Daijiworld Media Network – Bantwal (SP)

Bantwal, Feb 16: The hopes of the Dakshina Kannada district administration and the National Highways Authority of India to find a solution to the vexed issue of shifting of Brahmarakootlu shrine were dashed on Tuesday February 15. The persistent efforts of the authorities to get the issue solved and complete the national highway 48 widening work from Mangalore to the town, have failed to yield results because of the strong defiance of these efforts by the devotees of the shrine. The three astrologers, who were approached with the objective of finding a lasting solution to the problem, have said that the presiding deity is not agreeable for the shifting of the shrine elsewhere.

The meeting held by the officials with the shrine management and devotees in the past had, as a last ditch effort, decided to request three astrologers to sit together at the shrine and seek divine interference for the shifting of the shrine. The higher authorities have been insisting for the shifting of the shrine, saying that scores of temples and shrines have earlier been shifted for highway widening work. Well-known Vedic scholars and astrologers, K S Nityanand from Chikmagalur, Prasanna Acharya from Karkala, and Polali Subrahmany Bhat, who happens to the Tantry of the shine, offered prayers to the deity on Tuesday and sought permission of the presiding deity to shift the shrine, on behalf of the district administration and the Brahma Sannidhi management.

The astrologers, who conducted the divine query procedure, concluded that the place was installed by divine powers and not by human beings. They have asked for making alternative arrangements for the widening of the highway, as the deity is not willing to move from the place. The devotees have been asked to conduct Bhajans for a minimum of two hours every evening for 48 days at the shrine, culminating in a non-stop 24-hour Bhajan on the final day, besides organizing religious programmes to strengthen the divinity of the shrine.

Coastal Development Authority chairman, B Nagaraj Shetty, district BJP president, Padmanabha Kottary, shrine managing committee president, B Rajashekhar Rai, taluk panchayat member, Anita Malavoor, gram panchayat vice-president, Diwakar Pambadabettu, taluk tahsildar, Ravichandra Nayak who represented the district administration, and several other leaders and local people were present.