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CARY, NORTH CAROLINA, UNITED STATES, 2 June, 2005: Recently, the Triangle’s (a several-county area which includes Raleigh) growing South Indian population took a symbolic step toward creating a more permanent spiritual home. North Carolina’s largest Hindu temple is rising on a 9-acre plot in western Cary. Sri Venkateswara, the God of wealth and well-being, will soon reside in a US$1.5 million, 4,000-square-foot structure designed according to specifications in sacred scriptures. For seven years, members of the Sri Venkateswara Temple in Cary have had to make do with a tiny converted house. At an elaborate ritual groundbreaking ceremony, Hindu priests climbed into a pit and buried nine different gemstones, nine precious metals and nine types of grain – all offerings to the God who will soon sit in a shrine on that spot. With permission from the town and $500,000 in pledges to go ahead with the project, an ambitious architectural plan of a pyramid-shaped tower modeled after the Sri Venkateswara Temple in Tirupati, India, the temple is expected to be complete within two years. Traditionally trained temple architects and craftsmen will come from India to oversee construction.



Hundreds of people gathered there to celebrate the temple’s beginnings. Vendors sold vegetarian food, while women danced to traditional Hindu music, children, seated cross-legged, recited Sanskrit prayers to a crowd of proud parents clad in colorful garments. Yogi Velu, a temple member said, “This is our family.” Velu, along with many of the other men, arrived at 4 a.m. to begin preparing for the early morning ceremony. Many said this event is a testament to the growing strength of the Indian community in North Carolina. There were more than 26,000 Asian Indians living in North Carolina in 2000, with about 11,000 in the Triangle and a little more than 3,000 in Cary. For years, Indian immigrants who claimed Hinduism as their faith worshipped at a Morrisville temple, called the Hindu Bhavan, built in 1986. Now that the community is larger and more diverse, many are striving to preserve more authentic regional traditions. In addition to the Hindu Bhavan, there is the BAPS Swaminarayan Hindu Temple in Morrisville and the New Goloka Dham in Hillsborough as well as Hindu temples in Charlotte and Greensboro. Community leaders say they already have plans for a second phase of construction several years from now, which would include a “marriage hall” and classrooms. “The temple is a place where you get to know about your culture,” said Kaushik Ram Kommaraju, a junior at Green Hope High School in Cary, whose parents are active in the temple. “A lot of people forget the traditions. This temple serves to preserve it.”

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