The Annual Anivara Asthanam festival has been performed with religious fervour in the hill shrine of Lord Venkateswara on 16th july 2013, Tuesday in Tirumala.
The uniqueness about this festival is that the previous year’s accounts of the office are presented before the deity by the principal officers and are taken back to signify that the ‘Lord’ finds the officers fit enough to hold their respective offices. New books will also be issued for recording finances of the next fiscal. In the temple jorgon, this entire process is called “Asthanam” which will be performed inside sanctum sanctorum near Bangaru Vakili in the presence of processional deities of Lord Malayappa Swamy and his two consorts.
The Asthanam-temple court was performed at the Bangaru Vakili inside the sanctum sanctorum between 7am to 9am on Tuesday. The presiding deity and the utsava murthies, Lord Malayappa Swamy and chief commander Vishvaksena were decorated with the silk vastrams presented by Sri HH Tirumala Pedda Jiyangar and Sri HH Tirumala Chinna Jiyangar as a part of the ritual. Then the temple priests offered “Coin Arti” to Lord.
Later a special set of Silk Vastrams were also presented to Lord by Sri Rangam Devasthanam on this occasion. Usually the TTD will gift the silk vastrams to Lord Sri Ranganatha Swamy of Sri Rangam once in a year during Kaisika Ekadasi Day. The Sri Rangam Devasthanam follows similar procedure of gifting the silk vastrams to Lord Srinivasar during Anivara Asthanam day.
In connection with Salakatla Anivara Asthanam festival, the processional deity of Lord Malayappa Swamy flanked by His two Consorts Sridevi and Bhudevi took pleasure ride on colourfully decorated floral palanquin in Tirumala on Tuesday evening.
As the palanquin procession passed through the four mada streets, tens of thousands of pilgrims converged to see the mighty of Lord of Lords on the tastefully decorated Pushpa Pallaki.
