Officials are building new bathing ghats, permanent restrooms, drinking water tanks, changing rooms and pilgrim shelters at the Triveni Sangam, where the Godavari, Pranahita and Saraswati rivers converge
WARANGAL: With barely four weeks left for Saraswati Pushkaralu, the district administration and endowments department have fast-tracked a ₹21.56-crore makeover of this temple town. The 12-day river festival, scheduled from May 15 to 26, will be the first Saraswati Pushkaralu held in Telangana since state formation.
Officials are building new bathing ghats, permanent restrooms, drinking water tanks, changing rooms and pilgrim shelters at the Triveni Sangam, where the Godavari, Pranahita and Saraswati rivers converge. A 20-ft statue of Goddess Saraswati and sculptures of Vedic scholars will anchor the main pushkar ghat. Other works include an arch for the daily Godavari arathi, compound walls for temples and guest houses, extended queue line canopies and enlarged parking areas.
“Sixty-five of the 120 planned projects were cleared for the first phase. We aim to finish most of them by May 4, despite summer heat and logistical hurdles,” temple executive officer S. Mahesh told this newspaper. The original proposal sought ₹35 crore; ₹25 crore has been sanctioned so far.
Authorities expect lakhs of pilgrims from Telangana, Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Odisha. Separate teams are working on traffic diversions, round-the-clock sanitation, security and temporary accommodation. Endowments officials who studied crowd-management measures at Prayagraj’s recent Kumbh have incorporated similar protocols here.
Saraswati Pushkaralu occurs whenever Jupiter enters Gemini, an alignment Hindus believe confers special spiritual merit for holy dips. The last festival was held in undivided Andhra Pradesh in 2013. This year’s edition, being taken up as a prestige project by the Congress-led government, is expected to give Kaleshwaram both a spiritual and infrastructure boost.
