The Mahashthami Puja was celebrated at various temples and community puja pandals with gaiety and fervour on Thursday. Since the morning, devotees were witnessed visiting various temples and community puja pandals. The latter includes Karanpur Durga Puja, Bengali library Durga Puja, Hathibarkala Durga Puja, Sahastradhara Durga Puja and Junior Club Puja in Raipur. Kumari Puja-worshipping a virgin girl as an incarnation of the mother Durga- as conceived by Swami Vivekananda in Belur Math near Calcutta, was held at many places.
Hundreds congregated at these places to offer puja to the Goddess, worshipped as the slayer of the Asuras, the Evil incarnate, to ensure the reign of the Good. Devotion and delight were palpable in the air throughout the auspicious day.
The additional general secretary of the Durga Puja Committee, Raipur, Tapas Chakraborty said the Mahasthami Puja was held at 7.30 in the morning. After that "Pushanjali" was offered to the Goddess at 9.30 am followed by "Sandhi Puja" at11.45 am. 108 lamps were lit and a special puja was held to mark the occasion. As per the purohit, Mrinal Bhattacharjee, the " Sandhi Puja", marks the exact moment when the Demon King ‘ Mahisasur’ was killed by the " Devi Durga".
During the noon, Bhog was offered to the Devi and nearly four thousand devotees participated and got "Prasad" and "Bhog". In the evening, cultural programmes were held as usual. The noticeable thing this year is the eco-friendly idols of the goddess and her family.