Brahmins conducting homa for the Sultan of Oman

Editor's note (2026): This 2014 report is kept as originally filed. Sultan Qaboos bin Said died on 10 January 2020 at the age of 79, after a reign of nearly five decades.

In November 2014, a 22-member team of Vedic Brahmins from India travelled to Oman to perform Hindu rituals for the well-being of Sultan Qaboos bin Said, then 74, who was reportedly suffering from colon cancer and undergoing treatment under German specialists.

The team was led by Bengaluru-based astrologer Chandrashekar Swami. A special site was created at Barkha (Barka), a town 41 kilometres from Muscat airport, for the five-day yagna. Members of Oman's royal family were also said to be taking part.

"We are performing the Maha Dhanvanthari Yagna, Poorna Navagraha Shanthi Homa, Maha Mruthyunjaya Yagna and Maha Vishnu Yagna for the well-being of the ailing Sultan. We prayed for his recovery from all ailments," the Swami said at the time. The priests came from the Poorna Pragna Vidya Peetha in Mangaluru and from Kerala.

The Oman trip was reportedly the second phase of the effort: earlier that year, in July, special prayers and yagnas had been performed for the Sultan at the Devi Annapoorneshwari Kshetra in Hosanadu, Moodbidri and Dakshina Kannada in Karnataka.

Reported by The Times of India, November 2014. (The original link no longer resolves.)