“If we, of this generation, create a break in the chain of Vedic study, kept up for ages, from generation to generation, we shall be committing the unforgivable crime of denying our descendants the opportunity of learning the Vedas…..”



This Vedic tradition, the root, on which this large vata-vrksha of human civilization has prospered, has to be preserved and nurtured. It is not a question of why or for what. It is the only duty ordained to us by our future generation. This great fountain head of all traditions has to be continued through preservation of the mantra-dhvani and utilising it for the performance of the srauta and smarta rituals. South India has been the refuge and home of Vedic and sastraic learning for several centuries. The Tamil Brahmana agraharams where the oral traditions of the Veda were preserved through pathasalas and gurukulams which spewed scholars, philosophers and artistes of very high merit were open universities.

Palakkad with its several agraharams like its counterparts in Tamil Nadu had produced undaunted reciters of the Veda and renowned scholars in sastras during the last century. Having been born and nurtured in an unbroken Vedic tradition in this part of Kerala, Dr. C. R. Swaminathan with the support of such like minded people and with the blessings of the Sankaracharyas of Kanchi and Sringeri, established a full-time residential Veda Pathasala under the banner of the Veda Rakshana Samithi at Chathapuram Agraharam in Kalpathi in the year 1996. Over the last decade, this humble beginning has grown and metamorphosised itself into a beautiful institution at Ramanathapuram thus transforming the Agraharam into a “Global Vedic Village”.