Last month I and N. Ramanuja (Chairman, Bharathiya Vidya Bhavan, Karnataka) were in Chennai to attend a function to honour twelve Vedic scholars with Veda Ratna award which consisted of one lakh rupees each and a citation. This award is given every year by Vidya Bhavan, Bangalore and this time Chennai was the venue.

His holiness of Kanchi Kamakothi Peetham blessed the awardees on this occasion. This award is named after the great Vedic scholar Gangeswaranandaji whose contribution to Sanskrit and Vedic studies is of great significance.

Gangeswarananda was born in a village of Punjab on Dec. 27, 1881. It is said that he lost his eye sight and became fully blind due to small pox when he was just 5 years old. The boy joined the Sanskrit College and became a great scholar in Vedic studies at the age of 24. Though blind, he undertook tours throughout the country and gave discourses on Vedas, Upanishads and Hinduism. His urge to join the freedom movement did not fructify as he was advised to take up the revival of Vedic studies. He undertook many social service projects useful to the community.

The Durgayana temple in Amritsar had no water facility and Gangeswarananda took the initiative to dig a canal to connect the lake with the river. This was a great boon to the temple. He also played an important role in the reconstruction of the famous Somanatha temple in Gujarat, undertaken by Kulapati Munshi with the blessings of Mahatma Gandhi. The Swamiji realised that Sanskrit should be given its due place in our education system and hence embarked upon starting many Sanskrit schools and also encouraged many philanthropists to do the same. Guljarilal Nanda was a student of the Swamiji and with his help started the Bharat Sadhu Samaj.

Veda Bhagvan:
Since the Vedas, which had been learnt by word of mouth contained many errors due to various reasons, he thought of preparing a text of the four Vedas in their pristine purity both in terms of text and recitation. This was an ambitious literary project. He took the assistance of 35 Vedic scholars from different parts of the country. This team examined every verse of the Vedas and prepared an authentic text. He then published this in a volume and gave it the title Veda Bhagvan. This book which weighs 22 kgs can be considered as the magnum opus of the Swamiji. For this, people gave him the title Vedamurthi.

Veda Mandirs:
After this prestigious project, he thought of establishing Veda Mandirs all over the world. The purpose of these temples was not just to worship the Vedas but to study and chant them. Thus 500 Veda Mandirs came into existence within the country. These institutions helped in the study of Vedas and brought awareness among the people. Not satisfied by the establishment of these 500 Vedic temples within the country, he started an institution called Gangeswarananda International Vedic Mission.

Foreign Vedic Centres were established in Cambodia, Java, Sumatra, Borneo, Ceylon, Nepal, America and some cities in Europe.

At the age of 93, he made it a point to travel in foreign countries like Thailand, Hong Kong, Philippines, Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, Mauritius, Kenya, England, Switzerland, Vatican City, Nigeria, USA, West Indies, etc. At all these places, he established Veda Mandirs and placed Veda Bhagvan for study and research.

On the request of some Universities, the Swamiji personally went to Oxford, Cambridge Universities and Massachusetts Institute of Technology (Boston, USA) and handed over Veda Bhagavan volumes to their libraries. Impressed by this massive and scholarly work, many of these Universities came forward to give huge donations towards this project. But the Swamiji refused to accept any donations stating that Vedas were God's own gift and hence he was not prepared to commercialize it. He stuck to this noble ideal without any compromise.

Though he was busy with the projects and foreign tour, he found time to write many literary works in Sanskrit and Hindi on the theme of the Vedas.

They are great literary contributions to Vedic studies. To popularise and spread the message of Vedic knowledge among the common people, he arranged many Vedic conferences, seminars and study centres all over the country. He also delivered hundreds of lecturers on Vedas within the country and abroad. Thousands of people used to throng these lectures. Though he was blind, he had a photographic memory by which he could recite hundreds of verses from all the four Vedas, Upanishads and even puranas.

Simple in habits and always engaging himself in his pet project of the Vedas, Swamiji lived for 111 years and attained samadhi on Feb. 14, 1922. Thus he merged himself with the Veda Bhagawan. A huge endowment has been created in the name of this great saint called Sri Guru Gangeswaranandaji Veda Ratna Puraskar. The award is presented to 6 Vedic scholars each year. Perhaps this is the most prestigious award in the realm of Vedic studies. The Swamiji was physically blind but had a great vision. Persons of vision alone can excel in any society.