Mumbai: The head of Iran's Zoroastrian community, Dr. Mehraban Puladi, is on a religious and cultural tour in India. On Monday, he visited the three-century-old Bhikha Behram well at Churchgate, an important place of worship of the local Parsi-Zoroastrian community.
Puladi is the president of the Anjoman-e Mobedan, the highest religious authority for Iranian Zoroastrians. Mobeds are the Zoroastrian priests. He is on a tour of Zoroastrian religious sites in India. With him was Saloumeh Gholami, professor of Zoroastrian studies at the Faculty of Asian and Middle Eastern Studies, University of Cambridge where she leads the project 'Persisting Through Change: A Study of Oral Literature and Cultural Interaction in the Zoroastrian Community.'
On Monday morning, the guests interacted with the devotees and trustees of the Bhikha Behram Well. Porus Katrak, the visit coordinator, said Puladi will interact with the laity and the religious leaders. "It is an inter-cultural exchange. He will interact with the community and visit the fire temples," said Katrak who added that Puladi will visit the Iranshah in Udvada, Gujarat, the site of the holiest fire temple. The temple enshrines the holy fire brought from Iran by Zoroastrian refugees when they fled religious persecution in Iran, then called Persia, a millennia ago.
Puladi is from the Mobedan lineage of the Dasturan quarter in Yazd, a family seen as the custodians of the Zoroastrian community. He is a Civil Engineer and has a doctorate in ancient Iranian culture and languages. Iran, the birthplace of the Zoroastrian religion, now has an estimated 22,000 followers. He is credited with the founding of the Museum of Zoroastrian Documents and Manuscripts, housed in the Dasturan quarter.
Dr Viraf Kapadia, a trustee of Bhikha Behram Well Trust, said, "We asked him about Zoroastrian religious rituals in Iran. We gave him a copy of the special calendar that we have published to mark the week's tricentenary."
The Bhikha Behram well, built in 1715 CE by a Parsi businessman named Bhikhaji Behramji Panday, will celebrate its 300th-anniversary commemorations in March 2025.
