Rituals Begin In Jagannath Temple After 10-Hour Standoff

Puri: After nearly 10-hour standoff, the sevayats began the rituals of the Lords at Jagannath Temple in Puri on Friday afternoon.

The servitors began the rituals after a meeting between the sevayat bodies and the Shree Jagannath Temple Administration (SJTA) in presence of the Puri collector Jyoti Prakash Das and the members of the Jagannath Temple Managing Committee.

Talking to mediapersons after the meeting, SJTA chief administrator Pradipta Mahapatra said the sevayats opened the doors of the main temple at 5 pm and performed the rituals.

“The rituals of the sibling deities are over and the devotees have entered the temple for darshan,” he added.

Mahapatra further said that since devotees from the far-off places in Odisha and other states have come to Puri for the darshan of the Lords, the temple will remain open till late in the night.

“We have made all arrangements to ensure that devotees have a smooth darshan of the Lords,” he pointed out.

Earlier in the day, thousands of devotees were deprived of the darshan of the Lords as the sevayat bodies’ protesting against the police assault on a sevayat, closed all the doors of the main temple.

The incident had taken place on Thursday afternoon when the temple police detained Bhabani Bhittarachha Mohapatra, a senior servitor, who was accompaning two devotees to the temple. An altercation ensued after the police asked him to reveal the identity of the two devotees. Later, Bhabani had a scuffle with the police in which some policemen allegedly assaulted him.