The Daru for carving of the idol of Devi Subhadra was located at the Nilakantheswar temple in Adhangagada under Biridi block in Jagatsinghpur district. This is the second Daru identified in the district after lord Balabhadra’s was identified in front of Maa Sarala shrine at Jhankada.
Chief Administrator of Shree Jagannath Temple Administration (SJTA) Suresh Chandra Mohapatra made a formal announcement on the location of Devi Subhadra’s Daru on Friday. Mohapatra said Dalapati of the Banajaga team Haladhar Das Mohapatra had informed SJTA in writing about the location of Devi Subhadra’s Daru late Thursday night. Mohapatra, accompanied by the Jagatsinghpur Collector and SP, visited the site on Friday morning and made the formal announcement here. Barricades have been put up around the assigned tree.
“We have asked a team of sevayats to come here. On their arrival, a detailed layout for the yajna mandap and Sabarapalli will be worked out with them. All arrangements will be made for the expected large number of devotees to the place,” informed Mohapatra.
Jagatsinghpur Collector Satya Mallick, who accompanied Mohapatra, said, “It’s a great pleasure for us that the second Daru - that of Maa Subhadra - has been identified in Biridi. We are very happy that the Daitapatis have selected the second Daru in our district and have informed the SJTA accordingly. We will immediately put up barricades to protect the Daru. Construction of Yajna griha and other arrangements will be expedited. Traffic control will obviously be a big challenge for us here as this is located amid farmland. We will immediately start working on it from now. It will be done the same way it was done at Jhankada where lord Balabhadra’s Daru was identified.”
After completion of a 48-hour yajna, the cutting of the Daru for lord Balabhadra began on Friday evening after Biswabasu and Vidyapatis touched the tree with golden and silver axes. Amid chants of Jai Jagannath by thousands of gathered devotees at the site, the Biswakarmas (carpenters) servitors used real iron axes to fell the tree. The job was expected to be over late in the night.
Meanwhile, lord Sudarshan’s Daru on Friday entered Koili Baikuntha through the Uttara Dwar of the Shree Mandir after the Sagadi halted for the night at the Alam Chandi temple at Atharnala on the outskirts of Puri. lakhs of devotees and residents marched with the Sudarshan Daru Sagadi along the Grand Road (Badadanda) to the Shree Jagannath temple. After completion of certain rituals at the Alam Chandi temple on Thursday night and Friday morning, people pulled it all the way to the Shree Mandir in a spectacle that recalled the Rath Yatra of the lords.