About 

• Sree Narayana Guru was born in 1856 C.E. in the village of Chempazhanthi in Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala.
• He became one of the greatest proponents and re-evaluators of Advaita Vedanta, the principle of non-duality put forward by Adi Shankara.
• He is considered among the greatest social reformers and philosophers of Kerala and India.
• He led a reform movement in Kerala by rejecting the caste system and promoting new values of spiritual freedom, social equality and upliftment of the downtrodden.
• The Guru worked hard as a social educationist and condemned discrimination in the name of caste, creed and religion.
• His famous words “one caste, one religion and one god for mankind” worked as a fresh wave in the socio-cultural realm of Kerala.
• In his renowned work Atmopadesa Satakam, which consists of one hundred verses of self-instruction, the Guru proposes his philosophy of egalitarianism.

Why in News?

• The Ministry of Tourism has considered the revival of the Shree Narayana Guru (Sivagiri Sree Narayana Guru Ashram – Aruvipuram- Kunnumpara Sree Subrahmania – Chembazhanthi Sree Narayana Gurukulam) spiritual circuit under the Swadesh Darshan scheme.

About Swadesh Darshan

• Swadesh Darshan Scheme was launched by the Ministry of Tourism in 2014.
• Objective: To develop theme-based tourist circuits in the country. These tourist circuits will be developed on the principles of high tourist value, competitiveness and sustainability in an integrated manner.
• It is a Central Sector Scheme and efforts are made to achieve convergence with other schemes of Central and State Governments and also to leverage the voluntary funding available for Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) initiatives of Central Public Sector Undertakings and Corporate Sector.

The scheme has following objectives:

• Position tourism as a major engine of economic growth and job creation;
• Develop circuits having tourist potential in a planned and prioritized manner;
• Promote cultural and heritage value of the country to generate livelihoods in the identified regions;
• Follow community based development and pro-poor tourism approach;
• Create employment through active involvement of local communities;
• Projects under the scheme shall be under the following identified themes; Eco-tourism, Wildlife, Buddhist, Desert, Spiritual, Ramayana, Krishna, Coastal, Northeast, Rural, Himalayan, Tribal and Heritage.

https://www.thehindu.com/news/national/kerala/guru-spiritual-circuit-to-be-revived/article31948751.ece

https://www.keralatourism.org/varkala/sree-narayana-guru.php