Ten-day Ganesh festival ends on emotional note

All the happy faces, all the rhythmic drum beats, all the merry shouting, and all the bright clothes could not hide the disappointment. Lambodar was leaving, and it would be another year before he would be back. The atmosphere reverberated with the chanting of Ganpati Bappa Morya, Pudhchya Varshi Lavkar Ya at the immersion of Lord Ganesh idols.
Amidst tight security, nearly 800 Sarvajanik Ganesh idols and thousands of household Ganpatis were immersed at lakes in Telangkhedi, Gandhisagar, Sakkardara, Sonegaon, Naik Talao and Koradi till late Sunday night.
Over 2,000 police personnel were deployed along the procession route. Besides this, nearly 500 police mitras were deployed for crowd control at the immersion sites.
Witnessed by a large crowd, most of the processions began from evening and took their traditional routes to the lakes. Various cultural troupes including dhols-tashas performed during the procession. Commissioner of police Pravin Dixit and joint commissioner of police Babasaheb Kangale supervised the security arrangements. Apart from fire brigade personnel, divers were also working on immersion day free of cost.
Incharge chief fire officer Chandrashekhar Jadhav informed TOI that six fire tenders were deployed at various immersion sites. Six fire personnel were deputed with each of them to avoid any untoward incidents like drowning.
Jadhav said firemen with the help of Sonegaon police constable Munindra Iwnate rescued Mohan Chandak (60) from Sonegaon lake on Sunday evening. Similarly, an alert cop of Koradi police station rescued a youth who fell into Koradi lake while immersing Ganesh idol. Jadhav had inspected all the immersion sites personally till late last night.
Interestingly, with a view to help devotees in immersing Ganesh idols, many NGOs arranged immersion vans that parked at various parts of the city. Some NGOs had taken upon themselves to provide for an ecofriendly immersion by asking people to remove the “nirmalya” and disposing it of separately. They had also made arrangement for immersion in smaller tanks so that the water bodies were not polluted.