In connection with the shrine on Rangasvami peak, the following note is recorded in the Gazetteer of the Nilgiris. "It is the most sacred hill on all the plateau. Hindu legend says that the god Rangasvami used to live at Karaimadai on the plains between Mettupalaiyam and Coimbatore, but quarrelled with his wife, and so came and lived here alone. In proof of the story, two footprints on the rock not far from Arakod village below the peak are pointed out. This, however, is probably an invention designed to save the hill folk the toilsome journey to Rangasvami's car festival at Karaimadai, which used once to be considered incumbent upon them. In some places, the Badagas and Kotas have gone even further, and established Rangasvami Bettus of their own, handy for their own particular villages. On the real Rangasvami peak are two rude walled enclosures sacred to the god Ranga and his consort, and within these are votive offerings (chiefly iron lamps and the notched sticks used as weighing machines), and two stones to represent the deities. The hereditary pujari is an Irula, and, on the day fixed by the Badagas for the annual feast, he arrives from his hamlet near Nandipuram, bathes in a pool below the summit, and marches to the top shouting 'Govinda! Govinda!' The cry is taken up with wild enthusiasm by all those present, and the whole crowd, which includes Badagas, Irulas, and Kurumbas, surrounds the enclosures, while the Irula priest invokes the deities by blowing his conch and beating his drum, and pours oblations over, and decorates with flowers, the two stones which represent them. That night, two stone basins on the summit are filled with ghee and lighted, and the glare is visible for miles around. The ceremonies close with prayers for good rain and fruitfulness among the flocks and herds, a wild dance by the Irula, and the boiling (called pongal, the same word as pongal the Tamil agricultural feast) of much rice in milk. About a mile from Arakod is an overhanging rock called the kodai-kal or umbrella stone, under which is found a whitish clay. This clay is used by the Irulas for making the Vaishnava marks on their foreheads at this festival."