VIJAYAWADA: Sri Durga Malleswara Swamy Devasthanam management has doubled the price of laddu prasadam and reduced the quantity of pulihora ahead of the Dasara festival. The new prices were introduced on Monday.The 80 gram laddu, which was sold at a price of Rs. 5 earlier, is now being sold at Rs. 10. However, the weight of the laddu have been increased to 100 grams.Similarly, The temple management have reduced the weight of pulihora from 200 grams to 150 grams. However, they have not changed the existing price of Rs. 5 per packet.Temple executive officer M Raghunath said it was a justified move as with the previous price of the laddu prasadam, the shrine had been bearing an additional expenditure of Rs. 1.5 lakh per day. The price of prasadam has been increased in all temples in the region including Bhadrachalam, Srisailam, Dwaraka Tirumala and Yadagirigutta as per the decision of endowments department, he said.The temple management has decided to increase the price of laddu prasadam after the endowments commissioner approved the proposal sent by them ten days ago. According to the information, the shrine sells about 50,000 to 70,000 laddus on Saturdays and Sundays apart from the 30,000 on week days. The increase of the price of laddu has disappointed the devotees. M Satyanarayana, a devotee from Machilipatnam, who visited the temple with his family members on Monday, said with the increase in price, devotees are forced to buy less laddus than before.The devasthanam will earn a profit of seven paise on each laddu and three paise on each pulihora packet with the new prices, said temple EO Raghunath. It may be noted that devotees have been expressing ire over the poor quality of laddus in recent times.
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