VIJAYAWADA: Heavy rush continued at Sri Durga Malleswara Swamy Varla Devasthanam (SDMSD) atop Indrakeeladri with Bhavani devotees turning up in huge numbers to relinquish the deeksha on Thursday.
The 10-day Dasara festivities ended on Wednesday evening with traditional rituals such as Purnahuti and others. It is estimated that more than 10 lakh devotees visited the temple during the festival, temple authorities said.
Elaborate arrangements were made for Bhavani devotees and traffic restrictions were imposed near the temple and adjacent Kanaka Durga Nagar and Brahmin street to avoid congestion. According to temple authorities, more than two lakh Bhavani devotees visited the temple on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday.
“Despite informing earlier that there would be no sophisticated facilities for performing the relinquishment process, devotees visited the temple which made the situation tough for us to manage. However, we arranged an empty land near Kummaripalem to facilitate them,” said the temple officials.
Meanwhile, several devotees have expressed their dissatisfaction against the temple officials for not constructing Homagundam as and place for offering ‘Irumudi’ and Bhavani Deeksha clothes.
“Offering irumudi to the Goddess marks relinquishment of our Deeksha. With no arrangements in place, the devotees were forced to offer irumudi at the temple and throw clothes in the river. This is nothing but an insult to the Bhavani devotees,” a devotee from Rajahmundry, Suryam Babu rued.