KAISIKA DWADASI CELEBRATED WITH RELIGIOUS FERVOUR
TIRUMALA, NOVEMBER 14: One of the most important annual festivals of ‘Kaisika Dwadasi’ has been celebrated with religious fervour on Thursday in the hill temple of Lord Venkateswara.
In view of this festival TTD has cancelled arjitha sevas like Tiruppavada, kalyanotsavam, arjitha brahmotsavam and Vasanthotsavam. However the early morning sevas like Suprabhatam, Thomala and Archana have been performed as Ekantham.
In accordance to the age-old practice, the processional deities of ‘Ugra Srinivasamurthy’ with His two consorts on either side were taken out in a grand procession around the mada streets of the sacred shrine before the break of dawn. After the procession, Asthanam has been performed inside the temple.
The temple priests read out significance of the festival and performed asthanam inside the temple between 5.30am to 7.30am
TTD EO Sri MG Gopal who took part in the programme said, “it is on this day alone the Snapana bera of Sri Ugrasreenivasa Murthy is brought out of the temple once in a year and taken out for celestial procession around four mada streets along with two Consorts before sun rise.
Meanwhile the temple legend says, Nambaduvan an ardent devotee of Lord Maha Vishnu who hails from a downtrodden class happens to meet a demon (the demon was actually a Brahmin who was by curse turned to demon) who threatens him to kill. However the devotee convinces that since he is on his way to offer prayers to Lord, that he will definitely become his prey after his return from worship place. Later the devotee offers prayers to Lord by singing a keerthan in Kaisika Raaga and returns back to offer his body to be devoured as food to the demon. Seeing the truthfulness of the devotee, the demon leaves him and gets back to his original form getting out of the curse. On the other hand the truthful devotee also attains salvation. Since then the festival is observed as Kaisika Dwadasi as a mark of respect to the keertan rendered by the devotee in Kaisika Raga.
ISSUED BY THE PUBLIC RELATIONS OFFICER, TTD, TIRUPATI