Tirupati, Dec 31: The simmering differences among the members of the Tirumala Tirupati Devastanam (TTD) Trust Board have once again come to the fore on Thursday.The Trust Board under the stewardship of its Chairman, Mr D Adikesavulu Naidu, met on Thursday at an emergency meeting to discuss the issuance of VIP passes for Darshan of the Lord on the New Year day on Friday.Strongly opposing the move to issue VIP passes causing inconvenience to the common pilgrims, the members Mr Chevireddy Bhaskar Reddy and Mr Vijaya Sai Reddy walked out of the meet.
In the absence of the members, the meeting later passed a ‘unanimous’ resolution to issue 1,500 passes to the VIPs for the Darshan of the Lord on Friday marking the New Year day. The Board announced that the VIP Darshan will begin at 6 am on Friday.The issue of VIP passes has recently been shaking the TTD Trust Board. As the board has issued 10,000 VIP passes on the recent Vaikuntha Ekadasi day, the general pilgrims were put to a great inconvenience and the Hill Shrine witnessed a turmoil on that day.
Disgusted pilgrims had staged a dharna on the Hills and also gheraoed the Executive Officer, Mr I Y R Krishna Rao and the Chairman, Mr Adikesavulu Naidu.In view of the seriousness of the matter, Mr Bhaskar Reddy and Mr Vijaya Sai Reddy raised the issue during the Thursday’s Trust Board meeting, which was completely ignored by the other members.