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The
Ceylon Tamils' main areas of origin are the Northern and Eastern Provinces
of Sri Lanka. The chief area of settlement of the Tamils in Sri Lanka is the
Jaffna Penisula with Jaffna as its metropolis. The Jaffna Penisula was under
Portuguese rule from 1620 and later in 1685 it came under the domination of
the Dutch. The British took over control of the Penisula in 1795. It was only
from 1850 that the British began to develop Jaffna and introduce English education
- which became very popular with the Tamils. Soon bilingual schools (English
and Tamil began to sprout all over Jaffna and it is said that "within the
radius of a mile there are found several colleges and schools for boys and
girls in the town of Jaffna. These colleges and schools were soon to become
the "factories" supplying the English Language trained man-power needs for
the development of Ceylon and Malaya.
After the Treaty of Pangkor in 1874, the British embarked upon the construction
of roads, railways, schools, hospitals and government offices in the Malaya
Penisula, to develop the country and to increase its revenue.
"It was to meet those early problems that Malaya looked to its older sister
Ceylon for help and probably, the then Governor of the Straits Settlements
secured the despatch to Perak of the 2nd division of the Ceylon Pioneer Corp.
"So it fell to the Ceylonese to survey the railways and to build and man
them, to be apothecaries in the hospitals, to be technical assistants to
qualified engineers and to staff the clerical services on which an expanding
government was bound increasingly to depend. "s
In
Kuala Lumpur, the Ceylon Tamil population was mainly concentrated
in Brickfields and Sentui because of the proximity of the Administrative
Centre of the Malayan
Railway (opposite the railway station) and the Sentul Workshop.
The Government provided accomodation for the white and the blue
collar
workers in these
areas. The Ceylon Tamils living in both these areas were devout
Saivites and as they fervently believed that "no one should live in a place that has
no Temple ",
they soon began to organize themselve into Associations.
Temples
and associations began to sprout in areas where there was a sizeable
community. The railway staff residing in the Brickfields area,
many of whom
were students of Saiva Siddhanta Asiriar Sivapadasundaranar, an
acknowledged follower of Sri La Sri Arumuga Navalar, felt that
there was an urgen need
for a place of worship in accordance with the Saiva Agamas. They
were anxious to have a temple in order to practise and observe
the Saiva Siddhantha Tenets
and religious observances such as "Viratham" (fasting), "Thithis" (commemoration
rituals), "Punniyaahavaasam" (purification ceremony), "Kantha Sasthy" and
other observances and festivals. With this in view, on 24th December,
1890
a group of Ceylon Saivites met at the residence of one Mr. V. Sinnapah,
Acting Traffic Inspector, Malayan Railway and an influential member
of the Ceylon
Tamil Community. At that meeting it was decided (a) to build a temple
to worship Lord Subramaniam and (b) to purchase an appropriate land
to build
the temple.
The Sri Kandaswamy Temple was born on that December day.
The land between the closed end of the cul-de-sac of the present Jalan Scott
and the Klang River was considered most appropriate for the proposed temple
because of its central position and also because the land was quite empty.
It was purchased by the Selangor Ceylon Tamil Association in 1901 and the
construction of the Kandaswamy temple commenced about the year 1902. The
land title was originally registered in the name of Mr. V. Sinnappah. The
First group of Trustees was selected on 18th April 1903 to hold in trust
the property purchased for the temple. On 18th July, 1903 Mr. V. Sinnappah
transferred the two lots of land registered in his name to the trustees.
A
"Vel" was installed in the said land by His Holiness Sri Murugaswamy, an
eminent Saivite, and a small temple with Gopuram was completed in 1909.
The First Maha Kumba Abishegam of the Sri Kandaswamy Temple was held on
9th February, 1909 (Tamil year Keelaga 28th day of the Tamils month "Thai").
Source: National Library Malaysia Festival at Kandasamy Temple
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