Hyderabad: Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrsekhar Rao, accompanied by a 43-member entourage including his family and a team of ministers and top officials, arrived Tuesday in Tirupati, Andhra Pradesh, on a thanksgiving mission.
He was in the temple town to fulfil his personal vow of offering gold ornaments to Venkateshwara temple on achieving the separate Telagana state.
KCR, as the Telangana chief minister is known, was accorded a warm welcome by the top officials of Andhra Pradesh government and the Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanam (TTD) at Renigunta airport.
He has brought with him gold ornaments worth Rs55.9 million (Dh3.07 million), including a 14.2 kilo gold necklace ‘Saligram Haram’ worth Rs37 million, another 4.65 kilo Kanta Abharanam and a nose stud.
However, the move has triggered a controversy with many questioning why he was burdening the public exchequer and spending the taxpayer’s money to fulfil a personal vow.
During his prolonged struggle for separate Telangana state, KCR had vowed to gift gold ornaments to many big temples both in Andhra Pradesh and Telangana if his dream turned into reality.
KCR, who will spend the night at Padmavati Guest House, will visit the Venkateshwara temple on Wednesday morning and offer the ornaments to the deity with elaborate rituals.
Later, he is scheduled to visit the Padmavathy temple at Trichunur and make an offering of nose stud to the deity there.
The state administration had made meticulous preparations and constituted a three-member committee to look after the making of the ornaments. Responsibility of making the gold ornaments studded with gems and diamonds was given to a prominent jeweller of Hyderabad.
For KCR, who is on his maiden visit to the temple town since becoming Telangana chief minister, the Andhra Pradesh government has rolled out a red carpet and accorded him a warm reception keeping aside the hard feelings and disputes generated by the bifurcation of the state in June 2014.
KCR was accompanied by his son and minister K Taraka Rama Rao, daughter and parlaimentraian K Kavitha, nephew and minister T Harish Rao, several ministers and top bureaucrats and police officials.
KCR, who has keen interest in religious rituals and is an ardent follower of spiritual practices, has been on the spree of making such offerings to various temples in both the states.
In October 2016 he made an offering of 11.7 kilo gold crown worth Rs35 million to Bhadrakali in Warangal. He also offered gold ornament to the Kanaka Durga temple in Vijayawada in Andhra Pradesh. In April last year, he also sent a Chadar to the famous Khaja Moinuddin Chishti Dargah in Ajmer.
Next on his calendar is Veerbahdara Swamy temple at Kuravi in Mahabubabad district where he will make an offering of ‘Golden Moustache’.
Tirupati city, which till a few years back had echoed with slogans condemning KCR for his demand of a separate Telangana state, is now being honoured with posters and hoardings according a warm welcome to him.
Authorities had made elaborate security arrangements for the visit. The Telangana government had also sent an advance team of top officials including Intelligence Chief V Naveen Chand, IG (Security) M K Singh, CM’s Chief Security officer P Ramakrishnan to Tirupati to oversee the arrangements.
KCR and his entourage will return to Hyderabad on Wednesday afternoon.
KCR has always been in the news for his fetish for the rituals and pujas, visits to the temple, conducting Yagnams and occupying and using only those buildings which were Vaastu compliant.
When his Chandi Maha Yagnam with 1,500 priests at a cost of Rs 7o million in December 2015 had evoked questions and criticism, he had defended it by saying that the money was being spent from his own pocket and by his other well wishers for the peace and prosperity of the state.
However, this time there has been no answer from him or the government to the question why the taxpayers were being burdened to fulfil what was essentially his personal vow.
