The Madhva Matha of Udupi, founded by Madhvacharya, the proponent of the dvaita, is a fascinating institution. It is an octagonal arrangement where eight Mathas (or Matthas, as pronounced in Kannada) taking their names from villages near the temple town of Udupi have the right of conducting worship in the Krishna Temple by rotation. The Krishna idol was installed by Madhvacharya, who blended philosophy with bhakti, to propel a religious sect, distinct from the advaita propogated by Adi Shankara and his Mathas spread across the country. Unlike Shankara, the reach of Madhavacharya is confined to southern India, though modernization and urbanization have now made the upwardly mobile Madhwas set up their temples in India and abroad, as has happened to other Indian religious sects. The Udupi Mathas have also been in the public eye because of the activist role of Swami Vishwesh Thirtha, the head of the Pejawar Matha, one of the Astha Mathas. He is in the Margadarshak Mandal for the Ram Janma-bhoomi temple, has the top leadership of the Bharatiya Janata Party and Vishwa Hindu Parishad among his followers, he trod a new path by visiting homes of the people who were once regarded as untouchables, he gave sanyas diksha to a woman politician. Compared to the high profile of Vishwesh Thirtha, the other seven pontiffs have not been in the national limelight.
January 2004, volume 28, No 1
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