Right after stamping its name in the Guinness Book of World Record by lighting over 5 lakh 51 thousand earthen lamps or diyas, the temple city Ayodhya began a massive cleaning operation of the ‘Ram ki Paidi’ on Sunday.
Around 800 municipal authorities’ personnel were deployed to clean the ‘Ram ki Paidi’ and surrounded areas. The oil spilled out of diyas was removed by scrubbing with sand.
Harish Chandra Singh, municipal commissioner, said, “The lamps remained lit till 1 am here and as soon as the lamps went out, our staff started the cleaning process. We are cleaning the oil that has been spilt on the floor, with the help of sand.”
The cleaning process is expected to be over by Sunday evening.
On Saturday, the Uttar Pradesh government broke its own Guinness World Book Record for the largest display of the earthen lamps. Last year, more than 3 lakh earthen lamps were lit on the banks of Saryu River. In fact, this is the third consecutive year that Deepotsav has been celebrated on such a massive scale in Ayodhya, fondly also called Ramnagari.
Read: Ayodhya sets World Record as 5 lakh 51 thousand diyas lit to celebrate Deepawali
Last year, around 3.51 lakh diyas were lighten in the holy city as a part of ‘Deepotsav’, setting up a world record.
“The largest display of oil lamps was achieved by the department of tourism, the government of Uttar Pradesh and Dr Ram Manohar Lohia Avadh University (both India) during Deepotsav 2019 in Ayodhya, Uttar Pradesh, India on October 29, 2019,” reads the Guinness certificate which also termed the event as ‘amazing’.