AP Minister Says It’s An Order From Goddess Kanaka Durga

AP Endowments Minister Kottu Satyanarayana who visited Indrakeeladri in Vijayawada on Friday announced a hike in Antharalaya Darshanam. Earlier, the price of the ticket was Rs 300 per person and now it stands at Rs 500 per person/ticket. Initially the temple Devasthanam hiked the ticket prices in view of Dussehra festival (from September 26) but the state government has decided to continue the hiked prices permanently.

This hike in ticket prices has disappointed the devotees and they questioned why the hiked ticket prices are being continued even during non-festival days. Defending the decision of hike, endowments minister Kottu Satyanarayana added that the devotees should consider this as an order from Goddess Kanaka Durga and should honour it. That sounds ridiculous.

Well, Indrakeeladri might not be the first temple devasthanams to hike the prices. Previously TTD had such a similar plan and it wanted to charge heavily from the rich. A video of the same went viral and TTD dropped the plans.

Later Kanipakam temple authority had initiated a hike in darshanam ticket prices. The temple devasthanam proposed to hike the ticket from Rs 500 to Rs 5000. This controversial decision drew huge outrage and the temple authority suspended the official who proposed it and did not implement it.

The endowments department seems to be going sidetrack in monitoring the temple managements. First the department needs to take valuable inputs from common devotees who form a major part of their revenues but the rich are getting benefits and it is unacceptable.