The Andhra Pradesh government constituted a new Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanams Trust board with 29 trustees and ex-officio members to govern the affairs of the richest Hindu temples conglomerate in the world.

In addition, the government issued one more order through which 50 more special invitees were appointed to the TTD trust board with equal privileges which are on par with the member trustees though they will not have voting rights if a necessity arises.

India Cements chairman N Srinivasan, My Home Group D Chairman J Rameswar Rao, Hetero Group chairman B Parthasaradhi Reddy and Vemireddy Prashanthi Reddy were reappointed in the new TTD trust board.

Minus the three bureaucrats who are ex-officio members in the TTD trustees' list, the state-wise allocation of membership is as follows: Andhra Pradesh - 10, Telangana - 7, Tamil Nadu - 2, Karnataka - 2, Maharashtra - 2, Gujarat - 1, West Bengal - 1 and Puducherry - 1.

Now, the TTD administration will have a big task in terms of effecting suitable changes right from arranging the board meeting hall, providing logistics including vehicles and accommodation to the 81 board members at the time of the meetings.

Besides that, as the state government has made it clear in the government order that the special invitees are to be given privileges on par with members of the TTD trust board regarding darshan, it has to be seen as to how the TTD administration will accommodate darshan requests of these 52 odd special invitees under the discretionary quota on a daily basis.

And sources in the TTD feel that the number of overall members in the TTD trust board including special invitees could get closer to the century mark when presidents of TTD local advisory committees are also added to the overall list shortly.

Meanwhile, Tirupati MLA Bhumana Karunakar Reddy and TUDA chairman Dr Chevireddy Bhaskar Reddy who were appointed as a special invitee and as an ex-officio member were administered oath inside the Tirumala temple on Thursday.

The new members include Pokala Ashok, Malladi Krishna Rao, Tanguturu Maruthi Prasad, Manne Jeevan Reddy, Bandi Parthasaradhi Reddy, Jupalli Rameswara Rao, N Srinivasan, Rajesh Sharma, Bora Saurabh, Muramshetty Ramulu, Kavakurthy Vidyasagar, AP Nanda Kumar, Pachipala Sanath Kumar, Vemireddy Prashanti Reddy, Kethan Desai, Boodati Lakshmi Narayana, Milind Keshav Narvekar, MN Sashidhar, Alluri Malleswari, S Shankar, SR Viswanath Reddy, Burra Madhusudan Yadav, Kiliveti Sanjeevaiah and Katasani Rambhupal Reddy.

Image source: Indian Express