Manchester (UK): Manchester City of United Kingdom recently hosted its fifth Rath Yatra festival amid spectacular fanfare and spiritual fervour. The abode of Lord of the Universe, Gita Bhawan, was aesthetically and elegantly decorated to mark the occasion. Organised by North West Odisha Society, this year’s festival evoked unusual interests, unexpected enthusiasm and unprecedented excitement among both the organisers and participants.
More than a thousand Odia and non-Odia devotees congregated at Gita Bhawan along with their families and relatives to take part in the event. At about 12.45 p.m. the four deities were taken in Dhadi Pahandi procession to the colourful chariot, parked outside Gita Bhawan. Superbly designed, the chariot was decked up with an amazing Patachitra painting designed by renowned artist Pragyan Babu. The whole atmosphere got reverberated with the recitals of hymns, roaring slogans like Hari Bol, Jai Jagannath, sounding of ‘hulahuli’, blowing off conch and playing of musical instruments such as Ghanta, Mardala, Jhanja and Mrudanga.
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The highlight of the celebration was the Pahandi of Devi Subhadra being performed exclusively by ladies. The chariot went through Wilbraham Road, Werburgh’s Road, Brantingham Road and Withington Road before getting back to Gita Bhawan premises. The distinguished dignitaries present include Councillor Vimal Choski and renowned spiritual preacher from India Devi Chitralekha. Famous motivational speaker Dr Deepak Gupta’s divine discourse was highly emotive and impressive. Special attractions of the festival include soul-soothing Bhajan recitals by noted vocalists like Tanishka Gupta, Dr. Siba Senapati, Disha Patnaik, Jayan Panigrahi, Dr. Kapeelmeet Kaur, Deeptiman Rath, Dr Rajinder Singh, Priyanka Geemon, Harshangda Bhatnagar, Soumya Panda, Ms. Manorama and Ms. Supriya.
Odissi Exponent Rekha Senapati, Saanvi Sahoo and Drishika Panigrahi enthralled the audiences with their scintillating dance recitals. The cultural show was ably presented and coordinated by Ace Anchor Priyanka Bebarta. The entire arrangements were well managed and skillfully conducted with active supervision of the Organising Committee consisting of Dr Siba Senapati, Rekha Senapati, Siba Ranjan Biswal, Bishnu Dash, Jeeban Panigrahi, Prasanta Sahu, Sudhakar Sahoo, Bibek Babu, Surendra Nath Acharya, Sanjeev Srichandan, Prabhat Singh and Sujeet Behera
