State Tourism hopeful of darshan quota from TTD

 Hyderabad: The Telangana Tourism Development Corporation is hopeful of receiving a positive decision from the Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanam (TTD) to resume the Tirumala Darshan package, as the authorities have written a letter to the TTD requesting the resuming of the services.

According to the officials, the Telangana Tourism Minister, Jupally Krishna Rao, had written a letter to the Andhra Pradesh government requesting the restart of the tourism package. The Sheegra Darshan facility in the form of a customised package from the Telangana Tourism Development Corporation was a hit as people in large numbers used this service through airways and bus services for having darshan of Lord Sri Venkateshwara Swamy. This was tailor-made for the devotees, as they can wrap up the journey within a day or two. The passengers could start their journey after 6 am and return by night after having darshan. This method was easy for many devotees, as they could plan the journey seven days before and get an assured darshan along with the ticket.

Following irregularities, the newly constituted board of TTD had scrapped the darshan facility through the package tours by the tourism corporations of different States. The tourism corporations from four States including Telangana, Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, and Karnataka were running the Tirumala package services for the devotees.

The devotees utilising these services wanted the TTD Board to reconsider their decision. They also sought the tourism authorities to request the board restart the services. The Telangana Tourism Development Corporation Managing Director N Prakash Reddy said that a letter has been sent to the Andhra Pradesh government for resuming the services. The Southern States tourism corporations have also written to the AP government, as this is a popular scheme among the devotees. “There are no irregularities from here, and hence we are hopeful that we will get a positive response from the AP government and the services can be resumed after a fortnight,” said the Corporation MD.