Hindus will have to pay more for special puja at the Kedarnath and Badrinath temples, the committee managing the twin shrines in Uttarakhand has said.
Devotees will now have to shell out ₹1 lakh to organise the Shrimad Bhagwat Katha in Badrinath against ₹51,000 earlier. At Kedarnath, a daylong puja will now cost ₹51,000, up from ₹28,000 earlier.
The Badrinath-Kedarnath Mandir Samiti doesn’t charge anyone who visits the temples to pay obeisance. The devotees are usually forced to leave the sancta sanctorum within a few seconds of getting there to accommodate those in waiting.
The committee said the rates for 37 kinds of special puja in Badrinath and 46 in Kedarnath had been hiked.
For instance, a Maha-Abhishek will now cost ₹5,500 against ₹4,700 at Badrinath. For Akhand Jyoti, the rate has been increased from ₹1,500 to ₹2,100, while the cost of Swarna Arti has been revised to ₹6,100 from ₹5,202.
At Kedarnath, devotees will now have to pay ₹11,500 for Maha Abhishek, up from ₹9,500 earlier. Akhand-Jyoti, which was priced at ₹3,800, will now cost ₹5,100.
Committee president Hemant Dwivedi told reporters: “The new list has been put
up on the rate chart board of the temples.”