VISAKHAPATNAM: Festive fervour prevailed on the ‘Maharnavami’ as the diverse communities in the city celebrated the last day of Navratri with piety and pomp on Monday. Various cultural programmes, competitions and traditional food awaited the community people from morning till night.
Among all the communities, the Odiyas and the Bengalis in the city celebrated the Navratri in a grand manner with their family and community members.
Not only being the largest populated and oldest communities, the Odiyas and the Bengalis have been celebrating the festival in the city for nearly a century now.
The Bengali Association was established in 1928 and since then the community has been celebrating the festival in the Port City at the Town Hall.
Similarly, the Utkal Sanskrutika Samaj is celebrating the Dasara festival at the Jagannath temple.
The Bengali Association celebrates the festival within the community from Shashti.
The Town Hall in the city is seen organising all the five days different kind of culturals and games for the children and elders and the last day of Navratri concluded with many entertainment programmes. People of the community from children to elders were seen offering pushpanjali to the Goddess which is a ritual performed on an empty stomach.
“On the day the tradition of blowing conch during performing rituals is compulsory and this ritual was made a competition among the married women of the community. Besides, the trained children of the community performed classical dance and songs,” said AN Bhattacharjee, the secretary of Bengali Association.
The Jagannath temple was tastefully decked up and the troupe from Bhubaneswar ‘Jyoti Kala Parishad‘ performed Odissi, Sambalpuri and Chhau dances with vibrant spirit.
“With eight female dancers and four male dancers aged between 13 to 18 rehearsed to perform Odissi, Chaau and Sambalpuri on the occasion. We perform across the nation and this is our first visit to Vizag. The dances depicted episodes from the Mahabharat and life story of Gautam Buddha. They will be performing the ballet,” said Jyotirekha Mohanty, head of the troupe.
“However, we perform different kinds of culturals to delight the people but the celebration on the Navami makes the people leave their houses and visit the temple. On the Mahanavami day, the Odisha government has been sending different dance troupe every year to showcase the art and heritage of Odisha for the last 20 years,” said SC Choudhury, the president of Utkal Sanskrutika Samaj.