A belief that keeps villagers on ground!

Singarayakonda: There are many lakhpatis and crorepatis in the village but none of them flaunt their wealth by constructing multi-story buildings and look down on others. They are villagers of Pata Singarayakonda in the Prakasam district. They live a modest life by limiting their residences to just the ground level and join hands with others in worshiping Rajyalakshmi Godadevi Sametha Sri Varaha Lakshminarasimha Swamy temple on the hill in the village.

Singarayakonda is the name given to the village as Narasimha Swamy has been the protector of the village for ages. Due to the need for infrastructure, the village extended to the north side and got the name, Pata Singarayakonda. There are about 300 households in the village, and most of them are elders as the younger folk of the village migrated to other places for education and work. The remaining youngsters do agriculture along with the seniors of the village.

When asked why the houses are limited to ground-floor buildings, Kakarla Suryanarayana told Hans India that their elders did not approve of it as they are all the devotees of Sri Varaha Lakshminarasimha Swamy. They do not want anyone’s residence to be above the lord. He said that they are receiving abundantblessings from Swamy and are capable of constructing one more house in the village, the Singarayakonda town, or even in Ongole, to meet their requirements. He said that several families went to Ongole for studies of their children, businesses, etc, but they didn’t want to build another floor on the house.

The history of the Rajyalakshmi Godadevi Sametha Sri Varaha Lakshminarasimha Swamy temple dates to the Pallava rule. The mythological story says that Narada Maharshi performed penance for the Lord Vishnu at this place, and the god appeared as the Yogananda Narasimha Swamy. When Lord Rama was en route to Lanka, he prayed to the Narasimha Swamy and installed the Varaha Lakshminarasimha Swamy idol, the peaceful Narasimha Swamy, and named the place Singarayakonda.

There is one more anecdote about the temple. A long time ago, one of the priests in the temple brought his three-year-old son to the temple. Busy performing the rituals, the priest forgot about his son, who was asked to sit in the sanctum sanctorum, but thought that he had sent the child home with someone.

After the completion of pujas and rituals, he went home and found that the child didn’t return home.

The priest and the villagers searched all places in the night and prayed to the lord for the safety of the child. In the morning, when the sad priest opened the sanctum sanctorum of the temple, the child looked happy, and not worried at all. He told the priest that a tatagaru (an old man) accompanied him in the night, told him numerous tales, and made him sleep in his lap. Since then, the Lord Narasimha Swamy in this temple is also called Tatayya Swamy, and the locals started to give their children the name ‘Tatayya’.

Udayagiri Narasimhachari, the priest in the Sri Varaha Lakshminarasimha Swamy temple, said that up to the ‘60s and ‘70s, the houses in the village were thatched houses or made of earthen tiles. But even though the concrete buildings came up in the village, the owners decided not to construct their houses above the level of the temple.

He said the decision to limit their houses to the ground floor was only due to their spiritual devotion to god. He said that almost all families from Pata Singarayakonda and the nearby Gollapalem participate in the festivals of the temple and celebrate them on a grand scale. He said the locals participate in all Vahana Sevas with devotion, and he wished the religious fervour to continue for generations.