Brahma Sri Senthilnatha Ganapatigal -our first mentor
Sri Swaminathar Veda patashala has been instituted with the sincere objective of imparting our own Vedic education and culture to persevering students who wish to study the same in the traditional gurukulam system. The patashala is in Tirupadiripuliyur (Cuddalore, South India). This place is where the public at large had the rare opportunity of witnessing the divinity protecting Saint Appar, in the Sri Padaleeswarar temple in Cuddalore.
The inspiration to begin this Veda patashala was Mahaperiyava Sri Chandrasekhara Saraswathi Swamigal through his monumental work penned by Ra Ganapathi in the set of books “Deivathin Kural”. Dr T Vasudevan, a medical practitioner by profession was charged with the divine dispensation to begin such a venture on reading these books. Strangely, things seem to come together immediately when he found a retired head-mistress Smt. Saraswathi willing to donate her entire house for this noble cause. He quickly found an able administrator in Sri Ganapathi, a retired Bank manager willing to help him run the patashala. Thereafter, when he was in search for a guru who could live and teach the Vedas in the premises, Brahma Sri Senthilnatha Ganapatigal from Thiruvannamalai came forward to supervise and nominated his disciple to take this role and thus was born Sri Swaminathar Veda patashala under the auspices of the trust under the same name that was created.
Objectives:
- To impart Krishna Yajur Veda under the gurukulam system to identified students
- To serve as an institution of higher knowledge, encourage and teach Gana patam to persevering students
- To impart the students with knowledge of Vyakaranam, Dharma sastram that would enable them to follow, clarify and act as torch bearers for the ensuing generations
- To further facilitate students to progress with higher studies in bashyam of Upanishads, Bhagawad Geetha, and Brahma Sutram thus completing Prasthana Thriyam
- To equip them with additional knowledge of other languages/working knowledge of mathematics and communication that would enable them to communicate to the external world.
Constitution:
THE TRUST:
Sri Swaminthar Charitable Trust today is responsible to run the Veda patashala. The trust consists of eminent people who are determined to direct and operationalize the noble objective
Sri. Chandramouli Narayanan is now the managing trustee. He is an IT engineer working in Bangalore. In his younger days he learnt veda and also prayogam. He worked his way through school and college. Even now well versed in the various aspects of conducting rituals and laughingly says should the IT industry collapse he has no problem with finding a profession!
Other trustees who help Sri. Chandramouli Narayanan are:
Sri. Narayanan of Neyveli works for the electrical dept in NLC. He is always in the frontline during any voluntary activities in that area as well as any religious activity. He spearheads the “kai pidi arisi thittam” (collection of rice for feeding patashaalaa students, an activity encouraged by Maha Periva) in Neyveli and has been a great strength to the organization.
Sri. Rajaraman worked for the EB in Cuddalore and is now retired. He has attended part time classes conducted in the patashaalaa and is now reciting what he learnt daily. He has been a key person in the Gayathri japa yagna program in Cuddalore and is currently also the secretary of the local branch of Brahmin sangh.
Sri. Ganesan works for SBI locally and is very active in conducting medical care programs. Being the joint secretary in the Pataleeswarer sr.sec.school he has been instrumental in arranging the periodical medical camps. Now recently inducted in to the team of Trustees he brings his vast local management experience in managing the day to day affairs of the Patashaalaa.
Sri.Venkatrtamani is a retired secretory from SAIL. After retirement has settled in Cuddalore ans has been doing the evening part time veda classes. He has been efficiently functioning as an honorary secretary handling the day to day affairs of the patashalaa in the last few years.
Sri. Lakshminarayanan is a Samvedi doing aupasanam daily. He has done some adyayanam in krishan yajur veda as well as his swa shakha. He is a retired businessman. He has a lot of experience running a Aastiga Ilaignar Sangam in his younger days.
MARGA DARSHAKA MANDALI
Thia has been constituted recently including the trustees who have recently retired. This allows the trust to retain their association. The experience and expertise will still be available to the trust at the same time allowing new blood to be infused into the trust. The new initiatives, new energy and new ideas that will come forth will help the trust to face the new challenges in the time to come.
The members are:
Dr T Vasudevan is now the managing trustee. While continuing to practice medicine, has studied Vedas himself. He completed adhyayanam and went on to do nithya aupasanam and graduated to agnihotram. Today, he is supported by his wife, a gynaecologist in nithya agnihotram. Their son Sriramana Sharma is a Vedic scholar and also an Agnihotri lives in Nerur. He is well versed in Mimamsa, Dharma sastram and Vyakaranam. Dr T Vasudevan is the brain behind this divine venture and has been striving hard to give the patashala the required shape and sustenance in these difficult times. Dr T Vasudevan has pioneered the concept of Gayathri JapaYagnam which he began in a small way that has today been taken up in many cities across Tamil Nadu. He is an avid blogger and writes on Spiritual discourses and explanations from Vedas for the common man.
Sri Go Sivaraman is the ex PRO of Sankara Nethralaya. In a distinguished career that was dedicated to services for the society, he gave significant portion of his youth to a Hindu social service organization in working at the grass root levels in Tamil Nadu to spread the culture and tradition of the Hindu religion. He did this after his graduation and resigning from a prestigious secure job that he got into. He had the unique opportunity to stay close to Maha Periyava at Kanchipuram where he did whatever Periyava wanted him to do. On Periyava’s direction, he joined Sankara Nethralaya in late ‘80s. While in Chennai he met Sivan Sir, who transformed his life further and till date lives with utmost devotion to both Periyavaa and Sir. He is currently involved in an interesting project in documenting experiences of different people with Mahaperiyavaa and the first such publication has already been done.
Sri S.Kumar a management graduate from IIM Ahmedabad, works as Head in a software company in Chennai and has deep interests in tradition and culture. He had the opportunity to witness these at close quarters at a young age through his grandfather Sri Subramania Iyer of Kulasekarapatinam in Tirunelveli district. His interest is to contribute in developing the patashala as a world class institution for Vedic learning and Hindu traditions.
Past trustees:
Madhusri. Saraswati. She is the person who thought up the idea of a full fledged veda patashaalaa and donated her house for that cause. She was the first managing trustee and dealt with the day to day running of the organisation. Went to varanasi for deepavalai snanam in December 2015, only to arrive at cuddalore and and promptly leave her body at Pataleeswarer’s sanidhi! She left all her belonging to the trust in her will.
Sri R Ganapathi a service minded person, was a retired Bank Manager who took care of the administration of the patashala. He lived next to the patashala and dealt with all commercial aspects of running the organization including handling banking transactions, purchases, accounting, supervision of any repairs, construction work and looking after the overall welfare of the students including food, clothing and other essential requirements. He passed on in Nov, 2016 after a six-month illness.
Current Status:
Today the patashala currently has Shukla Yajur Vedam that is being taught through reputed Acharya.
Sri. Rajesh ganapatigal is the current Shukla yajur veda acarya. He is known for his emphasis on clear diction.
We have a total of 10 Vidyarthis residing in the patashala premises located in the agraharam, just behind the traditional Pataleeswarar koil at Thirupathiripuliyur near Cuddalore. We are in the process of adding more Vidyarthis in the coming academic year.
We have Sri.Satguru an M.Sc. graduate who teaches languages, science and maths to the students.