Nepal King visits Lingaraj temple in Bhubaneswar

Bhubaneswar: Nepal king Gyanendra Bir Bikram Shah Dev on Thursday visited Lingaraj temple here and worshipped the Lord Lingaraj inside the sanctum sanctorum of the 11th-century temple, a prominent Shiva shrine of the country.

Dev spent nearly 30 minutes inside the temple. Elaborate arrangements were made at the temple to ensure smooth conduct of rituals and special Puja by the Nepal king.

This is the third-time visit of Nepal king to Lingaraj temple.

“The relationship between India and Nepal will always remain at its best. I want to thank you the government of India and Odisha government for facilitating my visit and do the prayer here,” said the Nepal king.

He will visit Sakhigopal temple today afternoon.

The last monarch of Nepal is now on a six-day Odisha visit. He will leave the State on February 12.

On the first day of his visit on Wednesday, he laid the foundation stone of Gobinda Go-Mata Mandir, the first of its kind temple dedicated to cow, at Gadarathipur near Jatni.

He also inaugurated a Goshala constructed over 3.5 acres of land at Rathipur, exclusively for indigenous breeds and offered ‘Purnahuti’ at Biswashanti Mahajagyan organised by Shree Marg, a socio-cultural organisation working to popularise Hindu rituals as well as applied spirituality.

On February 9 and 10, Dev will also attend a programme commemorating the silver jubilee of Pattabhisheka of Jagadguru Shankaracharya of Puri at Govardhan Math in Puri.

On February 11, he will visit Jagannath Temple in Puri. He will have the special privilege of performing ‘aarati’ at Jagannath temple atop the Ratna Singhasan.