Heritage temples

I chanced upon a group that conserves and reconstructs heritage temples back to their glory with minimal changes to architecture and settings.. We were a motley group of 25 people from varied backgrounds on the trip to Pazhaverkadu.. I was quite impressed with the passion and commitment from some of the key members of the group who run an NGO called REACH. I must say that they are doing an amazing job of finding out heritage temples in ruins and building them back. For more info about them check this link

It just occurred to me that even economically, apart from the spiritual and mythological angles, such an activity spurs rural economy. Restoring a temple in a town /village brings back temple tourism and the town slowly can develop into a temple city and the economy can revolve around it.. Quite fascinating it was to see pics of the Adi Narayana Perumal temple back in 2006 and now in May 2009 after considerable cleaning and maintenence from local folks.. Calls for a lot of patience and perseverence but well worth the effort!! Kudos to REACH and their ilk!! May their breed flourish