On July 3rd Karnataka was shaken by a chilling confession. A former Dalit sanitation worker from Dharmasthala revealed that, under coercion, he had buried scores of bodies over the years in the temple town. Many of these bodies bore signs of sexual violence, mutilation, and acid burns. At great personal risk, he testified to decades of suppressed violence that forced the Congress government in Karnataka to appoint a Special Investigation Team (SIT).
This revelation pointed to a longer and bloodier history. Dharmasthala has long carried the memory of unexplained deaths and disappearances. The rape and murder of Padmalatha in the 1980s, the “Justice for Sowjanya” movement of 2012 after another teenager’s brutal killing, and the mysterious disappearance of Ananya Bhat in 2003 all form a continuum of unresolved cases that were buried in silence. Lawyers and activists have pointed to a pattern: for decades, young girls and women from the region have vanished, been raped, and killed. Each time, public outrage simmered, only to be subdued by the weight of political and religious power.
The whistleblower’s claims prompted exhumations, and human remains were indeed recovered. Forensic tests were initiated. Yet, instead of protecting the whistleblower, the SIT arrested him on August 23, accusing him of perjury and presenting fake evidence. He was accused of producing a skull from a laboratory rather than from Dharmasthala, and the focus shifted from probing the allegations to discrediting the man who dared to speak out. Not surprising given that police complicity and institutional silence have been recurring features for decades.
Leaders of both Congress and BJP rushed to defend the Dharmadhikari, Veerendra Heggade, the hereditary head of the temple. Congress’s DK Shivakumar thundered that conspiracies to tarnish the temple would be punished. The BJP, which in 2022 nominated Heggade to the Rajya Sabha, stood by him firmly. This bilayered protection exposes that in Karnataka, as in much of India, the two principal parties compete electorally but converge when it comes to defending entrenched feudal and religious powers.
Veerendra Heggade is not just a religious figure. He is a Padma Vibhushan awardee, a member of the Rajya Sabha, and a figure closely aligned with the RSS. His control extends far beyond the temple into sprawling economic activities, including charity trusts, educational institutions, and an extensive money-lending and microfinance system. Dharmasthala’s financial empire thrives on fear: borrowers believe that failing to repay loans is not just a financial matter but invites divine punishment. In this way, religion, money, and fear combine to reproduce feudal dependence in modern garb.
It is no coincidence that so many tourists and pilgrims who went missing or were later found dead were last seen near the temple or areas surrounding it. Likewise, many locals who turned up dead or disappeared had some ongoing feud or dispute with the temple authorities. From Padmalatha’s father Devanand, a CPI(M)-aligned farmer leader who challenged the temple in panchayat elections, to Narayan Sapale and his sister Yamuna, who had a land dispute with the institution, the pattern is unmistakable, conflict with Dharmasthala’s hegemony often ended in tragedy.
Bengaluru City Civil Court issued sweeping media gag orders on the case. The News Minute, one of the few media houses consistently covering the story, was forced to move the High Court to challenge these gag orders. The Supreme Court, on August 8, finally refused to extend a gag order sought by Heggade’s brother, observing that such injunctions stifled free speech.
Journalists reporting on Dharmasthala have been threatened with death and rape. In one incident, three YouTubers were physically attacked while filming near the temple, their cameras smashed and memory cards seized. As Shivani Kava of TNM documented, even speaking about Dharmasthala in the area evokes fear, voices drop, people fall silent, and no one dares utter the names involved. These are reactions to a stirring of the hornet’s nest.
Dharmasthala is thus not simply a religious institution but a nexus of power where feudal authority, capitalist enterprise, bureaucratic machinery, and political parties converge. It is a textbook case of how the state machinery works hand in glove with feudal figures, sustaining and reinforcing their dominance.
In this situation, one may despair for justice. The ruling class parties, be it Congress or BJP, are united in their defense of Dharmasthala. Institutions like the police or even the judiciary have been mute spectators until challenged at the Supreme level .
Only people can dispel this despair. The Dharmasthala case is a reminder that justice cannot be delivered from above when the institutions of state, religion, and capital are so closely intertwined. It shows us the limits of institutions, and the cost of speaking truth to power. It also shows us the only path forward: the united struggle of the people. Only when people rise together, defy the culture of fear, and build mass movements, can the cries of justice, buried for decades in the soil of Dharmasthala, finally be heard.
