The article on Thycaud Ayya Swamikal has got some responses. Note that Guruforum published Dr KS Pillai's article without any editing.

K Radhakrishna Panicker, Bombay writes:

"Dr. Kanam Shankara Pillai is not a renowned or recognised Historian. The victory of any great personality starts with the severing of their Guru. The ultimate knowledge starts from there. The disciple then becomes the Guru of their Guru. I think Dr. Kanam may be aware of this. One who go through the biography of Sreenarayana Guru can understand this. Guru's one of the earliest teachers("guru") of Kayamkulam, Kummanpalli RAMANPILLAI ASAN admires Sreenarayana Guru at many occassions during his tenure of 4 years with him. And Ramanpillai Asan had accepted Sreenarayana Guru as his "GURU". Here, I am not trying to belittle or denigrade Thycaud Ayyavu. Sreenarayana Guru studied Yoga from Ayyavu is a fact. It doesn't mean that Ayyavu fully nurtured Sreenarayana Guru. Dr. Kanam and people of his like are trying to project Ayyavu in the manner which I have mentioned above. This must be opposed to!"

Guruforum Comments:

It appears that Dr Kanam's statements like "Ayya Swamikal was the Guru of Sreenarayana Guru, Chattampi Swamikal .... " prompted the response from KR Panicker. There were similar attempts to compare and "place" Guru vs Chattampi Swamikal some time ago. This kind of comparison is unnecessary. Every great person must have studied under someone... but needless to say the student may outperform the teacher and become a greater personality. Budha, Vivekandana, Jesus, Krishna, our mythological characters all studied under someone. This means that they had education. But all of them became greater personalities than their teachers.

Guruforum underlines that it is better not to highlight such unnecessary comparisons and controversies.

Sree Narayan Guru's place is unique among all religious and social reformers in India. One has to go back 2500 years to see another person like that - Sree Budha. Guru is beyond all religion, caste and petty prejudices. Budha had enlightenment (revelation or Jnanodaya) at Gaya. Guru had enlightenment while doing meditation at Maruthwamala. Like Budha, Guru was a forward-looking person. Guru supported the need for English education, even at that time!

This being the case, no amount of comparison to other people are going to change the stature of Narayana Guru, whose disciples are not hundreds, not thousands but a whole people and even went beyond the times Guru lived. Many Western commentators coming to know Guru in recent times have admired him beyond any words. Daniel McKibben wrote: "there's a sense in which activists like Sri Narayana Guru had to be both Martin Luther and Martin Luther King."

Dr.Sugathan's Comments: (Wednesday, January 12th 2005 - 07:33:07 PM)

I think the comments of Mr Panikker dt.1st Sept.was unfair. Dr.Kanam Sankarapillai has every right to project Thaikkat Ayyav as a guru of Narayanaguru. Ayyavu taught him yoga and probably saivasiddhantham also. Some said Ayyavu was a brahmin, others said he was a paraya. Both were wrong. Recently reprt came in the papers, the ganaka ( kaniyan)community claiming that he belonged to their caste. This OBC (other backward community)takes the title 'panikker'. They are good in astrology. Narayanaguru had three gurus - Chempazhanthippillai who taught him the alphabet, Kummampilly Raman Pillai Asan who taught him Kavyam, Naatakam and Alamkaram and Ayyavu who taught him yoga. Please dont make Narayanaguru, the guru of Kummampilly Asan. Guruforum is happy to publish this one