Mumbai: For the first time, trustees of Mumbadevi Temple celebrated ‘Mango Utsav’ on the occasion of Vaishakh Poornima on May 18, where idols of ‘Mumbadevi’ and ‘Annapurnadevi’ alogn with entire temple premises were decorated with mangoes.
Mumbadevi Temple is the oldest temple in the city constructed during the British era by fisherfolk. Everyday close to 20,000 devotees pay their visit to the temple to seek blessings of Goddess Mumbadevi. Hemant Jadhav, manager of Mumbadevi Temple said, mango festival is celebrated every year in other temples across the state.
“It was the first time we decided to celebrate ‘Mango Utsav’. For which we requested all our regular devotees to donate their share of mangoes to the temple so that it can be celebrated at larger scale. More than 300-400 dozens of Alphonso mangoes were offered to Goddess Mumbadevi,” said Jadhav. He further said looking at the footfall and belief of the devotees the management of the temple has decided to celebrate this festival every year on the same auspicious day.
“Due to Bank holiday, a large number of devotees visited the temple for the Goddess’ blessings. We also performed Navchandi Yagna in the temple premises by five priests. The mangoes which were offered to Goddess Mumbadevi were distributed among the devotees as a prasad,” added Jadhav.
The devotees present at the occasion were happy and were mesmerised to see their goddess decorated with mangoes. We have seen our goddess being decorated with jewellery, but I could not believe our goddess Mumbadevi looked so extravagant when decorated with mangoes.
The work done by the temple management has been appreciated by many devotees and are also happy with the decision taken of celebrating it every year,” said R S Mishra, a regular devotee. On this occasion the temple trustee, Neena Kapadia who was present there, said “The Mumbadevi Bhakti Mandal and Mumbadevi Vyapari Mandal contributed quite generously to make this event a grand success.”
