Thirunettoor Mahadeva Temple

Thirunettoor Mahadeva Temple also known as Nettoor temple or Vyttila Mahadeva temple is located at Maradu, a small municipality about 10kms south from Ernakulam city center and 4kms away from Vytilla. The temple is dedicated to two main deities of the Hindu pantheon lord Siva and Lord Vishnu. Besides the idol of these main deities, the temple also houses idol of lord Yogeeswara, Sreekrishna, elephant god Ganapathi, Subrahmanya, goddess Saraswathy, Gulikan and serpent god. 'Thanthram', the right to offer poojas in the temple is held by members of Puliyannor Illam, a famous local brahmin family. The poojas are conducted three times a day for each deity.

Thirunettoor Mahadeva Temple is renowned for 'balitharpan', a ritual offered for the dead ancestors during the 'amavasya' or the full moon day of the month of Karkkidakam, according to the Malayalam calendar. On the day of Karkidaka vavu as well as the new moon day of Malayalam month of Kumbham large number of devotees visit the temple for paying obeisance to their dead ancestors. Vadapooja is the main offering during these days.

The main idol of the temple is belied to the installed by the great sage Parashurama. Another belief is that this temple had the distinction of being a common temple for all the major Namboothiri families residing in the 32 Namboothiri villages of Kerala. The annual temple festival falls on the Uthrattathi and Aswathy day of the Malayalam month of Dhanu.