Competition

This post is on my personal experience on my visit to Shirdi, Shani Shingnapur & Trambakeshwar.

All the three are pilgrim places & lakhs & lakhs of people visit these places to visit the deities for various reasons.

Shirdi is a place of Sai Baba. Sai Baba was an Indian guru, yogi & fakir. The best part of this place is that it is visited by both Hindus & Muslims as Sai baba is worshiped by both religions. Very good.

Shani Shingnapur is the place where Shani Bhagvan resides. People visit this powerful god to fulfill certain wishes. Shani as a stone is also named as neelam. Not every body can wear this stone in the form of jewelery.

Trambakeshwar as the name indicates is the temple were Shiva resides. Shiva as all know is a tantric & a aghori deity. Parvati who is Shiva's wife is also considered as Shakti, the famous union of Shiva & shakti is well known.

But apart of the well known information provided, I am writing this blog for expressing my feelings.

I have been a frequent visitor of Shirdi, recalling from my childhood. When once upon a time, as a child I had visited this place, there had never been such a craze or must say devotion. We could just gain direct entry, have a very good glance at the deity & come back. But as the times passed, population increased, times changed & lots & lots of devotees came up. Now to visit Sai Baba, you have to go through a big, a very very big line, hours & hours of waiting & finally u get to have a short glance at your favorite deity.

The same is with Shani Shingnapur & Trambakeshwar. And same is obviously the case with our own Siddhivinayak temple in Mumbai & other temples else where in India.

Gone are the times when things were finished easily. According to me there is no difference between these temples & offices were people flock in large numbers to get their work done.

I first thought competition occurred only in studies, at least to became doctors but there is also a competition to get in other fields & excel. But now the competition has been extended to the lines of worship. There is a lot of competition to get ahead of one another to reach god.

Things have changed, simpler things are no longer that simple as they were once upon a time. Nowadays I think even God must have made a posh office up there and busier then anybody existing, fulfilling the demands of their devotees. And I think there would be competition between the gods too, who has the maximum number of devotees. Ha ha ha.

Before I entered Trambakeswar temple, me & my husband visited Shri Gajanan Maharaj temple. Its just about 2 km from Trambakeswar temple. But Shiva being a star god, rush was obviously there. With barely any people in the 2nd temple. Might be 1 year down the line, it would became the same very very busy temple as the very well known star temples.

Times are changing & will keep changing.