Priests’ diktat

At a meeting held in Poona on December 6, 2002 at the Sir J. J. Agiary complex, all the mobeds of Poona resolved unanimously that irrespective of what may have happened in the past: "no mobed will perform any ceremony for the first four days, or even thereafter, for those who opt for burial or cremation, or any other mode of disposal other than dikhmemashim (dakhmenashini), where a dokhma exists. Any mobed who breaks the above resolution would not be allowed to practice his profession in any agyari in the city.” A copy of the Poona mobeds’ resolution has also been sent to Dastur (Dr) K. JamaspAsa, with a request to endorse the same on behalf of the Council of High Priests.

For those who do not subscribe to dakhmenashini, certain enlightened mobeds have to be ‘imported’ from Bombay at a heavy fee, including transportation and accommodation which no poor or even middle-class Parsi can afford. In sheer desperation therefore, such people are either forced to take the bodies of their dead to the dakhma, or to go without a priest’s prayers which a family member then chants to the best of his ability.

What a disgraceful state of affairs for an enlightened community where its priests’ diktats are even worse than those of the mullahs of Taliban or Iran. The fact that the trustees of these agiaries have not the ‘guts’ to go against their priests for such diktats is another matter.

Brig N. B. GRANT

Poona