An Atheist who built a Hindu temple and became a guru to the many

I never met him in person. Our connection was forged through quiet correspondence—emails exchanged across time zones and belief systems. Once, I donated to support the construction of his temple, and in return, he sent me CDs containing his work on the Sri Cakra. He extended an invitation for me to visit, but as life often goes, I never made the trip in time. By the time I finally stood at the gates of his temple, he had already passed on. Yet his presence lingered—palpable, unmistakable.

He began his journey not as a holy man but as a nuclear physicist, working within one of India’s most prestigious scientific institutions. An atheist by conviction, he never attended temples, never participated in Hindu festivals. According to his daughter, his worldview was shaped by rationalism and scientific inquiry. For a long time, that was his truth. Then something happened—an inner shift so profound that it prompted him to leave the cloistered world of labs and equations. He turned instead toward something ancient, symbolic, and spiritual. He envisioned and built a temple shaped in the form of the Sri Cakra—a sacred geometric form rooted in the esoteric tradition of Sri Vidya. But his temple was unlike any other.

He began teaching the very rituals, mantras, and meditations that were traditionally reserved for Brahmins—rituals usually guarded by lineage, caste, and gender. The response was fierce. Conservative Brahmin groups accused him of desecrating sacred knowledge. Some branded him a traitor to the tradition. He was undeterred. In a world where spiritual knowledge is often fenced off by hierarchy and birthright, he flung the gates wide open. Women, non-Brahmins, people of all races and nationalities were welcome—not just as spectators, but as participants. He trained them. He empowered them. And he insisted on paying women ritual practitioners for their service—an act both radical and dignifying in a landscape where unpaid ritual labor is often expected.

When I finally made my way to the temple about two years ago, I stayed for a week. I witnessed rituals said to be "once in a lifetime" experiences. But what struck me most wasn’t the grandeur of the ceremony—it was the serenity. The temple radiated peace. The kind of peace that doesn’t demand belief, only presence. I found myself returning to a quiet promise: If ever I needed to disappear into solitude, this would be my sanctuary—where no one would find me, and where I could truly find myself. I listened to his daughter recount stories of her father. She affirmed his atheism in his early life. She didn’t speak of a blinding revelation or a dramatic spiritual conversion. She simply hinted that something changed. Was it an intellectual evolution? A mystical experience? A reckoning with mortality? We may never know.

This temple is not feminist in the loud, performative sense. Yet in practice, it is deeply subversive: the majority of its rituals are conducted by women. They are not assistants. They are not "allowed" to perform rituals—they own the ritual space. For a tradition still steeped in patriarchy, this is a revolution. Women are usually gatekept from mantra initiations, restricted in their access to sacred texts, or placed in support roles. But here, under this late guru’s guidance, they have become the torchbearers.

As I sat there during that 1 week, I asked myself "What drives a rationalist, a scientist, and a non-believer to construct a sacred space?"

Perhaps the question is flawed. Perhaps his atheism never truly left him. Maybe it was never about belief in the supernatural but about reverence for the sublime. The Sri Cakra, in his hands, may not have been a symbol of religious devotion, but one of consciousness, structure, and unity.

Perhaps he understood ritual not as superstition, but as psychospiritual technology an architecture of inner transformation. Something to be deconstructed, democratized, and reimagined. Maybe he didn’t convert at all. Maybe he simply evolved.

But then again, what if this was never about him? And I have this vision this quiet, persistent thought that maybe, just maybe, he went back to dismantle the system. To make it accessible for all.