திருவண்ணாமலை-- சித்ரா பௌர்ணமி தரிசனம்

With The Divine Grace of  Arunachaleswara, ten of our volunteers who are working in Canara Bank had the opportunity of serving at Thiruvannamalai Temple in connection with the Chitra Pournami festival on 25.04.2013.

It was in the year 2006, a group of Canara Bank employees who had just a few months earlier started doing uzhavarappani in a small way, sat together to discuss ways and methods to strengthen their initiative.  They decide to open a common account and make monthly contributions from their salary to facilitate uzhavarappani activities.  The name of the account was deliberated upon at length and no satisfactory suggestion emerged.  At this point, one of our volunteers Shri Atma Ram suggested: " Today is Chitra Pournami Day.  Let us call ourselves as ANNAMALAIYAR ARAPPANI KUZHU ".  This suggestion was immediatly accepted by everyone present.  Thus Annamalaiyar Arappani Kuzhu came into existence 7 years ago.

Chitra Pournami attracts about 15 to 20 lakh devotees to Holy town of  Thiruvannamalai, next only to the Karthigai Maha Deepam festival in numbers.  The temple authorities had estimated a sale of atleast one lakh special darshan tickets on this day.  Canara Bank - Thiruvannamalai, which is the main banker for the temple accounts,  had gladly accepted the task of handling the sale of these tickets.  As our group has a sizeable presence in Canara Bank and widely known, we were entrusted with handling the sale of tickets.  

Assembling at Koyambedu bus stand, we left on the morning of 24th April itself to avoid the usual rush during the Pournami festivals.  Our group included two lady employees as well.  During our bus journey, Shri Ramachandran, our coordinator, recalled the above incident of 2006 that clinched the name of our group.

We reached Thiruvannamalai by noon.  The Chief Manager of our Thiruvannamalai branch had been kind enough to arrange for our stay and food within the temple complex, another rare opportunity in itself.  We were provided two rooms at the temple guest house and one of them we allotted to the ladies in our team.

After having a Darshan inside the temple, we started handling the ticket sales around 5.00pm, which continued till 10.00pm.   There was not much of a crowd on that day.

On April 25th, we all got up by 3.30 am itself and were ready by 4.30am to handle the counters.  Even at that early hour, there was a steady inflow of pilgrims.  As the day progressed, the number of devotees too increased.  Even to take a special darshan ticket, the pilgrims had to wait in the serpentine queue at least for two hours

We were handling the counters till 5.30pm in the evening, when we were relieved by the officials of Tiruvannamalai branch.  This gave us the opportunity to do a Girivalam on this holy day.  Some of us stayed in the temple premises that night and had a once in a  life-time opportunity of doing mantra japa during the  lunar eclipse at Thiruvannamalai.

A panoramic view of the Gopurams  and the Holy Hill from our place of stay

எதுவும் எங்கள் செயலல்ல. அனைத்தும் உன் திருவருளே !  அருளாளா !! அருணாச்சலா !!!

காசி விஸ்வநாதர் கோவில் , நசரத்பேட்டை

Kasi Viswanathar Temple, Nazarethpet, Poonamalle

Kasi Visalakshi Samedha Kasi Viswanathar temple at Nazarethpet is said to be more than 1000 years old.  The temple was earlier  managed by a family of  Beri Chetty, a trader community of the Arya Vysya Clan,   who had created a  number of endowments for the temple.  Now  the HR &CE board has taken control and have initiated steps for renovating this temple.  Balayalam has already been done and the renovation work has commenced at  snail's pace.

The specialty of this temple is that on the 5th , 6th & 7th of the Tamil month Panguni every  year, the rays of the sun fall on the main deity in the morning hours between 6 am and 7 am. It is considered that Surya Bhagvan is worshiping the presiding deity Lord Kashi Viswanathar on those days.

The Nandhi Bhagavan of this temple delights the devotees with his smiling face.  With his head inclined slightly to the right and a serpent tucked under his frontal left foot he sits majestically facing  the Presiding Deity, in the outer praharam.  On enquiry, we were told that the serpent here represents Karkotaka Mahirishi who got his mukthi here.  It is possible that there may be some connection of Karkotaka Mahirishi to this temple, since, the jeevasamadhi of the Maharishi is located at the  nearby Vaidhyanatha Swamy temple at Poonamalle.  If any  reader of this blog is aware of the history and background of this temple, we request that the same may please be passed on to us.

There is a separate shrine for Lord Ayyappa near the northern boundary of the temple.  This construction, we were informed, had come up within the last 12 years and it appears to be  a better-maintained one.

When we reached there on the morning of 21.04.2013, there was not a single soul anywhere nearby.  Only the priest's helper was waiting for our arrival. In view of the commencement of renovation, the main temple itself remained locked down.  Hence there was not much of a work for us inside the temple.

There was a wild growth of weeds and shrubs, especially on the northern side of the temple's outer praharam.  Our volunteers actively involved themselves in clearing the same.  Soon, our newly acquired brush cutter was pressed into service and made the job of cutting the unwanted shrubs easier.  Wild growth was also noticed on top of the gopurams and vimanams.  The same were cleared and weed-killer chemical applied over the remaining portion to prevent further growth.

Before returning, we dug two deep holes and planted coconut saplings after clearing the wild bush in that area

To view additional photos on Nazarethpet Uzhavarappani :  Click Here

How to Reach:  Nazarethpet is two kms away from Poonamalle. From Poonamalle, you can get into any MTC bus proceeding to Sriperumpudur side and get down at the next stopping, which is Nazarethpet.  Take a left turn at the bus stop and a walk for five minutes will lead you to the temple.