Celebrating a Sage-Unifier with Kashi-Tamil Sangamam

S Bharat celebrates its civilizational showcase with divinity, hosting a monumental gathering of over 50 crore devotees visiting the Maha Kumbh, Varanasi celebrates through Kashi-Tamil Sangamam (KTS), an enduring strain of national unity.

- S VAIDHYASUBRAMANIAM

As devotees gather to take a dip in the spiritual Triveni-Sangamam of the Ganges at Prayagraj, Tamilians gather to take a cultural dip that begins at Varanasi today in the form of the KTS. This spiritual-cultural convergence establishes the connect between the holy trio of Varanasi, Ayodhya and Prayagraj with Tamil Nadu and Tamil sage Agasthyar, forming the bridge that makes KTS 3.0 a tall tribute to this short polymath-saint.

Bharat is home to many scholarly Tamil poets, but very few wrote in Tamil and Sanskrit. Not many know that great Tamil poets like Kambar and Villiputhur Azhwar were proficient in Sanskrit also. The great Saiva saint Arunagirinathar's compositions had many Sanskrit words. Just as Bharat cannot be conceived without Tamil and Sanskrit, as it is the 'world's pooja room' (Swami Vivekananda), Tamil and Sanskrit cannot be seen independently without appreciating their mutual harmony. Puranic history traces how Agasthyar drank the entire ocean to help King Indra destroy the demon Taraka. However, his oceanic gulp of the Tamil language that manifested as Agattiyam, the first known book for Tamil grammar, makes him a Tamil poet non pareil. Mahakavi Subramania Bharati, in one of his poems, shares Tamizh Thai's portrayal of Agasthiyar as the epitome of Tamil language.