MP businessman, wife become Jain ascetics, leave behind toddler

There is no age for choosing to renounce the world, says the family of Madhya Pradesh businessman couple Sumit Rathore and his wife Anamika who have become Jain ascetics, leaving behind their around three year-old daughter.

Ignoring protests by the family, Anamika followed the footsteps of her husband Sumit, the son of a millionaire businessman in Madhya Pradesh's Neemuch district, and embraced monkhood at a ceremony in Surat, Gujarat, on Monday.

According to the Jain society in Neemuch, when the couple resolved to become ascetics questions were raised as to who would take care of their two years 10-month-old daughter Ibhya, who has been given for adoption to Anamika's brother and sister-in-law.

The couple was supposed to embrace monkhood together on September 23 but Anamika could not do so after news about their daughter came to the notice of the Rajasthan Human Rights Commission. The husband became a monk that day and took on the new name of Sumit Muni.

According to people of Jain society, Anamika returned from Surat on September 23 and completed the process of her daughter's adoption. She embraced monkhood at a ceremony in Surat on September 25. Anamika's in-laws reside in Kapasan in Rajasthan's Chittorgarh district.

Those who participated in Monday's ceremony said that Anamika took her vows of becoming a Jain nun, after which her head was shaven and she was made to wear white clothes. She was given a new name Sadhvi Anakar Shrijee.

Sumit's uncle Sushil told IANS on Tuesday that Sumit did his MBA in foreign trade from London, while Anamika did her engineering from the same place.

To a question on why the couple, who are in their early 30s, chose to become ascetics, he said that "One cannot define when the feeling to renounce the world will manifest in an individual. There is no age for becoming an ascetic."

--IANS

hindi-amit/rn