Tuesday, August 21, 2007

Political Hypocrisies and Double Speaks

The inspiration for this post was an article from rediff.com by Mr.Ram Madhav. I was thinking that this is just one instance of hypocrisy in the world of politics. But I always believed that our great country of the past is in such state of distress now because we've been constantly ruled by one group of people called HYPOCRITES till now. One more thing, if you think this post is going to talk about hypocrisies in political arena and its effect on nation building, then its totally wrong. My job is to list down events, words from the recent past to present, so sit down, relax and just enjoy it. Before I give the listing, let me tell you one thing, I did a lot of searching based on recent events over the internet and in the process had got the information from a lot of websites, private blogs etc. So my thanks to all those source web sites. OK now, here is the list:

  1. I will start with the all famous 123 nuclear-agreement and the doublespeaks and hypocrisies involved in it. The source of information is the link I've provided above. This time our all famous left parties are the source of these words.
    Now - Left says, "India-US deal is against our national interest, since it impends our sovereignity of conducting nuclear tests." (Well, left seems to be genuine and they definitely want India to do a nuclear test whenever it wants, and hence protect our national interest. Fair enough...)
    Then - The time was when BJP led government conducted the all famous Pokhran nuclear test in May, 1998. (Man the nuclear-test-loving left should have been super happy. But wait, where they?). Left parties organized a "Convention against Nuclear Weapons" in New Delhi on June 9, 1998. (What? I thought the left love sovereign nuclear-testing. I am confused.)
  2. The next instance is from the land of contradictions - Tamil Nadu. The issue here is government trying to take over cable TV operators(also called MSO - Multi System Operator).
    Then - May 2002, Jayalalitha led AIADMK government tries to push through an act, which tries to take control of the MSO (read Sun Network's Sumangali Cable Vision, which controlled 70% of cable TV subscribers in the state). DMK cries foul, claims its against democratic values. (Man, DMK is correct. Why is the government trying to take control of the MSOs. This happens only during a army coup or an emergency. Hail DMK)
    Now - August 2007, Karunanidhi led DMK government plans to establish a MSO in the state and also push an act to organize this sector. Read it in a different way - Take control of Sun Network's Sumangali Cable vision, which controls more than 70% of cable TV subscribers in the state. (What? Man, I hailed DMK on May, 2002. What's happening? Oh dear, I just realized, they are hypocrites)
  3. From Tamil Nadu, now we travel to the God's own country - Kerala. This is a ideal case of hypocritic government.
    Then - Kerala government led by LDF (Left Democratic Front) bans Coca-cola citing presence of pesticides and hence public health as a reason. The words as said by Vaikom Viswan, convenor LDF, "We cannot make our people drink poison and pesticide just because we want industries here. This is not the policy of LDF". (I completely agree with the LDF. If I was the Chief Minister and I found pesticides in colas, I would ban them right away. Way to go LDF)
    Then - Around the same time when the Coca-cola was banned, statistics showed that Kerala was the biggest consumer of alcohol and Kerala government's biggest income earner was through the sale of government approved alcoholic drinks. The income - approximately 2000 crores. (Did some one tell them that alcoholic drinks are not categorized as health drinks any where in the world?).
  4. We still stay in Kerala. Of course, its the god's own country and no humans want to leave that place. Check out this one, this probably is the best of all in this list.
    Then - Coca-cola is accused of depleting the ground water resources in its Plachimada plant by over utilising the ground water resources. Again Kerala's saviour LDF(with CPM as the majority share holder) leads the agitation from the front. (Way to go LDF. I am all for saving ground water and our mother earth)
    Now - CPM, our friendly communist party is the owner of a Water theme park somewhere in in the hilly regions of North Kerala. (Water theme park? Was the water red that inspired a left theme park? CPH is a more suitable name. No prizes for guessing what H stands for...)
  5. We come back again to Tamil Nadu. This time the theme is dynasty politics. We have no other option but stay with DMK, as AIADMK cannot have any dynasty politics.
    Some time back - when Mr.Karunanidhi was accused of dynasty politics by projecting his sons ahead of others in his party, he was accused of dynasty politics. His response was swift "DMK is a democratic party and every party worker is elected in a democratic manner"
    Some time after 'some time back' - Kanimozhi, Karunanidhi's daughter is the member of the Rajya Sabha. (I still think she got elected democratically ;-) What say readers?)
  6. For some reason I found a lot of information talking about left parties and hypocrisies. than any other political party. This time though the events are from 2 different states, Andhra and Bengal respectively.
    The Andhra event - Six people are killed in police firing in Khammam in a protest by landless agricultural labourers. CPM demanded the resignation of the Andhra CM - Mr.Reddy. (Fair enough, I would say)
    The Bengal event - A lot of people are killed in police firing in Nandigram and Singur. But the state is ruled by CPM. What about the Bengal CM? (What do you do?)
Well, the list above could be endless. I just picked up a few based on the events I remembered in the recent past. But what a shame? God save India...

