Indore: Over 7,000 devotees reached Bijasen Mata Temple and Annapurna Mata Temple each on Friday, i.e. seventh day of Navratri.
On the 7th day of Navratri also known as Maha Saptami, Hindu devotees worship Maa Kalratri form of the Goddess Durga, as shared by Annapurna temple priest Harishankar Sharma Shastri.
He added that due to the coronavirus outbreak, some devotees are visiting the temple and seeking blessings from outside the premises avoiding the crowd. However, many devotees stand in queues and wait for their turn for ‘darshan’ at the temples.
Aarti is being conducted at 9 pm, but no collective gathering is allowed even at that time. Only young girls known to be a form of goddess are allowed to perform Shagun ritual in most temples.
Panditranath temple and Harsiddhi temple have installed beautiful idols of the goddess, but the rush of devotees to these ancient temples is limited to few.
The usual pomp and colours of celebrations are missing in the city this year, due to coronavirus outspread.
Glorify the spirit within, yagya for devotion
On the seventh day of Navratri, religious organisations immersed in devotion by participating in group chanting, bhajan, yagya and Havana. Most of the gathering were organised virtually.
The day began with thousands of devotees attending Maharudra yagya and Athimaharudra yagya. Maha Sudarshan Yagya was performed in the evening.
“Navratri is celebrated to glorify the spirit in us. The spirit in us alone can destroy all negative qualities (inertia, pride, obsession, cravings, aversions, etc). By turning inward during Navratri, and getting in touch with the spirit within, we can overcome these negative tendencies and invoke the positive qualities that are within us, thus feeling elevated and renewed,” Dinesh Surana, coordinator for Art of Living organisation, cited the message from Sri Sri Ravi Shankar.
Durga Pujo
On Friday, Bengali community attended the ‘Maha Saptami Puja’ in various pandals in the city from 9:00 am onwards. ‘Bhog’ was distributed in packets after 12:30 pm.
Due to coronavirus, the usual dance and grand celebrations were not seen in pandals. "This year, we did not install the grand idol of goddess Durga and instead put up a flex,” Bengali club cultural secretary Ambuj Dutta said. He added this is the first time in 91 years that the idol has not been installed in pandal in Indore.
“On a positive note, we have built a proper place for preparing Bhog for the goddess this year,” Dutta said. The Bhog preparation place was inaugurated on Friday by MP Shankar Lalwani.
