Andhra Pradesh - Vijayawada   

Devotees narrate experiences

Staff Reporter

VIJAYAWADA: "Our pilgrimage is over," said A. Rajasekhar of Visakhapatnam while gulping water at a kiosk located outside the goddess Kanakadurga temple on Indrakeeladri on Saturday afternoon. Along with his wife Sumathi and daughters Sushma and Swapna, he went to a makeshift pandal and waited for a vehicle meant for VIPs to take them down the hill.

A private financier from M.V.P. Colony, Mr. Rajasekhar managed to get a recommendation letter from a politician. Though he did not like the practice of collecting Rs. 25 per head from those who obtained recommendation letters, he was happy for having a darshan of the goddess, who was decorated in the form of Sri Durga Devi. After successfully occupying the middle seat in a vehicle, he said that the trip was memorable. "We spent 20 minutes in the queue and another 10 minutes at prasadam counter," he said.

Regular visitor

The vehicle reached Kanakadurga Nagar, a transit camp for pilgrims near Vijayeswaraswami temple, where another batch of VIPs were waiting for it.

Sixty-year-old G. Hymavathi, a resident of Hanuman Junction, returned from the temple on foot, sat in a corner of the tent in Kanakadurga Nagar and distributed `pulihora' to pilgrims sitting around her. "It did not take much time. I returned from the temple in three hours," she told them while sharing her experiences in dharma darshan queue.

A regular visitor of the temple during Dasara Navaratri festival every year, Ms. Hymavathi said that she wanted to have her lunch at the temple, but the long queue at Annadanam counter made her give up the idea. "I will take rest for a while and go home by evening," she said and left for nearby makeshift auditorium to watch cultural programmes.

"Let us go to Bhavani Island now. We can have our lunch there and spend some time before boarding our bus," Mr. Rajasekhar told his daughters, while enquiring about auto-rickshaw fares.

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