Melkote Visit

8-Oct-2006

We went to Melkote today. I decided to play it safe - and engaged a cab from the nearby New India Travels. Pretty cool! (I mean the trip as well as the weather). The driver Nagaraj was a pleasant guy and could talk in Tamil too. We left at 6.40AM and as usual, circumambulated the 17th Cross Ganapathi temple and were on the way soon. We were in Melkote around 10.15 and went directly to the Narasimha Sannathi.

We went in the Bangalore - Mysore road and took a right turn after Maddur towards Melkote (also called Thirunarayanapuram). (It is really surprising to note that there is a route to Hassan / Sarvanabelehola from here. I thought we had to take a different route for that. Come to think of it, when we went to Sugganahalli the last week, we were surprised to see signs towards Melkote. Should look at a map!). The journey was absolutely fabulous - with some heavy rains now and then and very cool. As Melkote is at an elevation, the hilly path added to the excitement.

We got off the car in the bus stand. Actually, as we were going up the steps (believed to be 400), we saw another place where a bus and a couple of cars were parked almost at the top. But, we could not figure out how to go there in the car. The driver just passed it off saying that the road was not good enough to go up. I suspect if he really knew about it.

As Prahlada took a pilgrimage, he reached this place and Vishnu appeared before him as Narasimha again. There is a place where the Lord's feet are there (actually it is an open window and care is required) and a passage leads from there to a cave (we were told so -we could not see the cave) where Prahlada is supposed to have undertaken a Tapas.

We went to the 'Vimanam' of this very old temple and had a very good view of the town. We had one of the temple employees, Ramiah explaining things to us about the 'Vishnu Paadam' etc. Really a divine experience.

Lord Narasimha was very impresive and having developed a recent affinity for Lord Narasimha, my wife was very thrilled to see the deity. Here the lord is alone and there is no Thayar. Anyway, Prahalada (and probably Dhruva) is something special for him and he did not mind going alone to help him or see him, I guess.

On way down, we had some tender coconut (we forgot to take water bottle with us) and saw a small accident: a boy rolled a few steps. Fortunately, not a major one.

My wife wanted to distribute some sarees to the people asking for alms on the step - but had forgotten to take the bag from the car. Fortunately, she found two old ladies near the ground and quickly took and distributed the sarees to them from the car. (I wonder if they could really use those sarees especially while asking for alms. Something to be verified the next time).

There is a Mutt opposite the Narasimha temple and we had a quick dharshan of the deity. We wanted to see the Saligrama. The person there said Rs 10 first and we were OK. Then he said, Rs 10 per Saligrama and there were 5. We said OK again. But then, he said that it would take time - so we left.

The car took us to the main temple - around 11.30 or so.

Really a 'big' temple. A lot of shilpas are unfortunately had broken arms. We had good dharshan of the main deity (Thiru Narayana) as well as the 'Sella Pillai', the Uthsavar. There is also the 'Beebi Nachiar' (who goes by the name 'Thulukka Nachiar' in South, especially Trichy) at the feet of the Uthsavar, who is supposed to have fallen in love with this beautiful God!

The archaka asked us about our plan for lunch and then gave us the coupons for the free lunch (is there a really free lunch? Seems to be -- but wait.. we did not want it to be free!) in Jeer's ashram just behind the temple.

After a wait of about 45 minutes, we had a simple but a very good lunch. It consisted of rice, a kootu, sambar and butter milk. We were also told that every day they serve 30 (or 32) heads and the coupons are given by the temple archakas. We can opt to participate in it and the expense would be Rs 500 (or more) for just one day or Rs 1100 (or more) for one day every year. Since that day happened to be my son's Hari's birth day (star based), we paid Rs 1,200 and chose Sep 21 as the date.

So, time to return. With a lot of pleasant memories and a feeling of punya earned, we started our journey back. It was again a good trip back - only the driver ended up getting into Mandya town (wow...how many sugar-cane carts).

We were home around 5PM. We totally covered 312 ("oh...oh...your house number, saar") KM and it was Rs 5.25 per km PLUS Rs 150 as driver allowance and some tips.

Let us wait for His next call!


A lot of sites talk about this temple and a web search could yield them. For example, look here that has some very good photographs too.

The Places / Temples visited

Yet to Plan:

1. http://www.karnatakavaishnavatemples.net/Kolar/Rangasthalla.htm
2. http://www.pbase.com/svami/belavadi&view=slideshow Belavadi temple of Karnataka
3. Bylahalli, Hasan: http://www.pbase.com/svami/bylahalli and http://www.karnatakavaishnavatemples.net/Hassan/Bylahalli.htm Lakshmi Janardhana
4. http://www.karnatakavaishnavatemples.net/Mysore/Hedathale.htm and http://www.karnatakavaishnavatemples.net/Mysore/Hedathale2.htm, Hedathale near Mysore
5. http://www.pbase.com/svami/javagal Javagal - Sridhara, Lakshmi Narasimha and Venugopala
6. http://www.karnatakavaishnavatemples.net/Hassan/Gorur.htm


