Hyderabad: Telangana chief minister K Chandrasekhar Rao is resorting to occult practices to tackle crisis with a mega ritual believed to bestow invincible powers, with 1,000 priests praying non-stop for 10 days.
The Ayutha Chandi Yaga is being planned for February at KCR's farm house in Medak. Seven hundred mantras will be chanted 10,000 times to Goddess Durga and oblations offered through 100 sacrificial fire pits or yagna kunda.
"Raja Vashikarana is the use of occult science in which mystical energy and tantric powers are used to control and regulate other people's minds, thoughts, and actions," said Bhanuprakash Sharma, a senior priest. According to a revenue department official, KCR is being driven by concerns about the failure of his populist schemes.
"Recently the CM rued that even after enhancing the old age pension from Rs 200 to 1000, the government was getting a bad name. Since the government was not effective in stopping suicides of farmers and pensioners, he said something extraordinary must be done, even if it meant divine intervention," the official said.
"The chief minister has not planned the Ayutha Chandi Yaga for his own gains. Now that we have achieved statehood for Telangana, the new state needs the blessings of God," said Seri Subhash Reddy, political secretary to KCR. Having participated in Ayutha Chandi Yaga for Deve Gowda in 1999 in Mangalore, Sharma claimed that the ritual was even performed by the likes of Indira Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi.
