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* * * P R E S S R E L E A S E * * * (250 words) Sri Lanka to Host 2nd World Conference on Skanda-Murugan(Colombo: 19 October 1999) In 1998, India hosted the First International Conference Seminar on Skanda-Murugan at the Institute of Asian Studies in Chennai. Some 150 delegates and observers from 23 countries participated in the Conference. The largest foreign delegation of 25 Sri Lankan scholars was headed by Hon. S. Thondaman, whose proposal that the next Conference be hosted by Sri Lanka was unanimously approved by the Conference delegates. The Second International Conference Seminar on Skanda-Murugan to be held in Colombo in July 2000 will assemble scholars of many disciplines from around the world sharing an interest in the composite Aryan-Dravidian god Skanda-Murugan. Since late Vedic times in the Sanskrit tradition and perhaps far earlier among Dravidian and tribal peoples of the South, the vigorous and complex deity Murugan or Skanda has exerted a powerful influence upon Indian literature and religious thought. Even today, his cult commands the allegiance of crores of devotees in India, Sri Lanka, Malaysia and wherever there are expatriate Tamil communities. The forthcoming world conference in Colombo represents an extraordinary opportunity for bhaktas and scholars to meet and interact. Undoubtedly, the conference will long be remembered as a watershed in the study of one of the world's great religious and literary traditions. Full details on the coming world conference on Skanda-Murugan may be had at the Murugan Conference web site www.murugan.orgor from the Institute of Asian Studies in Chennai. Visit the Murukan Conference web site.
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