KAMALIKA PIERIS

India is encouraging the Ramayana trail”.  The Government of India and the Indian High Commission in Colombo are very active in the matter.  It is quite possible that Ramayana trail idea may have originated in India.

 The idea for a pilgrim centre at Seetha Eliya was first suggested by an Indian team that came on a familiarization tour of Sri Lanka in 1997. In 2011 Home Minister for Madhya Pradesh announced that he will promote the Ramayana trail. India will grant a subsidy of 50% per head to those wishing to visit the sites.

 India is behind the plan to build a Sita temple at Divurumpola, 15km from Nuwara Eliya. This would be a prime tourist and pilgrimage location for the Indians.   Chief Minister of Madhya Pradesh, Chouhan came to Sri Lanka in 2010 for the bhumi puja of the new Sita temple at Divurumpola where Sita is supposed to have performed Agni puja. He had offered one crore of rupees for its construction. This did not appear in our newspapers, but was reported in Indian Express of 29.6.2010 announced Bandu de Silva.

Shivraj Singh Chouhan had again mooted the Sita temple in September 2012 when President Mahinda Rajapaksa visited Sanchi to inaugurate the Buddhist-Indic Studies University. (India Today).

In 2016 India sent an official team to inspect the site. A Bengaluru based firm had prepared a design and estimate htat it would take 12 to 18 months. The expected cost would be around Rs 12 crore to Rs 14 crore.  

But in 2019, P C Sharma, Minister for Legal Affairs, Madhya Pradesh said that there was nothing on paper about this offer. We dug into the files to see if anything concrete was put on paper by the Shivraj Singh Chouhan government, but found nothing.”  Government had  sanctioned Rs 1 crore for the temple but the money had not been released. Sharma said his government would look into the matter and see what could be done. The project is under consideration. But his government   will take action only after studying all the aspects related to the project in detail.

Sharma agreed that that the Sri Lankan mainland is connected to the Hindu Epic Ramayana. Sri Lanka is considered to be the Kingdom of Ravana who abducted Sita and fought a war with Lord Rama’s army in Lanka itself, Sharma said.

 A war of words erupted between the ruling Congress party and the opposition BJP over this matter, said Hindustan Times. I am surprised to hear that Kamal Nath government wises to conduct a survey in Sri Lanka to verify whether or not Sita was abducted, declared Chouhan. What can be more ridiculous than this?

The world knows that Sitaji was kept in Ashok Vatika in Sri Lanka where she also underwent an ‘Agni pareeksha’. When I had visited Sri Lanka, it occurred to me that there should be a magnificent temple at the site. The necessary approvals have been obtained from the Sri Lankan government as well as the central government in India, concluded Chouhan.

Swami Govind Dev Giri Maharaj, the Treasurer of the Shri Ram Janmabhoomi Teerth Kshetra Trust, Ayodhya, India, arrived in Sri Lanka in May 2024, to initiate a new era in the country’s spiritual and cultural journey. He was accompanied by a team of delegates from Ayodhya Shri Ram Mandir. He has been invited by President Ranil Wickremesinghe to promote religious tourism between the two countries.

The visit was facilitated by Chairman of Supreme Global Holdings R. M. Manivanan, and Rogan Muralidihran of IGS India. The visit was aimed at reviving the millennia old relationship between Ayodhya and Sri Lanka, said the press release.

Swami Govind Dev Giri Maharaj participated in the inaugural ceremony of the Ramayana Trail Project in Sri Lanka, where the project website was officially launched.  ‘Ramayana Trail – The Sacred Mission’  is an ambitious project aimed at transforming nine key sites along Sri Lanka’s Ramayana Trail into world-class spiritual monuments.

 Noteworthy locations include Ram’s Bridge in Mannar Basin, Ashoka Vatika in Sita Eliya, Welimada, Divurumpola, Ussangoda, Rumassala, Koneswaram, Manawari Temple (Chilaw), Ravana Cave in Ella and the Kataragama Ramayana Trail.

From Adam’s Bridge to Seetha Eliya, each site serves as a narrative canvas, recounting episodes of the Ramayana, for spiritual and cultural purposes. The main link was Seetha Amman Temple in Sita Eliya. This temple is important in the sacred stories of Ram and Sita. Just as Ayodhya’s Ram Temple stands as a symbol of devotion and unity, Sita Eliya Temple represents the strength and resilience of Sita. Together, they create a complete spiritual experience for devotees worldwide.

The Ramayana trail also emphasized the importance of King Vibhishana whose palace was said to be on the banks of Kelani River and who is venerated by thousands of devotees even today at many temples around the country as a guardian deity of Sri Lanka, concluded the media account of Swami Govind’s visit.

A historic milestone in the Indo-Sri Lankan cultural and religious bond was marked   with the official launch of the ‘Sri Ramayan Trails’ project at Taj Samudra, Colombo, added the media. The initiative aims to draw millions of Indian and international tourists to the country.  It is intended to  strengthen the nation’s spiritual and cultural heritage while also boosting its tourism sector.

Indian High Commissioner to Sri Lanka, Santosh Jha hosted Swami Govind  and his accompanying team at India House. The two sides discussed ways in which India can support the development of the Ramayana Trail in Sri Lanka. The document titled Buddhist Circuit in India and Ramayana Trail in Sri Lanka” demonstrates our shared antiquity.

High Commissioner Santosh Jha delivered a speech in Colombo on April 21, 2024     where he said that ‘Ramayana Trail’ reaffirms that the two countries are civilisational twins sharing the same antiquity.

We all know today that the Ramayana trail stretches from India to Sri Lanka. This was not so well known to many in our two countries even a decade or so ago despite references to this in our ancient epics such as Ramayana and Mahabharata. I myself discovered this first hand when I came to Sri Lanka in 2007 and worked at the Indian High Commission for three years. ‘’I had the pleasure of visiting these places in Sri Lanka multiple times during that period, High Commissioner Santosh Jha  concluded.

India has given a lot of offers to establish Ramayana Trails in Sri Lanka, State Tourism Minister Diana Gamage said in February 2024 in Parliament. Sri Lanka has renewed the establishment of Ramayana Trails, which includes all the places believed to be associated with Ramayana. The places include Sigiriya, Ashok Vatika, a garden in the city of Nuwara Eliya, which is believed to be the place where Ravana kept Sita captive, Ravana Ella Falls, Koneswaram Temple in Trincomalee and Divurumpola Temple in Bandarawela.

Sri Lanka wants more Indian tourists to boost the hospitality industry. India is even willing to invest in it. India has have given a lot of offers. They will build hotels even, Diana said. If we do this in the right way, we can bring 5 million tourists from India alone. This should have been done a long time ago. So now I am thinking that we should do it at least now, concluded Diana Gamage.” (continued)