Grand farewell to Godavari Pushkaralu today

Hyderabad: Godavari Maha Pushkaralu, the 12-day long ritual that has drawn over five crore pilgrims to various ghats of Godavari river in Telangana, will come to a close in a grand way on Saturday.

The Maha Pushkaralu, which occur once in 144 years for Godavari river, commenced on July 14. The ritual witnessed an unprecedented turnout of 5.76 crore pilgrims on the banks of Godavari from Dharmapuri to Bhadrachalam till Friday, the penultimate day. On Friday alone, as many as 45,19,372 pilgrims took holy dip at Pushkar ghats located in all the five districts of Telangana. Nizamabad district recorded highest turnout with 15 lakh pilgrims thronging to the ghats,



official sources told. 

As many as 96,844 pilgrims utilised special health camps installed at all the 17 main Pushkar ghats. RTC run over 4,500 special busses apart from regular services on Friday. The Telangana government made all arrangements for the closing ceremony of the Pushkarams across the State. All the ministers will participate in the programme at several ghats in the evening. Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao thanked the officials for ensuring safe and secure Pushkarams, though crores reached the Godavari banks to take a holy dip. He told them to be alert on the last day, as the number of pilgrims would be much higher.