Puri: The Srimandir sunk into darkness on Wednesday evening, causing a stir among the group of devotees present inside the temple. The power outage lasted for approximately 15-20 minutes, creating a sense of fear among the devotees.
The temple, rushing with devotees entering and exiting, was suddenly engulfed in darkness due to a power cut. The backup power system failed, leaving the temple in darkness. Mini inverters managed to illuminate some areas, but the majority of the temple remained dark.
The power outage affected the entire temple, from the outside to the inside, including the lion door to Baisipahacha and the inner temple. The incident happened when the devotees were returning after darshan, which was closed due to Banakalagi niti.
For a period of 20 minutes, devotees were seen navigating their way using the dim light from mini inverters and clay lights. The power outage was reportedly due to a failure in the power backup system. Even the inverter attached to the west door, which was operational initially, eventually failed, leaving the temple without electricity.
The development administrator attributed the problem to a power trip.Â
