By IANS
Puri : Preparations for the annual rath yatra of Hindu god Jagannath have begun in this seaside town in Orissa with priests performing rituals to purify the wooden logs used to construct chariots for deities.
Every year, Lord Jagannath, his brother Balabhadra and sister Subhadra are taken out of the 12th century Jagannath temple in chariots to another shrine in the same town called Gundicha. The festival will begin July 4.
Thousands of devotees pull these chariots with the help of four ropes tied to each chariot. The chariot of Lord Jagannath is known as Nandighosh, that of Balabhadra as Taladhwaja and Subhadra’s as Padmadhwaja.
The annual procession is a celebration of the journey of Jagannath’s journey from Dwarka to Kurukshetra along with Subhadra and Balabhadra some 5,000 years ago.
The priests Monday evening performed the rituals in front of the temple, about 56 km from state capital Bhubaneswar, temple public relations officer Laxmidhar Pujapanda told IANS.
Like in the past, the temple administration asked the state forest department to provide about 1,000 wooden logs to be used for constructing the gigantic chariots for the festival. Organising the procession costs more than Rs.3 million.
Pujapanda said the forest department has already supplied at least 43 large wooden logs and three of them had been placed in front of the temple and worshipped.
Every year, priests perform this ritual on Basanta Panchami – the fifth day of the Hindu month of Magh that also marks the beginning of spring – which fell on Monday this year.
Work for the construction of chariots will start on Akshaya Trutiya – the third day of the bright half of the lunar Vaisakha month in the Hindu calendar.