Shri Venkateswara Balaji Temple

From its humble roots, half a century ago, this steadily growing Hindu temple is now regarded as the largest of its kind in the UK and Europe. Each year, an increasing number of devotees and visitors, currently nearly half a million, visit the temple. Many visiting groups including over 10,000 students from schools, colleges, and University, come to the temple for guided tours. The journey began in the late 1970s when a group of Hindu Diaspora from the Indian sub-continent shared a vision to create a temple, a sanctuary for prayer, and meditation. The inspiration was the Venkateswara (Balaji) temple located in Tirupathi, in South India. Initially, the group held regular monthly community prayers at Shri Geeta Bhawan Mandir in Handsworth, Birmingham. In 1980, a deity of Lord Venkateswara, set in an ornately carved wooden Mandapam, was installed in the Mandir. Monthly pujas were performed, initially on the first Sunday of each month and then weekly every Sundays, attended ...