Golden temple or Lakshmi Narayani Temple in Vellore is a popular among religious folks. Few of our acquaintances spoke highly about the place and as it is on the way to Chennai, we decided to include it.
After seeing Vellore fort, we headed to the temple which is around 7 to 8 km from the fort. The sign posts are well-marked and wouldn't be difficult to locate the place. As it happens with most temples it was crowded with small shops selling flowers, sugarcane juice, sodas, savories, etc. We parked the car outside the gate. It was scorching hot and Tamil Nadu's summer was at its best. Few ladies were selling plastic covers for 2 rupees to keep the shoes and sandals which we ignored, only to come back again and get it. As soon as you enter the gate, on the left side there was inquiry center and there is a board depicting "darshana takes 3 hours ", which put us off immediately.
First of all we are non-religious person and if it is standing in a queue for hours to darshana (seeing main deity), we will run miles away in opposite direction. If any religious place doesn't have historical importance, it is definitely not for us. And this temple was built in 2007. If it is not for mother we would have returned without seeing it.
After depositing our shoes/sandals at the counter, we started walking. We left our cameras, cell phones, and bags inside the car as they are prohibited inside. We were made to wait in a room locked and we felt like caged animals. There were small shops selling snacks, soft drinks, coffee, etc. After waiting for half an hour, we were made to walk slowly. They block the walkway many times, so we had to pass through shops selling medicine, cloths, books, sovereign, and what not. On both sides of walkway there are small cutouts of Godman Sakti Amman and depicting his charity work and of course quotes in English, Hindi, Kannada, Tamil, Telugu. We couldn't get the word megalomaniac out of our mind. Now you may ask why didn't we opt for special darshana which is merely 250 rupees per person. We are from rural part of the State and have seen fair shares of popular temples and know what real crowd is. Here an illusion was created for non-existent crowd. After an hour or so we reached the temple. The temple is beautiful. There is a pond surrounding the temple in which coins, currency, bangles, etc., strewn around.
We presume they left it scattered to create a tradition where it is believed throwing coins to water brings luck. We were told the temple looks magnificent at night with lighting and glittering gold. Well, we can imagine golden temple gleaming in the pond.
The people who opted for special entry were made to sit closer to sanctum sanctorum. And less mortals like us were huffed and puffed, and could steal only a glimpse. Our two cents on this temple is that it is a great place for resort or theme park because of the sprawling garden, which is maintained very well. It is way too much commercialized for a temple.
Vellore is well connected by bus and train from both Bangalore and Chennai.
Visit if you are in Vellore for some work.
PS: Our only consolation is that this temple ranks #13 in the "Large Hindu Temple" list.
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