Sai Baba Vigraha Pratishta in Saginaw, MI USA

On the auspicious Shravana Pournami (11th-13th August), Sai Baba's idol Vayu Pratishta was held with great splendor in Saginaw, MI, USA. This prestigious program was organized for three days. The three days rituals were including Akhanda Deeparadhana, Ankurarpana, Panchagavya Prashana, Vastu Mantaparadhana, and Saibaba, Dattatreya, Navagraha havans and vaayu pratishta were conducted by three priests under the direction of "Brahma Sri" Bhagavatula Yugandhara Sharma (from Kuchipudi, AP). As part of the idol worship, the Sarvato Bhadramandali, decorated by Sri Yugandhar Sharma was especially impressive and attracted many devotees during the event. During the entire program, Sri Sharmaji explained all Sanskrit veda mantras to devotees in Telugu and English languages.

Founder President of Sai Samaj of Saginaw, Dr. Murali Ginjupalli said that he is very happy that the Sai Baba Dhyana Mandir, which was started by just four friends in January this year, has been transformed into a full temple within eight months. Dr. Ginjupalli expressed special thanks to Srinivas Vemuri, Haricharan Mattupalli, Sridhar Ginjupalli, Sambasivarao Korrapati, Leela Paladugu, Lakshmi Mattupalli and Krishna Janmanchi who contributed every day in the maintenance of this temple. All the devotees expressed their gratitude and congratulations to the Sri Vemuri Neelima-Srinivas couple who brought the idol of Sri Sai Baba from Rajasthan at their own expense. Furthermore, Dr. Ginjupalli said that here every Thursday, many Indian families that live in the Tri-City area perform Sai Baba Haarti and Bhajans with devotion, and they are very happy that the Pratishta program was held in such a grand manner. He said that in the future, there is a plan to build the largest Sai Baba temple in North America in the area of seventeen thousand square meters here.

As part of the three-day pratishta program, food was served (Annadaanam) to about three hundred people every day during lunch and dinner. The food donation program was organized by Mrs. Neelima Srinivas Vemuri, Selvi Vishnu Kumar, Tanuja Srinivas Vaddamani, Monica Mahesh Bhuti, Pallavi Amit Shahsane, Rohini Jitendra Vaidya, Subha Raghu Melgiri, Kalpana Murali Tamminana, Sujani Murali Ginjupalli, Hemamalini Mahesh Samatham and Nikita Rahul Gupta. Doctors of Indian origin settled in Michigan Dr. K.P. Karunakaran-Lakshmi, Raghuram Sarvepalli, Narendrakumar, Kishore Babu- Samrajyam Kondapaneni, Subbarao-Vani Sri Chavali, Subrahmanyam-Sundara Yadam, Anirudh-Vidya Bhandiwar, Vijaya Rao along with devotees from Detroit, Flint, Grand Rapids, Midland, Bay City, Saginaw and Canada were among the five hundred devotees who participated in the event.