Well I wanted to end with the previous paragraph, but why not end with another classic double speak from none other than our ambassador to the US - Ronen Sen. Here it goes...

2 days ago - Our friend Ronen said "The nuclear deal has been approved here (in Washington, DC) by the President, and there (in New Delhi) it's been approved by the Indian cabinet. So why do you have all this running around like headless chicken, looking for a comment here or comment there, and these little storms in a tea-cup?”. He also said "I can understand (such a debate) immediately after independence," he said. "But 60 years after independence! I am really bothered that 60 years after independence, they are so insecure—that we have not grown up, this lack of confidence and lack of self-respect," (I say, well said Ronen)
Yesterday - Our friend Ronen said, after a huge hue and cry by our parliamentarians, "My comment about running round like headless chicken looking for a comment here or a comment there was a tactless observation on some of my media friends and most certainly not with reference to any honourable MP,"" (Looks who chicked out)

....
Note & Disclaimer: The source of the informations are news websites and some blogs from the world wide web. If you notice some discrepancies in the correctness of the information, please put in the comments section so that I can correct them.

Monday, August 20, 2007

The 1 lakh car :: Time to take care

Time: 1 or 2 years ago.
Place: My home, Bangalore, India
TV Event: Ratan Tata announces the all ambitious 1 lakh car project.

I was watching the above announcement live on TV. When I heard that Mr.Tata is gonna give India a car for just a lakh of a ruppe, it took some time for me to digest the fact. And after that I thought. WOW. Mr.Tata is close to fulfilling one of the most cherished dreams of an Indian middle class family - OWN A CAR.

Time: Yesterday
Place: My home, Bangalore, India
TV Event: Ratan Tata announces that the 1 lakh car will be available to India by June, 2008.

I watched the above announcement on some news channel. I thought again, WOW. But this WOW, unlike the first WOW, was only for one more day.

Time: Today
Place: My home, Bangalore, India
TV Event: None.

This morning I started at 10 in the morning from my home in Kanakapura road to my office in Brigade road, a good 12 kms from my home. I reached my office at around 11.15 AM. One and a half hours for 12 kms. After I reached my office, I was doing my morning internet browse of the usual web-sites - Rediff, NDTV, EconomicTimes, IBNLIVE etc. While I was browsing through the Economic-Times website, I noticed this interesting article on TATA cars. It said that in a few years from now, TATA would be the biggest manufacturer/exporter of small cars in the world, commanding a huge 25% share in the world market. The next one was Mahindra-Renault and the other Indian companies in this list. That evening, I came back home and after a few dosas for dinner was sitting in my balcony and started to think. INTENTLY...

The points I considered to its merit were the following
  • TATA's one lakh car is definitely a WOW for all those deserving Indian middle class families, who've been earning for a luxury living for a long long time. No doubt.
  • TATA's one lakh car is definitely a WOW for TATA motors, who would become the world leader in small car manufacture and exports
  • TATA's one lakh car is a definitely a WOW for Indian economy. India would be the global hub for small cars and probably a automobile giant in the making and towards greater glory as a world power.

All the points mentioned above about India moving towards global economic supremacy was making me jump with joy, when suddenly the counter-argument twin brain inside me took over. My twin brain started asking questions that may make feel sad, the same average Indian who felt elated by the 1 lakh car. What are the questions? Here they are:
  • TATA's one lakh car - Is India's road infrastructure(especially the city road infrastructure) ready to handle this explosion of new vehicles to hit the road?
  • TATA's one lakh car - Is India ready to make available the extra fuel that would be demanded by the sudden explosion of new vehicles to hit the road?
  • TATA's one lakh car - Is India ready to balance out the tremendous environmental impact the emissions from these news cars that are gonna explode into the market?

