A ‘sea of devotees’ all the way

An air of festivity pervaded the entire 32-km route of Giri Pradakshina in Visakhapatnam on 9 July 2025 with devotees in lakhs joined the spiritual trekking with all religious fervour. Tholipavancha, the first step downhill the Simhachalam temple, where hereditary trustee P Ashok Ganapathi Raju flagged off the decorated chariot marking the beginning of the event, witnessed heavy crowd and the police found it difficult to control the surging devotees.

Considered to be a sacred ritual, people from different parts participate in the annual event to seek blessings of Lord Varaha Lakshmi Narasimha Swamy, the presiding deity of the temple.

People started thronging the temple from wee hours and their number multiplied by evening. The district administration made elaborate arrangements like provision of drinking water, medical aid and lighting. The police department deployed over 3,000 personnel for safety of devotees. Voluntary organisations put up stalls on a big scale at various points on the route and distributed water bottles and snacks to devotees.

After completing the pradakshina (circumambulation), devotees started reaching the temple from the early hours of July 10 to have a darshan of the God. Elaborate arrangements were made at bathing ghats to ensure no inconvenience to the Narasimha Swamy devotees.

But for traffic jams, a common sight at several places like Hanumanthavaka, NAD and Vepagunta junctions, and a few cases of minor thefts, no untoward incident was reported during the annual Giri Pradakshina of 2025 in Visakhapatnam.

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This article is written by Senior Journalist Lakkoju Nagesh Babu