Click to play videoThe naturally formed ice Shiva lingam at the holy cave shrine of Amarnath has completely melted, that too on the very first day when the Amarnath yatra finally began.
The Chief Executive Officer of the Shrine Board, Arun Kumar, confirmed the melting. The lingam has apparently melted down owing to the rise in temperature.
Two other ice lingams, representing Ganesh and Parvati, have reportedly not melted, though their size has reduced.
Mahant Giri the head priest at the shrine said that too many visitors and human activities coupled with global warming have resulted in early melting of the Shiv linga.
On CNN-IBN show India 360, Sagarika Ghose brought up the question: What can we do to save the Amarnath Shiva lingam?
On the panel to discuss the question was geologist, Dr V K Raina, CEO of Amarnath Shrine Board, Arun Kumar and CNN-IBN correspondent Shamim Meraj joined in from Jammu.
What was the cause for the lingam to have melted?
Dr Dr V K Raina was of the opinion that it was only due to the allowing of commercialisation that resulted in the melting of the lingam. “About 1,000 people are allowed darshan of the lingam who offer flowers, milk and sindoor. The people are interfere with the environment that is conducive for the preservation of the lingam,” Dr Raina said.
So what steps should be taken to try and preserve the remains of the shrine?
Riddled by Dr Raina’s comment that there has been a strong commercialisation of the lingam, Arun Kumar in his defence said that the Shrine Board was not a commercial body. It consisted of nine members with the Governor as the Chairman. He confirmed saying, “There is absolutely no commercial element involved in our functioning. We are basically facilitators,” Sharma said.
He further added the yatra was only confined to the day of the raksha bandhan 10 years ago, which made it impossible for the yatris to have darshan of the lingam. So it was decided that the yatra be extended. The duration of the yatra was extended only to enable the yatris to have a darshan of the lingam in which there was no involvement of commercialisation.
Has the melting lingam shattered faith?
However the question that many were asking is what would happen to faith when the object of worship would disappear? Had the faith been shaken by such a phenomenon?
CNN-IBN correspondent Shamim Meraj asked a devotee, Saurabh whether an artificial limgam was the answer to the melting lingam?
“It is my first Amarnath yatra and it is the journey that matters and not what lies at the end of the journey. I had a close look at the lingam and it had decreased in size but had hardly undergone any change. There was a rumour last year the lingam was fixed up by artificial ice but I think that the lingam looked as it should be,” said Saurabh.
Recovering the melting lingam?
So had the lingam melted due to global warming?
Dr Raina chose not to blame global warming. He said it has been long since global warming had started and it was not the prime cause. The parameters that was conducive for the preservation of the lingam had to be maintained. However, preservation was getting interfered by humans.
Dr Raina suggested that people should not be allowed to pour water on the lingam but they should be allowed to watch the lingam from a distance.
Kumar intervened by saying that the pilgrims were not allowed to go up to the cave where the lingam was so there was no question of offering flowers and milk.
However, nobody would be able to stop the pilgrims to visit the shrine every year, so should science be allowed to rescue their object of faith?
Kumar affirmed that they were not looking for any artificial solution. They were considering seeking the help of experts so that they could preserve the lingam.
He said that the lingam formed fully in the month of December- January and if there would be some way to preserve it then even from the outside world including the human bodies then it would be a great success for them.
So that would bring up a question- should a natural shrine exist in its natural form or should it only be a representative?
“It has to be a natural representative. We look that the lingam with awe and worship because it had been formed naturally from the past 2, 000 years,” said Dr Raina.
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