The weeklong festival of Kharchi Puja began on Monday morning at ‘Chodda Devata’ temple, 7 KMs east of Agartala with religious pomp and gaiety. The worship of the 14 Gods and Goddess began after ritual ablution at river Howrah in the morning.

Thousands of devotees from across the state and other parts of the country were assembled in the festival days for the worship of fourteen deities.

Kharchi Puja symbolizes a unique mixture of Hinduism and animism as the 14 Gods and Goddess are identified by both the faiths with different names. The puja is performed by tribal priest ‘Chantai’ and is basically a tribal religious ritual. But at the same time, it is also virtually a Hindu Puja with lakhs of devotees from both the tribal and non-tribal communities thronging and taking part in the religious activities. Kharchi also symbolizes the age-old unity of both tribal and non-tribal people of the state.

 As per the tradition, the week-long festival began with a procession. All deities and priests were escorted by the Tripura Police personnel, who also presented a guard of honour for the chief royal priest ‘Raj Chantai’.  Thousands of devotees joined them en route to Howrah River for the customary bathing or ablution of 14 deities, followed by the sacrifice of 108 animals in the presence of thousands of devotees, all at government expense.

Chief Minister Dr Manik Saha inaugurated the seven-day festival during an inauguration programme at Krishnamala open stage at the erstwhile capital of Tripura, Puran Habeli in presence of other dignitaries.

While, in his inauguration speech Chief Minister Deb highlighting the developmental activities of the state government said that his government is trying to give new bonanzas in their every step towards development, but the state government would not tolerate any kind of appeasement.

The weeklong fear not only brings brotherhood, but also provides good business among the traders as lakhs people will throng in fair days, said Dr Saha. During the weeklong festival, the cultural programmes would be performed by some renowned artists from the states of the country along with special artists from our neighbouring Bangladesh.

Giving details of the festival, authorities of the festival committee said, above 2000 stalls had been distributed to vendors, small and medium business establishments including those from West Bengal and Assam traders. The festival committee added that massive security arrangements have been made along with voluntary services for the devotees.

Police sources said, large number of security forces along with Traffic personnel and plain clothes police were deployed in the festival area. State police also installed CCTV cameras and watch towers in the festival premises.

During the inauguration programmes Ministers Sushanta Chowdhury, Bikash Debbarma, local MLAs Ratan Chakraborty, Swapna Debbarma, AMC Mayor Dipak Majumder and other administrative officials of the state were also present.