Hyderabad: 21-kg laddu auctioned for Rs 17.6 lakh

Hyderabad: The gold-coated 21 kg Balapur laddu, has once again fetched a whopping sum of Rs 17.60 lakhs which is one lakh more than last year, in the auction held amidst the huge crowd of devotees on Thursday.  Mr K Ram Reddy, a Balapur resident, bagged the laddu out of the 28 contenders, who were in the race, comprising locals and non locals from other states as well.

Mr Kolan Ramreddy, speaking to this newspaper, said that he was very happy that he could manage to get the laddu for the Kolan family for the ninth time since the inception of the laddu auction, which began 25 years ago.

Mr Ramreddy started his bidding price at Rs 450 and ended at Rs 17.6 lakh in 20 minutes in a tense bidding war. The laddu would be distributed among the Kolan family members, relatives and acquaintances. People who came from neighbouring states of Andhra Pradesh, also participated in the bidding, however at the end of the day, it was the local resident who got the laddu.

If the person who gets the laddu is a local, then he/she would be given a time frame of about a year, to deposit the auction money.  

The money that came from last year’s auction, an amount of `16.60 lakh, is being utilised for the reconstruction of the Nalla Pochamma Temple, now in a dilapidated condition, in the locality.  

The makeover was being done so that locals could start offering their bonum to the goddess during the Bonalu festival, said Mr Niranjan Reddy, President Balapur Ganesh Utsav Samithi.