Kalyana Venkatesa Perumal Kovil

Marriage or Kalyanam is one of the important phases of life and one who is born and is willing to take up worldly desires needs to get married at some part of life. While for some marriage happens quite easily with less effort, for some it takes certain efforts based on their horoscope, dasa etc., and can turn into frustration if the search continues for a long period of time.

Kalyana Venkatesa Perumal Kovil is a temple situated in the East Coast Road, Chennai which leads to Pondicherry. This temple is close to 25-30 kilometres from the city.

Kalyana Venkatesa Perumal Kovil is believed to be a place where the unmarried people worship Narayana and they go back with 2 garlands given to them. Once they get married, they need to return back the garlands to this temple to complete the vratha.

It is strongly believed that those who suffer from prolonged delay in getting married have found it quite astonishingly after visiting this temple how they get alliances / proposals immediatley.

While I havent personally experienced this, I did visit this temple sometime back and could see the huge number of devotees puring in with garlands to get a glimpse of Kalyana Venkatesa Perumal.

The Perumal is in the form of Varaha with Lakshmi Thayar, Bhooma Devi and Maarkandeya Maharishi nearby.

There is also a Ranganatha Perumal Sannidhi within the premises.

Its worth a trip if you happen to travel across the ECR Road, atleast to get a glimpse of Sriman Narayanan, the ultimatum.

Narayanayethi Samarpayami !!!

Maangaadu Kamakshi Amman Temple

Maangaadu Kamakshi Amman Temple is one of the famous temples in Chennai, Tamil Nadu. Situated around 20 kms from the City it boasts of a rich heritage and great number of devotees particularly around the months of July, August etc., There are various beliefs around the temple's existence and the one told by the people around is as follows:-

Parvati Devi, mother of the universe once playfully closed the eyes of Lord Shiva while he was in penance. The act was just a romantic gesture but resulted in the whole world becoming dark. Lord Shiva's two eyes are believed to be the Sun and Moon and since Parvati closed the eyes, the whole world plunged into darkness and life became stand still.

Lord Shiva got angry and cursed Parvati Devi that she would be born in earth as a human being and needs to worship Shiva to get married again.

Born in earth, Kamakshi (Kama + Akshi - one who controls "Kama" or Sexual desire) she grew up and also started worshipping Lord Shiva. The place where she worshipped was then a Mango Forest and hence the name "Maangaadu" meaning forest of mangoes. Her worshipping became fierce since Lord Shiva didnt turn up and she started penancing with one leg facing up and hands over her head in the form of a flame. Lord Shiva got pleased with her and asked her to come down to Kanchipuram where they married each other.

Interestingly, Vishnu who is believed to be the brother of Parvati (here Kamakshi) came down before the marriage with a Gem Stone Ring (Kanayazhi) and still waits at this location since the marriage didnt happen here. This diety can be found in the Perumal Kovil that is a few metres away from the Kamakshi Amman Temple.

Also, a few kilometres into the town, there is also a Shiva temple which is believed to have bene formed since Shiva came down to the earth to extinguish a fire which Kamakshi left as is before going back to Kailash. The name of Shiva here is Vellishwarar and little is known about this temple even for frequent visitors to Kamakshi Amman temple. It is very important and relevant to visit both the Shiva and Vishnu temples nearby whenever one visits Kamakshi Amman temple.

One has to accept that the huge number of devotees turning up get the blessings of Kamakshi Amman and get all health, wealth and prosperity after visiting here. There are various beliefs around visiting the temple for 12-13 weeks regularly and getting your desired wishes fullfilled etc.,

Narayanayethi Samarpayami !!!