Unfortunately for all these questions, the resounding answer was "NO NO & NO ONLY".

I have consciously decided not try to blame any person or organization or the government per se. My job is to raise questions and thats exactly what I will do in the lines to come...

  • If India would be the next AUTO-HUB of the world, then why did it not take steps to amend the road infrastructure(specifically city road infrastructure) in our country?
  • India is a energy deficient country. Our oil-pool deficit huge compared to say a country like Russia. In that sense, has anything been done pro-actively to tackle this additional fuel needs that might arise (or) has anything been done so that these vehicles use alternate fuel modes for their operation?
  • India contributes to just 1% of the global pollution. But its a developing country. And in the years to come, the emissions are just gonna increase. Are there any steps taken to tackle this impending environment menace? The government need not foster research et all, but at least it can give sops to companies making or to people who are ready to buy environment friendly vehicles. Brazil is an excellent example of a developing country following development with minimal cost to the environment. Fact is that Brazil has a significant percentage of its vehicles running on BIO-FUELS.

I would let you, the readers, to ponder over the answers for these questions.

But in the midst of these questions, one very important question still lingers deep inside my mind and comes back to haunt me again and again and again.

"Why is it always that our dear Earth a casualty whenever there is an opportunity for the development of humanity?"

Thursday, August 16, 2007

The Temple Triangle - A Travelogue

It all started somewhere around the first week of July. I was planning for a big road trip in my new Xeta. Also it’s been quite sometime since I toured with my parents. We decided to explore places, mostly temples, around Chennai and short listed on the following places for the visit – Tiruvannamalai, Pondycherry, Mahabalipuram and Kancheepuram. I call this trip as The Temple Triangle. The reason was so simple - places in and around the triangle formed connecting Tiruvannamalai, Pondycherry and Kancheepuram are filled with just temples and temples everywhere.

Day 1: July 30th, 2007
Time: 6 AM


One advantage of touring with your parents is that everything happens on time. All of us were ready exactly at 6 AM to start out trip. Our journey was towards Tiruvannamalai our first stop over before our final destination of the day - Pondycherry. We reached Tirunvannamalai at around 10 AM.


Tiruvannamalai is filled with spiritualism all over. It boasts of the all majestic Arunachaleshwara temple. We had a wonderful darshan of the almightly Shiva. Another common way of worship is a walk around the hill during a full moon night. History shows that during full moon day the population in this holy town swells to a staggering 25 lakhs sometimes. So plan your trip accordingly on those days. Since it was not a full moon day we managed to visit the temples quiet easily.
We also visited the Ashta-lingams (eight lingams) around the holy hill walk way. One interesting place of visit was this Idukku-Vinayagar temple. The mode of worship is to mange your way through a small gap available in a rock. I managed to do it. People there say that however fat you are, you still manage to sneak in this gap.
Apart from these there are lot ashrams in Tiruvannamalai – Ramana Maharishi ashram, Seshadri swamigal ashram and many more.

Place/Route/distance(kms)

Route comments/tips

Bangalore to Tiruvannamalai (200)

  • Hosur – NH7
  • Krishnagiri – NH7 (92)
  • Mattur - NH66
  • Uthangarai- NH66
    Chengam- NH66
  • Tiruvannamalai – NH66 (110)

Upto Krishnagiri the roads are 4-laned, super fast and of the highest quality. From Krishnagiri, take the route towards Chennai and follow the directions to Pondycherry highway (NH-66). There is one good Reliance petrol bunk in this route.

From Krishnagiri to Tiruvannamalai we lose the luxury of 4-laned roads but are still welcomed by the high quality roads with green trees and hills by the road side. Except the inter-city buses there is not much traffic. There are no good hotels or petrol bunks till Tiruvannamalai, hence plan accordingly.















Traveller Tip: Though we had our own food packed for the lunch, you can consider Hotel Auro Usha in Tiruvannamalai. It is just opposite to the Seshadri swamigal ashram


OK time now is around 2.30 PM and we are ready to drive to our next stop - Tirukovilur.

On our way to Tirukovilur we also visited Gnananda Thapovanam established by Swami Gnananda. Thapovanam is just 5 kms before Tirukovilur town. The place was very calmed, peaceful and a great place as a stress buster. To know more about this place you can check www.gnanananda.org
Tirukovilur is famous for the Ulagalanda Perumal temple. It’s a part of the 108 Divya Desam that Hinduism boasts of. Lord Vishnu has a unique pose in this temple. He has one leg on the earth and the other leg lifted up, supposedly on the sky, thus measuring this universe. The temple name in Tamil - Ulagalandha = Ulagam(World) + Alandha(Measure), which translates into “measuring the world” in English.

