Kotilingeshwara temple near KGF

March 14, 2010 was Sunday.

I was planning for long time to visit kotilinga temple. This day I made up my mind to visit the deity at KGF. Since my house was near to Old Madras Road, I started to wait for a bus towards KGF. However I could not get even a single one. I had to reach Majestic to catch a bus. Since it was express, it will not stop even in my place. I caught up with a passenger who was also travelling to Kotilinga. The co-passenger had to get down at Kolar due to some reasons. As soon bus reached Kolar bypass, the beautiful stone hills attracted me. I did hear that there are so many beautiful spots here.

I reached KGF around 11:30AM. Apparently it is under-developed town. There are no proper facilities. The MPP of this region is Railway Minister of state also. Bus stand looks to be garbage dump. But the irony was it was gold field some time back. People are really good. One person told me that buses towards vellore, gudiyattam, v.kote go via Kammasandra where temple is located. I caught up a private bus for Rs.5 and got down at Kammasandra. A boy was also travelling to the same place and he guided me to the stop. Apart from temple it is just like an under developed indian village :(.

Temple has wide area. Not many people were seen at that day. Apart from that I was getting too hungry. What a co-incidence. Free meals are served every day here. I enjoyed anna saaru and mosaranna. The food was very good and tasty. I donated some amount for annadaana too. Free meals are served from 12:30PM to 2:00PM. The entrance fee to temple is Rs.5 while Rs.100 for camera. I paid the money since this was first time I was visiting. Temple is covered with bountiful of shivalingas. You are tempted to take more and more snaps. Inside the temple you find many other temples too! The main deity is Manjunatha Swamy. Apart from that, one can find Brahma-Vishnu-Maheshwara temple, Venkatesha temple, Annapoorneshwari temple, Santoshi Maata temple. In between one can also spot Ganapthy idols too. Temple has around 82lakhs shivalingas. The target is to reach 1-crore as per the boards. You can install shiva lingas too! One needs to contact temple administration regarding this. Moving forward, the huge shivalinga with Nandi facing is very attractive. People who do not carry camera have to pay Rs.40 to take photo beside huge Shivalinga. Exclusive camera persons are present to take photos and print them.

NANDI FACING SHIVALINGA

I took around 150 photos to compensate the camera fee :). Later I travelled back towards Bangalore. Despite of huge number buses, the roads are completely pot-holed. I took government bus towards KGF which costed Rs.7. That is the reason private buses were crowded. I took express bus from KGF to bangalore. It started around 4:15PM. The tiredness made me to sleep till Hosakote. I reached home around 6:30PM.

See my blog on Kolar