Drain to remove water from Jalaganteswarar temple located

There was a sense of jubilation among officialdom over this as over the last few days repeated efforts by digging up the road in the same area only revealed water at a depth of 10 feet.

With water stagnating to knee level inside the temple from November 18 the number of devotees visiting the temple dipped from 2500 daily to less than half, the trustee said.

As the temple premises is linked to the moat, rise in the moat’s water level resulted in water inundating the temple. Officials were thus searching for the drain channel constructed by kings of yore to remove stagnant water. The now discovered drain connects the moat to the Palar river and was part of ancient system tanks which finally drained into the Palar river.

Though a wire borne camera was inserted into a deep hole dug for this purpose on the road opposite the fort, it failed to find any sign of the channel, sources revealed.

Asked about daily poojas being affected, the trustee said temple priests would conduct the necessary poojas in the water logged sanctum sanctorum while poojas involving devotees were conducted at the Rajagopuram itself.

Suresh Kumar said the problem would be to desilt the new channel which is more than 100 feet wide. Hence officials now have their next problem cut out for them, though work at the sport continues.