Containing Murder in a South Indian Temple

Abstract

On 3 September 2004, during the Pavitrotsava temple festival which serves to erase all ritual mistakes committed during the previous year, the manager of the Varadarāja Perumāl temple in Kanchipuram was brutally murdered. This murder constituted both a criminal act and a religious offence. In outlining its aftermath, this article analyses the highly dynamic responses to this multifaceted transgression, which depend on and signal the interaction between political power and religious authorities specific to time and place.