The Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanams will construct resting facilities for devotees heading from Chennai to Tirumala at three or four locations, its chairman Y.V. Subba Reddy has said.
He said thousands of devotees were heading to Tirumala by ‘padayatra’ all through the year and the TTD felt it was essential to provide ‘mandapams’ with basic amenities to enable them to halt to refresh, cook food and rest en route.
Mr. Subba Reddy made this announcement at the swearing-in ceremony of A.J. Sekhar, who was re-nominated to the post of Local Area President, Tamil Nadu and Puducherry, TTD, here on Monday.
The TTD Chairman said the proposed ‘mandapams’ would come up at every 30th km between Chennai and Tirupati and the route and site location maps were getting ready.
Efforts were on to expedite the project on constructing a replica of the Tirumala temple in Chennai at a site identified in Sholinganallur. He would meet Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M.K. Stalin soon to request expeditious transfer of the land to TTD.
Mr. Subba Reddy said the Devasthanams would construct a community hall on a 1.5 acre land it owns at a prime locality in Royapettah for public use. Besides spiritual programmes, public could make use of the hall for organising functions like marriages.
Mr. Sekhar said work on the ongoing Padmavathi Temple on G.N. Chetty Road would be completed in one year. The number of devotees visiting the TTD temple on Venkatnarayana Road in T. Nagar was steadily on the rise and the authorities had made all safety arrangements to ensure wearing of mask, social distancing etc in view of the pandemic.
