Visakhapatnam: Devasthanam lands to be protected by a wall

Visakhapatnam: The exercise to protect Sri Varaha Lakshmi Narasimha Swamy Devasthanam lands spread over various locations has taken off in a concrete manner. Earlier, a proposal was made for the construction of a boundary wall along the extent of the Simhachalam lands that fall under the purview of survey no:275. As far as Simhachalam lands are concerned, there are about 9,000 acres of land in existence across five villages (panchagramalu). Of them, a number of stretches have already been encroached upon.

According to the Devasthanam records, there are about 10,000 encroachments of Simhachalam lands at various places. Protecting them has now become a challenging task for the authorities concerned. Keeping this in view, proposals have been made to raise compound wall along the hill area that fall under the survey no. 275, stretching across thousands of acres of area.

Recently, seer of Visakha Sri Sarada Peetham Swaroopanandendra Saraswati laid the foundation stone for the construction of a 4.5-km compound wall from Chinagadili near Venkojipalem to Gnanananda Ashram in Simhachalam hill area. The proposal was made with the support of MPLADS funds to the tune of Rs 5 crore. YSRCP MP V Vijayasai Reddy, who is leading the project, mentioned that the government decided to build a protective wall along a part of the Simhachalam hill to save its lands from encroachments. This, he felt, would resolve serious issues faced by those residing in 'panchgramalu' and make the temple lands encroachment-free.

To accelerate the work, the MP added that CSR funds will also be utilised along with MPLADS funds. Further, he stated that the construction of the proposed compound wall would be completed at the earliest. Meanwhile, Anakapalli MP BV Satyavathi is contributing to the project to the tune of Rs 3 crore through MPLADS. Already, the protection wall was built along the area to an extent of 15-km. However, to carry the rest of the project forward, the officials estimated expenditure to the tune of Rs 25 crore.

In addition, parts of the protection wall which was built earlier require repair works. Meanwhile, District Collector and Visakhapatnam Metropolitan Region Development Authority (VMRDA) Commissioner A Mallikarjuna said that construction of the 4.5-km compound wall will be taken up by the VMRDA.