Photos: Devotees bring Ganesha home as 10-day festival begins

The ten-day long Ganesh festival kicked off with zeal and fervour across India on Thursday. The festival began with devotees, mostly attired in traditional clothes, bringing colourfully-crafted idols of the elephant-headed God in their homes and pandals and installing them amid chants of 'Ganapati bappa moraya', beating of drums and and sprinkling of 'gulal'.

Updated on: Aug 06, 2019 6:57 PM IST

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Devotees carry an idol of the Hindu god Ganesha from a workshop to a place of worship at Dadar in Mumbai. Devotees of Ganesha look forward all year to Ganesh Chaturthi or Ganeshotsav, a 10-day festival during which Ganesha idols are brought home or to public pandals and followed by ten days of festivities. (Kunal Patil / HT Photo)

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A boy sits with an idol of Ganesha in the trunk of a car in Mumbai. This year, the festival is being held from September 13 to September 23. (Rafiq Maqbool / AP)

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Devotees dance as they take an idol to a place of worship in Ahmedabad. Ganesh Chaturthi is believed to mark the birth anniversary of the deity and is celebrated on the fourth day (chaturthi) of the Hindu calendar month of Bhadrapada. (Amit Dave / REUTERS)

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A priest offers prayers at the foot of a Ganesh idol. Recorded public celebrations of the festival date back to the Maratha empire in the 16th century. The festival in its present form saw resurgence under Bal Gangadhar Tilak as a rallying ground for people beyond caste and class lines and a means of spreading ideas of nationalism and a sense of unity. (Noah Seelam / AFP)

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Devotees seen at the APMC market in Navi Mumbai to buy decorative items for the festival. During Ganeshotsav, devotees throng pandals and feast on sweets such as modak, which is considered Ganesha’s favourite, lending him the additional title of ‘Modakpriya’. (Bachchan Kumar / HT Photo)

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People play drums as they transport an idol for the Ganesh Chaturthi festival in Mumbai. On the final day, the idols are immersed in water (visarjan) to the chants of Ganpati Bappa Moraya, Pudhchya Varshi Lavkar Ya. (Punit Paranjpe / AFP)

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A devotees carries an idol in a local train at Dadar. The festival is most commonly associated with the state of Maharashtra, while celebrations also occur in Tamil Nadu, Goa and Kerala. The ten day festival is also celebrated in Delhi with the presence of at least two dozen Ganesh Mandals. (Kunal Patil / HT Photo)

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A devotee transports an idol of the elephant-headed God in a taxi in Mumbai. With massive crowds expected to participate in the celebrations, security arrangements across the city see an increase in CCTV cameras, use of drones and deployment of anti-terror squads and bomb squads. (Rafiq Maqbool / AP)

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Devotees offer prayers before entering their homes with an idol during Ganesh Chaturthi festival celebrations in Mumbai. (Rafiq Maqbool / AP)

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A view of a pandal at Chinchpokli in Mumbai. Several beautifully decked up pandals have been erected in all major cities and towns in the state, including Mumbai, Pune, Nashik and Nagpur, where huge idols of Lord Ganesha have been placed on raised platforms for people to worship. (PTI)