Shiv Sena Warns Stir Over Non-Hindu Tirumala Staff

A Sudarshan, Shiv Sena General Secretary for the two Telugu States, on Friday demanded that non-Hindu employees working in the sacred Sri Venkateswara Swamy temple at Tirumala be removed forthwith, failing which his party would be constrained to launch an agitation.

As part of the movement, Shiv Sena activists would stage a dharna in front of the TTD Balaji Bhavan at Liberty crossroads (Himayatnagar) on Saturday, he added.

Speaking to mediapersons here on Friday, Sudarshan said some 1,500 of the 5,000 employees working in the world-famous hill shrine were non-Hindus, who drew salaries from the TTD but visited churches every Sunday for prayers. And though the Tirumala-Tirupati Devasthanam (TTD) had identified 42 non-Hindu employees and issued notices to them, none of them had been removed from service so far, he lamented. TTD Executive Officer Ashok Singhal had completely failed in this regard, and should be immediately removed from office, the Shiv Sena leader demanded.

The Chief Secretary to the AP government L V Subrahmanyam had promised to remove all the non-Hindu employees in the Tirumala shrine, but had failed to keep his promise for reasons best known to him, Sudarsan added.

The Shiv Sena leader claimed that even at the Himayatnagar office, Usha Nandini, working as an AEO in the TTD Hindu Dharma Prachara Samithi, went to church every Sunday. He also alleged that at the instance of Nandini, the regular ritual of the chanting of Govinda namams during the Sri Venkateswara Swamy Kalyanam in the Himayatnagar temple was not being performed.

Shiv Sena Yuva Sena State president Gote Ganesh, Shekhar, Pradeep, Raju and others were present.