Bhartiya Mandir in Sandringham hosted its Lohri celebrations for the community on Saturday, January. More than 500 people were present at the event.
This is the third time that BhartiyaMandir has organized Lohri celebrations for the community, which has witnessed more crowd attending the folk festival.
Balmoral Temple is the first temple built for the Hindu community in New Zealand, and it is celebrating its silver jubilee in June this year.
On the occasion of Lohri celebrations this year, devotees and volunteers decorated the temple flowers, made rangolis and set up an enormous Lohri Bonfire, an ancient tradition of the festival.
The celebrations started at 7 p.m. on Saturday when the two priests commenced the special Lohri prayers followed by cultural performance and other activities around the bonfire.
Community members attending the event witnessed an array of cultural performances such as gidda and garba dances, rangoli competition, best-dressed competition besides others.
“We had one of the best Lohri celebrations seen here, just like we celebrated in India. Most importantly children were so enthusiastic to perform 'gidda' and 'garba' and making rangolis on the ground,” an attendee said.
Those present were served langar and Maha Prasad at the end of the event. The next big event at the temple is the celebration of Saraswati Puja on Monday, January 22, which also sees hundreds of students and parents perform the puja at the temple.
“We would like to thank all the devotees and volunteers who helped us in making the celebration a very grand success. We look forward to getting the support of the extended Indian community's for Bhartiya Mandir so that we can work more effectively and closely to bring all our community members together to keep our culture alive,” an official of the temple said.
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