My expedition for Digamber Jain Temple in Chennai

Empty mind, devil's workshop!!! Well, something opposite happened to me. One fine day (weekend of course), when I had absolutely nothing to do, I decided to visit a Digamber Jain Temple. Now don't ask me why all of a sudden, coz I myself don't know that ;-)

So the hunt begins by search for the address first. The googly wasn't of much help and I was little disappointed to know that no one has even bothered to maintain some decent website for the help of religious people like me ;-) I finally found one website called AtmaDharma and could find one address there and surprisingly even the phone no and the contact person was written there. The site was last updated years ago but still I decided to give it a try. I called up on that no and heard one elderly lady on the other side. I asked for the concerned person, she said something in Tamil. I asked, do you understand English? She said, yes and then again Tamil. I could finally make out from the discussion that the Temple still exists and the address given is correct.

So now the expedition begins! Koustub showed equal interest in joining hands for the expedition and we pulled my Termi to the petrol pump to get started finally. I studied Chennai map and at one place found "Jain temple" written, so we assumed it should be same (quite arbit assumption though). As expected, we just kept on going as per the map and finally ended up taking the longest route possible. Asking people for the address was great fun, you have to pick the key words or any other English word that they utter. Many a times, we had to thank them even before they completed telling the description as they were not using any "key words". ;-)

Just beating around the bush and making several other assumptions and making way thru busiest of Chennai streets with most weird traffic possible we finally reached one place where I could recognize the Jain swastik on several buildings. Ah, our hunt was finally over and we are there. After struggling for parking place somewhere far, we went inside the temple and to our dismay, the gate keeper denied that there is any temple inside. I knew there is some misunderstanding and we went ahead to find it to be Shwetamber Jain temple. Ah, how does it matter, afterall it was Jain temple. Well for that matter, there is one Lord Shiva temple next to my house but the expedition was about Digamber Jain Temple. So we again continued taking more frequent breaks to ask more no of people and after taking circles of same place 3 times, we found one Digamber Jain temple at its center. Ah ... finally, the hunt must be over now. We parked the Termi and stretched ourselves to feel victorious and went ahead. As any normal Hindi masala movie, the main gate was again locked and the watchman shouted from inside that the temple gets closed at 8p.m. itself and it was 9 now. Oh no, not again, at least give us address of other temples so that we can visit at any later time. But nothing worked. We tried to read everything written on the walls, that we could to make out something but...

On asking the nearby shopkeeper, he told us way to another Digamber Jain temple and said that you may get the list of addresses from there. We knew all temples will be closed by then, but still like true sailors we began to sail in the wind direction!

While searching for the right address, considering it as short cut, we accidentally entered one dingy street and found written at one house like building " Shri 1008 Adinath Digamber Jain Temple". There was no excitement as we knew, even this would be closed but when we entered we found it to be open, to our surprise. I really got highly excited and rushed upstairs before it could get closed, did Darshana with all the time in the world and felt satiated and victorious!! To add to our victorious feelings, we also found the list of all Digamber Jain Temples in Chennai.

Someone said it right, Things happen when you expect them the least.

If someone else is/was looking for same kinda expedition, let me reduce your burden. I am posting the list of Digamber Jain temples in Chennai here:

1. Kondliar street, Konditope, Chennai - 79

2. 34, Subramaniam street, Chennai - 79. Phone- 25242319

3. 16, Gandhi Road, Vanaram pet, Adam Bakkam, Chennai- 91

4. 15, Chandrappa Mudali Street, Sowcorpet ( This is one I went )

5. Balaji Nagar (opp. STATD Board) Ambattur. Phone- 22454269

6. Opp Perumal Koil, Moogappire(w)

7. 92, Hussain Colony, Vavekanandan Road, Kolathur, Chennai - 99. Phone-26450833