Lakhs Witness Karthigai Deepam

The below photograph is a view of the Deepam on Arunachala from the Temple yesterday evening immediately after the lighting of the Flame. 

A National Newspaper reported of the evening as follows: 

"Lakhs witness Karthigai Deepam Lakhs of devotees witnessed the lighting of the Karthigai Maha Deepam on the Tiruvannamalai hill on Tuesday. The ten-day Karthigai Deepam festival, which began with hoisting of the flag at the Sri Arunachaleswarar temple on November 18, culminated with this ritual. 

 Crowds had begun pour into the town from daybreak for performing ‘girivalam’ or circumambulation of the holy hill. Setting stage for the final event in the evening, the Barani Deepam was lit inside the sanctum of the temple in the early hours as thousands of devotees watched. 

At 6 p.m. the ‘Deepa Nattars’, who hail from fishermen community, lit the Maha Deepam atop the hill. The Maha Deepam is a huge cauldron filled with three tonnes of ghee, with the wick made of several hundred meters of cotton cloth. 

As the huge flame became visible from the hill top, lamps were lit in the temple and across the temple town and surrounding villages." 

2012 Arunachala Mahadeepam Online Streaming

There will be a live feed coming from Arunachaleswarar Temple for live telecasts and live streaming on the internet. 

Coverage starts from about 4.30 p.m. (IST) at this Vasanth TV link and the Arunachaleswarar Temple at this link here. 

For Ramana Maharshi devotees, the Ramana Maharshi ashram will be running a live feed between 4.30 and 6.30 p.m. today, on their website of a Deepam function to be held at their Ashram, which will include film of Arunachala from a distance with the deepam on top. 

 

 

2012 Arunachala Maha Deepam Live Streaming and Live Telecast

A website at this link has posted the below information regarding Live Streaming of the 2012 Karthigai Arunachala Mahadeepam:-

"Thiruvannamalai Maha Deepam 2012 Live Streaming and Live Telecast: 

The Thiruvannamalai Maha Deepam 2012 will be aired live on following TV Channels – Jaya TV, Raj TV, Vasanth TV, Podhigai TV, Zee Tamil, SVBC TTD TV, Sri Sankara TV, etc. 

Live Streaming of Thiruvannamalai Maha Deepam 2012 will also be available on Ustream.com and Justin.tv"

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Last year Vasanth TV as well as having a live TV Telecast also had a wonderful live online streaming of Bharani Deepam from 3 am or 3.30 am in the morning and a live telecast of Maha Deepam from 4.00 pm in the evening 

The photograph is of last year’s live feed from the inside of the Arunachaleswarar Temple Compound. It is expected that Vasanth TV will also have a live stream this year 2012 at this link, (I hope to confirm that early tomorrow morning). 

For Ramana Maharshi devotees, the Ramana Maharshi ashram will be running a live feed on their website of a Deepam function to be held at their Ashram, which will include film of Arunachala from a distance with the deepam on top. 

2012 Mahadeepam Cauldron

Below are photographs of the cauldron that will be used for the 2012 Arunachala Mahadeepam. By the time the Festival is over and the Deepam flame is extinguished, the bright and beautiful cauldron will be blackened by soot and smoke. 

The giant tub in front of the cauldron, is that which will be used inside the Temple near the flagstaff in front of the Siva Sannidhi. The giant tub, will also be filled with a ghee saturated wick, and then lit at around 6.02 p.m. (time of dusk) Tuesday evening. The fishermen at the top of the Hill will be looking down at the Temple compound and as soon as they are given the sign of the lit deepam down below, will then light the cauldron at the top of the Hill.

The Gents Painting the Cauldron

Cauldron for the Hill, Tub for the Temple

Just a small amount of the Ghee that will be used

Early this morning there was a puja inside the Temple blessing the cauldron, and at which the Temple elephant and one of the cows from the Temple goshala, were present. 

Blessings Abound

Immediately after the Temple puja, the fishing family set off from Arunachaleswarar Temple with the precious Cauldron, on their way to the passage opposite the Temple which winds its way past Virupaksha and other Caves and onwards and upwards right to the Hill Summit. 

Leaving the Temple on its journey upwards

Already a huge amount of ghee, and cloth wicks have been carried to the top of the Hill in preparation for the lighting of the flame Tuesday evening. 

From early morning tomorrow, it will be easy to see with the naked eye, hundreds of pilgrims climbing the Hill on their way to the top of Arunachala, in order to claim as close a vantage point as possible from which they can watch the lighting of the Deepam in the evening. 

