Baripada: Law Minister Pratap Jena assured the servitors of Baripada Jagannath Temple that steps will be taken to fulfill their demands in next 15 days.
The assurance came at a meeting held in Bhubaneswar Tuesday in the presence of Law Minister Pratap Jena, Mayurbhanj Collector Vineet Bhardwaj, Baripada Sub-Collector Dibyajyoti Parida and other officials.
“The law minister assured us to fulfill our demands in next 15 days,” said Kameswar Tripathy, a servitor.
The servitors had launched their marathon pada yatra to Bhubaneswar July 29 (second time) to meet Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik over the issue of Dwitiya Srikshetra tag to Baripada Jagannath Temple.
However, the district administration intervened and transported the servitors in a vehicle to Bhubaneswar Tuesday.
It may be noted here that the servitors had earlier undertaken a pada yatra on the same issue June 19. After they walked 7km from the town, Revenue and Disaster Management Minister Sudam Marndi and Baripada Sub-Collector (in-charge of the Endowment Department) Dibyajoti Parida had rushed to the servitors and persuaded them to call off the pada yatra midway.
According to the servitors, during the 2019 poll campaign, they had raised the demand for Dwitiya Srikshetra status to Jagannath Temple in Baripada before Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik who had visited the temple then.
They pointed out that the Baripada shrine has its own specialty as Rath Yatra usually begins here a day after the Puri Rath Yatra.
Another hallmark of the Rath Yatra here is that only women devotees are entitled to pull the chariot of Devi Subhadra. Though people have been calling it Dwitiya Srikshetra, the government has not recognized it, the servitors lamented.
Recently, several outfits had rallied behind the servitors. Members of Barista Nagarika Manch had taken up the issue with the district administration June 28.
They had submitted a memorandum with signatures of thousands of people to ADM Braja Chandra Bhola. The memorandum was addressed to the Chief Minister.
PNN
