Narasimha in Velachery, Chennai.

[Guest guest]

Thanks are owed to Sri Kidambi Soundararajan for mentioning

the Sri yOGa narasimha shrine in vELa-chEri (common spelling

Velachery), the well-known suburb of Chennai.

 

This appears, from my cursory deciphering of the Grantha

lithic inscriptions in the temple, a Pallava temple. The Pallava-s

had a special adoration for the dear narasimha manifestation of the

Lord, just to mention Velachery, SinGa-perumAL-kOyil near

Chengalpattu, SOLinGa-puram etc.

 

This temple is among the blessed sites which are well

maintained in this region (and the rally of devotees here is

for the obviously popular and sadly wrong reason of identifying

Sri narasimha as the fearful deity, as with heathen personifications).

 

There is a stunningly beautiful and majestic

(viGraha-archA of) Sri vEda / yajna nArAyaNa-svAmi

(who must have been the presiding deity of this place

originally known as 'vELvi-c-cheri', or yajna-SAlA),

besides a vivid (and unusually large) maNavALa-mA-muni

(looking a twin of mA-muni in Tirupati Govindaraja-svami

shrine) in the same shrine. The archaka-s, however,

discourage you in offering 'archanam' to the two, viz.,

Sri yajna-nArAyaNa and mA-muni.

 

aDiyEn rAmAnuja-dAsan,

T.S. Sundara Rajan, at Srirangam.

 

-

<ramanuja>

<ramanuja>

Tuesday, August 05, 2003 7:20 PM

[ramanuja] Digest Number 591

 

Message: 6

Mon, 4 Aug 2003 15:42:54 -0700 (PDT)

vimalkumar ranganathan <panardasan

Yoga Narasimha Temple at Velachery

 

Sri:

Srimate Ramanujaya Nama:

Srimath Varavara Munaye Nama:

 

Dear Vaishnavas,

I had gone to India,... Velachery, one of the

popular suburbs of Madras. Not many realize that there is a

really beautiful temple dedicated to Lord Sri Yoga Narasimha

Swami. He is four-armed, with the two front arms resting

on his lap symbolizing his state of Yoga.

Supposed to be a very powerful deity...

The temple is very easily accessible by any

mode of transport. Situated on the Velachery Main road,

there is a bus-stand located less then 100 yards from the temple,

all sorts of Metro buses (normal, express, etc..) stopping there.

I request all the adiyaars in this forum residing

abroad to make it a point to visit this temple and seek the

blessings and grace of Swami Yoga Narasimhar, the next time

they get to visit India. The adiyaars living in Madras should visit

(or rather rush to!!) the temple definitely.

If I am right, the timings are : 8.00 - 10.30 AM

and 5.30 - 8.30 in the evenings.

 

the Vaishnavas in the forum can peruse the following

link:

http://www.hinduonnet.com/thehindu/mp/2003/02/06/stories/2003020600690300.htm

 

I shall scan and upload the picture of the Moolavar

in another mail.

 

AazhwAr emperumAnAr jeeyar thiruvadigaLe Saranam.

Dasan,

Kidambi Soundararajan.