Sai Baba pushes Chennai to limits

SAI IN CHENNAI: Nearly 60,000 devotees have so far reached for Baba's yagna.

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Chennai: Devotion knows no limits. The residents of Chennai will vouch for it now more than ever.

Almost every inch of liveable space in the Tamil Nadu capital now seems to be occupied by a Sathya Sai Baba devotee.

Thanks to the Baba’s Athi Rudra Yagna being conducted for world peace in a city suburb, Chennai is bursting at its seams and hoteliers are doing a brisk business.

Ashok Sairam, one among the nearly 60,000 devotees, has come 500 km from his hometown Salem to catch a glimpse of his God.

After a vain hunt for hotel rooms to stay in, he decided to put up in a school. Sairam is not alone. At least 60 of his relatives and friends too are bunking here.

“We're staying tonight at the school and we'll be up at four in the morning to attend the yagna. One more night at the school and we'll head back to Salem,” he says.

Sairam’s tale is a common one in Chennai these days as devotees from around the country and across the globe are thronging to the Thiruvanmiyur suburb for the 10-day maha yagna.

With the city's hotels packed, many like Sairam have already found more innovative ways of spending the next 10 days in the city. They include taking shelter in marriage and banquet halls.

But it has certainly not been a smooth stay even for those who have managed to find a hotel room. “I'm one of the more fortunate ones since I've got a hotel room. But a lot of Westerners are in a really bad state - not been able to get rooms. Some get rooms about 18 km away but can't afford the high rates. So lots of them have simply gone back,” says a foreigner, Kevin Gillian.

Even the Baba's volunteers and staff are living in makeshift tents at the venue itself and in marriage halls surrounding the area.

Faith perhaps makes the devotees fight the crowds and if things go the way they have been so far, Baba may now soon have followers from the Chennai hospitality industry!