Place/Route/Distance(kms)

Route comments/tips

Tiruvannamalai to Tirukovilur (35)

(State highways)

The route from Tiruvannamalai to Tirukovilur is straight forward. The roads are very wide, 2-laned, newly laid and of the highest quality. The time I went there were a few bridges being built. Those would have been completed by now.








The time now is 5.30 PM and ready to hit the roads to Pondycherry

We reached Pondycherry around 8 PM. We checked into Hotel MASS. It’s a 3-start hotel right in the heart of the city. A word of appreciation for the travel company, whose services I am using for the first time. We had good wholesome dinner and a good-night sleep readying ourselves for the local Pondy site seeing. From Tiruvannamalai, Pondycherry can be reached either through Gingee & Tindivanam or through Tirukovilur & Villupuram. I took the latter route as we wanted to visit Tirukovilur, thought the former route is the usual one taken through NH-66.


Place/Route/Distance(kms)

Route comments/tips

Tirukovilur to Pondy(77)

· Villupuram(35)

· Pondy NH-45A (42)

Tirukovilur to Villupuram has awesome roads by the country side. Roads are narrow but of good quality. Lush green fields on the side of the roads are a treat to eyes. I saw a new Reliance petrol bunk coming up on this route.

Villupuram to Pondy has good roads, but heavy traffic. It took 2 hours for me to cover a distance of 42 kms.











Day 2: July 31st, 2007
Time: 8 AM

We got ready by about 8 AM. We had a very good breakfast in our hotel. Today’s plan is to visit places in and around Pondy. Before going to our travelogue, I have to mention one thing about Pondy. This place is better organized than any of the major Indian cities I’ve been too. It’s clean, road traffic is organized, people are very helpful and I read about Pondy somewhere that it has almost a zero crime record. One very important piece of information – Petrol in Pondycherry is Rs.41/litre – A good Rs.10 less a litre than the rates in Bangalore and a good Rs.6 less than in TamilNadu. Pretty Impressive!!! Coming back to my trip, we started our day on an auspicious note.

Manakula Vinayagar temple.

This temple doesn’t have any historical importance, is not as huge as any other south Indian temples but still I liked it for the very reason that it’s clean and organized.






Our next stop was Auroville city. It’s an experimental city where people from over 30
countries reside. The experiments include innovative and inclusive education, renewable power source among lots of others. This city is the brainchild of the Aurobindo ashram in Pondy. It spans over 25 square km. Some trivia about Auroville includes the following: It’s shaped in the form of a galaxy. It has a banyan tree as its centre and an energy centre called Mantri Mandir near by.




After the Auroville visit, we retired to the hotel for a good one hour’s rest before our evening’s visit to the Aurobindo ashram.

Aurobindo ashram – silence everywhere. It has the Samadhi of Sri Aurobindo. People meditate sitting near his Samadhi. It has a library which has books on the life of Sri Aurobindo and his spiritual collaborator called affectionately as The Mother. It has volunteers serving to keep the ashram running. Must see place in Pondy.







The beach – was our next stop. Pondy beach was totally different from the beaches I’ve seen
before in that it has no sand at all. The waves crash directly into the beach road on the shore. But again, the beach was very neatly maintained. I saw a electric-non-polluting vehicle collecting the garbage. We also ended up watching the cine-shooting of a bollywood movie, which had Suniel Shetty in the lead. We also spotted some Pondy policemen with a funny red cap on their heads.





We retired to our hotel around 7 PM had a good dinner and ready for a nice sleep before our next stop tomorrow to Mahabalipuram.

Day 3: August 1st, 2007
Time: 7 AM

Our destination today is Mahabalipuram. We could have taken the scenic East Coast Road (also know as ECR). By this way Mahabalipuram is just 95 kms away. But we decided to take the route NH-66 & NH-45 through Tindivanam since we decided to visit a few temples – Melmaruvathur, Madhuranthagam and Uthiramerur. Using this route, the distance is almost double at 170 kms approximately. Some information about this route in the following table:

Place/route/Distance(kms)

Route comments/tips

Pondy to Mahabalipuram (170)

· Tindivanam - NH66 (37)

· Melmaruvathur - NH45(32)

· Madhurandhagam – NH45 (11)

· Uthiramerur (20)

· Chengalpet (35)

· Thirukalukundram (20)

· Mahabalipuram (12)

Pondy to Tindivanam was mostly city roads and heavy traffic heading towards Chennai.