 Many other pilgrims will be walking up the Hill tomorrow and throughout the period that the Deepam flame will be alight, in order to offer their ghee personally onto the flame. 

Cauldron on the start of its journey to the Hill Summit

Tiruvannamalai Railway Station, May 2012

A dear friend and yearly visitor from Malaysia, asked me to check out the railway timetable for Tiruvannamalai for Deepam 2012. 

I have also had several requests from readers, to post up-to-date photographs of Tiruvannamalai railway station. 

Thus, in order to get information and photographs, I visited Tiruvannamalai railway station yesterday morning. While there I learnt that there will shortly be a new rail timetable schedule for Tiruvannamalai. Thus the schedule below may not be in operation for a long time. In addition a train schedule for Deepam, will only be published a short time prior to the Festival. 

Regular Train 

06842 (North) Villupuram to Katpadi arrives 05.45 departs 05.50 

06841 (South) Katpadi to Villupuram arrives 19.35 departs 19.40 

Weekly Train 

16779 Tirupathi to Madurai - Sunday/Friday arrives 18.25 departs 18.30 

16780 Madurai to Tirupathi - Sunday/Friday arrives 03.55 departs 04.00 

Weekly Train 

22603 Kharagpur to Villupuram - Thursday - arrives 20.25 departs 20.30 

22604 Villupuram to Kharagpur - Monday - arrives 12.10 departs 12.15 

Weekly Train 

22605 Purulia to Villupuram - Tuesday - arrives 20.25 departs 20.30 

22606 Villupuram to Purulia - Saturday - arrives 12.10 departs 12.15 

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The first photograph is the view of Arunachala when coming out of the Tiruvannamalai Railway Station. The road of the second photo, is the driveway up the Railway Station. 

Glad to see in the newly modernised Railway Station, that they kept the name board the same nice bright yellow as before. 

Although there is a brand new bridge connecting the platforms, while I was at the station I saw NO-ONE using the bridge. All seemed to prefer scampering across the tracks. Hope that changes when the tracks are electrified when the next phase of the development of the Railway Station takes place. 

The station is being maintained very well, and it was spotless on the day I visited. They even had a lady walking the tracks picking up the ubiquitous plastic from the lines. 

The new platforms are inordinately long, so glad that there is a helpful sign displayed for the engine driver! 

 Track Maintenance 

 View of the lines and station from 

the railway crossing in town. 

 The railway crossing in town. 

Aid to Motorists

Have found a fascinating application at this link here which will help motorists compute road distances to Tiruvannamalai from their native place. Hope it helps.

Movie Update

The below is the latest published news on the progress of the movie 'Thiruvannamalai,' currently being filmed in Coimbatore and locally at Tiruvannamalai.

“Perarasu Turns Spiritual: Director Perarasu has written a beautiful and spiritual song which praises lord Shiva for Thiruvannamalai.

Action film specialist director Perarasu has written a very beautiful song praising lord Shiva, which makes one wonder whether he is changing from "Adhiradi Perarasu" into "Aanmiga Perarasu".

This song will be featured in his present project Thiruvannamalai, which stars Arjun and Saniya Vakil in the lead. The song goes:

“Yemmai Aalum, Ulagai Aalum EesaneVinnai Aalum, Mannai Aalum NeysaneNamashivaya, Namashivaya, Om Namashivaya”

[Translation: Shiva, you are my friend and ruler, you are the King of the Earth and King of the Universe. Om Namah Shivaya]

This song was shot entirely on the "girivala pathai" of the Thiruvannamalai temple. About two hundred real sadhus were asked to participate in this song's shoot and no junior artists were used.

Thiruvannamalai is also an action film, in which Arjun plays a cable operator at loggerheads with local politicians. Sania Vakil plays his love interest.

Stunts, which are mainstay of any Arjun starrer, have been spectacularly choreographed by Anal Arasu. Apart from writing the lyrics of a few songs and directing the film, Perarasu has also written its story, screenplay and dialogues.”

We await further news with interest.

Sparsa Hotel Update

Probably the most important quality for a Tiruvannamalai Hotel, Resort or Ashram is its location and view of Arunachala Hill. In this respect the new Sparsa Hotel has a wonderful vantage point set off from the girivalam roadway.

'Sparsa' is a chain of eco-friendly resorts with the first Hotel already open here at Tiruvannamalai and with work currently in progress on additional resorts at Kanyakumari, Chidambaram and Kumily. The resorts are operated by the Auromatrix group which is an established Hotel and Resort Company.

