VIJAYAWADA: With the State government showing no sign of sanctioning funds for conducting State festival Dasara at Indrakeeladri, the officials of Sri Durga Malleswara Swamy Varla Devasthanam are likely to slash the budget for celebrations this year to reduce the temple exchequer’s burden.
In October 2015, the State Government announced Dasara as ‘State festival’, increasing the scale of celebrations, and hence the festival budget, to around Rs 10 crore. For the past two years, the devasthanam has spent around Rs 30 crore from the temple treasure for a smooth conduct of Dasara festival at the hill shrine. This year too, the officials have prepared estimates of around Rs 15 crore for conducting the nine-day festival on a large scale from October 10.
But due to lack of financial support from the government, the devasthanam has decided to organise the festival making use of the donations offered by devotees.
Moreover, the temple authorities are facing severe criticism from a section of devotees for spending crores of rupees for making temporary arrangements for the conduct of annual festivals like Dasara and Bhavani Deeksha. Devotees appealed to the devasthanam to take steps towards making permanent arrangements for annual festivals as that would reduce the burden of the temple exchequer.
In a recent coordination meeting held with various departments, temple EO V Koteswaramma also said there was a need to slash the festival budget to below Rs 10 crore.
In this regard, the EO directed officials concerned to prepare estimates for providing basic amenities to the devotees and put an end to spending lavishly for unnecessary work that is often undertaken during festivals. As per the records, officials have spent lakhs of rupees for developing queue lines, temporary toilets, resting shelters and tonsure hall during the festival.
“Several representations have been submitted to the State Government, seeking its aid for conducting the festival, but there was no positive response from its side with regard to releasing funds,” temple trust board members said.