'Pran pratishtha' of Maa Annapurna's idol to be performed by Yogi Adityanath on Nov 15 in Kashi

The grand celebrations to mark the handing over of the 18th-century idol of Maa Annapurna to the Uttar Pradesh government was attended by several Central ministers and state ministers in attendance in New Delhi.

The event was the first such grand official handing over the statue retrieved from a foreign country by the Archaeological Survey of India.

The idol of Maa Annapurna was dressed in red lehenga while silver chhatr was placed on her head. The statue sat elegantly on a grand wooden throne and will cover the journey of 800 kilometres from Delhi to Kashi Vishwanath temple.

The representatives from the Uttar Pradesh Government received the stone statue from the ASI after a religious ceremony amid the chanting of mantras.

A shobha yatra has been planned before it reaches the temple.

Central ministers who were present in the ceremony Hardeep Singh Puri, Dharmendra Pradhan, Meenakshi Lekhi, Ashwani Kumar Choubey, Anupriya Patel, Smriti Irani, B L Verma, Arjun Ram Meghwal, Pankaj Chaudhary, Lt Gen V K Singh, G Kishen Reddy, Sanjeev Balyan, SPS Baghel, Mahendra Nath Pandey and UP ministers Suresh Rana, Bhupendra Choudhary and Baldev Aulakh registered their presence.

Maa Annapurna, is considered the Goddess of food and nourishment.

The idol was received by India from Canada on October 15.