STAFF REPORTER
GUWAHATI: The ritual to invoke Lakshmi, the goddess of wealth will be observed across the State on Sunday. Households and community marquees will decorate their premises with colorful floor art, offering delicious vegetarian platters to the goddess and fasting with prayers for prosperity.
The city streets are crowded with vendors selling puja items and idols. A Lakshmi idol will cost anywhere between Rs 100 to Rs 2000. These idols are both locally made and some also brought in from Barpeta and Kolkatta even.
In the city markets, puja ingredients such as Patas are priced at Rs 100, banana saplings brought in from Hajo, Ghagrapar, Bezera and Baihata Chariali are priced at Rs 50 per piece, earthen pots at Rs 20 to Rs 50, a cluster of paddy at Rs 20 to Rs 50, marigolds at Rs 20 to Rs 50, a bunch of dubori grass at Rs 10, a bunch of bel paat at Rs 10, one lotus flower at Rs 20, a raw coconut at Rs 20, ripe coconut at Rs 80 to Rs 100 a pair, a robab tenga (pomelo) at Rs 15 to Rs 20, earthen diyas at Rs25 to Rs 250 a dozen, sugarcane at Rs 40 a stick, senikol (banana) at Rs 30 a dozen, malbhoog (banana) at Rs 60 to Rs 80 a dozen, nashpati (pear) at 120 per kg, pomegranate at Rs 220 to Rs 260 per kg, apple at Rs 150 per kg and mousambi (Citrus limetta) at Rs 120 per kg.
To guide the Goddess into their homes, women, and children drew colorful patterns (known as Alpona) and footprints of the Goddess herself, using rice flour, on the floor, across doorways, and inside temples. Families offered grains, flattened rice, gold, clothes, fruits, vegetables in obeisance to the deity who is worshipped in the form of clay idols, photographs, and earthen disks or ‘Patas’ with paintings of Lakshmi.