'Godavari Antya Pushkarams' from July 31

The 12-day-long 'Godavari Antya Pushkarams' will be held in East Godavari district from July 31.
East Godavari district collector H Arunkumar reviewed the preparations for the religious event, where several pilgrims are expected to come, with senior police and civic officials in Kakinada yesterday.
"We are expecting large number of pilgrims or devotees from states like Odisha, West Bengal, Telangana for the 'Godavari Antya Pushkarams'," Arunkumar said.
The collector directed the fisheries department to ensure that 242 boats and 320 swimmers are kept ready in view of the mega-event.
According to him, 'A' category bath ghats have been kept for common people to take holy dip in river Godavari and they are not allowed to take dip in other ghats.

Rajamahendravaram Urban District Superintendent of Police B Rajakumari said, "We will utilise services of NCC cadets for queue management."

"We have over 60,000 staff deployed for Pushkaram duties
and communicating will become easier and quicker with this single application.It also has an inbuilt location-tracking system for monitoring deployment and movement of staff," Babu said.
For the first time in the country, the administration has also introduced child tracking services to easily locate children in case they go missing.
"We will tag every child entering a bathing ghat with a waterproof band that will have their mobile phone number. In case a child goes missing, the tag will help in easy identification of the child and the parents," Babu added.

The police department, according to Director General of Police Nanduri Sambasiva Rao, has installed 1400 closed-circuit television cameras at all vantage points for crowd and traffic management.
"We are also deploying 25 drones for live recording at all ghats. In all, 31,401 police personnel, including officers, will be on duty to ensure smooth conduct of the festival," the DGP said.
Besides CRPF personnel, policemen from neighbouring Karnataka, Odisha and Chhattisgarh were also deployed for bandobust duties.
A helicopter is being kept on standby for use in emergency.
The Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanams will provide free food to one lakh people while the Akshaya Patra Foundation will cater to another three lakh pilgrims every day during the 12-day festival, according to Pushkaram special officer B Rajasekhar.

The Railways, on its part, will be running 646 special trains from different places to Vijayawada while the AP State Road Transport Corporation will ply 2500 special services.
In Vijayawada city alone, over 700 city buses will be in operation to ferry pilgrims to bathing ghats free of cost.