2007-05-25 Mattapalli etc. PLUS Bhadrachalam

2007-05-01 Mulbagal Lakshmi Narasimha + Vinayak

2006-12-28 Visiting Relatives

2006-12-23 Hampi

2006-12-19 Picking Hari

2006-12-09 Sowmya & Keshava Perumal

2006-11-18 Bagepalli & Mitemari

2006-10-08 Melkote

2006-09-30 Sugganahalli

2006-06-24 Maddur Narasimha

2006-02-04 Sampige and Kadaba

2005-12-17 Magadi Ranganatha and Savandurga Narasihma

2005-12-24 Ahobilam

2005-11-05 Bethamangala

2005-08-14 Satyagalam and Barachuki

2005-07-31 Kolar Kotilingeshwara Temple

2005-06-25 Gathi Subramania Temple

2005-06-18 Folk lore place on way to Mysore

2005-06-12 Vishwa Shanthi Ashram, Devarayana Durga

2005-06-04 Chikka Thirupathi, Bangara Thirupathi, Koti Lingeshwara

Sugganahalli Visit

30-Sep-2006:

Main Deity: Lakshmi Narasimha

Speciality: Standing Posture (Rare for Narasimha) – in the same way as he gave dharshan to a rishi.

Today we visited Sugganahalli, another beautiful Perumal koil in Karnataka. We went by Maruthi Car driven by our driver, Shibi. (Interesting episode about Maruthi later).

Address: Lakshmi Narasimha Swamy Temple, Sugganahalli, Kudur Hobli, Magadi Taluk, 91-80-775 1002

Route and timing: We left our home in Malleswaram, Bangalore at 8.20AM and went towards Nelamangala (or Neelamangala) where we took the left turn, NH48 towards Hassan (about 1 hour and 24 KM). Then we reached Solur (1.5 hr and 42KM from home). From Solur, we took a right turn towards Kudur (called as Ku – dhoor). We proceeded beyond Kudur (1 hour 50 min, 53KM from home) to reach Sugganahalli at about 10.40AM, covering a distance of 64 KM.

Temples and Murthys: Lakshmi Narasimha, Amruthavalli. There is also the garden reared by the rishi; there is a rare Chakrathalwar sannathi. The interesting spot is the Sthamba Narasimha, about 2-3 KM away. In the middle of the field – a small building.

Interesting Events in travel: The Maruthi car just stopped on the return journey as we were leaving Kudur. There was a person (my God! I did not even ask for his name!) on a two wheeler who took my driver and left him near a two wheeler mechanic. The mechanic came in his two wheeler along with his friend and my driver. He tried doing several things – and the car would not start. Then he went below the car and tapped certain place – and lo, it was an empty container’s noise. He became thrilled and told us that it was in deed lack of petrol. We were puzzled – though the petrol indicator was behaving erratically, it cannot be an empty tank. Anyway, there was not much choice. The mechanic’s friend took the driver who in turn took Rs 300 for 5 litres of petrol.

Guess what, the car in deed started after adding petrol.

I asked the mechanic for his fee. He said that I could give whatever I felt like. I gave him Rs 100 – and he said that I needed to give him only Rs 50. Real village honesty – we were in deed moved.

With fear in the heart, we started the journey. May be the mileage of the car has reduced to something like 5KM per petrol? Does it mean, can we reach the next pump safely?

God was with us. We reached Solur and located a pump. We wanted to try the full tank and we did not have money for it. Fortunately the pump was accepting Credit Card. I checked with him twice. He confirmed it. He inserted the pump in the tank and started the pump – and it was just 20 sec or so – he had to stop it. It was FULL TANK already. And, he filled petrol only for Rs 140! Oh…oh…what is happening? Was his diagnosis wrong? How could he sense an empty tank?

With thousand questions and zero answers, we proceeded towards Bangalore – and we went on changing our positions. The mechanic was a god send person the first moment. No..no…he did not know his job the next moment.

Second times, Guess what – the car again stopped near Penya. Similar method. In the middle of the peak traffic. Fortunately, there was some space in the side. We moved the car there. There was no mechanic nearby. So, we called our favorite ‘family mechanic’ the Iyengar. He is a very efficient man. Over phone, he collected the details and through a remote diagnosis, suggested what should be done: the fuel pump might have become hot. Cover it with a damp cloth for a few minutes. Then it should start.

We did that. Like the lady who goes around (circumambulate) the peepul tree for a child and then at the end of it, checks if the child has in deed come, we kept trying to see if the car starts. The driver removed the tube feeding into the circular pump and kept sucking petrol through it (the tube) to see if the petrol flow is there. No, there was no flow. Then he found that the end was kind of cut and he trimmed it and then sucked again.

I have a feeling that the tube had some holes and cuts at the feeding point and with running, the tube became hot and the sucking did not have any effect. But, we will know the real picture only with passage of time.

Let us see. Till date, it is running OK.