Ground Report : July 2015

Wednesday, July 29, 2015

Oil pilferage on the rise on NH-44

Mantris toiled with cabinet rejig news

The news that state Cabinet expansions is likely soon has been making the rounds in political circles for some time now. And, this related competitions among ministers to make Godavari Pushkaralu a success.

It is said that ministers representing the same district competed with each other and toiled hard to make the Pushkaralu a success in order to protect their berth in the Cabinet.

Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao, recently during his tours, announced names of few TRS MLAs to be inducted in the next Cabinet expansion.

In Adilabad district, both the ministers Jogu Ramanna and Allola Indrakaran Reddy went around all the pushkar ghats in order to improve facilities for the visiting devotees during the river festivals.

While competing with each other, the ministers also worked in coordination for conducting Haritha Haram and Godavari Pushkaralu smoothly.

Entry of senior Congress leader D. Srinivas into TRS and possible induction of a woman MLA in Cabinet, besides possible announcement of induction of Koppula Eshwar into Cabinet by Mr Chandrasekhar Rao, got the ministers worried.

Hence, they made efforts to improve efficiency so that the CM retains their berth in the cabinet.

Experience of lifetime for visually impaired

Visually impaired students of OU at pushkara ghats

A group of eight members visually impaired students of Osmania University, Hyderabad, took a holy dip at the Basar pushkara ghat with religious fervor and gaiety and had a darshan of knowledge goddess Saraswati.

The students joined hands together and headed towards the pushkara ghat and took the holy dip without much difficulty at Basar.

The students came from Hyderabad by train and enjoyed the Godavari pushkaralu with a common friend briefing them about the arrangements and rush.

Visually impaired students studying at Osmania University, Hyderabad and Mahesh, Venkanna and Swamy Naik are natives of Nalgonda.

Srinivas Reddy of Karimnagar, Nagesh and Bhanu Kumar of Nizmabad and Venkatesh others came to pushkara ghats with the help of their common friend and took the holy dip with the help of volunteers, police present at the ghat.

“We can feel the flow of the river Godavari and visualize its beauty though they may not see its beauty though they may not see it and added that they can feel like any other person with our ‘Mano Netram’(inner conscious) though they are blind", said visually impaired Venkanna who took the holy dip.

He said for all the visually impaired friends who came to Basar this was a first time life time experience. They were grateful for being able to experience it.

Adivasis' wooden deities

Despite being attachment to the river Godavari since a long time, Adivasis do not practice Godavari pushkaralu and will not take holy dip in the river Godavari as they have no such tradition.

However, Adivasis give bath popularly known as ‘Ganga Snan’ to the wooden idols of their traditional gods like Bheemanna, Jalli Devara and Nagoba in the river Godavari twice in a year.

Adivasi leader Sidam Shambu said, “We do not observe Godavari pushkaralu. We have our own set of customers and traditions on various occasion”.

They Adivasis take their traditional gods in a procession to give them bath at identified local streams and also some places at river Godavari.

“It is must for the Adivasis to take dip in the water along with their gods to purify themselves (Shuddi)”, Sidam Shambu said, adding that they will give bath to their traditional gods in Pushyamas and Vaishakam’.

He said they too do Pindapradan called ‘Thoomu’ to their ancestors and forefathers while giving bath to their gods.

There is a tradition among the Adivasis that they equate their elders who died, to that of gods, by performing rituals in their names on the occasion of giving bath to their gods. This traditional is called ‘Karun’ merging the elders who died into their gods.

Adivasis give bath to their traditional gods at ‘Padmalpuri Kako’ at Rampur in Dandepali, considered to be a sacred place as they believe it was a birth place of Adivasi dance ‘Dandari’ to be performed by the Gussadis on the occasion of Diwali.

Another place was Kalamadugu in Jannaram mandal on the banks of river Godavari. The ‘Kattodas’, traditional priests of Adivasis, will perform rituals. Various clans like Atram, Nitham, Sidam, Mesram among the Gods will perform their traditional rituals to their specific gods.