Hyderabad: Sivaratri festival looms ahead, but ‘Dharma Gundam’ in the prominent Vemulawada shrine is dried up and there is no water for pilgrims to take a holy dip.
The Sivaratri festival will be celebrated on Friday and temple authorities have been planning special pujas from Thursday.
The celebrations will end on Sunday morning. Officials are expecting more than 5 lakh pilgrims to come to the shrine on Sivaratri. Pilgrims from Telangana, Maharashtra, Karnataka and Chattisgarh generally visit the shrine on Sivaratri and temple authorities are making all arrangements for the convenience of the devotees.
For decades, pilgrims used to take a holy dip in the Pushkarini (Dharma Gundam) before entering the temple’s sanctum sanctorum to perform special pujas. The pond did not ever dry up as it always had plenty of water supply from a tank nearby.
During the extension work of the temple, the tank was disturbed and it shrunk, which led to the water crisis in both the tank and pond.
