Priests sit inside water tubs with mobiles to appeal to rain gods in Halasuru

Mangalore Today News Network

Halasuru, Jun 08, 2019 : While most people take to sipping coolers and taking multiple showers to beat the heat, priests at a Karnataka temple have gone one step deeper in their efforts to bring some respite from the scorching sun, News18 reported.

 

The priests in Someshwara temple in Halasuru conducted a special puja in honour of the rain god. The idea was that pleased with the puja, the god would show mercy in the form of cooling showers, thus bringing the much awaited monsoon season to India.

While praying to rain gods is not unheard of in India, there was, however, something different about this particular Puja. In photos that went viral on social media, three priests can from the temple can be seen. One of them is conducting hawan. But in another image, two more priests appeared to be sitting inside huge patilas filled with water. To further add to the cryptic image, the priests seemed to be holding what looked like smartphones while immersed in the water.

According to the ANI post, the incident occurred on June 6.

The images were shared by news agency ANI on Twitter and have garnered many laughs from monsoon-craving Indians who have been reeling under unbearable temperatures across the country. Many on social media joked that the two priests were sitting inside the tubs, playing PUBG. Yet others found the image relatable to their own tendency to carry their phones everywhere, even inside the shower.

In fact, netizens even ran a caption contest for the image.

Some netizens tried to point out the irony of wasting water in parched times while others joked that this was the best way to use the phone in summer time.

Apparently the bizarre sitting inside the tubs was part of the puja rituals. Some saner netizens surmised that the priests were probably reading their "mantras" on their phones, though not all were impressed by the tech-saviness.

After a delay of a week, monsoon hit the Kerala coast on Saturday, marking the official commencement of the four-month rainfall season in the country. Whatever the Karnataka priests’ strategy to please the rain gods was, looks like it worked!