Oneness Temple, Varadaiahpalem

Ekam, the Oneness Temple, stands at Varadaiahpalem in the Tirupati district of Andhra Pradesh, on open land beside the Eastern Ghats. The Oneness organisation founded by Kalki Bhagavan built it at an estimated cost of $75 million, and it opened in April 2008. The architect Prabhat Poddar of Auroville designed it using the Golden Ratio, drawing on architecture, geobiology and Vaastu Shastra.

Built of white marble, with domes, spires, stupas, latticed windows and ornate doors, the 32.85-metre building rises on a 130 by 106 metre platform ringed by water at its four corners. Its three floors are each a large meditation hall, and more than 8,000 people can meditate inside at once. The middle floor is the Artha Kama hall, and the top floor, Dharma Moksha, is a hall without pillars that holds a golden orb about 36 inches across. Chennai is roughly 73 km away and Tirupati about 80 km, with Tada the closest railway station.