The celebration of this year’s Durga Puja, the biggest religious festival of the Hindus, ended yesterday with devotees bidding farewell to the Goddess Durga and her four children.
The five-day long festival came to an end through the celebration of Bijoya Dashami, in which the main ritual is the immersion of Durga idols in rivers.
In the capital, jubilant devotees joined colourful truck processions carrying statues of the deity Durga and her children – Lakshmi, Saraswati, Kartik and Ganesha – amid fanfare towards the Buriganga River for immersion.
Thousands of devotees, young and old, men and women, thronged the banks of the Buriganga for the ritual.
They joined hands to lower the idols into the water amid the beating of drums, prayers and chanting of hymns.
According to Dhaka Metropolitan Puja Celebration Committee, alongside the Buriganga river, hundreds of devotees also thronged the Turag, the Shitalakkhya and the Balu rivers in the capital to immerse the goddess.
In Chittagong, about 100,000 Hindu devotees thronged the Patenga beach to bid a tearful farewell to Durga by immersing the idol in the Bay of Bengal.
“Chittagong usually sees the highest number of immersions. At least, 200 idols were immersed at Patenga beach – the main immersion point – while the rest were immersed at Kalurghat, South Kattoli, Pathor Ghata Gongabari, Enayet Bazar Goal Para Pond, Parky Char Sea Beach and a few other places,” said Ratnakar Das Tunu, general secretary of Bangladesh Puja Udjapan Parishad, Chittagong.
According to Hindu belief, the deity, along with her four children, sets on a journey for Kailash, her husband’s abode, on Dashami.
Durga Puja is the worship of “Shakti” or divine power embodied in Goddess Durga symbolising the battle between good and evil where the dark forces eventually surrender to the divine forces. Durga Puja was celebrated at over 28,000 puja centres across the country, including over 200 in Dhaka city.
