Durga pandals drawing crowds in Vijayawada

Vijayawada: Over 1,700 Ganesh pandals, the highest ever in the city, marked the celebration of Ganesh Chathurti this year and the public is now set for celebrating the 10-day-long Dasara festival.

Like Ganesh pandals for Vinayaka Chaviti, pandals for Goddess Durga are also increasingly coming up in city with each passing year.

Locals are catching up with the new tradition and the number of such pandals has doubled this year. As many as 88 Durga puja pandals have come up in various areas of the city so far, said police officials.

The number of such pandals which are locally called ‘Prabha’ was less than 50 last year. Several associations of colonies, work groups and others have formed committees and set up pandals with idols of Goddess Kanka Durga. Prayers are offered to the deities all through the day and devotees have been thronging the pandals to have a glimpse of the Goddess.

“We organise special puja to Goddess Durga every year by setting up pandals. This time more pandals have come up in city and it is helping people who can't visit the Kanaka Durga temple,” said K. Durga Rao, organiser of one such pandal at Suryarao Pet.

The Durga idols are immersed in the river on the day of Dasara or much later around Oct. 25.

Central zone of the city has more number of pandals, 39, followed by the west zone which has 31 pandals and east zone with 18 pandals.

To make it an interesting affair, some pandal organisers are offering lucky draw for devotees if they offer money for 'free meal for poor' programmes.