Even as public sector lender Punjab National Bank (PNB) is battling a crisis, thanks to the Rs 11,400 crore scam by jeweller Nirav Modi, a temple on the outskirts of Hyderabad has taken it upon itself to save the banking system of the country.
On Monday afternoon, special puja was held at the Balaji temple in Chilkur. The temple is a very popular place of worship for those seeking US Visas. During admission season and over weekends, youngsters who want to pursue higher studies in the US flock to the temple.
Around 1,000 devotees stopped walking around the temple in clockwise direction, as is the practise, to participate in a special chanting. The ‘Narasimha puja’ was conducted by seven priests inside the temple for one hour. The ‘Runa Vimochana Nrusimha Stotram’ was chanted to invoke the lion god. The ritual lasted for an hour in which nine verses were chanted eleven times.
The head priests M.V. Soundararajan and C.S. Gopalakrishna said such an invocation will help the recovery of money from defaulters, however big they are. They said the puja was needed as there is a deep crisis in the banking sector and crores of people are worried about the safety of their money in the banks.
Similar religious programmes were held in the past whenever the country was hit by financial turmoil, including during the recession in 2008, Satyam scam and also when the dollar rate went up in 2011.
