Tirupati: As many as 56,371 devotees had the darshan of Lord Venkateshwara on New Year’s day on Wednesday.
Probably for the first time in the last decade, there was a considerable drop in the number of devotees thronging the hill shrine on New Year’s day, said TTD officials who were relieved with the low turnout.
They attributed the smaller numbers to a decrease in devotees from Tamil Nadu because of amavasya (new moon) on Wednesday.
“New moon is an auspicious day for Tamilians and they prefer to perform some rituals at home and avoid other events,” a temple official said.
He said the TTD’s decision to reduce the number of VIP passes had ensured darshan for ordinary pilgrims and those coming on foot to the holy shrine.
Members of the TTD Board stayed away from Tirumala in view of criticism by endowments minister C. Ramachandraiah over allotment of VIP passes.
Not only the Board members, even Board chairman Kanumuri Bapiraju stayed away from the temple town.
Authorities had earmarked darshan for VIPs between 2 am and 6 am. However, VIP darshan was over within two hours and ordinary devotees were allowed into the temple before the scheduled time.
According to information, only 3,340 VIPs had darshan before 4 am. This led the authorities to make announcements, asking those holding VIP passes to come before their allotted time for darshan.
Darshan was allowed for those who had trekked up the hill on foot from 4.05 am although the scheduled time was from 6 am.
Though TTD had announced the cancellation of the Rs 300 darshan for January 1, tickets were issued after 9.30 am on Wednesday because the rush was manageable.
People throng temples, zoo on New Year
Hyderabad: While Hyderabadis welcomed the New Year with great gusto on Wednesday, the party scene on New Year’s Eve was comparatively dull due to clubs and hotels charging astronomical entry fees and restricting entry only to couples.
“Some places charged as much as Rs 7,000 per couple, which did not even include food. This was much more expensive than last year. So, I decided to throw a house party instead,” said Anurag Jain, a techie.
On Wednesday morning, Birla Mandir was full of people. There was a huge rush outside the temple till evening with the queue almost reaching to the end of the Adarsh Nagar road. Traffic came to a standstill and parking was a mess.
“It took me an hour for darshan and another hour to get my car out,” said Shivani Jain, a visitor at the temple.
With most schools and colleges closed, many buses remained off the roads. Meanwhile the Nehru Zoological Park received about 40,000 visitors, a record.
The only other timewhen the zoo had so many visitors was in May 2012, which was a Sunday during the summer vacations. The zoo’s revenue crossed Rs 10 lakh on Wednesday which was again a record for a single day’s collection.
“What was heartening was that the number of cars entering had gone down drastically with only 158 entering the zoo,” said A. Shankaran, curator of the zoo.
