More than a decade has elapsed since the Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanams (TTD) took the first step for the establishment of a Veda Pathasala at Chilkur village, near Hyderabad, and yet there is not much headway on the project.
Chilkur had been chosen in view of its close proximity to the famed Balaji temple, where an allied ecosystem could be developed.
The first proceedings for handing over advance possession of land for the project had been issued in June 2010. For road access, it had been decided to acquire the adjoining land and compensate the neighbour with a similar extent of land elsewhere.
After more than five years, the proposal for alienation of 8.27 acres in Moinabad mandal of Ranga Reddy district had been sent to the CCLA in November 2015.
The proposal has been gathering dust there since then. Blame it on bifurcation of the State, or the TTD’s indifference in following it up, the proposal has not made much headway.
Limited space
The Veda Pathasala had started functioning temporarily from the first floor of a building constructed by the Rotary Club of Bhagyanagar, where an anganwadi exists.
The limited space was hardly sufficient either to take up new admissions, or introduce new courses. Objections had also been raised over the venue, as it shared the premises where eggs were cooked and distributed under mid-day meal scheme.
Dwindling strength
The student strength had started shrinking to reach the single digit, and doubts were raised over its very existence when it was closed during the COVID-19 lockdown.
The TTD had written to the Telangana government in January 2019 that it would be forced to merge the Chilkur school with the existing Veda Pathasala at Keesaragutta, 60 km away, if it did not get the land alienated soon.
The Balaji temple authorities, despite having no locus standi in the process, had offered shelter to the students till a permanent structure was made available, but there was evidently no response.
“We have offered to provide space for classrooms and living space inside our temple to run the show, but there are no takers,” temple trustee and hereditary priest S. Rangarajan told The Hindu .
Apart from the one in Chilkur, the TTD runs a Veda Pathasala in Nalgonda in Telangana and Dharmagiri (Tirumala), I. Bhimavaram, Kotappakonda and Vizianagaram in Andhra Pradesh, all of them taking shape with local support and political will.
Taking cognisance of the issue, Chevella MP G. Ranjit Reddy recently promised to take it up with Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhara Rao.
