Īccording to noted epigraphist Iravatham Mahadevan, the ideographs signify a brave warrior capable of killing evil beings to save the devoted. It is interesting to note that at least twenty five tribes in East Africa worship Murunu as supreme god and like the Dravidian god Murugan, the African Murungu resides in sacred mountains. Murugan, the god of mountains, is a prominenet and typical deity of the Dravidian India.
Lord Murugan is also associated with Ahmuvan, an Indus Valley Deity. Ī coin, around 200 BCE, of the Yaudheyas with depiction of KarttikeyaĪrchaeological findings of pottery and relics in several places in Tamil Nadu, particularly in Adichanallur had ideographic inscriptions of this name and show signs that Murugan worship was prevalent at least as early as 10th century B.C, if not earlier. In Durga Puja in Bengal, Murugan is considered to be a son of Parvati and Shiva along with his brother Ganesha and his sisters Saraswati and Lakshmi. In Indonesia, the name Kartika is more commonly a girl's name. Like most Hindu deities, He is known by many other names, including Senthil (Smart), Saravaṇa, Kārtikeya (meaning 'son of Krittika' ), Arumugam, Sanmuga(from Sanskrit Ṣaṇmukha), Shadanana (meaning 'one with six faces'), Kumāra (meaning 'child or son'), Dhandapany (meaning God with a stick), Guhan or Guruhuha (meaning 'cave-dweller'), Skanda (meaning 'that which is spilled or oozed, namely seed' in Sanskrit), Subrahmaṇya, Vēlaṇ and Swaminatha. He is the patron deity of the Tamil land ( Tamil Nadu). Lord Murugan is more popular in South India especially among Tamil people famously referred as Thamizh Kadavul (God of Tamils) compared to other parts of India. Chinese in Penang, Kuala Lumpur, of Malaysia also pray to Lord Murugan during Thaipusam. In Sri Lanka, Hindus as well as Buddhists revere the sacred historical Nallur Kandaswamy temple in Jaffna and the sacred Buddhist and Hindu shrine or Kataragama temple (also in Sinhala "Katharagama Devalaya") dedicated to him, situated deep south in the country. His six most important shrines in India are the Arupadaiveedu temples, located in Tamil Nadu. Murugan ( Tamil: முருகன், Sanskrit:सुब्रह्मण्य, Sanskrit: कार्तिकेय, Kannada: ಸುಬ್ರಹ್ಮಣ್ಯ, Telugu: సుబ్రహ్మణ్యేశ్వర స్వామి, Malayalam: ശ്രീ സുബ്രഹ്മണ്യസ്വാമി ) also called Kartikeya, Skanda and Subrahmanya, is a popular Hindu deity especially among Tamil Hindus, worshipped primarily in areas with Tamil influences, especially South India, Singapore, Sri Lanka, Malaysia, Mauritius and Reunion Island. For other uses, see Subramanian (disambiguation). Shankar is Visiting Fellow for ‘ Multilingual Locals and Significant Geographies‘ project."Subramanian" redirects here. His most recent book is Flesh and Fish Blood: Postcolonialism, Translation, and the Vernacular (2012 U. He is Professor of English and Director of the Creative Writing Program. His scholarly areas of interest are postcolonial literature (especially of Africa and South Asia), literature of immigration, film, and translation studies. Shankar is a critic, novelist, and translator. He ends by drawing conclusions relevant beyond the specific Tamil situation. Shankar sketches the challenges of contesting literary censorship using aesthetic terms fashioned within national and/or cosmopolitan contexts and considers ways in which such contestation might nevertheless be pursued within vernacular contexts. Shankar’s purpose is to uncover the vernacular conditions within which censorship becomes possible. Late in 2014, Tamil writer Murugan was attacked for describing caste practices of ritual sex within a temple in his novel, driving him eventually to renounce writing. Shankar takes up the text and controversial context of Perumal Murugan’s novel Mathorubagan (English title One Part Woman).