Owing to the almost 90 degree diversion in the natural direction of flow in the water of Ganga, this year here in Patna the Chhath devotees may face great hurdles as there would be limited ghats. All and sundry after Collectariate ghat towards West one may be surprised to witness that the holy water is nowhere to the stretch of 2 kms. There is almost 90 degree north turn in the natural direction of Ganga at Collectoriate ghat. Children can be seen playing and slum being surfaced at the once river bed e.g. Baans ghat and Pehelwan ghat.
Knowingly, out of 52 Ganga ghats that comes between Digha and Deedarganj almost 35 of them have no water at all. Giving the faith attached to the rituals of giving Arghhya() at a particular ghat, most of the devotees are likely to surpass the stretch of dry land on foot and do their prayer at the place comes most perpendicular to the original one. This also going to pose great challenge for the administration to provide security and basic arrangements for these devotees.
Amid all this, this austere festival of Chhath could not attract the attention of our secular Chief minister who gives more priorities to a goodwill tour to Pakistan, right after a hectic "adhikar rally" episode. He could not even continues the old rituals of inspecting ghats before Chhath puja, that used to be a warning for the civic authorities which helps the work get done. The carelessness of the municipality is obvious as most of the ghats are full of filth and garbage till Monday as the Vratis(who keeps fast) will begin reaching ghats from Saturday. Yesteryears, Nitish used to perpetually monitoring the ghats personally by boats and in 2009 he directed the officials to take help of Google Earth for locating the unsafe ghats in 2009. He then scolded the lethargic officers and also directed to make all necessary arrangements for the the safety and security of Chhath puja devotees. The bihari must be missing that fervour of the CM on the eve of this Mahaparva(the greatest festival) of Bihar.
Knowingly, out of 52 Ganga ghats that comes between Digha and Deedarganj almost 35 of them have no water at all. Giving the faith attached to the rituals of giving Arghhya() at a particular ghat, most of the devotees are likely to surpass the stretch of dry land on foot and do their prayer at the place comes most perpendicular to the original one. This also going to pose great challenge for the administration to provide security and basic arrangements for these devotees.
Amid all this, this austere festival of Chhath could not attract the attention of our secular Chief minister who gives more priorities to a goodwill tour to Pakistan, right after a hectic "adhikar rally" episode. He could not even continues the old rituals of inspecting ghats before Chhath puja, that used to be a warning for the civic authorities which helps the work get done. The carelessness of the municipality is obvious as most of the ghats are full of filth and garbage till Monday as the Vratis(who keeps fast) will begin reaching ghats from Saturday. Yesteryears, Nitish used to perpetually monitoring the ghats personally by boats and in 2009 he directed the officials to take help of Google Earth for locating the unsafe ghats in 2009. He then scolded the lethargic officers and also directed to make all necessary arrangements for the the safety and security of Chhath puja devotees. The bihari must be missing that fervour of the CM on the eve of this Mahaparva(the greatest festival) of Bihar.
