Ramalayam Project
Ramalayams hitherto in the past were usually small Temples dedicated to Lord Rama in almost every village in the Telugu states of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana. They were centres of cultural education and exchange where villagers used to spend their time after work along with their families before the advent of Television and other multimedia entertainment platforms. The time thus spent not only allowed active and useful inter-personal interactions, it gave the requisite opportunity to build inter-personal relationships based on high morals. The essence of the concept of the Ramalayam Project is the revival of these noble and socially gainful activities. Ramalayam will be extremely well received by the people of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana because there exists an emotional connect with the very idea of Maryada Purushottam Rama.
Are Ramalayams under this project going to be merely grand temples of spirituality?
No. The idea behind this proposed project is much more. While the worship of Lord Sri Rama in accordance with the Vedic traditions and rituals would be strictly followed to re-create or re-establish the spiritual glory of the Lord, which in turn would establish a serene and pious temple atmosphere for dissemination of higher and noble social learning. Therefore, our main focus is to bring back all good and appropriate old traditions to help in the development of society through character building and morals. Our proposed Ramalayam, be it existing or new would be designed in such a way that it will be modern and futuristic in terms of use of advanced technologies to facilitate efficient management. We shall use a self sustaining economic model along with active local participation at the appropriate levels to ensure its continuity for long time to come.
Ramalayam Thrust Areas or Main Focus Area:
1. Arranging basic expenses incurred for the Ramalayam Temple and the personnel associated with it to manage the spiritual and cultural activities. While the purohit or pujari, who is well versed with the Vedic rituals to be performed and a local care taker for other cultural activities as laid out by the Central Committee to spread the SUVICHARA of Lord Rama would be the important positions, there may be other supporting staff.
2. The temple, if already existing, would get associated with the proposed project and a separate cultural centre that shall impart the good ideas of Lord Rama centered around high morals in the society would be built. It is in these Centre's, culture programs of various types based on Ramayanam would be planned to interest the local population to attend and the same platform shall help in spreading the good word of Lord Rama to build character of the Society. In the 2nd phase, new Ramalayam along with the requisite integrated cultural centre would be built afresh with the same objectives described above.
3. Reviving our ancient cultural aspects of Lord Rama and his SUVICHARA that are good for strengthening the social fabric in the Telugu states of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana with an aim to empower the people to achieve true spiritual, moral and strength of character. This would give the people the true and permanent happiness/satisfaction.
We would like to thank Sri M L Narayan Rao, Rajamallu Education Society, Hyderabad for his valuable inputs for preparing the concept note.
Ramalayam Project - 10 Years - Timeline - Contributed by Sri G Ramakrishna, AASRA, Vizianagaram
