Nabakalebara preparations insufficient till date

By Rajkumar MohantyPuri, May 28: The first high level coordination committee meeting for the July 18 annual Rath Yatra of the Nabakalebara year that was held on the Wednesday ended without discussing all the points as pandemonium prevailed after a series of issues were raised by some temple servitors.It was revealed that most of the infrastructure development works for Nabakalebara ritual of Lord Jagannath, his siblings Balabhadra and sister Subhadra and Sudarshan remains incomplete till date despite the respective departments’ commitment to complete the job before the deadline.Maheswar Mohanty, BJD legislator from Puri and chairperson of the Nabakalebara Infrastructure Development Committee expressed concern over the issue.Among other things, the committee discussed about supply of uninterrupted power, potable water and laying of drains while important issues such as supply of essentials commodities, passenger transport by road and railways, security arrangements maintenance of law and order, post and telegraph service, about construction of parking lots and information centres could not be discussed in the meeting.The PHD would provide 58 million litres per drinking water per day during the festival.It would create 60 deep and 1400 shallow tube wells besides the existing systems in the city.The power supply officials informed that continuous power supply would be provided to the city through two 33KV stations established at Samagara and Samuka stations.Members expressed concern over the outbreak of jaundice and poor health care facility in the city.They alleged that the district headquarters hospital was unable to provide treatment because of shortage of staffs and doctors in the hospital.The ongoing row over construction and renovation of the existing bus stand at an estimated cost of Rs.2.4 crore in the city between the civic body and the PWD has caused inordinate delay while it was alleged poor work was executed while renovating the holy ponds.The storm water discharge lines were yet to be completed while the repairs and construction of roads were delayed.The committee was informed that the all the construction work would be completed by June 15.Special trainsEast Coast Railway would ply 200 special trains to Puri during the festival.The ongoing work of the doubling the tracks to Puri would be completed soon, the railway officials informed.The permanent Mella shed for the pilgrim shelter being constructed near the Puri railway station at a cost of about Rs.10 crore is nearing completion.The parking lot at the station and two new platforms have been completed to facilitate movements of the trains.Efforts were on to run a number of local trains from Malatipatpur railway station to Puri during the fete.As many as 64 ticket booking counters would operate to cater to the needs of the visitors.SecurityDirector General of Police Sanjib Marik had set deadline for completion of all ongoing construction related to Nabakalebara preparation work like construction of parking lots, temporary pilgrim shelter sheds, drainage and sewer lines before June 15 so that the police security planning could the made out.He was evaluating the security and other logistic arrangements in a high level meeting of senior officials and engineers of concern departments on Thursday.Addressing media persons, Marik said five layer security arrangements for the Sri Jagannath temple and Gundicha temple and entire city would be made to ensure safe conduct of the fete.An unspecified number of police personnel including the NSG, RAF and SOG besides bomb detection and disposal units would be pressed into service.This apart anti-sabotage teams would put in place to thwart any such attempt.A total of 190 CCTV cameras were being installed by the police housing corporation across the city and strategic places to monitor the crowd movement.A number of CCTVs would be installed inside the Sri Jagannath temple complex.This apart all the hotels, apartments and commercial establishments were directed to install CCTVs in their facilities.Baggage scanners would be installed at the Atharnulla, Mangalaghat and Balighat the three entry points to the city while two scanners would be installed at two gates of the main temple besides one at Railway station. The security personnel of the Coast Guard and the personnel of marine police stations would patrol the beach line of Puri in speed boats while air surveillance would be conducted.The entire Bada Danda (Grand Road), the venue for the Nabakalebara Rath Yatra, would be declared as no flying zone during the fete.An additional helipad would be constructed at Baliapanda area for landing of VVIP guests.Three air ambulances would be kept in readiness at Talabania helipads.A state-of-the-art police control room would function from the town police station, the DGP said.