Lord Balaji comes to Bangalore

The Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanam (TTD) has announced the opening of the temple at Vyalikaval in Malleswaram.

The temple intends to cater to the needs of thousands of devotees travelling every week from Bangalore and Karnataka. The installation will be organised from May 21 to 23 and the temple will be open to devotees from 1 pm on May 23.

President of TTD's local advisory committee, P Shyamaraju said the temple has been constructed as per Agama Shastra, under the guidance of TTD's temple architects and stapathis. The rituals conducted will be performed in accordance with Vaikhanasa Agama Shastra.

“The idols have been sculpted by TTD at their Shilpa Kendra and all of them are exact stone replicas of the ones at Tirumala. Even the jewellery has been made by the same people,” he said.

All the puja and sevas will be conducted in the same spirit as in Tirumala and all contributions made here shall be directly credited to TTD Hundi at Tirupathi.

Sixty priests will be arriving in Bangalore from Tirumala to conduct the pujas and according to Shyamaraju, the pujas and maintenance will be better than Tirumala.

A spiritual centre will also be attached to the temple, where religious discourses and kalyanotsavas will be held. Secretary of the TTD Information Centre in Bangalore, K B Venkatesh Rao, said this was the first temple of TTD outside Andhra Pradesh with stone idols.

The temple has been constructed at the cost of Rs 12 crore. The temple authorities are also looking at building some facilities for accommodating devotees, if the number of people visiting the temple from outside the State picks up. “If we can attract at least 10 per cent of the people headed to Tirumala from Bangalore, it would be great,” Venkatesh Rao said.

No entry fee will be charged and the laddoo will be priced at Rs 25 each. “But we cannot promise the same taste,” Rao quipped.