Kerala samadhi case: Self-styled guru’s body found in sitting position and covered in ash, police say
Kerala samadhi case: After locals raised suspicion about the disappearance of Gopan Swami, his family had said he ‘attained samadhi’ and was lowered into a concrete chamber. The body was exhumed Thursday.
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Kerala samadhi case: Police and authorities seal the burial site of 81-year-old Gopan Swami in Aralumoodu, Neyyattinkara. (Express Photo)The mystery behind the death of self-styled spiritual guru Gopan Swami was a step closer to being solved on Thursday after his body was exhumed from a concrete chamber in the premises of his house in Thiruvananthapuram and a postmortem was conducted.
Neyyattinkara Assistant Superintendent of Police S Shaji said a final conclusion on whether the 69-year-old died of natural causes would be arrived at after getting reports on chemical analysis, visceral examination, and histopathology. “There were no external injuries on the body. After the postmortem, the body was handed over to family,” the ACP said.
Police said the body was found in a sitting position inside the chamber and was covered with ash.
Several people at Aralamudu in the Neyyattinkara area of Thiruvananthapuram have been curious about Gopan’s whereabouts since last Friday. His family claimed that he sat in samadhi — a state of meditative consciousness, according to different Indian religious traditions — the previous day and was lowered into the concrete chamber that Gopan himself had constructed five years ago.
After local residents moved a complaint about the mysterious disappearance of their neighbour, police registered a missing person’s case and began a probe last Saturday. On the assumption that Gopan’s body had been kept in the chamber, erected close to their family temple, the police had made elaborate preparations to exhume the body for postmortem.
On Monday, Gopan’s wife Sulochana, and sons Rajasenan and Sanandan, objected when the police, armed with an order from the Revenue Divisional Officer, tried to open the tomb to exhume the body.
However, on Wednesday, the Kerala High Court rejected the plea of Gopan’s family against the police’s move to exhume the body.
Vishnupuram Chandrasekharan, chairman of Vaikunda Swami Dharma Pracharana Sabha (VSDP), a group of the Nadar community said Thursday, “We have planned a maha samadhi on Friday which will be attended by several swamis and ashram heads. He died a natural death and the findings go in tune with what his family said. A spiritual guru was insulted and he will be given a maha samadhi. Gopan Swami had attained samadhi, it was made a controversy and history will not pardon those who were involved.”
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