Puri temple keen to emulate Tirupati shrine's pilgrim measures

Tirupati: The famous temple of Lord Jagannath in Puri in Odisha is keen to emulate various pilgrim-friendly measures implemented in the hill shrine of Lord Venkateswara.

A three-member expert team headed by Justice (Retired) B P Das, set up by the Odisha government, today visited the hill shrine at nearby Tirumala to study administration, security and queue management system for pilgrims among others.

The team members visited the massive queue complexes, parking lots and free meal canteen, observed temple rituals and held in-depth discussions with the top functionaries of Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanams (TTD), which governs the 2000-year old shrine, sources in the temple told PTI.

Das, a retired Judge of Odisha High Court, and his team members also discussed with TTD Executive Officer D. Sambasiva Rao and Joint Executive Officer K S Srinivasa Raju about the pilgrim crowd management during important festivals such as Lord Jagannath Rath Yatra, they said.

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Appreciating the functioning of the existing administrative system on Tirumala, Justice Das asserted "We want to streamline our temple set up in terms of security and other arrangements including darshan facilities for lakhs of visiting pilgrims in Puri shrine on par with Tirumala temple."

He said Odhisha would seek the support of TTD to replicate similar system in Puri also.

The team from Odisha is the latest to visit Tirumala to study pilgrim crowd management system and other measures being implemented in the Lord Venkateswara temple, which draws millions of devotees annually.

Officials from the Vaishano Devi temple in Jammu and Saibaba shrine in Shirdi were among those who had earlier visited the Lord Balaji temple here.