sphere and reach growing, expanding steadily into the likes of a city revolving around a religious economy.
The trust has hired artisans to carve intricate sculptures on the temple pillars and then gild the art in gold. It has added new roads, a Sanskrit university, Vedic library, entertainment centres, hotels, bus stands, gardens, fountains and covered stone walkways. Its goal: to create a “divine India,” a recreation of miniatures of every spiritual place in the country.
“So that when you come here to Somnath, you can also simultaneously visit every other spiritual place in India,” says Ashok Sharma, secretary to Somnath Trust, in charge of the expansion projects for the temple. “You will not recognize this place in 10 years’ time.”
Already, in a shorter period, the temple and town have been made over. Significantly, temples, traditionally landowners, have gained from the real estate explosion across the country. They also have benefited from Indians at once becoming richer and more religious, and expressing their faith and gratitude through temple donations.
Somnath Trust’s land assets have increased in worth four times from Rs468.42 crore to Rs1,639.14 crore in six years. The fixed deposits of the Somnath Trust have increased from Rs780 crore to Rs1,218 crore.