Shri Dwarkamai Sai Baba Temple of Billerica and Shri Gurusthan Sai Baba Temple of Northboro jointly celebrated New England’s first Ganapati Visarjan ceremony in the Atlantic on Sat Sep 21st 2013. This marked the conclusion of the 10 day Samuhika (Community) Ganapati festival at the two temples.
The Ganesh Chaturthi festival is dedicated to the worship of Lord Ganesha, the remover of obstacles.
The tradition of celebrating this festival together as a community was started by Lokmanya Tilak in 1893 in Pune with an idea to get the people together from all walks of life for a spiritual cause without any distinction.
Following this tradition, Dwarkamai had organized the first Samuhika Ganesh festival starting back in 2011 in the New England area.
The festival began on Sun Sep 8th 2013 with the initiation ceremony which was attended by many devotees as Lord Ganesha was welcomed in a joyful procession. The procession was marked by chants of Ganapati Bappa Morya and devotional kirtan and dancing by the devotees.
Ganapati Homam was performed to mark the beginging of the 10 day celebrations. During the course of the next 10 days devotees congregated every day in the evening for special spiritual services and prayers like chanting of the Ganapati AtharvaShirsha and Aarti.
The Visarjan procession took place on board the boat named Starfish which took off from the Hampton Harbour in New Hampshire into the Atlantic. It was cloudy at the onset of the journey but the skies soon gave to sun which made for a pleasant journey for all.
Some 115 devotees had gathered for the cruise into the ocean along with Ganapati Bappa. Priests Shri Raghu Ram and Shri Jagdeesan started the proceedings with Vedic chants and prayers on the open upper deck of the vessel.
Soon everybody immersed in the joy of devotion for Lord Ganesha to the tune of Ganapati songs with energetic rhythm and beat as everyone broke into a spontaneous joyful dance. Eventually it was time to bid adieu to the Lord at the seas, Arati was performed and Lord Ganesha immersed in the sea, this being an emotional moment for everyone. Lord Ganesha remained in the heart of everyone as he merged his physical form with larger universe.