From Tindivanam, I was in for a surprise. We were welcomed by super fast, 4 laned NH-45. This road extends all the way till Chennai.

From Madhurandhagam to Uthiramerur, you have to take a left diversion at a place called Karunkuzhi. From here, you are welcomed by beautiful trees on the road sides. The roads are narrow but still of good quality. You have to pass through Vedanthaangal to reach Uthiramerur.

From Uthiramerur to Chengalpet you have to again join NH-45.

From Chengalpet to Mahabalipuram are again narrow country side roads. You have to pass through Tirukalukundram to reach Mahabalipuram. The road quality is good enough.

























Coming back to our travelogue again, our first stop was Melmaruvathur.

  • Melmaruvathur has this Amman-temple by the side of NH-45. This temple is made famous by Bangaru Adigal. Every year lakhs of people, sporting red religious robes, walk to this temple from all over Tamil Nadu and even from other states.
  • Madhurandhagam is famous for the Erikaatha Ramar temple. The legend goes as follows. During the British colonial times, the water level in the Maduranthagam reservoir (which incidentally supplies drinking water to Chennai) was in the verge of being breached. And the British governor of Chennai had supposedly prayed in this temple for the safety of the place. And the god obliged.
  • Uthiramerur for me honestly was a surprise. I just so happened to travel via Uthiramerur to Mahabalipuram but never heard of anything there. The temple is Sundara Varadar temple. The architecture of the temple was something that I have never seen before. The main sannidhi is in 3 floors, one above the other and totally there are 5 principal deities for darshan. I don’t remember exactly the name of the gods in each of these sannidhis but as far as the temple is concerned simply amazing is the word.
    Traveller Tip: People wishing to goto Vedanthangal’s bird sanctuary have to take this route. On the way you will take a diversion of 4 kms to Vedanthaangal.

From here we started our journey towards Mahabalipuram. We checked into the hotel, a beach side resort, around 4 PM. I heard from the resort manager that the resort was completely ravaged during the Tsunami and was re-built.

Traveler Tip – Kancheepuram is just 27 kms from Uthiramerur and the route from Uthiramerur to Kancheepuram is filled with so many temples of historical importance. This is one route that we missed and would be useful for others who are subsequently visiting Kancheepuram. We also visited Kancheepuram during this trip but did not take this route.


Day 4: August 2nd, 2007
Time: 8 AM


Our plan was straight and simple for the day. Visit Tirukalukundram temple in the morning and Mahabalipuram rock temples in the evening.

Tirukalukrundram is around 12 kms from Mahabalipuram on the Chengalpet route. It has a huge Shiva temple. The whole town has evolved around this temple. There is also a temple in the nearby hill, and according to popular legend, for centuries together every day at 12 PM some eagle visits and accepts the offering from the temple.

After the visit we left for the beach resort and took some rest before the evening visit to the rock temples. I am not going to say anything about the rock temples as already a lot of information is available in the World Wide Web about these temples.


One more incident that I encountered during this visit is the entrance into Mahabalipuram town itself. I was coming from Chengalpet and had to cross (note it was just cross not drive) East Coast Road (ECR) to enter into Mahabalipuram. And a toll of Rs.24 was collected as a toll for this crossing. And the worst part is, whatever route you take, we have to cross the ECR. I ended up paying Rs.96 overall.


We stayed in the resort that night and the next day fully was available for us to see Kancheepuram.

Day 5: August 3rd, 2007
Time: 6.30 AM

From Mahabalipuram we reach Kancheepuram through Chengalpet - the same route that we took to reach Mahabalipuram from Uthiramerur. Kancheepuram is called as the land of 1000 temples and every word of that statement is true. We were welcomed by the majestic gopurams of the Vardharaja Perumal temple. This city has spiritualism in the air. Shops of flowers, silk sarees, spiritual items, hotels almost fill the entire city.


We parked our car right along the compounds of the beautiful Kanchi Kamakshi Amman temple. It was a Friday and apparently Fridays are the most crowded day for this temple. We managed to get in and out of the temple in about an hour.

