OTDC offers special package for Banajaga Yatra 2015

The State-owned Odisha Tourism Development Corporation (OTDC) has come up with an exclusive package for the people desiring to witness the rituals of Banajaga Yatra, a part of the Nabakalabar festival this year.

Banajaga Yatra is a ritual where servitors search for the sacred wood required to make the new idols. Priests, servitors and other officials of the Jagannath temple will take part in this ritual from March 29 to April 1.

“We have chalked out a package of 1 day 1 night, 2 days 2 nights and 3 days 3 nights so that the tourists can follow the yatra team. The tourists will go by air-conditioned buses and stay at the Yatri Nivas with AC accommodation and vegetarian food,” said OTDC marketing manager Alok Mishra.

The Banajaga Yatra package will cost a person between Rs 1900 to Rs 3199 (package cost per head) depending on the duration of stay. A minimum of 10 persons are needed to form a group under a specific package.

Booking can be done online at www.visitorissa.org or at the OTDC regional offices in Delhi, Calcutta, Chennai, Hyderabad, Mumbai, the central reservation counters of the Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation. It can also de done at any OTDC panthanivas or its marketing manager’s office.

The Banajaga Yatra team consisting of 96 servitors of Shri Jagannath temple will be led by senior servitor Haladhar Dasmohapatra as dalapati (leader). The team will leave for Mangala temple at Kakatpur on March 29 in search of daru (log) for the making of the new images of the Lords for the ensuing Nabakalebara Rath Yatra scheduled on June 18.

Check also: 1996 Nabakalebar images of lord Jagannath from Puri

Banajaga Yatra (29th March to 1st April 2015) package details here.