Even though many choose to stay at Ashrams or more rustic facilities, its good that comfortable and facility-laden Hotels are becoming available here at Tiruvannamalai and thereby providing safe and luxurious amenities to both the first time visitor to India and to those wishing for greater comfort and increased security and privacy.

As the Hotel is operated by an established Hotel group the service and maintenance at Sparsa is markedly better than at other Tiruvannamalai Hotel.

Office Management



Security


Pool and Garden Maintenance

All the facilities at the Hotel are reserved exclusively for guests except for the restaurant which welcomes visitors. Below one of the waiters is demonstrating an old fashioned curd churner.


Waiter


Restaurant

Arunachala Grace will be maintaining a 'direct link' on this page (view the box banner on the left hand column) to Sparsa Hotel, in order to facilitate easy bookings and reservations. Also will soon be posting a slideshow montage of the Hotel and its facilities.

Thiruvannamalai - the movie

For those interested in the progress of 'Thiruvannmalai', the movie currently being shot in Tamil Nadu, the following updates are taken from this Tamil movie website.

“No one is sure about what’s so happening with heroines of Arjun’s films. First, in his film Durai, actress Padmapriya was removed and Keerath replaced her. Now, the same scenario occurs in his other film titled ‘Thiruvannamalai’ directed by Perarasu and Kavithalaya Productions churning it out. Mumbai based model Saaniya Vahilai was chosen by Perarasu to star opposite Arjun in the female lead role, he wanted to rope in a new actress with the belief that there wouldn’t any problems with the call sheets as the leading actresses do so. But things were completely different once photo shoot of Arjun and Saaniya was over. Mumbai missy didn’t give call sheets to the director and kept delaying in signing as well she was irregular and late to the shooting spot.

So, it all landed up Perarasu in the decision of changing the heroine and pursuit for the new one is going on now…”

“Director Perarasu has been rightly nicknamed "Oorarasu" as he names all his films after towns. He has to his credit "Thirupatchi", "Sivakasi", "Thirupathi" and "Dharmapuri". "Thiruvannamalai is the title of his latest film, starring Arjun and Mumbai import Sania Vakil. Pushpa Kandasamy produces this film on behalf of K. Balachander's Kavithalaya.

Perarasu is known for having sentiment and action in equal proportions in his films. But he comes out of this circle in "Thiruvannamalai". Instead of sentiment, he deals with the burning social issues that affect man's life. It revolves around politics which is getting dirtier by the day, increasing rowdyism and law and order problem. Man is dogged by a variety of problems, personal and social. In some cases man himself is a problem. How a man lives surviving these problems is the theme of "Thiruvannamalai". The film has also a liberal dose of spirituality.

Perarasu met the producer only with an outline and wrote the full story after the producer gave the go-ahead signal. Then Arjun was selected for the lead role.

Perarasu says "Thiruvannamalai" would be a new experience not only for him but also for Arjun. He is not doing it just as a commercial film. For Arjun also it is not another action film. They go beyond and make a new effort.

Arjun plays the role of a Cable TV operator. Sania Vakil is a school teacher. Karunas, who has been typecast as a comedian, is given a character role. Saikumar plays the villain.

The film is being shot in two parts - the first part in Kumbakonam and the second in Thiruvannamalai. The 'spectacular' scenes of "Girivalam", a special monthly event in Thiruvannamalai are a highlight. This mammoth procession of devotees around the hills on every full moon night, in fact, marks the story's turning point, says Perarasu. The background song 'Namma Nadai Pottuputta Veera Nadai..Nammappadai Singappadai," set to the music of Srikanth Deva, is sung by Perarasu himself.

Performing folk singers and artistes are featured in folk songs, Karagattam and Oyilattam. These songs have been recorded live.

The technical team includes Padmesh (cinematographer), 'Anal' Arasu (stunt), G.K. (Art), V. Jaishankar (editing). The story, screen and dialogue are by Perarasu.”

'Thiruvannamalai' Movie

Today at Kumbakonam work started on a movie directed by Perarasu and entitled ‘Thiruvannamalai”.

The director says, 'there are no sentimental scenes in the movie. It is an out and out commercial venture, but quite different'.

The story has the famous Tamil movie actor Arjun playing a local television cable operator who has a troubled relationship with politicians. The narration delves into the animosity with corrupt politicians and follows the hero's struggling path to victory. The heroine of the movie is the debutante Sania and the music composer is Deva.

It was earlier reported that in the movie the hero, Arun, would be displaying Shiva-like qualities. That may be so, but the poster of the actor is quite alarming! We wait for further developments and news of when filming will occur locally at Tiruvannamalai.