GODDESS LAXMI IN DHENKANAL

For the last fifty years or more, Goddess Laxmi is paying her customary visit to Dhenkanal starting with the day of Kumar Purnima. No, the people of Dhenkanal are bringing her to her earthly abode for an eleven days long stay in the small town that turns crazy in her presence. Starting from Govindpur, a roadside village in the outskirts of the city till Station Square, the city is decked like a bride. An unbroken chain of colourful lights illuminates the city as soon as darkness falls.
Goddesses sit on decorated pandals in their full glory. The atmosphere seems so intoxicating that some residents of the city wish that the celebrations never ended.
Dhenkanal , being a small town has a straight road running through the market. And unlike any other city in Orissa, the main attraction of the Laxmipuja celebrations is that you can the whole distance on foot with family or friends and go on watching the idols, the decorations etc without break. The experience id really heady, you feel like being in the light and the crowd the whole night.

An ORMAS(ORISSA RURAL DEVELOPMENT AND MARKETING SOCIETY) fair iS organised every year by to sponsor and help the rural businessmen and weavers who get ample business during the puja. Varieties of household items are bought and sold in the stalls starting from edible items to carpets and clothes. The fair is helpful especially to the women SELF HELP GROUPS who market their products produced throughout the year by their members.

Numerous small businessmen line the streets, either sitting on the ground with their products or vending in their stalls opened specifically for the puja. People are drawn to these stalls as flies to the fire. Besides people of Dhenkanal, people come to see the puja, from other cities as well.

When the Goddesses is immersed in water, and the decorations have been taken off, the city looks like a widow. But the people of the city go through their daily grind with the hope of the Goddess's arrival the next year.

The Laxmi puja celebrations in this hilly town of Dhenkanal are one of their kind.
The Puja brings a wondrous joy in the life of people who get relief from their monotonous, routine life and roam around in a mad frenzy and rare abandon these eleven days.