Siddhivinayak padyatra cancelled, Mumbai devotees walk 25km at home

A Kandivli resident, Rakesh Bhandari, and his group of 25 pilgrims, who recently completed their 175th padayatra (walk) from their homes to the Siddhivinayak temple,

A Kandivli resident, Rakesh Bhandari, and his group of 25 pilgrims, who recently completed their 175th padayatra (walk) from their homes to the Siddhivinayak temple, on Tuesday continued their monthly tradition by enacting the pilgrimage by walking at their respective homes.

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Around 21 people including Bhandari walked for around 20 to 25 km at their respective homes, the same distance that they covered during their monthly group walks to Prabhadevi’s Siddhivinayak temple.

“I had hoped that the lockdown will end on April 14, post which we would have walked to Siddhivinayak temple. However, as the lockdown was extended, we didn’t have an option but to walk at our homes to continue our tradition of padayatra,” said Bhandari. Bhandari along with a group of seven friends started the tradition of carrying out padayatras in 2005.

The group now has about 200 members with a core team of around 25 people. On a monthly basis, at least 10 to 15 members walk to the shrine with their family and friends.

“It was tough initially. But over the years, it became a fun exercise for all us. Considering we are all runners, when we reach near Mahim signal, we run the remaining stretch for 4.5 km,” said Rajesh Sharma, who stays at Ghatkopar.

On Tuesday morning, they had decided a designated time when everyone would run at their homes and click a selfie at the end to get a feeling that they were all together.

The run timing for each of them differed from three to five hours. A friend of theirs, who had participated in more than 100 padayatras with them before moving to Australia, also joined the group along with his wife on Tuesday.

After the run, each of them prayed to the deity from their place and watched the prayers taking place live on Siddhivinayak temple’s website.

Sanjay Karve, a chartered accountant who is a member of the group, spoke of a time when the group had managed to wade through waterlogging to reach the temple during monsoon.