The Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanams (TTD) has made adequate arrangements to deal with the surge in footfalls at the hill shrine of Lord Venkateswara, Additional Executive Officer A.V. Dharma Reddy has said, adding that the devotees can now plan their pilgrimage without any apprehension.
The VIP break darshan, which was suspended last week, has been resumed. Mr. Dharma Reddy said that 5.30 lakh devotees had darshan at the temple last week and around 2.40 lakh had their heads tonsured. The temple hundi fetched ₹32.49 crore during the period while the sale of laddus went up to 24.37 lakh units.
“Elaborate arrangements have been made to meet the requirements of devotees. The protocols pertaining to coronavirus pandemic have also been relaxed as the infection count has gone down drastically. The conditions that existed during the pre-COVID days are back in place now,” Mr. Dharma Reddy told the media at Annamaiah Bhavan on Monday.
Additional food counters
The TTD employees who were deputed to the other wings during the pandemic have been again brought back to serve the devotees. Additional counters serving food free of cost have been set up at various locations. Devotees do not have to queue up at the Central Annadanam Complex now. The RO water has been made available at all pilgrim centres, he said.
Milk and refreshments are being provided to the devotees waiting in the queue compartments, which are being sanitised.
Around 800 barbers have been roped in on piece-rate system both at the Kalyanakatta and other mini-tonsuring centres . At present, around 1,200 barbers are working round-the-clock in three different shifts.
With the temple town limping back to normal after the pandemic, he said, efforts were also on to issue 40,000 slotted sarva darshan (SSD) tokens for the benefit of common devotees.
It has rather become imperative on the part of TTD to enhance the sarva darshan tokens as the common pilgrims reaching Tirumala without tokens are forced to spend 15 hours to 20 hours in the queue compartments. A decision in this regard will be taken at the earliest, the TTD officials said.
