Durga Puja concludes in Jharkhand as devotees bid tearful adieu to Goddess

Ranchi: Durga Puja which was celebrated with much fanfare and grandeur after a gap of two years concluded in Jharkhand with the immersion of idols across the water bodies. In the capital city of Ranchi as well as in other prominent towns and districts the majority of the Puja committees performed the ‘Visarjan’ on Thursday itself while few others had done it on Wednesday itself.

The devotees, comprising men, women and children, bid adieu to Goddess Durga and her children with heavy hearts as the five-day festival came to an end. Before the immersion of idol in ponds and rivers, colourful immersion processions went around different cities.

A sea of devotees lined up on both sides of the roads to catch a last glimpse of the idols, while thousands assembled on the immersion ghats. The police, disaster management authorities and officials of the urban local bodies made all the arrangements for the immersions to avoid any mishap.

Prior to the idol immersion in Bengali dominated pockets of the state ritual of ‘Sindoor Khela’ was performed where married women applied sindoor on the goddess and offered sweets to her followed by applying sindoor on each other’s faces.

The Police Headquarters had sounded an alert in all the districts of the state and had asked the respective Superintendents of Police to ensure peaceful immersions. In the state capital Ranchi DC Rahul Kumar Sinha and SSP Kaushal Kishore kept a watch on the proceedings on the main road as through this route only bulk of the procession reached to their final destination of Bada Talaab for the immersion of the idols.