In a departure from tradition, a Lingayat Mutt in Kalaburgi in Karnataka has chosen a woman as the successor to the incumbent pontiff. Neelalochana Thayi, 40, has been anointed as the head of Korneshwara Sansthan Mutt in Khajuri village in Kalaburgi, to succeed 61-year-old Murugharajendra Koraneshwar Shivayogi swami, the pontiff of the mutt affiliated to Sri Jagadguru Murugharajendra Mutt of Chitradurga.
The Khajuri mutt has four branches in Karnataka and it subscribes to the Basavanna's principle of gender equality and social justice, says the pontiff.
The mutt became a trendsetter by passing a decree that barred the pontiffs from anointing their kith and kin as their successors. While, most Lingayat mutts choose a man belonging to the Jangama caste as the successor, the Khajuri mutt has chosen a woman from Jangama gouda caste.
"In 1997, when I came to the Khajuri mutt, there was a tradition in all the Virakta mutts, where the pontiff married a woman from an ordinary family (of any caste) after gifting land to the girl's parents. The offspring of the pontiff would automatically inherit the seat. I changed the rules. I also started giving Linga Deeksha to devout women. Neelalochana was initiated into the spiritual path at the age of 16, after which she trained under Murugha Sharanaru of Chitradurga Mutt in sadhaka, bodhaka and sudharaka," said Shivayogi swami.
Neelalochana, the youngest child of the five children of Hanumanthappa Nagare and Mathurabai of Khajuri village, was administered the "Linga Deekshe" in 1998, though her two brothers took up farming and sisters got married. After her schooling (till Class 10) in Marathi medium in Maharashtra, Neelalochana was sent to the Chitradurga Mutt for spiritual training and to learn Kannada in 2001. She founded the Nijacharana Kannada medium school and engaged in training the local women in animal husbandry and was chosen to head the Khajuri mutt owing to her dedication and service.
Fluent in both Marathi and Kannada, the new head of the mutt hopes to build linguistic harmony among the Marathi-speaking and Kannadiga people in the region.
Last year, one of its branches—the Murugharajendra Koraneshwara Shanthidhama mutt in Asuti village of Gadag—named Diwan Sharief Rahimsab Mulla, a 32-year-old Muslim autorickshaw driver, as its new pontiff.
