What is the controversy about the Bodh Gaya Temple? |Explained

Buddhist monks held placards during a protest calling for the abolition of the Bodh Gaya Temple Administration Act in Thane, Maharashtra in 1949 | Photo source: PTI

Story so far: Since February, nearly 100 Buddhist monks under the All India Buddhist Forum (AIBF) have been protesting, first at the Mahabodhi Temple or Mahavihara in Bodh Gaya, and later there is a little way to go, demanding the abolition of the Bodh Gaya Temple Act (BTA), 1949, 1949. Bodh Gaya is one of the four sacred sites of Buddhism. The other three are the birthplace of Buddha Lunbini, where Sarnath gave his first sermon and Kusinagar, where he obtained Parinirvana.

Have you ever protested?

In November 2023, Buddhist monks held a rally in Gaia and submitted memorandums to the central and state governments. The monks expanded the protests last year and held a rally in Patna to urge the repeal of the bill. Back in 2012, monks filed a written petition to the Supreme Court to repeal the bill. The petition has not been heard yet.

What is behavior?

The BTA has established an eight-person management committee with equal numbers of Buddhist and Hindus. The bill makes local magistrates a local official of the committee. As local policing judges praised from the majority community, it translated into Indian majority on the committee, which was dissatisfied with Buddhist corpses. Since then, various Buddhists have been intermittently increasing their voices to gain autonomy over the Bodh Gaya Temple, which they call Bodh Gaya Mahavihara.

How to say the yearbook?

In his famous poem “Light of Asia”, the famous poet Edwin Arnold talks about the enlightenment of Gautam Siddharth under the Bodhi tree. Bodhi was then described as a holy land of Buddhism, and in many ways, Western Buddhism became popular. However, Bodh Gaya’s claim to fame is timely and further away. In the third century, Emperor Molyan Ashoka worshipped Bodhi trees and built temples there. From Ashoka to Palas, the Bodhi Temple continues to be a place of worship and pilgrimage for Buddhists. During the reign of Harshavardhana, Chinese traveler Hiuen Tsang visited it in 629 AD. By the way, Hiuen Tsang calls it a Buddhist site, and it is said that only Buddhist relics of the Avaloktishvara statue were found here.

Things changed due to the invasion of Bakhtiyar Khilji in the 13th century. The invasion ended the rule of Para, and thus began the decline of Buddhism. During the reign of Akbar, in 1590, a Hindu monk established Bodh Gaya Mutt. In this way, the temple fell into the hands of the Hindu community. After independence, the Bihar Parliament passed the BTA in 1949, and its control over the temple was transferred from the Hindu coach to the new governing committee.

How does the government intervene?

The Bihar government has passed the BTA to resolve the orgy dispute between Buddhists and Hindu temples to control the same time. Buddhists are dissatisfied with the provisions of the current officials’ district magistrates who can only serve as leadership by the Hindu community. It changed in 2013 after the state government revised the rule and inserted a rule to give the former chairman any faith.

In the early 1990s, then-Chief Minister Bihar Lalu Prasad Yadav drafted the Bodh Gaya Mahvihara Act to replace the BTA. It should hand over the administration of the temple to the Buddhist community. The bill prohibits idols from immersing themselves in Hindu marriages near and within temples. However, the bill entered the cold storage.