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Swami Kuvalayānanda Biography
Swami KuvalayānandaOn 30 August 1883 Jagannatha Ganesa Gune was born in a traditional Karhade Brahmin1 family in the village Dhaboi in Gujarat state, India.
Later he was known as Swami Kuvalayānanda. Jagannatha’s father, Sri Ganesa Laxmana Gune, was a teacher and his mother, Srimati Saraswati, a housewife.
The family was not rich and had to depend for some time on public and private charity. Being from a poor family, Jagannatha had to struggle hard for his education.
When Jagannatha was fourteen years old he lost his parents. Subsequently he joined Nutan Marathi Vidyalaya, one of the oldest schools in Pune, Maharashtra.
At his matriculation in 1903, he was awarded the Jagannath Shankarsheth Sanskrit Scholarship to study at Baroda College where he graduated in 1910.
During his student days, Jagannatha was influenced by political leaders like Sri Aurobindo, who was working as a young lecturer at the university, and Lokmanya Tilak's Indian Home Rule Movement.
His national idealism and patriotic fervor prompted him to devote his life to the service of humanity. During this time, he took up a vow of lifelong celibacy.
Jagannatha’s was fascinated with Sanskrit poetry and he assumed the name "Kuvalayānanda”.2
Coming into contact with the Indian masses, many of whom were illiterate and superstitious, Kuvalayānanda realized the value of education, and this influenced him to help organize the Khandesh Education Society at Amalner, where he became the Principal of the National College, in 1916.
The National College was closed by the British Government in 1920 due to the spirit of Indian nationalism prevalent at the institution. From 1916 to 1923, he taught Indian culture studies to high school and college students.
Kuvalayānanda's first guru was Rajaratna Manikrao, a professor at the Jummadada Vyayamshala in Baroda. From 1907 to 1910, Manikrao trained Kuvalayānanda in the Indian System of Physical Education which Kuvalayānanda advocated throughout his life.
As early as the 1930s, Kuvalayānanda trained large groups of yoga teachers to spread physical education in India.
Paramahamsa Madhavadas MaharajIn 1919, he met Paramahamsa Madhavdas,3 the Bengali yogi who had settled at Malsar, near Baroda, on the banks of the Narmada river.
The insight into Yogic discipline, under Madhavdasji's guidance, greatly affected Kuvalayānanda's career. He became a pioneer of a new style of yoga influenced by physical culture.
Though Kuvalayānanda was spiritually inclined and idealistic, he was, at the same time, a strict rationalist. He sought scientific explanations for the various psychophysical effects of Yoga he experienced.
In 1920–1921, he investigated the effects of the Yogic practices of uḍḍīyana bandha and nauli on the human body with the help of some of his students in a laboratory at the State Hospital, Baroda.
In 1924, Kuvalayānanda founded the Kaivalyadhama Health and Yoga Research Center in Lonavla, Maharashtra, to provide a laboratory for his scientific study of Yoga.
His research agenda, although covering a variety of yogic practices which he divided into asana, pranayama, kriyas, mudras and bandhas, resulted in a detailed study of the physiology involved during each such practice.
These experiments impressed some Western researchers who came to the Kaivalyadhama Health and Yoga Research Center to learn more. Dr. Josephine Rathbone, a professor of health and physical education, visited from Columbia University in 1937 to 1938. K.T. Behanan, a doctoral candidate from Yale University, wrote his dissertation on yoga after visiting in 1931 to 1932. Research and collaboration continue to this day.
At the same time as founding his research institute at Lonavla, Kuvalayānanda started Yoga Mīmāṃsā, the first journal devoted to scientific investigation into yoga, published quarterly. It has covered experiments on the effects of asanas, kriyas, bandhas, and pranayama.
Besides his yoga research, Swami Kuvalayānanda established new branches of Kaivalyadhama:
• In 1932, the Mumbai branch of Kaivalyadhama at Santacruz. It was relocated to Marine Drive (Chowpatty) in 1936 and named the Ishvardas Chunnilal Yogic Health Center.
• Kaivalyadhama Spiritual Center in Colaba, at Kanakesvara near Alibaug.
• In 1943, Kaivalyadhama branch in Rajkot, Saurashtra.
• The Gordhandas Seksaria College of Yoga and Cultural Synthesis was established in 1951.
• In 1961, the Srimati Amolak Devi Tirathram Gupta Yogic Hospital for the treatment of chronic functional disorders with the help of Yogic techniques.
Some of his pupils, like Krishnamacharya and the Padma Shri awardee, S. P. Nimbalkar, became known yoga teachers.
Swami Kuvalayānanda died on 18 April 1966 (aged 82) at Lonavla, Maharashtra, India. On a blackboard in his room he left a message: “The wise who looks inward, they get permanent peace – not others. One should accept whatever comes one’s way, without loosing heart.”
Books
• Asanas, Kaivalyadhama; 1993 [1931].
• Pranayama, Kaivalyadhama; 2005 [1931].
• Goraksa-Satakam (translation), Kaivalyadhama; 2006 [1954].
• Vashishtha Samhita (translation), Kaivalyadhama; 1969.
• Vision and Wisdom (letters), Kaivalyadhama; 1999.
Sources
• https://kdham.com/swami-kuvalayananda/
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swami_Kuvalayananda
• https://www.esamskriti.com/e/Yoga/Asanas-ad-Pranayama/Swami-Kuvalayananda-~-A-brief-biography-1.aspx
Footnotes
1. Karhade Brahmins are essentially Rigvedi Brahmins who follow the Ashwalayana Sutra. Karhade Brahmins are divided into two groups based on the Vedanta they follow, the first of which follows the Advaita Vedanta of Adi Shankara and the second of which follow the Dvaita Vedanta of Madhvacharya. Majority of Karhade Brahmins are Smarthas, while small minority among them are Madhwas.
2. Blissful (Sk. Ānanda) Blue Lotus (Sk. Kuvalaya, bot. Nymphæa nelumbo).
3. Paramahamsa Madhavadas Maharaj (1798 - 1921) born in Bengal, was initiated as a Sadhu (monk) in the order of Vaishnavism.
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