Srinagar: Thousands of devout Kashmiri Brahmin Hindus called Pandits are flocking to Tulla Mulla, a sleepy village about 27-km north of capital Srinagar, to pray at Kheer Bhawani as the annual festival of Zeystha Ashtami begins on Monday. Kheer Bhawani is the most revered place of worship of Kashmiri Pandits. Though the number fluctuates depending on the ground situation and weather conditions, they usually turn up in thousands at the place of worship during the annual mela (fair) to seek blessings from goddess Ragnya Devi, coinciding with the festival of Zeystha Ashtami. The Valley’s aboriginal Brahmin community worships Ragnya Devi, better known as Kheer Bhawani, as their protective patron deity Kuladevi. The main rituals connected with the annual fair are scheduled to take place on Tuesday, an official holiday in Jammu and Kashmir. On Sunday, dozens of buses, other collective transport vehicles and private cars ferried pilgrims from Jammu, Delhi and other places to Srinagar and then to Tulla Mulla and, as per the officials sources, more carrying a large number of devotees are on the way. A few hundred pilgrims have arrived here from Delhi, Mumbai and Bangaluru via flights, the officials said. A convoy of sixty J&K Road Transport Corporation (SRTC) buses ferrying about 2,500 pilgrims which was flagged off by Inspector General of Police Bhim Sen Tuti in presence of Deputy Commissioner (Jammu) Sachin Kumar Vaishya and Relief and Rehabilitation Commissioner (M), J&K Dr. Arvind Karwani, amid chanting of religious hymns and slogans at Jammu on Sunday morning has entered the scenic Valley. The convoy will be escorted back to Jammu on June 4, the officials said. Most of these pilgrims are displaced Kashmiri Pandits who will join their co-religionists who chose not to leave the Valley in the 1990s to worship, have the darshan and perform puja at Kheer Bhawani, on Zeystha Ashtami or Jaisht Ashtami. The expatriates will also seize the opportunity for meeting their lost Muslim neighbours and friends. A vast majority of Kashmiri Pandits fled their hearth and homes in the Valley after the separatist campaign burst into a major violence in 1989-90. Majority of the displaced families took shelter in makeshift or rented accommodations in the erstwhile state’s winter capital Jammu, Delhi and other parts of the country. Kheer Bhawani fair marks the annual pilgrimage to the sacred spring to seek the blessings of goddess Ragnya Devi. The spring is on an island and in the centre of it (spring) is a small marble temple. The occasion is the eighth day of the full moon (Ashtami Shuklapak) when, legend has it, the goddess changes the colour of the waters of the spring-to turn rosy, various shades of green, diluted milky and light blue. The devotees wash their clothes and abstain from eating meat. They offer milk, candy sugar raisins, clarified butter and candles amidst chanting vedic and tantric hymns. Large numbers of Muslims, locals as well as from neighbouring and far off places, also turn up at the mela to greet the Pandit devotees and in their quest to find in them their old neighbors and friends. Politicians also make a beeline to Kheer Bhawani festival to extend their greetings to the devotees. Though the main congregation marking Zeystha Ashtami is held at Tulla Mulla, the devotees also visit and pray at temples dedicated to goddess Ragnya Devi at Tikker in Valley’s Kupwara district, Devsar and Manzam in Kulgam district and Logripora in Anantnag district. A government spokesman here said, “The necessary arrangements of accommodation, langar facility and essential services have been made by the concerned district administration in collaboration with the Relief Organization for the convenience of the pilgrims”. Some officials believe that though Kheer Bhawani has attracted huge crowds of devotees during the annual fairs in the past decade, the recent terror attack at Pahalgam in which 25 Hindu tourists and a local Muslim horse-handler were killed may overshadow this year’s event. However, J&K Director General of Police Nalin Prabhat assured tight security measures, including extensive surveillance, a command center, and increased police deployment, have been put in place to ensure the safety of the pilgrims attending the event. During his visit to Kheer Bhawani on Sunday, the DGP reviewed the on-ground situation to ensure a peaceful and incident-free pilgrimage, an official release said. Later in the day, Chief Secretary Atal Dulloo also arrived at the temple to inspect the preparations. While speaking to reporters Dulloo, himself a Kashmiri Pandit, said, “All the arrangements have been put in place. Adequate security measures have also been ensured for the safe and peaceful commencement of the Mata Kheer Bhawani Mela.”
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