RB News World Latest News
Related Articles
Andhra Pradesh: Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanam (TTD) has announced a new initiative to control the huge crowd of devotees at the Lord Venkateswara temple. Under this plan, artificial intelligence (AI) will be used in crowd management. Its aim is to reduce the waiting time for darshan in the temple from the current 8 to 12 hours to less than two hours.
This technological initiative of TTD has given rise to controversy as well as support. On the one hand, TTD Chairman BR Naidu considers this move as a “necessary and logical step taken towards the future”, while on the other hand, former executive officer and retired IAS officer LV Subramaniam has termed it as “unrealistic and impractical”.
Speaking to reporters in Tirumala on Sunday, Subramaniam said that given the current limitations related to space and process, it is impossible to efficiently handle the crowd of lakhs of devotees relying only on technology. He said that the resources spent on this scheme should be used to improve the basic facilities of pilgrims like drinking water, toilets and resting places.
There will be no direct cost on TTD
On the other hand, BR Naidu termed the criticism as “misleading” and clarified that this AI based system is being developed with the help of companies like Google and TCS and there will be no direct cost on TTD. He said that the purpose of this technology is only to improve queue management and not to interfere in the religious traditions of the temple.
AI can play an important role
TTD believes that when lakhs of devotees come for darshan every month, it becomes necessary to make the darshan process more smooth and systematic. Technological solutions, especially AI, can play an important role in this direction. It remains to be seen how effective this technology will prove to be in practice. Currently this technology is in the testing phase.
