Indian temples shift to online real time supply

HINDU temples are setting up just-in-time electronic connections with suppliers to keep the hungry fed.

The temples, which feed millions of poor daily, are looking at online connections as a way to beat food profiteers, according to the Economic Times.

India's richest temple, the Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanams, in the southern city of Chennai (Madras), began checking prices at online commodities exchanges this month and beat mark-ups from traditional suppliers of up to 50 per cent.

It is the first time in India that a temple authority has tied up with an online commodity broker.

Sikhism's holiest site, the Golden Temple in the northern city of Amritsar, and other shrines and temples around India are likely to follow suit, the newspaper thinks. µ