Kanchi Kamakshi mutt was the next place we visited. The place was so spiritual. With the vedic chants in the background and some or the other puja happening continuously this place is a definite must for anyone and especially for the spiritually wanting.



Kailasanathar temple was the temple we visited next. The very architecture and grandeur of the temple struck me. Apparently it’s more than 1000 years old and still its beauty hasn’t diminished even a little bit. It has been included under the World Heritage Site and the Archeological Society of India. What pains me is to think that there were barely any visitors to this temple.





Kachabeeswarar temple was the next one. It’s big and historical again. In this temple, Lord Vishnu is shown worshipping Lord Siva in the form of turtle (kurmemerali).

Then we had a sumptuous lunch at Hotel Saravana Bhavan and checked into a hotel right next to it. The time was around 12.30 PM. The hotel rates are pretty reasonable. We paid Rs.660 for a 2 bedded room and an extra bed. We took some much needed rest. By evening we were ready again to visit the next group of temples.



Ulagalandaar temple was our first temple in our evening session where Lord Vishnu poses with one leg on the ground and one leg to the sky. This is the same pose that we saw in Tirukovilur.

Vaikunda Perumal temple is another vaishnavite temple built during the 7th century. Again this temple is included under the World Heritage Site and the Archealogical Society of India and again no crowd whatsoever.

The majestic Ekambareeswarar temple was next in our agenda. The gopurams were huge. Ekambareshwara literally means one mango. Popular myth says that Parvathy, Shiva's consort, playfully closed his eyes bringing darkness to the entire world. Lord Shiva angrily cursed her to become black like Kali. The goddess however did penance here and made a lingam under a mango tree.





Traveller Tip: Most of the temples in Kancheepuram, or for that matter in Tamil Nadu would be closed between 12 PM and 4 PM. So plan accordingly.

Kanchipuram and silk saris – always a nice company! After ending our marathon spiritual quest my mom started her quest for artistically woven silk saris. Ask for the locally popular silk sari shops than the shops with big brand value. You can pick the saris for a good discount. She settled for 2 saris after a good one and a half hour. It was around 8 PM and time for dinner and good night sleep.

Place/route/Distance(kms)

Route comments/tips

Mahabalipuram to Kanchipuram(70)

· Chengalpet(32)

· Kanchipuram(35)

Go through the same route to Chengalpet that we used to reach Mahabalipuram.

From Chengalpet, Kanchipuram is just 35 kms away and roads pretty good. But the roads were crowded.








Day 6: August 4th, 2007
Time: 6.30 AM


Only one temple was missing out from the list of temples we needed to visit in Kancheepuram – the majestic Varadharaja Perumal temple. I don’t remember any popular legend that I heard in this temple, but I do still remember those majestic art work done on a single stone on the four mandapams in the temple.





This would become the last day of our trip. We skipped our journey to Chennai. Instead we started our journey back to Bangalore. The table below would give you the details of the route back to Bangalore.

Place/route/Distance(kms)

Route comments/tips

Kanchipuram to Bangalore(200 apprx)

· Arcot

· Vellore

· Vaniyambadi

· Krishnagiri

· Hosur

· Bangalore

Just join the Bangalore-Chennai expressway (NH-46) which is barely some 10kms from Kanchipuram.

After that, all the way till Hosur, its uninterrupted, superfast, 4-laned, high quality roads. I did an average of 80 kmph with my XETA. I am sure it would be much higher in bigger vehicles.

Ofcourse from Hosur to Bangalore you have to do away with the traffic situation.












All in all it was a very nice and relaxing journey. We planned this trip so that everyday we rest at least 2 hours of time in the hotel during the day time, so that we don’t feel the heat and tiredness and actually enjoy the places we need to see. The positives were

1. Roads – never interfered into our plans. It was monsoon time and I was expecting very bad roads, and hence kudos to the state and central government in giving an amazing road infrastructure.

2. Weather – very pleasant. Weather during summer is scorching in Tamil Nadu. This time of the year is pleasant for a trip.

3. Stay – Nice luxurious hotels of stay definitely played a role in having a relaxing and enjoyable trip.

That’s it. I am planning another trip soon to Belur and Halebid areas of Karnataka!!! Hope to come with a travelogue soon. Thanks a lot for reading and hope you got something out of this.