Chief minister Mamata Banerjee will pull the rope of the rath of lord Jagannath between 2 p.m. and 2.30 p.m. at Digha tomorrow.
The temple was thrown open to the devotees today. She took part in the netra festival, which is held a day before the Rath Yatra.
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To make the first Rath Yatra at the Jagannath temple Miss Banerjee held a meeting with the senior officials of the state government. Manoj Pant, chief secretary, Rajeev Kumar, director general of state police, H K Dwivedi, former chief secretary along with the district magistrate and superintendent of police, East Midnapore attended the meeting.
State ministers, including Chandrima Bhattacharya, Indranil Sen, Aroop Biswas and Snehashis Chakraborty attended the meeting.
To make the first ever Rath Yatra at the temple Miss Banerjee inspected the road which will be used by the three chariots to reach mashir bari (aunt’s home) situated a kilometre away from the temple.
She was accompanied by the senior officials, including the chief secretary and DG along with the ministers.
Later, she told news persons that puja will be performed at the temple from 9.30 a.m. The devotees can see the puja but will not be allowed to stay in the temple for a longer time to facilitate everyone to have a darshan of the trio.
During the journey, no one will be allowed to walk on the road. Barricades have been put up along the stretch on the road up to mashir bari to prevent the visitors from entering the road . The rope pulling the raths will pass through the barricades so that everyone could touch it, as touching the rope is considered to be holy. During the journey the rath will stop at the intersections so that the devotees can worship the deities.
More than three thousand policemen have been deployed to maintain peace and to ensure that no stampede takes place. Traffic sergeants with motorcycles have been deployed to control traffic.
The district administration expects two lakh people to witness the Rath Yatra procession tomorrow. All the rooms in hotels and lodges have been sold. Special arrangements have been made to prevent the visitors from going to the sea in case of inclement weather.
The businessmen at Digha said business has gone up by four to six times since the temple was inaugurated on 30 April.
The temple has been built by the HIDCO. Thousands of people are visiting the temple complex on weekends. Miss Banerjee had taken special measures to ensure that prasad reached every household across the state.