Ma Nithya Tanmayananda will never forget the life or death experience she survived on route back to her home at aadheenam (monastery) in Bangalore. Hearing the screams of her sister sanyasis and the physical blows to her head will be forever etched in her memory.
28 November 2015
I Was Disheartened as Locals Called Us Prostitutes
Ma Nithya Tanmayananda, a Brahmachari of Nithyananda Order shares her shocking experience of an unforgettable incident that happened in 2015.
She recollects the memories from 2015 when Swamiji was coronated as the head of the Mutt in Tiruvarur. This was received with great enthusiasm and grand plans were being discussed to make the temple active and enrich a large number of people so they could involve in the activities of the temple. The Bengaluru aadheenavasis (monastery residents) were excited to take care of the pujas and homas and with these plans in mind, a few Sanyasis set out to Tiruvarur Aadheenam. After traveling overnight, they all managed to reach the place by noon. As they were walking towards the temple, they overheard abusive comments but decided to ignore them and continued to head towards the temple.
They were shocked to be confronted by Anti-Hindu elements who simply blocked their way to the temple and not allowing access. To their dismay, it was not at all as they had expected it to be.
“Early one morning, I reached the temple along with a few other Sanyasis. Outside, we saw a few unknown people who looked at us strangely. We heard one person yelling crude comments against us. They abused us saying, ‘From where these prostitutes are coming batch by batch? We should not allow them inside the temple! The sanctity of the temple will be spoilt.’ -Ma Nithya Tanmayananda
The women went with an intention to do good to the temple instead, they were not only stopped from entering the temple, what followed was even worse. The assassins started to physically attack the female Sanyasis. Completely devastated, the female Sanyasis just stood 100 meters from the temple the whole day without having any food or drink, just to seek an opportunity to get into the temple. Normally, food is consumed by Sanyasis only after offer puja, so that day they had to go without food. Standing on the streets the whole day, not even having access to use the restroom the group silently suffered in pain.
In spite of having a court order that gave them the right to enter the temple, the Anti-Hindu terrorists managed to stop them. This was totally unacceptable and hurt the religious sentiments.
I Will Never Forget the Attack on My Life
As the night time approached, local people starting approaching them to enquire where from and why they had come over to this place. After a while, frenzy media folks arrived at the scene pretending to be concerned as they had heard about the attacks. The Sanyasis simply brushed them away refusing to give them any story to create a sensation. In a few minutes, they boarded their vehicle and reached the bus stop to get back to Bengaluru Aadheenam.
As they boarded the bus, tired and exhausted by the day’s incident, it was not over yet. Suddenly a few men entered the bus and started brutally attacking the female Sanyasis. One person was hit multiple times on the head, a chair was hurled at another, pulled and broke the religious necklaces worn, they started tugging at their sarees disrespectfully. All this happened in a flash and within a few minutes, the men were successful in hurting them so badly and vanished from the scene.
“To my shock, one man pulled the seat rest from the 3 seater row and started attacking my sister, Ma Arunesha, who was sitting next to me. She got frightened and both of us stood up. That time another man came near another Brahmacharini and pulled the saree off her body.
Instantly she held her saree so tightly that the pin tore and ripped off. I helped her to move back from that person. Seeing this, that terrorist got angry, folded his fist and hit my head and eye with so much of force that I almost fainted on the seat. It was a heavy blow, my left eye bulged and I couldn’t see through the left eye. It became so reddish, everyone thought that I lost vision in that eye because of the attack. They were arranging for an ambulance to get me to the hospital immediately.
I prayed to Swamiji. By his blessings, I got my vision back and the head injury that could have left me paralyzed for life got healed in just a few days.” -Ma Nithya Tanmayananda
It was appalling that while all this was happening, none of the passengers in the bus came to help or protect them. Ma Nithya Tanmayananda recollects how her head and left eye were left bleeding after the attack. The brutality nearly blinded her eyesight.
When they got off the bus, a policeman finally arrived, however, it was of no use as the damage was already done. The attackers were still there, surrounding them and checking where they were heading to.
Ma Nithya Tanmayananda shares how shocking this incident was and how she is unable to forget this incident in her life. With pure intention of doing good to the people they had started their journey, but the experience was completely devastating. She is still very shocked with the memory of how they were physically assaulted. No ordinary person could have come out of such an experience unscathed, but she recounts, only through the grace and energy of Swamiji, she was able to get out of it.
Ma Nithya Tanmayananda Describes the Atrocity in the following video
“Literally I’m not able to forget this incident. Because they physically hit us. And they didn’t have the guts to stand in front of us. We expected to do good to the people, but what happened was completely different. I just want to share exactly what happened and during that time what each person went through. If some normal woman experienced this, they would have lost themselves. But because of Swamiji’s energy, I came through.” -Ma Nithya Tanyamananda
Ma Nithya Tanmayananda completed her Bachelor of Business Management and has been living in Nithyananda Dhyanapeetam, Bengaluru Aadheenam for the past 5 years.