Abstracto

Environmental Status Assessment of Guruvayur Temple Precincts in Kerala, India

Govind M.P., Yogesh Keskar

Guruvayur is a very important pilgrimage centre as well as one of the major south Indian temple attractions. It is also known as the Dwarka of the South. God Krishna in Guruvayur is popularly called Sri Guruvayoorappan. The whole life of this town revolves around the temple and there is very little activity beyond what is connected with the temple even though there are a few other noteworthy temples in the area. Core of activities occur within an area coming within the outer ring road surrounding the temple. Therefore, for the purpose of environmental status assessment, this area has been considered in this study. Under environmental status assessment of Guruvayur temple precincts, Municipal Solid Waste Management, Sewage Management & Storm Water Drainage and Crowd Management are covered, keeping in mind the fragile environment of the temple precincts. The analytic hierarchy process (AHP) has been applied to identify most suitable use for some of the existing parking lots. It is a structured technique for organizing and analysing complex decisions, based on mathematics and psychology.