The Delhi government would send senior pilgrims to the Jagannath Puri Yatra in Odisha as part of its free pilgrimage programme. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the general public was prohibited from participating in the Rath Yatra in 2020 and 2021. However, the prohibitions were eventually lifted. The yatra began on July 1 this year.
Two trains under the ‘Mukhyamantri Tirth Yatra Yojna’ transporting the senior pilgrims would depart for the yatra on July 11 and July 28, according to government authorities. Kamal Bansal, chairman of the Delhi government’s Tirth Yatra Vikas Samiti, said, ‘The Jagannath Puri Yatra is very popular. On the instructions of Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, free pilgrimage is being provided to senior citizens and now they will get an opportunity to visit the historic yatra. In the month of July, specially two trains will leave for the yatra’.
The programme was launched in July 2019 but was put on hold because of the pandemic. After 23 months, it was restarted last December.
The third wave of COVID-19, propelled by the Omicron version, however, caused further disruption to the plan in the first week of January this year, and it was only able to restart on February 14 with the flagging off of a Dwarka-Somnath train.
Post Your Comments