The Dakshineswar temple will soon have a light-and-sound show on its history, chief minister Mamata Banerjee said on Monday while inaugurating a skywalk connecting Dakshineswar station to the shrine’s main gate.
“We will have a light-and-sound show capturing the history of the temple.... Why did Ramkumar Chattopadhyay (Ramakrishna’s elder brother) come to the Kali temple here to perform puja before it was the turn of Gadhadhar? The show will cover all aspects,” Mamata said. “The tender has been floated... work should start shortly.”
The skywalk will be open to devotees who are expected to turn up in large numbers on Tuesday on the occasion of Kali Puja.
People are expected on the skywalk from morning. There are CCTV cameras on the skywalk to keep tabs on it 24X7.
“The skywalk’s biggest challenge would be on Tuesday when the temple is likely to see the maximum number of devotees in a year,” an officer of Baranagar police station said. “We have made arrangements so that devotees can use the skywalk throughout the night on Tuesday when the puja would be performed.”
The skywalk, built at an approximate cost of Rs 80 crore, is 340m in length. It starts from the gate of the Dakshineswar station and terminates near the main gate of the temple. The structure is covered with circular polycarbonate sheet and houses 137 shops and a few utility rooms. There are several entry and exit points with escalators and staircases. “You’ll have to take care of the maintenance. Hawkers have to be rehabilitated within a week. The trustee will maintain this skywalk,” Mamata said.
Kushal Chowdhury, the secretary of the Dakshineswar Kali Temple and Debottar Estate, said work was on to build a place where devotees could sit down and have prasad.
Mamata with urban development minister Firhad Hakim take an escalator to reach the skywalk. Bishwarup Dutta