Telangana witnesses grand Pran Pratishta celebrations

In Adilabad, Nirmal, Mancherial and Kumram Bheem Asifabad district and mandal centres, people sported saffron attires and chanted 'Jai Sriram' while carrying flags and wearing tilak on their foreheads

Hyderabad: Chants of ‘Jai Sriram’ echoed on the streets across Telangana on Monday as devotees of Lord Ram celebrated the Ayodhya Ram Mandir Pran Pratishta in grand fashion.

From special puja rituals at temples, including at the Sri Seetha Ramachandra Swamy Devasthanam in Bhadrachalam, known as Dakshin Ayodhya, to Shoba Yatras with devotees carrying saffron flags, chanting mantras and ‘Jai Sriram’, the State wore a festive look with saffron dominating the colours of the day.

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From devotees bursting crackers, organizing bhajans to politicians too vying for a share of the attention with flex boards, there were processions carrying replicas of Ram Lalla all across. Apartments saw large congregations of residents right from the early hours of the day as the rituals began in Ayodhya, with some gated communities using their open spaces to set up large screens, bhajans and pujas. There were large scale food distribution programmes as well in almost all colonies organized by resident welfare associations.

From Adilabad, Nirmal, Mancherial to Kumram Bheem Asifabad and all across the erstwhile districts of Karimnagar, Khammam, Warangal and Nalgonda, there were people on the roads sporting saffron attire, wearing the ‘tilak’ on their foreheads and celebrating the occasion.

Several private schools declared a holiday, some of them after classes in the first half of the day in view of the Pran Pratishta, while Hindu households lit lamps to mark the event.

Villages joined the festivities with special pujas in temples that were decked up from the night before, ‘annadanam’ programmes and ‘abhishekhams’ and also giant screens for the people to sit together and watch the live proceedings from Ayodhya.

The State BJP unit too organised a live telecast of the event at Nizam College Grounds in Hyderabad. The event was attended by Governor Tamilisai Soundararajan and senior party leaders including union Tourism Minister G Kishan Reddy and Rajya Sabha member K Laxman.

BJP units across the State too organized special poojas and annadanam apart from distributing sweets.